cially that of writing, and was very anxious to learn more. To New Zealand, therefore, our philanthropist earnestly directed the attention of the Society for missions to Africa and the East; and, succeeded in obtaining a practical artisan well versed in carpentry and building, and at the same time of sound Christian principles and a devotional turn of mind. This man and his wife he has taken over with himself, and we belive he will be found of incalculable service. He is also accompanied, we believe, by another well-qualified person, skilled in flax-dressing, twine-spinning, and rope-making.

*

One of the last public acts to which his heart was directed before he re-quitted his native country, was that of procur ing, by public contributions and donations of books, what he called a lending library, to consist of the most valuable and useful publications in religion, morals, mechanics, agriculture, commerce, general history, and geography; to be lent out under his own controul, and that of his clerical colleagues, to soldiers, free-settlers, convicts, and all others who may have time to read, so as to prevent idleness and occupy the mind in the best and most rational manner. In this desire, too, he succeeded under the favour of Providence; and it is with no small gratification we add, that, by the gift of books, and subscriptions, he was enabled to take over with him a library of not less than between three and four hundred pounds value; which he intends annually to augment, on a plan he has already devised.

We ought not to close this imperfect sketch, which few of our readers will think too long, without stating that, on its being communicated to his majesty that Mr. M. was extremely desirous of obtaining the royal assent to purchase and take over with him a couple of Merino sheep, his majesty, with his accustomed generosity, not only freely gave such consent, but requested Sir Joseph Banks, with whom Mr. Marsden had the honour of being acquainted, to select for him, as a royal present, five Merino ewes with young: Sir Joseph had much pleasure in obeying, and hastened to Portsmouth for this purpose with all speed, where he arrived just in time to put his present on board before the ship sailed. At this moment Mr. Marsden is on his passage,-in humility a child, in vigour of mind and benevolence an angel; full of enterprise for the good of mankind, and especially of his native country, and full of faith and reliance on the divine promises. Already has he sown the good seed on the best principles of heavenly husbandry, and half the eastern hemisphere, perhaps, may form its harvest. Unborn empires are dependent on his exertions; and his name will be the theme of the new world, as long as there is a heart to feel reverence, or a tongue to utter praise.

A few words must be added respecting the work under consideration: but no description of moderate length could do justice to the labours and success of M. Péron and his com panions, in augmenting the treasures of natural history, in its three grand divisions. We must content ourselves with stating, in the words of the official Report, that their zoological collection includes upwards of 100,000 specimens of animals of different kinds and sizes; that it already appears to have enriched the science with many important genera, and contains above 2,500 new species; that, in fact, a greater addition has been made to the knowledge of zoology by MM. Péron and Lesueur, than by all the other travellers of the age. They have also brought home 1500 drawings executed by M. Petit, who fell a victim, three months after his arrival in Europe, to the effects of repeated attacks of the scurvy. Only these three members of the scientific corps employed in the expedition, which at first amounted to twenty-three, returned to France; some abandoned the project at an early stage, some were left ill at different places, and the rest are dead.

Among other important results of M. Péron's judicious and diligent investigations, is the refutation of a favourite notion with certain philosophists, that the physical strength of man, in savage life, is greater than in a civilized state. From numerous experiments with Regnier's dynamometer, it appears, that the average manual power of five races of men was as follows, expressed in kilograms, Van Diemen's land, (the most savage) 50, 6; New Holland, 51,8; Timor, 58, 7; French 69, 2; English, 71, 4; and the average renal power, in myriagrams, New Holland, 14, 8; Timor, 16, 2; French, 22,1; English, 23, 8.

When the other volume of this work appears, or when the whole is presented to the English public in their own. language, we shall gladly resume our description, and attempt to render it somewhat more complete. At present we must only add, that the knowledge, diligence, perseverance, good sense, and modesty of the author, together with the immense extent and diversity of the additions he has made to science, combine to place his performance in the first rank of similar works, and amply intitle it to the privilege, granted by Bonaparte at the recommendation of the Institute, of being printed at the public expense.

The charts which should accompany this volume have not arrived, we believe, in England; but we have received a volume of plates about forty in number, very carefully drawn, efegantly engraved, and coloured in a style of beauty and splen dor never equalled perhaps in any English publication.

Art, II. ESCHYLI Tragedia quæ supersunt, Deperditarum Fabularum Fragmenta, et Scholia Græca; ex editione THOME STANLEII, cum Versione Latina ab ipso emendata, et Commentario, longe quam antea fuit Auctiori, ex Manuscriptis ejus nunc demum edito. Accedunt Varia Lectiones, et Notæ Virorum doctorum Criticæ ac Philologicæ, quibus suas passim intertexuit SAMUEL BUTLER, A. M. Reg. Schol. Salop. Archid. Coll. D. Joann. ap. Cant. nuper Soc. Tom. I. 4to. pp. 591.

Price 11. 11s. 6d. or an 8vo. edition in 2 vols. Price 16s. CAMBRIDGE at the University Press; LONDON, Lunn. 1809.

IT is about twelve years since we were informed that the University of Cambridge had committed the charge of republishing that noble monument of our national erudition, Stanley's Eschylus, to Mr. Samuel Butler of St. John's College. The classical qualifications of that gentleman had been attested by two or three respectable prize poems and, subsequently to the appointment, he drew the attention of scholars by editing the pure, beautiful, and most interesting Elegiac Address to the Shade of Plato, by Marcus Musurus the Čretan, one of those illustrious Greeks who were patronized by the House of Medicis.

Eschylus, of lofty and awful genius, was the poet of liberty; sublimis, et gravis, et grandiloquus sæpe usque ad vitium, says Quintilian. He was one of the defenders of Greece at the battles of Marathon, Salamis, and Platææ; and he was no less distinguished for the political and ethical lessons of his poetry, than for his bravery and love of freedom. Out of more than seventy productions of his fertile muse, seven only remain. Six tragedies were first printed, in a very imperfect state, at the press of Aldus, but after his death; and, notwithstanding the valuable labours of Robortellus, Victorius, Henry Stephens, and Canter, the text was still deformed with many corruptions. Isaac Casaubon, in his Strabo (Comment. p. 104.( announced his intention of giving a new edition of Eschylus, "si Deus dederit;" for that prince of scholars and critics was not ashamed of his piety. It was not granted him to execute his purpose. Our countryman, THOMAS STANLEY, the nephew of the celebrated chronologist Sir John Marsham, and himself a signal example of learning and industry, modesty and worth having, before he was twenty eight years old, finished his History of Philosophy, "undertook Eschylus, the most knotty and intricate of all the Greek Poets ;* and in the year 1663, after a world of pains spent in illustrating and restoring him, he published his accurate and beautiful edition of that author. This was a work of great difficulty, and an enterprize worthy of Mr. Stanley's abilities and great skill

The biographer is mistaken in this assertion. Probably he was not acquainted with Lycophron.

in the Greek language. Henry Stephens, Salmasius, and divers other critics, thought the difficulties insuperable, and despaired of seeing this accomplished." Life of Mr. Stanley, prefixed to the 3rd. ed. of his Hist. of Phil. 1701.

This edition was received with the universal applause of the learned. Though the tragedian was again edited, with pompous professions, by the vain and unworthy Cornelius de Pauw, and still more recently by the well qualified, but not scrupulously conscientious Schutz, Stanley's edition has not only maintained its ground, but has been rapidly rising in

estimation.

At his premature death in 1678, Mr. Stanley left many valuable manuscripts on subjects of classical and biblical fearning. These were obtained by Dr. John More, who died Bishop of Ely in 1707. Among them were eight volumes in folio, of additional Commentaries on Eschylus; which, with the whole of the Bishop's valuable collection of books and manuscripts, were, finally, presented by King George II. to the University Library.

If this inestimable treasure had formed the only distinction of the present publication, it would have been hailed with abundant thanks and honour. But Mr Butler has devoted his time and labours to the collection of all that was important and valuable for the illustration of his author, from the former editors and annotators, Robortellus, Michael Sophianus, Stephens, Canter, Garbitius, de Pauw, Giacomelli, d'Arnaud, Abresch, Heath, Morell, Brunck, and Schutz. He has extracted the emendations of Bentley from his Dissertation on Phalaris, &c. He has enjoyed the use of a copy of Victorius's edition (H. Steph. Par. 1557.) formerly the property of Isaac Casaubon, and afterwards of Bishop Pearson; the margin of which possesses Annotatiunculae from the former, and a collection of various readings from the latter, of those distinguished men. Seventy years ago, Dr. Anthony Askew prepared materials for an Eschylus which he meditated, comprising among other collections, notes from Joseph Scaliger, Casaubon, Grotius, Bourdelot, Isaac Vossius, and Ezekiel Spanheim. All these are in Mr. B.'s hands; and he had the felicity to find that the greatest part of the readings proposed in them had been preoccupied in Stanley's critical researches. He has also enriched the edition with many admirable observations, philological, historical, and antiquarian, communicated by the celebrated historian M. Müller of Vienna. A few notes have been contributed by the Rev. James Tate, A. M. of Richmond in Yorkshire; with whose judgement and taste in : the Greek language and versification the public is not unacquainted. Nor must we forget, in enumerating the mate

rials of this edition, the Glasgow folio Eschylus of 1795, which contains many emendations surreptitiously obtained from the corrected text of Professor Porson, printed at the same place in 1794, 2 vols. octavo, but published at London, 1806. The readings of both these are carefully noted under the designations, Pors. 1 and 2. In a word, this ample supellex leaves us nothing to want or wish, except the Notes of Mr. Porson; a treasure of which, alas! his friends appear to think the world not worthy.

Mr. Butler has disposed these stores in a manner which corresponds to the advice given him, in the infancy of his undertaking, by that Hercules of Greek literature, Dr. Charles Burney, that they should be "collected into a sort of Corpus Eschyleum;" and he has interspersed his own notes among them.

The present volume contains the first and the last tragedies in the usual distribution, the Prometheus Vinctus and the Supplices. Each, however, has its own series of pages; so that the seven may be finally arranged according to the judgment of the possessor.

The work before us, in the first place, furnishes the Greek Text, in a clear and unincumbered form. But in this part lies our only objection to this handsome and elaborate edition: it is the text of Stanley. Surely it ought to be regarded as the chief duty of a competent editor, to exhibit a text constituted to the highest degree of completeness and purity that his authorities and his critical talents can effect. Nor can we conceive of any rational motive, except in peculiar cases, for a departure from this rule. It is true that the University resolved to publish a new edition of Stanley's Eschylus. But undoubtedly that illustrious body is superior to any sentiment of blindly superstitious regard to their exemplar. Had such been their principle, why was Mr. Butler permitted to add a page of his Note Varr. et Butleri Critt. et Philologg.? Why was not the edition in folio, page for page, and letter for letter corresponding with the original? And, to complete the scheme, it would only have been further necessary to publish, an engraved fac simile of the manuscript commentaries.Could the estimable Stanley himself lift his head from the tomb, would he not conjure the sons of Granta to urge the career which he had so nobly run? Would he claim for himself what he had refused to Victorius and Canter? Would he not demand that his Alma Mater should complete the honours of, this splendid publication, by the crown which her Dawes, her Porson, and her Barney have in readiness for him?

It does not remove our objection, it does not satisfy our wishes, that, in the Note Critica, Mr. Butler has industriously