abolition of the religious orders; the difturbances at Rennes, Marseilles, Toulon, Touloufe, Nifmes, and feveral other places; and the ceremony of the Federation. These several events, and many more of lefs importance, as we have obferved, are related with candour and fairness, but with a zealous attachment to the caufe of liberty. If any thing be liable to objection in the narrative, it is, that the authors are too fparing of their dates, and fometimes enter more into minute details than will please an English reader: but then we should remember, that it is originally for the French reader that the work is compofed. Pear-e. ART. XII. Hiftoire Abrégée de la Mer du Sud, &c. i e An IN an advertisement prefixed to this work, M. DE LA BORDE obferves, that he claims no great merit on account of the prefent performance, as it is only a collection of extracts from the principal voyages made in the South Seas, illuftrated occafionally by a few reflections, and rendered more perfect by the correction of fome errors. His motives for undertaking this talk were two: first, to collect, in a fmall space, that which, before, was to be fought amid fifty volumes in quarto; and, fecondly, to afford an explanation of a map of the South Seas, in the production of which the author has been engaged during upward of ten years.-It appears, by the conclufion of his advertisement, as well as by other parts of his writings, that M. DE LA BORDE is offended with the criticifms of pretended judges, as he ftyles them, who, without genius to produce a work of their own, claim a right to cavil at his productions. To thefe he only deigns to anfwer-Go, and do better. Previously to entering on his fubject, he informs his readers that, after having laboured for many years in producing this history, accompanied with the neceffary charts, he was unfortunate enough to find, in the very week of its intended appearance, that a treatife was published by M. Fleurieu, on a part of the fubject in the difcuffion of which he was occupied. He is very anxious to prove that his opinions, though the fame as thofe of M. Fleurieu, were not borrowed from him, but were delivered publicly to the Academy of Sciences, before the promulgation of thofe of his learned cotemporary: but while he fpeaks with high encomiums of the character of M. Fleurieu, he avows himfelf fenfibly offended that, in this gentleman's late work, work, he has not deigned to obferve that they had both entertained fimilar ideas, without having any communication on the fubject.-Thefe opinions, concerning the property of which M. DE LA BORDE IS fo jealous, refpet the voyage made by Captain Shortland, and his difcovery of New Georgia, or the Land of the Arfacide, as it had before been called by M. De Surville. On this head, much reproach is bestowed on Capt. Shortland, and not a little lavished on his countrymen, thofe proud islanders, who endeavour to appropriate the difcoveries of others to themfelves. As we have already treated this fubject at full length in our account of Governor Philip's voyage, in the first volume of our New Series, p. 164; and again in the review of M. Fleurieu's work, vol. vii. p. 174 to 185, and p. 250 to 259, we omit any farther remarks on it in this place, only obferving that M. DE LA BORDE has advanced nothing to induce us to depart from the fentiments which we there expreffed.-Our author differs from M. Fleurieu in two points: 1ft, in not believing that the coafts discovered by Meffrs. Bougainville, Surville, and Shortland, form an archipelago, but belong to the fame continent; and next, in imagining that, if they are a cluster of islands, they are not the fuppofed Solomon Islands. This laft idea, he obferves, is a dream of M. Buache, in the refutation of which he would not waste his time, had not M. Fleurieu, by adopting it, given it fome importance: he there. fore hopes to prove, in a work written for the express purpose, that this fuppofition is a mere chimæra.-M. DE LA BORDE clofes this part of his fubject with calling the attention of his countrymen to the misfortunes of M. De la Peyroufe; who, with his companions, is, in his opinion, ftill living on the fhores of New Holland. We are next prefented with a preliminary difcourfe on the mode in which America was peopled: whether by Africans paffing from the coaft of Guinea to the Brazils, which, in our author's idea, formerly joined each other, fo as to make one continent:-or was America peopled by the unfortunate remains of the inhabitants of the Atlantides of Plato, or was not its population derived from a nation which once inhabited an immenfe country joining Mexico to the Moluccas, and of which the remains are to be fought in the innumerable islands of the South Sea, in New Zealand, New Holland, &c. ?—All this is wandering on an immenfe plain with very little light to direct us; and, accordingly, though we may fometimes admire M. DE LA BORDE's ingenuity, we are feldom, if ever, convinced by his arguments. We are moft inclined to join him in fentiment, when he tells us that much reafoning is thrown away in proving nothing; and that it might as well be pretended that America. peopled the other three parts of the globe, as that it received its population from them. He maintains, however, that, from the refemblance between the two people, the Americans were either the ancestors or the defcendants of the Scythians. M. DE LA BORDE next enters on his principal subject. He first gives a concife ftatement of the circumftances leading to the discovery of the South Sea, and afterward furnishes an abridgment of all the voyages of confequence made to that part of the globe. His narrative is brought down to the year 1790, and concludes with an account of the Mutiny on board the Bounty, and of the fhipwreck of the Guardian. The different voyages, which are here related, have been already noticed by us at feparate times on their original publications; in courfe, we need at prefent only obferve, that their most material circumftances are judiciously brought together into a fmall compaís. Thefe volumes are alfo illuftrated by valuable maps, which do credit to the author's skill and industry; and the readers of this work will readily own with us, that M. Dɛ LA BORDE has enabled them to acquire a confiderable degree of information with very little expence or trouble. Our newspapers have reported that the ingenious author of this work, and his learned brother-historian, M. Fleurieu, were among the number of thofe who have been lately facrificed to the ungovernable fury of the mobs of Paris. We fincerely hope that the report is unfounded: for when men of literature and fcience fall victims, and generally innocent victims, to the rage and frenzy of the multitude, their excefies are particularly deplorable. ART. XIII. CHRISTOPHORI SAXI1 Onomafticon Literarium, five nomenclator Hiftorico-criticus Præftantiffimorum omnis ætatis, populi, artiumque formulæ fcriptorum. Item Monumentorum maxime illuftrium, ab erbe condito ufque ad fæculi, quod vivimus, tempora, digeftus, et verifimilibus, quantum fieri potuit, annorum notis accommodatus. 8vo. 7 Vols, Trajecti ad Rhenumn, 1775-1790. London, Elmsley. THE 'HE laft volume of this most useful and truly excellent work has just reached us, and has afforded us a fresh occafion of lamenting the difficulty of procuring the new productions of modern fcholars from the continent, in any moderate time, after they are first published. The first volume appeared in 1775: it begins with Adam, and concludes with Gelafius, who Hourished about 476 years after the Chriftian æra. It contains 598 pages. The The fecond volume appeared in 1777. It opens with Eutocius, the mathematician, A. D. 478, and finishes with Joannes' Rhagius Efticampianus, the author of a Commentary on the Grammar of Peter Helias. He was born in 1460, and died in 1520.-659 pages. The third volume was published in 1780:-from Raphael Maffeus Volaterranus, grammarian and hiftorian, who was born in 1451 and died in 1521, to Academia Parmenfis, which is faid to have been founded between 1585 and 1590, a Rainutio, duce Parmenfi.-660 pages. The fourth volume came out in 1782: from Cæfar Baronius, the celebrated author of Annales Ecclefiaftici, who was born in 1538, and died in 1607, to the foundation of the Academia Natura Curioforum in Germany, 1652, by J. Laurentius Baufchius.-659 pages. The fifth volume appeared in 1785-from Placidus Carrafa, author of Motuce illuftrate defcriptio, published in 1653, to the establishment of the Royal Society at Berlin, in 1700, under Frederic, the first king of Pruffia.-655 pages. The fixth volume, published in 1788from Dominicus de Angelis, a Neapolitan hiftorian and Philologue, author of a tract, Della Patria d'Ennio, printed at Rome in 1701, and of other works in Italian; who was born in 1675 and died in 1718-to Joannes Taylor, editor of Lyfias, in 1739.—744 pages. The feventh volume, which came out in 1790, begins with Jofephus Bartoli, a Philologue and Antiquary of Padua, author of two learned difputations, in Italian, who flourished in 1740; and concludes with Rudulphus Henricus Zobelius, author of Bibliothek der Philofophie und Litteratur, which opened with fair profpects, in the year preceding his death, 1774-447 pages. To this volume is added an index to the whole work. In a compilation of this nature, fome omiffions and many errors must be expected. Frequent objections alfo will be ftarted from a difference of opinion, in the reader, refpecting the merits of the writers, whofe names the author has enumerited, and whofe works he has characterized. In the prefaces, appendices, and analecta, SAXIUS has fupplied numerous deficiencies, and has corrected feveral mistakes; and to the caviller and the carping critic, he may recommend the verses of Euenus: Πολλῶς ἀπιλέγειν μὲν ἔθος περὶ πανὸς ὁμοίως Καὶ πρὸς μὲν τύτες ἀρχει λόγος εἷς ὁ παλαιός" Among Among the omiffions, which have efcaped the diligent and learned SAXIUS, may be enumerated TYNNICHUs, celebrated by Plato, in Ione, and by Parphyrius de Abftinentià, as an excellent hymnographift.-The curious reader may confult also Koenius in Corinthum, p. 135, Briffaus, in Terentianum Maurum, and Fabricius, Bibl. Græc, vol. 1. p. 184. Edit. Harles. He lived earlier than the age of Ejchylus. We have alfo noted the omillion of LYSICRATES, whofe name occurs not in Fabricius, though he is quoted by Hefychius, V. Bayaia, and V. Σpha; and of many of the writers, quoted by Athenæus; among whom we particularly lament the want of a complete enumeration of the Greek tragic and comic writers. On the whole, however, we congratulate the literary world on the completion of this Onomafticon, which must be confidered as a lafting monument of the diligence and learning of SAXIUS; and we may with confidence atiert, in the words of the authors of the Bibliotheca Critica, that the feventh volume iifdem, quibus priora volumina, commendatur dotibus, diligentia, brevitate, delectu, in notandis fcriptorum ætate, genere, laude, et memorandis notitia fontibus. Biblioth. Crit. Vol. II. P. VII. p. 94. De Saxii Onomaft. Vol. IV. C.B.-J. ART. XIV. Hiftoire de la Nobleffe bereditaire, &c. i. e. An Hiftory of the Nobility, as well ilereditary, as following by Succeffion, (fucceffive,) among the Gauls, French, and other Euro. Fean Nations of their Government from the Year 57 before our Era to the prefent Time: containing the Origin and Names of the ancient Nations which have united and formed the Kingdom of the Francs; the Names and Authority of their Chiefs and Kings, taken from the moit ancient and illuftrious Families among them their Government under the Roman Empire to the Time of Clovis, &c. By the Abbé C. 1. DE BEVY, Hiftoriographer of France, &c. 4to. pp. 544. 11. 55. fterling. Liege. 1791. Imported by Nicol, Pall Mall. IN N times like the prefent, when philofophy is bufily employed in overturning authorities and prejudices, and in fubftituting reafon and juftice in their place, it behoves thofe, in whole eyes all change is innovation, and all innovation is deftruction, to step forward and plead the caufe of ancient ufage and immemorial custom. Now is the fealon when the aristocratical fophift should affail the ear that is liftening to fenfe, and distract its attention by the fafcinations of found: when he should dazzle the eye that is fearching after truth, by interpofing the glare of tiufel and frippery under which the has been buried. He |