attendant guard and protection. Each of these layers is of a different, though analogous, structure; and performs different offices. Both are continually renewed, yet each preserves for ever its own distinct properties. The sensitive skin is so full of nerves and bloodvessels, of which the scarf-skin is divested, that it is scarcely possible to insert a needle in any part of the body without causing pain and a flow of blood. Its surface is uneven, to increase its extent and multiply its power. Its papillæ, microscopic in size, by which the enlargement of the surface is provided for, are each composed of a hair-like vessel and a minute nerve, several times bent upon themselves. In every part of it there are perspiratory tubes, with attendant glands, terminating on the surface in a pore. To give one striking example of its extraordinary structure, we may mention that Mr. Wilson has counted 3528 of these pores in a square inch on the palm of the hand; and each tube, of which the pore is an opening, being a quarter of an inch long, it follows that, in a square inch of skin on the palm of the hand, there exists a length of tube equal to 882 inches, or 73 feet. In other parts of the body the pores are not so numerous. "Taking 2800 as a fair average for each square inch, and assuming that the number of square inches of surface in a man of ordinary height is 2500, the number of pores will be 7,000,000 and the length of perspiratory tube 1,750,000 inches, or nearly 28 miles." Well may Mr. Wilson ask, what will be the effect if this drainage be obstructed? Well may every man say that, of this wonderful covering which ignorance and brutality even yet fetter, scourge, and brand, we are wofully ignorant, and science cannot be better employed than in ascertaining its properties, and in teaching us how it may best be preserved. The former has been for several years the great object of Mr. Wilson's assiduous researches ; the latter is the immediate object of his present work. He has here methodised his own discoveries and the discoveries of other physiologists and anatomists, and given us a practical treatise on the means of procuring and preserving a healthy skin. When we remember that to this end we erect and preserve dwellings and manufacture clothinga large proportion of the labours of the community having that for its object; it being in importance second only to supplying us with food (if, in the wonderful economy of nature, any one part can be said to be only secondary)-we conclude, that we can scarcely over-rate the value of such researches as those of Mr. Wilson, and the practical lessons he has successfully deduced from them.

THE LIFE OF MOZART, including his Correspondence. By EDWARD HOLMES, author of "A Ramble amongst the Musicians of Germany." Post 8vo, Chapman and Hall.

THE biography of a man of genius is one of the most useful as well as entertaining books that can be written. The development of an extraordinary intellect in any art or science, if properly pourtrayed,

must convey a great deal of actual instruction, and the numerous vicissitudes that ever accompany the manifestation and establishment of any new power keep up a constant and lively interest. Mozart was a genius to the fullest extent of the term, and his equally extraordinary precocity made him a wonder. Dying in his thirty-fifth year, he left a name as universal as the love of music; having gained that indisputable fame which is denied to any but the most powerful spirits. The history of such a man cannot fail to be eagerly inquired into, and it is strange that until the appearance of the present work, there should have been none in England at all equal to the subject. Mr. Holmes has well supplied the deficiency. To trace the genius of Mozart, and inform the reader wherein consisted his great superiority, a competent knowledge of the science of music must be possessed, and this the biographer has but it is not only in the pourtrayal of his musical abilities he excels, but in the narration of all the vicissitudes attending a career beset with many impediments, and abounding in numerous adventures. It of course also necessarily embraces a considerable portion of the musical history of the time, and has many entertaining and characteristic anecdotes. He has also judiciously made copious use of Mozart's correspondence, which is lively and graphic, and thus occasionally conveyed to his narrative the charm of an autobiography.

To those who only know of Mozart through his glorious compositions, this biography will afford great gratification. His extraordinary precocity made his life eventful from four years of age, when he could retain in his memory the brilliant solos in the concertos which he heard, and at which age his father began, half in sport, to give him lessons. He had certainly great advantages in the care bestowed upon him by his father, who was a musician of considerable note.

Mr. Holmes considers that Mozart was before his age, and his enduring fame as a musician would seem to establish this fact, as the enthusiasm is increasing towards his productions, which have already existed far longer than the usual period of musical fame, and have outlived the works of many popular composers. His character had all the impulsiveness of genius, and he was of a noble disposition, bearing ingratitude and neglect with a magnanimous equanimity. By his untimely death, the world was deprived of much : but his life, measured by his works, cannot be considered short. His whole existence was one of stupendous energy, and he may be considered as a man from his earliest years, having, in fact, no childhood, in the common acceptation of the term.

The following account of his person may be interesting to the reader :

Mozart, though born of beautiful parents, possessed beauty himself as a child only; in his later years he retained nothing of his early look but its pleasing expression. His features were marked, and had a strong individuality of character that rendered them as impossible to be mistaken as those of Socrates or Frederick the Great. The outward man of the composer presented no index to his genius. His eyes, which were rather large and

prominent, had more of a languid than a brilliant and animated character; the eye-brows were well arched, and the eye-lashes long and handsome. His sight was on all occasions sharp and strong, notwithstanding his frequent and laborious application in the night. There was wandering and abstrac tion in his eye, except when seated at the piano, when the whole expression and character of his face seemed altered. His unsteady gaze became then earnest and concentrated, and every muscle of his countenance betrayed the influence of those feelings on himself which he was seeking to awaken in others.

His head was comparatively too large for his body; but the body itself, and the hands and feet, were formed in exact proportion, of which he was rather vain. The easy, natural, and elegant movements of his small hands on the piano, rendered it interesting to overlook him when playing; while the power which he occasionally exhibited raised astonishment. His nose, which had been handsome, became so prominent a feature in the last years of his life, from the emaciation of his countenance, that a scribbler in one of the journals of the day, the Morgenblatte of Vienna, honoured him with the epithet" enormous-nosed."

It has been stated that he never attained his natural growth; and the reason assigned for this is his want of exercise in childhood. But both assertions may be questioned. Mozart's parents were small persons; and the best proof that Leopold Mozart, though he did not permit his children to lose their time, cared sufficiently for their health, may be found in the long life of Madame Sonnenberg, whose youth was passed in the same industrious culture of excellence as her brother's.

The house in which Mozart resided during his last years at Vienna, and in which he died, was called the Kaiser-Haus (the imperial house) and was at one time a building belonging to the government.

THE FIRST PART OF AN ENTIRELY NEW PRACTICAL AND THEORETICAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FRENCH LANGUAGE. BY GEORGE CRANE and GUEIRARD NEGREL. 12mo. Whittaker and Co.

So many royal roads to the acquirement of languages have been proposed, that it is necessary to be very cautious in adopting the plan of any new candidate. Mr. Crane's is, however, really worthy of attention for it is the result of a profound study of the nature of language, and of a long course of instruction developing this knowledge. He terms his system (somewhat pedantically) the Pasiglot system, as applicable to the development of the principles of all languages. Now although it is certain that the main principles of language are formed and grow out of the intellectual formation of the mind, still there are so many caprices, so much that is arbitrary, and so much that is corrupt in all tongues, that it is impossible to apply one entire set of rules to the innumerable languages that exist. There is nothing in creation, perhaps, that is so various as language; so imperfect, so ill calculated to produce the end it is created for ;-a deficiency arising from its being the product of human invention, to a great degree, and the empirical

offspring of a want in the human being, which want is supplied as it arises, without any scientific consideration, and not from any instinct. But although we may think Mr. Crane, like most inventors, overrates his system, still his work is a very admirable one, based on a thorough knowledge of his intricate, not to say profound, subject.

The present Part is divided into a series of lessons, comprising grammatical rules, a vocabulary, and exercises; by which means the system of the language is progressively and fully unfolded. Doubtless this mode requires rigid attention and considerable comprehension on the part of the student; but it is impossible to acquire a language, after childhood, in any other way correctly. There can be no doubt that if pupils can be made to give the strict attention required, and the necessary exercise of intelligence, that Mr. Crane's is an excellent one; and not only valuable from the complete and rapid way in which a language can be acquired, but highly serviceable as a training of the faculties to consideration, readiness of apprehension, and constancy of attention. Let any one go through this grammar, and he will not only find that he has acquired a language, but habits of mind far more valuable than the acquirement of any series of facts, however useful they may be to his pursuits.

It must not be considered, from anything we have said, that there is anything empirical in Mr. Crane; on the contrary, he has the modesty and the severity of those accustomed to scientific pursuits; and having educated himself completely in several European languages by the same method, he is engaged in successfully communicating it to others, both teachers and pupils. He has also published an English Grammar on the same principle, which is well worthy of the attention of all anxious to acquire a correct knowledge of their own tongue, and especially valuable to adults.

EVENINGS AT HADDON HALL. Edited by the BARONESS DE CALABRELLA ; with Illustrations from designs by George Cattermole. Royal 8vo bound. H. Colburn.

THIS is a very handsome present book, and very well suited to fulfil the intention of its publication. The principal charm and value of the book consist in twenty-four exquisitely engraved vignettes from designs by Mr. Cattermole, whose admirable style in delineating the architec ture, manners, and costume of the chivalric ages, is duly appreciated. He undoubtedly is at the head of this class of illustrators, and has a truth of delineation and an absence of theatrical effort, that generally remove this class of painting far from the genuine historical. The engravings are worthy of the designs, and are all by artists of established celebrity-Stocks, Goodyear, C. and H. Rolls, J. C. Bentley, Brandard, Cousen, Griffiths, Fisher, Radcliffe, Engleheart, Higham, Allen.

The literature of such a volume is not to be too severely examined,

the principal attraction being the plates. The stories illustrating the plates are, however, rather above the usual average of such tales. They bear the evident marks of being manufactured to suit a market; and have too much of the phraseology of the historic novel which has become rather stale. However there is occasional power and interest in them. It would seem to be a much better plan to take some celebrated work and illustrate it, than to strain the faculties of a variety of clever, and perhaps even men gifted with genius, to subjects with which they do not sympathise, and to call on them to write at a time when they have no inspiration.

Haddon Hall being the seat of a nobleman, celebrated for a taste for all that is connected with the pomp and sentiments of the middle ages, is taken by the authoress for the scene of the recital of the tales, which are supposed to be impromptus uttered as illustrations of a series of drawings. The working out of this slight thread is somewhat wearisome, as has always been the case from Boccaccio downwards. The great fault of this entire class of modern annual literature is, that it is common-place in the extreme, though varnished and burnished by every means that elegant expression can bestow. Its great radical defect is that it is produced to pattern, and has nothing creative or suggestive about it. It deals essentially with past ideas, working up to a standard, suitable to the class it is intended for, and partakes therefore of the inanity and vapidity that condemn those with every apparent means of pleasure in their power to wearisome ennui and lifeless tedium. Let any man of real genius penetrate to such a set, and what a delight does his power produce. Generally speaking, however, the barriers are closed against his entrance in the nervous fear there is of the intrusion of ideas not suited to the caste, of which there is as much a horror, as if the tenets were religious.

Taken in its class, "Evenings at Haddon Hall" is very superior to most of its rivals, and if only for the plates alone, is a handsome and valuable present. The paper and the printing are excellent, and the binding durable and elegant.

SKETCHES OF THE HISTORY OF LITERATURE AND LEARNING IN ENGLAND, FROM THE NORMAN CONQUEST TO THE PRESENT TIME. In three series of two volumes each. By GEO. L. CRAIK, M.A. 18mo. Knight's Weekly Volumes.

To give even an outline of a history of a literature so rich as ours in six small volumes, is a task of no slight difficulty, and Mr. Craik has executed it admirably. Keeping a due proportion, and in a terse yet pregnant style, developing the characteristics of each age and author, from the brief monkish chronicler to the copious writer of the present time, he divides his subject into three portions of two volumes each: From the Norman Conquest to the accession of Elizabeth ;-from the