casm, renders that little perfonal controverfy to the present moment highly entertaining. They were fortunate alfo in their antagonist, for the vanity, the irritability, the peculiar language of Partridge, in the real annual anfwers, prefixed to his Almanack, added to the entertainment. All thefe concurring circumstances cannot again be expected; we cannot compliment Peter, by afcribing to him the merits of Swift and Arbuthnot, and we would not difgrace Mr. Nicholls, by level. ling him to the rank of Partridge. In the profaic part, Peter feems to have had the fuppofed answer of Partridge in his view. Mr. Nicholls is reprefented as the herald of his Magazine, and owning his former ignorance to enhance his prefent knowledge. But the acknowledgment is fpun out too far; and the humour by being too much heightened renders the portrait a ridiculous, and frequently an unnatural caricature. The Poetical Answer feems purpofely written in low doggrel ftrains.

Thou lieft when thou fayeft, like a top,

With anger ais'd, I fpinn'd about my shop; Nor did I ever, madden'd by thy ftripes, Thou prince of liars, kick about my types. Books have I written; books I ftill will write, And give, I hope, to gentle folks delight: With charming print, and copper-plates fo fine, Whofe magazine goes off fo well as mine? Who, pray, like me, the page fo fond of filling? Who gives more curious matter for a fhilling? England's first genuifes I keep in pay; Much profe I buy, and many a poet's lay: The filk-worm Hayley, fpias me heaps of verfe, And Gough, antiquities exceeding fearce : Great Horace Walpole too, with fweet good will, Sends me choice anecdotes from Strawb'ry Hill; Mifs Seward, miftrefs Yeardsley, and mifs More, Of lines (dear women!) fend me many a fcore.' The principal part of the Rowland' confifts in the little mifcellaneous works of Peter: indeed, as the 'fuppofed antagonift obferves, Peter must answer himself; and, with that view, different poems are felected, which are introduced by obfervations, pointing out their imperfections. In fact, they are not unexceptionable: indecorum fometimes difgufts, and a little occafional indelicacy makes us condemn the choice; while wit, pleafantry, and farcafm, in turns, as ufual, difarm our severity. We shall select some particular paffages; and the firft shall be fome of the ftanzas addressed to his barn.'

By Lacedæmon men attack'd,

When Thebes, in days of yore, was fack'd,

And

And nought the fury of the troops could hinder;
What's true, yet marv❜llous ro rehearse,

So well the common foldiers relish'd verse,
They fcorn'd to burn the dwelling-houfe of Pindar.

Daughter of thatch, and stone, and mud,
When I, no longer flesh and blood,

Shall join of lyric bards some half a dozen;
Meed of high worth, and, 'midft th' Elyfian plains,
To Horace and Alceus read my strains,
Anacreon, Sappho, and my great old coufin.

On thee fhall rifing generations ftare,
That come to Kingsbridge and to Dodbrook fair;
For fuch thy history, and mine fhall learn ;
Like Alexander fall they ev'ry one

Heave the deep figh, and fay, hence Peter's gone,
With rev'rence let us look upon his barn."

The following picture of affectation, a ́ prim,' ' dainty,' * startful virgin,' is admirable.

Nymph of the mincing mouth, and languid eye,
And lifping tongue so soft, and head awry,

And flutt'ring heart, of leaves of afpin made;
Who were thy parents, blufhful virgin? fay-
Perchance Dame Folly gave thee to the day,
With Gaffer Ignorance's aid.'

But we must not extend our account of this fugitive publicacation too far: as we faid once on a more important occafion, it is a work, laudandus, ornandus, & tollendus.'

FOREIGN ARTICLE.

Annales de Chymie, ou Recueil des Memoires concernant la Chymie les Arts qui en dependent par M. M. de Morveau, Lavoisier, Monge, Berthollet, de Fourcroy, le Baron de Dietrich, Haffenfratz, & Adel. A Paris. 8vo. London. Boffe.

IT

Tis no unfrequent complaint among phlofophers, that dif coveries are fcattered in fo many different volumes, and explained in fuch different languages, that the expence and the knowledge neceffary to attain them, are beyond the reach of private fortunes or common attainments. This difficulty renders the various Journals and Reviews valuable, independent of other confiderations; for to furvey one of our own volumes, would be a fufficient encomium, and to point out the various fources of intelligence, otherwife inacceffible, would at once difplay their value and importance. Works of this kind, however, are generally confined to printed volumes; and there are a few Journals only on the continent, where original communications

A a a 4

nications are admitted, which, as they extend to the whole fyf tem of phylics, afford too confined a sphere for the admirers of any one branch. Chemistry is every moment extending its confines, and adding new facts or new fyftems to its former stock; but as the fcience confifts chiefly of facts, a rapid and eafy communication is neceffary to facilitate its improvement, The French chemifts have, therefore, thought their fituation fufficiently centrical, and their language fufficiently general, to enable them to offer their affiftance in this department; and, as from them we have derived much of our information, and fince from this fource we may expect to derive more, we receive their offer with particular fatisfaction. Four volumes are already published, and our delay requires fome apology. We trufted that they would have been fo generally read, that a fhort account of the most important effays in our ufual Intelligence' would have appeared fufficient, and in this way we have indeed anticipated fome parts of this article; but we find the limits of that part of our work, and the neceffary variety to render it in, terefting, prevent us from returning to this fcience as often as the facts accumulate. We muft, therefore, take up thele volumes as feparate publications, and fince we have delayed a lit tle our account of them, we must step hastily on,

M. Adel, in the first memoir, examines the fmoaking liquor of Libavius it is well known to be a muriated tin; but it was not known that the tin was diffolved in the acid, while, by the addition of the caloric, it was in the state of air. When united with water it lofes the caloric and becomes folid: the air feparated feems to come from the water, and to be the air combined with the water, not one of its ingredients; that which usually feparates, when from combination, or even cold, it affumes a folid ftate. This liquor then is, as we formerly obferved was probable from other views, tin diffolved in muriatic acid, highly dephlogisticated."

M. Lavoilier's treatife on the combuftion of iron is curious. A fine iron wire twisted into a fpiral, is fixed to the cork of a bottle filled with inflammable air; to the end of the iron a match is applied, (it is a peculiar match made of the agaric of the oak boiled in a nitrated lixivium) and when ignited, the cork is returned and fixed in the bottle. The match burns vividly, and the iron foon burns alfo with brilliant fparkles, till it is reduced to small, very brittle globules, ftill attracted by the magnet, having gained thirty-five or thirty-fix grains on the hundred in weight, diminishing the air nearly feventy cubic inches. The remaining air is faid to be very pure; and if the iron is entirely pure, fcarcely to contain any aerial acid, the little which at any time occurs, feems, from this account, not to be more than can be accounted for from the plumbago ufua ly contained in it. The experiment is, however, tried every day in making rockets, for the nitre in the gun-powder furnishes the vital air which contributes to inflame the iron,

M. Ber

M. Berthollet's memoir on the Pruffian alkali confifts of mi nute diftinctions, which we cannot follow. He thinks that the hygrogene and azote (inflammable and phlogisticated airs) are found in it, and combined with the coaly matter, fo as when oxygen (vital-air) is added to form the carbonet of ammoniac; but to take the form of ammoniac, or of the coaly acid, alkali or lime are neceffary.

M. Fourcroy's memoir on the history of azotic gas, as a prin ciple of animal matters, was read to the Royal Society of Me dicine in 1788. The azote (inflammable air) or its folid principle, is fo copious in animal substances, that, as we have already feen, it forms their diftinguishing character. It occurs, however, either as air loofely combined, or forming by a more intimate union, an ammoniacal falt. The flefhy and concrefcible parts of the blood furnish it most copioufly; the gelatinous and albuminous parts in a lefs proportion. This gas has a peculiar fmell, that of meat when it begins to taint; turns the more tender blues of a green hue, and is very deleterious to the human conftitution in its ftate of air. The fame author, when he treats of the means of procuring the azote, tells us, that it is the gas found in the air-bladders of carp, and that manganese when it has been heated and cooled again, attracts it from the atmofphere. This peculiar air may then be feparated by calcining manganefe with a degree of heat lefs than a red heat.

Metals combine with acids in their state of oxyds (calces), and M. Berthollet, perhaps led by the confideration of the acid nature of the metallic radicals, enquires in turn, whether they do not combine with alkalis and earths like acids. He gives many inftances of this mode of combination, where calces are diffolved in alkalis, or where they unite with each other. Some incidental remarks on fulminating calces alfo occur, and he mentions particularly, that highly fulminating bodies will explode by compreffion without heat.

M. de Fourcroy tells us that a woman, who from distress fell into a nervous hypochondriacal diforder, terminating in a cachexy and fcorbutic hemorrhages, difcharged blood of a fingu lar nature. The colour it left on the cloth was at first a brown red; but it foon became a beautiful blue, though not deep. Alkalis changed it to a rusty brown, as well as the colour of the Pruffian blue. As all the ingredients of the Pruffian acid are found in the blood, our author fuppofes that, in confequence of difeafe, their combination may be altered, and a true Pruffian blue be formed, as iron is also a part of the blood. In the very livid countenances of emaciated people, we think we have feen a blue tinge, if we have not been milled by the appearance of venal blood through the skin.

In the account of M. Chaptal's memoir on the use of the dephlogisticated muriatic acid, we have fome ufeful information. We know the fumes of this acid are ufeful in whitening cloth; but M. Chaptal applies it to reftore books difcoloured by age to

their former hue, and even to restore prints where the traits are not diftinguishable. When the acetous acid is expofed to these fume, it acquires the fmell and the properties of radical vinegar, and forms, when copper is expofed to its vapour, a true calx, foluble in the acetous acid, and capable of crystallization. It is a little greener than verdigrise.

M. de Fourcroy in the following article obferves, that lead diffolved in wines, is, in reality, a triple falt, first diffolved in the tartareous, and afterwards in the acetous acid. He calls it an aceto-tartite of lead. The bell teft is hepatic air separated from alkaline fulphurs: it is the air of the Harrowgate waters.

The warm waters of Nivernois, analysed by M. Haffenfratz, appear to contain a large proportion of calcareous earth, diffolved by means of fixed air; nearly an equal proportion of mild alkali; fome common falt; a little aerated magnesia and alum. Some other waters in the neighbourhood had an hepatic odour, though no hepatic gas could be feparated: thefe chiefly contained felenite, aerated lime, and a fmall proportion of aerated magnefia, with fome uncombined fixed air.

M. Pelletier's first memoir on phosphorus we have had occafion to examine; the fecond fhows that phofphorus will unite with gold, filver, platina, copper, iron, tin, and lead; and leffens the ductility of the five firft; but this chemist means to enquire, whether by combining a larger proportion of phofphorus with the two laft, they would ftill preferve their malleability. In the letter which follows, M. Morveau describes an eafy experiment, by which he fhows the compofition of water in a manner lefs exceptionable than any other that we remember to have feen. The account of M Sennebier's experiments on the action of folar light on vegetables, we cannot abridge; and the profpectus of the fociety to encourage the knowledge of working mines we have already noticed; the former we hope to examine in M. Sennebier's work. The accounts of the chryfoprafos, the prehnite, or the chryfolite of the cape, and the adamantine fpar, we have alfo anticipated. A native phosphat of lime found in Hungary is analyfed by M. Haffenfratz.

The fame author next fubjoins obfervations on hydrogenous gas (inflammable air), which he tells us does not lofe its peculiar properties, or become fir for respiration, as fome have contended, when kept for a long time under water. Some mifcellaneous communications from M. Prouft to A. M. d'Arcet follow; particularly an account of a new kind of tea found in Santa fee, resembling in fimell the fpirituous water of Belin, and fuppofed to be a caffine;-a defcription of an iron ore mineralifed by arfenic; of a kind of mifpickel from America, or a mineral compofed of iron and pure arfenic; of the granite of Valentia, fuppofed by our author to be a compound of the phosphoric acid and clay; of mountains of phosphat, or earth of bones, in Eftramadura. In thefe letters too, we find an analysis of bezoar, which contains much phofphoric acid, though the part from

whence