-Here fhall come

Calm Contemplation from her funless grot
To meet the favour'd youth, whom scenes like these
Can please; who views with eye inquifitive
Thefe rude memorials of ancient times.

Long o'er thefe ftones the flow'ring weed shall spread
Its colour'd folds, and long the thistle shake
Its white beard to the winds; the wintry storm,
Oft through these cloifter'd cells and arches dim
Shall howl amain; and oft the fummer gale
Wave the high grafs that tops the ruin'd wall,
Ere he who loves the Mufes fhall forego
Thefe fimple beauties and unboastful charms,
For Folly's tinfel glitter, though her lyre
To Mufic's fofteft blandifhments be ftrung
In hall or bower;-thefe o'er the foul fhall fhed
A placid calm, as when the rifing Moon

O'er the fmooth lake reflects her filver beam.'

Mr. Whitehoufe, however, is not at all times attentive to the harmony of his numbers :-for example,

Paffing each flow'r that scents th' amorous gale.” He feems to remember the remark of the poet, that

"Oft the ear the open vowels tire;"

and therefore has recourse to elifion; but as the flow of the verse is neceffarily interrupted by it, the practice is discontinued by our better poets. The defect, indeed, is trifling, and we really wish that there was nothing more material to be objected to him; but juftice obliges us to acknowlege that he fometimes runs into error and absurdity, of which we will produce an inftance or

two:

-bidd'ft the foul-commending lyre

Some fuch magic numbers chufe

As love and tenderness infpire,
Till the forrow foothing ftrain

On the rapt ear with nectar'd sweetness fall.*

A found may be faid to fall upon the ear with fweetness; but it is wholly impoffible that it fhould fall with neclar'd sweetness. The Poet has unwarily confounded the fweetnefs or melodiouf nefs of found, with the fweetnefs which is perceivable by the palate, by the fenfe which we denominate tafte. We know, indeed, that the like incongruous metaphor is frequently found in poetry, but we have not the lefs objection to it on that account: Naiad, that lov't to pour thy azure wave In foft meanders thro' yon fhadowy cave; Whofe woods faint-murmuring o'er the rocky steep, O'er all the place a folemn ftillness keep'

But

But if the woods are faint murmuring,' how can they keep a ⚫ folemn ftillness?' Faint-murmuring is found; and fillness is privation, or abfence, of all found.

Dear Goddess of each amiable Mufe.'

This is the beginning of an addrefs to Simplicity. But what it is to be the Goddess of an amiable Mufe, we do not know. flant hillock gay,

With which erft Flora deck'd in trim array.'

The fecond line is faulty in its conftruction.

Erft' appears as though it were an epithet. It might be written thus:

Which Flora erft bedeck'd in trim array.

There are other inaccuracies in Mr. W.'s poems. We likewife track him in the walks of Akenfide, Warton, Shenftone, &c. &c. He is, however, a man of abilities; but let him ftudy to be correct: correctnefs (fince the days of Pope) is a quality expected in every one who afpires to the name of Poet.

ART. XIII. Remarks on the most important Military Operations of the English Forces, on the Western Side of the Peninfula of Hindooftan, in 1783 and 1784; in which the Conduct of the Army under the Command of Brigadier General Mathews is vindicated, from the illiberal Mif-reprefentations contained in a late Narrative, figned JoHN CHARLES SHEEN, and published by Order of the Court of Directors of the Eaft India Company. By a British Officer. 8vo. 2s. Robfon and Co. &c. 1788.

W Public, and pledges himself for their authenticity, he has

7HEN a writer presents a state of facts or events to the

a right to a degree of credit, proportionate to the character and rank which he holds in fociety. On this principle, we paid due regard to the narratives of Capt. Oakes and Lieut. Sheen, and mentioned them accordingly, in our 72d volume, p. 379. These gentlemen, however, are here animadverted on, by a writer who pretends to better information, but who has withheld the fanction his name, and contented himself with telling us that he is A British Officer; and with figning the initials J. M. to his Dedication To the Officers in the Service of the King, and of the East India Company, employed during the late War on the Western Side of India;'-with whom he fays, he had the honour to share in their toils, and to be an eye-witnefs of their fervices.

We with that J. M. had given us his name at length, as it might have added great weight to his reprefentations, and precluded the objection of thofe who pay little regard to anonymous accounts; and who, befide, may deem it an infraction of the laws of literary war, thus, in difguife as it were, or under a mafque, to enter the lifts against the man who appears in pro priâ perfonâ.

REV. Aug. 1788.

M

The

The Remarker premifes, that his intention in writing thefe letters, is not to exculpate General Mathews from imputed guilt, but to clear his officers and foldiers from the imputations with which they have been indifcriminately afperfed, as if it were not poffible for them to be otherwife than guilty under him.-Admitting him, therefore, in all refpects, to be as culpable as reprefented, guilty of cruelties and peculation,-it must be unjust to make it a neceffary confequence, that the officers of the army under his command were equally criminal: for in direct contradiction of all the malicious reprefentations to their prejudice in the public prints, I can in confcience pofitively declare, that there never was an army in any quarter of the globe lefs inclined to cruelty and oppreffion; nor one which had exhibited flronger proofs of unwearied zeal, honour, and humanity, than that employed on the western fide of India, during the laft war.'

The narrative of Capt. Oakes comes firft under this author's notice. As we cannot defcend to the enumeration of particular facts, we fhail here only obferve, in brief, that our British Officer' confiders the charges of licentioufnefs, rapine, and cruelty, brought against the officers who ferved under General Mathews, as totally ground lefs, and flanderous in the highest degree.

With refpect to Lieut. Sheen's narrative, the Remarker is equally ftrenuous in contradicting that part of it which repeats and enforces the above-mentioned charges against the British foldiers; and, in return, he is occafionally very free in his glances at the credit of the Lieutenant's teftimony, and even against the Lieutenant himself; frequently aiming at him a random fhot from the battery of Ridicule-a battery which moft controverfialists are ever forward to open on their opponents.

We hope, for the credit of the British name and nation, that we have here a more fair and just account of the conduct of the unfortunate General M. and his troops, than that which had before been given. The Author does not undertake the General's vindication in every point, but only where tyranny and oppreffion have been laid to his charge; and we regret with him, that no general and impartial hiftory of the military operations of the British forces in Hindooftan, has been publifhed under the fanction of any refpe&table authority, though, as he obferves, the fubject is of the higheft magnitude, and deferves to be recorded in the moft circumftantial manner.' As to fome particular papers, including Lieut. Sheen's narrative, the Remarker confiders them as having been published under the Company's authority, and as adapted rather to ftrengthen than to remove thofe illiberal afperfions' which have gained too much credit with the uninformed part of mankind.'

The tract now before us is well calculated to do juftice to the injured reputation of our troops, and to give the Public more fatisfactory information than had before been obtained, concerns

ing the principal events which are here brought under review. The relations, with refpect to many of the circumftances, are highly interefting, and the traits of Tippoo Saib's character will increase the abhorrence and deteftation, in which that Eaftern tyrant has long been held by the friends of HUMANITY in every part of the globe to which the report of his horrid barbarities hath extended.

ART. XIV. Elements of Natural Hiftory, and of Chemistry: being the Second Edition of the Elementary Lectures on thofe Sciences, first published in 1782, and now greatly enlarged and improved, by the Author M. de Fourcroy, Doctor of the Faculty of Medicine at Paris, of the Royal Academy of Sciences, &c. &c. Tranflated into English. With occafional Notes, and an historical Preface, by the Tranflator. 8vo. 4 Vols. 11. 4s. Boards. Robinfons. 1788.

E expreffed our hearty approbation of the first edition of

M. de Fourcroy's work, regretting only that the office of tranflating it had been undertaken by a perfon, who was unequal to the task. The prefent publication is, as the title-page expreffes, very much improved throughout, and enlarged from two volumes to four; the difcoveries made fince the former went to the prefs (in 1781) having required many corrections. and additions. The tranflation is executed with fidelity and propriety, and we think we can recognise in it the fame masterly hand, to which the English philofophers have already been indebted for feveral valuable productions of the continent.

The Tranflator's notes are few, but judicious. There is one very curious, and of confiderable length [in vol. i. p. 108-115.], containing a series of propofitions, drawn up in the geometrical form, on the theory of heat ;-not its chemical theory, but that of its communication, quantity, and the different capacities of bodies for containing it; which are objects of mathematical demonftration, and must obtain equally, whatever its nature may be. From thefe propofitions, a rule is deduced, for investigating (from the ratio of the capacities of the fame body in its folid and fluid ftates, and the number of degrees that the fluid would increase in temperature by the heat which fimply melts the folid) the number of degrees between the temperature of the solid just melting, and the natural zero, or abfolute privation of heat; and from experiments on water and ice, the zero is determined to be 1300 degrees of Fahrenheit's fcale, below the freezing point of water.

The Tranflator has given, in his Preface, a concife hiftorical account of fome of the principal changes which the chemical

See Monthly Review, vol. Ixxiii. p. 329.

M 2

fcience

fcience has, of late years, undergone. A fair and impartial ftatement of these points, which we believe this to be, is now the more neceffary, as it is certain' (to ufe his own words) that the want of a speedy and faithful communication of philofophical discoveries between Great Britain and the continent, together with the unprincipled conduct of fuch perfons as are daily employed in endeavouring to appropriate to themfelves the difcoveries of others, have produced many hiftorical mistakes: and on the other hand, among the variety of new theories of chemistry offered to the Public, few have been exhibited with a proper discrimination between hypothefis and matter of fact.'

Of the above-mentioned want of speedy and faithful communication between us and our neighbours, we obferve a ftriking inftance in the prefent work, vol. i. p. 152. An inftrument capable of indicating with exactnefs the high degrees of heat' (M. de Fourcroy fays) would be an acquifition of great value and importance. We are affured that fuch an inftrument has been constructed in England. It confifts of a very acute angled cone, on which a ring of the fame matter is occafionally placed. The contraction of the dimenfions of the cone by heat caufes the ring to fink to a pofition nearer the base, according to its intenfity. This ingenious intrament is yet unknown in France.'

This ftrange mifreprefentation of Mr. Wedgwood's thermometer is corrected by the Tranflator in a note; but we could hardly have believed that fuch a chemift as M. de Fourcroy should be fo ill informed refpecting an invention (of which he fo well underflood the importance, and felt the want), that was defcribed at large in the Philofophical Tranfactions fo long ago as the year 1782*, and connected with the common thermometer, fo as to form one regular scale of heat from the freezing of mer-. cury, up to the ftrongeft fires of our furnaces, in 1784 +.

With regard to the different theories which have lately divided the philofophical world, the Author, in the first volume, embraces the phlogiftian, as explained and modified by Macquer; but many important facts which arofe in the progrefs of the work, induced him to change his opinion, and to adopt the principles of Lavoifier. As these facts could not be inferted in the places which they ought properly to have occupied, he has prefixed a connected view of them, with all the others that relate to the fame fubject, fo far as they are known, under the title of A fhort Account of the Nature and Properties of Elaftic Fluids;' ftating, clearly and diftinctly, the system of Lavoifier, in its full extent. We fhall here juft obferve, that fome other important facts have arifen fince the time of M. de Fourcroy's publication, which, had they been then known, ingenious and