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painting with a large scrubbing brush, while pots of soap lees, spirits of wine, varnish scrapers, &c. stand ready to complete the work of destruction. A hog with spectacles on nose, seen grovelling under a picture, is presumed to represent a connoisseur of antique rubbish. This vignette is from the design of Ibbetson. The other tail piece is also aquatinted. It represents a monkey as an artist, regarding some grotesque attempts at composition, intended as a warning to young artists not to take their subjects from scenes too near the metropolis, lest they should be obliged to adopt birch brooms, mopsticks, &c. for their landscape scenery. The work is dedicated to the Right Hon. Lady Elizabeth Keith Lindsey, with whom, and the Countess of Balcarras, the author declares, the first idea of his work originated, || during a long residence in their neighbourhood at Roslyn, in the summer of 1800. From this work I have extracted || the following, and only matter which relates to himself, in || his own words:

"I had from my earliest youth a most violent propensity or inclination to the arts, without ever meeting with instruction, encouragement, or patronage. I at last, on making my way to London, found myself safe moored in a picture-dealer's garret. It was generally supposed in those days, that none but the lowest mechanics were calculated for the profession of picture-dealers; and I believe it right: they all seemed so perfectly at home in it. I saw a little shoemaker who made a fortune in the most agreeable manner imaginable, laughing heartily (at his customers) all the while. He brought up his son to the business. There was also a house-painter and slater, who could repeat all the cant of connoisseurship, and talk of the picturesque with the most profound gravity, and really had a tolerable share of knowledge outside of his head, by which he realized a considerable fortune, with which, I believe, he built a methodist chapel.

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Two others I knew got into vast repute, with regular customers to their backs, who dealt with them as with their cheesemongers, and took their articles upon their word. It is from this period I must date the first knowledge I ever acquired of the mechanical parts of painting. It is well known that Sir J. Reynolds destroyed many a picture of the Venetian school, by scraping off the different coats or glazings, to find out their system of painting. I had a better opportunity on a scowering day, of seeing all the different coats of a picture varnish, one after another. I am under the greatest obligations to my old departed friend John Evans. He was, in his time, the first of all possible grubbers. He by means of a delicate Malmstock brick, fetched off every thing, except here and there a stubborn bit of heightening. Mr. Peter Brozel did the same thing, but could not for his life make his work so smooth as John. He was of the good old sect of sand and scrubbing-brush, and has numerous followers. However, the prevailing schism of the searching soap ley, which finishes the canvass and all, has my sincerest good wishes on its side. I was much employed by these scrubbers, in repairing their mischief, and became extremely expert at it, and of course a valuable fixture in the concern. But I found an extreme difficulty in matching the tints, especially in the transparent parts, the common colour of the || shop appearing like gritty mud upon the mellow transparent shades of the exquisite pictures of the last century. I had, by a continual acquaintance with hardships and ill usage, acquired a sort of impervious husk, or (a better term

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• Talking of the soap ley, Mr. Editor, a friend of mine once possessed a Teniers, and a very valuable one; but the Head of a Fiddler wanted cleaning, and my friend was his own picture-cleaner. He carefully lays on the soap leys, when he is called down to a friend. Forgetting the state of the poor Fiddler, he returns not very soon; but when he does, he finds his unfortunate musician without his head, and his Teniers ruined for ever.-COMMUNICATOR.

would be a cork jacket) which enabled me to hold up my head in such miserable situations as would have consigned to oblivion every propensity to exertion in any other beside myself. I possessed a most insatiable curiosity, and so very much to laugh at, that I was amused beyond measure. But the least attempt at painting any thing of my own was discouraged to the last degree by the gloomy fanatic with whom I was a prisoner. Prisoner I may well call myself: -Instead of raising my pittance, on which I could not exist, he would advance me trifling sums, and I became his debtor. Seven years that I lost in that manner, I had the dread of the consequences continually hanging over me. I never knew the amount till the consummate hypocrite had me arrested, at the moment of my setting out on the first embassy to China, for what?-£40!! which had been seven years accumulating. This last indignity almost broke my heart. My drawings, which were only to be seen in the shop windows, as I was entirely unknown, had attracted the notice of some persons of taste, who with difficulty discovered me. I was all at once noticed in a manner totally new to me. Of course I became elated beyond measure. Of those of whom I received kindnesses inexpressible, I cannot help enumerating Messrs. C. and R. Greville, the Marquis of Bute, Sir George Beaumont, Captain Baillie, Mr. Knight, &c. &c."

In the work alluded to, he announces, "The Water Colour Process, also a Book of Etchings of Cattle and Figures, &c. from Nature." This work was never published, but the work I have mentioned is thus titled, "An Accidence, or Gamut of Oil Painting for Beginners, in which is shewn the most Easy Way of imitating Nature, by means of a simple System,-the Result of inany Years' Practice; with a Landscape painted in Oil, by the Author, and all the Tints in Patterns." 1805, 8vo. 42s. Watt's Bibliotheca Britannica. Ibbetson died, I think, about 1821. I. C.

TO THE

EDITOR OF THE SOMERSET HOUSE GAZETTE, SIR,

PRESUMING Such an article may amuse your artistical readers, I enclose for your consideration the following biographical sketch, which appeared in a pamphlet published just thirty years ago. I have selected those which I should consider the least objectionable to the spirit of your paper, as the author in his lucubrations upon the artists and arts of his country, mixed a superabundance of gall in his critical ink.

MR. STOTHARD.

"THOMAS STOTHARD, R.A. was born in Long-acre, St. Martin's parish, London, in 1756. This artist was first apprenticed to a pattern-drawer, in Spitalfields. When Mr. Stothard was first emancipated from his indentures, his knowledge of the human figure was very restricted; but having a small annual income, and being naturally œconomical, he took the very laudable resolution of living within his income, and appropriating all his time to the study of the arts. The first time he burst upon the public notice, was by the designs which he so ably furnished for Mr. Harrison's Novelist's Magazine; and as these designs were adequately engraved, it, fortunately for him, laid the foundation of a celebrity which has never been surpassed by any native of these realms. I have heard his vignettes and taille douce pieces much commended in Paris, where the artists highly value themselves on their address in this province of the arts, and not without reason, as Gravelot, Eisin, and Picart, have been unrivalled in their efforts by the rest of Europe. There is a littleness and nice atten

tion to trifles visible in French paintings, which tallies admirably with such endeavours. The first historic_picture in oil he exhibited, was the death of the gallant Lord Robert Manners, who was killed on board his own ship, the Resolution. He was encouraged to this effort by Mr. Macklin, of Fleet-street, of whom the artist speaks in terms of gratitude, for his generous and becoming conduct: but the picture which established his reputation, was an historical subject from Mallet. This performance was very commonly admired, and Mr. Stothard, from that moment, continued ascending the acclivity of fame. He was elected an associate of the Royal Academy in 1791, and a Royal Academician in 1794.

This gentleman is among the very few historical painters in this realm who appear to believe, that the undertaking is more dependent upon thought than action; he gives his subject to the general eye with more precision than his compeers; and though, perhaps, he disdains the subordinate efforts of the art too much, and particularly what is understood by the word handling, yet is his produc-I tion valuable, as he gives us, in the composition of a subject, what is consolatory to an inquiring spirit, although he refuses to bestow on his labours that correctness which should be the ultimate desire of all who expect universal approbation.

It is no mighty matter to do one thing well-a lucky hit may help you; but to do another, with the tythe of its merit, is quite another thing. Hence couples in pictures are only companions in the mere name. It has perplexed nature, and well may it puzzle art to create or compose a companionable companion.

The Bees Wing is a happy thought; not so the other: but public taste is so gregarious, that nothing in art will go down single and alone. Wine is good-too much of it calls for physic. So, at last, there may be more wit in the pair of prints than even the artist himself perceived.

To write a sequel, or to paint a companion, is one and the same thing; and he is a fool who makes the attempt, for the second, twenty to one, is a mill stone round the neck of the first.

Saving and excepting that there are two exceptions to this rule, the first being of King Charles and Queen Henrietta, who, whether in whole lengths, half lengths, or threequarters, front face or profile, are ever stock companions: know not why, but they appear always so fitting. Contemporaries of these royal sufferers have assured us, that they were the most comely companions that were known to wear the crown.

The second; A Storm and a Calm. The marine painter alone has a precept for companionship; he cannot blunder. The one scene is never compared with the other. The one is all mildness, the other all bluster, which dissimilitude I venture to suppose, only that I am no metaphysician, is the cause why they make such excellent pairs."

"Mr. Stothard is of that few, who make their movements independent of the lesser vanities of life. Every disciple should mingle as little as possible in the bustle of an agitated world; his deportment should be unalterably in the haunts of peace, where he might contemplate serene- Landscapes in pairs, by the same hand, are not the thing. ly, and make his professional ability illustrate and develope I had rather, an hundred times, hang a picture of Turner's the magic of his teeming conception. If the animi pathe- in the spacious recess on one side my drawing-room chimmata are not harmonized and attuned by the benign influ-ney, and another of Callcott's on the other, (if I had a drawence of truth, the powers of thought cannot have a due ing-room,) than hang either artist alone; I mean, than share of force, in the guidance of the genius to deeds of hang their pictures. Good Lord! how imperfect is rhetoric. indisputed honor. When the lake is continually ruffled No, Mr. Hardcastle, every line of this-(gives the lie to, I by the obtrusion of gales more or less turbulent, it cannot had almost said)-trips up my assertion," That it is the reflect the received objects of vision with accuracy or easiest thing in the world to write." beauty."

ARTISTICAL SCRAPS.

To the Editor of the Somerset House Gazette.
SIR,

I WOULD very willingly perform any reasonable penance; for instance, take double my usual quantity of wine, rise an hour later in winter, or submit to any co-equal penalty, rather than have said what I did say, touching the light matter of authorship. In the vain glorious ebullition of the moment, I wrote, in my last contribution, "That it was the easiest thing in the world to write." Now I beg to revoke that vapouring assertion, and do revoke it hereby.

If I have not suffered more, in the shape of compunction, for that flourish of my pen, than for trespassing against the command that forbids the working on the Sabbath, may my next cup of tea be more nauseous than Sharpe's Black Draught. (Vide the print.)

Writing, like flying a kite, is easy enough when the thoughts are up; but then the difficulty is the raising of them. It is the getting them on the wing-the launching of your subject.

I have been, the last two hours, balancing my thoughts 'twixt sleeping and waking, to start my theme, without advancing-even to the beginning.

Morning and evening, sun rise and sun set, what pretty associations they beget on the fancy whilst reading the Somerset House Catalogue; not your Somerset House Catalogue, old gentleman, that of the R. A.'s in the Strand; whilst the pictures, Lwill be bold to say, have no more the character of companions than two Englishmen (strangers) in a common stage coach, or in the same box in a coffee house. They have nothing to do with each other, from the very circumstance of being too much alike. Such fellows, or companions, should be hung separately.

I may be wrong, but may I be shot, with all my acknowledged sagacity in art, if ever I could discover the difference between a painted morning or an evening scene, sufficiently to swear to the identity of either, unless, indeed to the latter, by the figures of well-dressed ladies and gentlemen, such as we occasionally behold in the works of our older landscape dons, who, I have thought, were rarely, if ever, seen perambulating the meadows before they quitted their dormitories. By this sign alone, could I assign, to which season of the day the painter pointed his art. A painter then would be doing service to posterity, in lack of ladies and gentlemen, to write upon his composition Morning or Evening.

For, "I hold it an abomination, a vile and fraudulent limb of a conspiracy against the understanding, for any student, or tyro professor of a polite art like this, and be d-d to him, to be worthy the name of a painter," as Professor Barry said, good man," who does not write upon his sign what is its symbol, peradventure it does not, like How the said Michael Sharp contrived, after painting the the sun at noon, stare you in the face, put your eyes out, Bees Wing, to compose that Black Draught, can only be or hammer into your stupid skull its own simple tale." accounted for on the principle of wanting a second thought, This Professor Barry was a great man, Mr. Editor, he which is the case with a thousand other clever fellows, my-spoke out. Such a censor kept your painters on the qui self included. I did so-so-so far; but how to proceed-vive, there is the rub.

Talking of English painters, most venerable Sir, pray is it

true what I have heard-But hold. I will not affect igno-bragged of having purchased certain early engravings, even rance, or be mawkish upon the subject, but speak out. I of Hogarth himself, who was no imprudent spark, valued know it to be true-that the scheme proposed by the Di- by the weight of the copper, at so much per pound! rectors of the British Institution, to the President and Times are wonderously improved, hey! Mr. Editor. members of the Royal Academy runs thus:George Cruickshanks, I'll hold you a guinea to a shilling, will earn you with ease twenty pounds in a week, by his delectable little scrap etchings, working only half tides. Catch him when you can! such a genius may command his own price.

Each R. A. is to present six pictures, of his own painting, to my lords and gentlemen directors, from which they are to select three; each associate four, from which they are to choose two; and artists, not members of the Royal Academy, are to send two, from which the noble directors This said Mr. John Bowles was brother to the first are to take one. The Royal Academicians to decide upon Bowles in St. Paul's Church-yard. His son was the wellwhat are to be submitted in toto for the said noble directors' || known Mr. Carrington Bowles, whose son again, the preinspection. sent Mr. Carrington, of the same surname, if I am not mistaken, constitutes a part of the firm of Messrs. Bowles and Carver, still presiding over the old shop, which, together with the old-fashioned buckle shop at the N. W. corner, seem heir-looms for ever of St. Paul's Church-yard. Coypel was one of the best designers, in the humorous style, contemporary with Hogarth. He illustrated with his pencil the quarto edition of Don Quixote-I think, that translated by Jervis the portrait painter.

I would give a premium for your genuine opinion upon this plan, Mr. Editor; but as you have said nothing upon the subject, farther than being the first to tell the public that an exhibition of the living English masters is expected to appear early in the next year, at the British Institution, submitting to your discretion "To print or not to print," I offer you my own.

66

I would ask, then, why the nomination of what pictures are to have the preference is to be conceded to these lords and gentlemen? excepting, indeed, as to their size, with reference to the space which certain large works might occupy upon their walls.

For, with the most profound deference for the rank, character, delle tantiship, connoisseurship, learning, general taste, and noble zeal of these noble directors for the promotion of the interests of the British school, I cannot be persuaded to think that the painters themselves are the least competent judges to decide upon the merits of their

own art.

I say this, Sir, whilst bearing in mind what the unenlightened owe to committees of taste, chosen from this enlightened body of noblemen and gentlemen, on many memorable occasions, and not unmindful of the obligations which, in particular, the lovers of virtu have derived from that great virtuoso recently departed, for the memorable service rendered by him to the empire and the arts, in the valuation of the works of Phidras, an appraisement which the congregated talent and judgment of the greatest living sculptors and painters declined with modest dignity.

But this great connoisseur was the mighty chief of the legion of taste, and such another Knight may not enter the lists, to bid defiance to all comers, for a thousand years!

Pray, Mr. Hardcastle, for the present, to cut the matter short, I would ask, why the Royal Academicians, having their own apartments, should not occupy them with the proposed collection, and make, very early in the next year, this interesting national exhibition for themselves?

One word more. Let us calculate, for this display, forty academicians, three pictures each, one hundred and twenty; twenty associates, two each, forty. Here we have an hundred and sixty pictures at once. This is a fine occasion for the exercise of the congregated integrity of the whole body. If one single picture should be admitted that was not voted creditable to the artist and the arts-if one single act of favouritism should creep in-then would the artists be traitors to their own cause, and the sin be visited upon their memories, as long as one stone should stand upon another on the site of Somerset House.

So much for the living the British Institution, the Royal Academy, the noble directors, and the academicians, Mr. Editor; for you and I are aware that we are here upon ticklish ground. Let us return to the old theme, the old school, and talk of such wags as the following:

HUMOROUS DESIGNERS.

He was one of the wags who caricatured the Italian Opera, about the year 1730, when Signor Farinelli, and the rival beauties, of the Signore Cuzzoni, and Faustina, charmed the fashionable world with their vocal powers. The print is entitled Les Chats, wherein the principal performers at the King's Theatre, in the characters of cats, superbly attired, are squalling in concert.

This Coypel used to commit piracy on the witty cargoes of Hogarth, and seizing his characters, offer them for sale in a foreign market.

From his incomparable Antiquated Bride, and the young female attendant adjusting the folds of her gown, Monsieur Coypel made a parody, in a crayon picture, from which a print was published in Paris, the subject A wrinkled Harridan of Fashion, attended by a blooming coefleuse, engraved by L. Surugue, 1745. This print was inscribed "La Folie pare la Decripitude des aujustemens de la Jeu

nesse.

Vandergucht, the engraver, who assisted Hogarth in several of his early plates, was also a caricaturist and humorous designer. So was

Vandrebank, who was preferred by Lord Carteret to Hogarth, to design a set of illustrations for his lordship's translation, of the knight of the woeful countenance, which the aforesaid comical Vandergucht engraved.

George Pulley, the publisher, at the sign of Rembrandt's Head, the corner of Bride-court, Fleet-street, was a choice spark. This house was the nightly rendezvous of the engravers of his time.

Gravelot, the engraver, who assisted Hogarth in some of his plates, was numbered among the whimsical few who converted their art to the purposes of ridicule. Many political publications, during George the Second's reign, had frontispieces designed by Boitard, Liotard, Gravelot, Bickham, Vandergucht, Vandrebank, Worsdule, and others, the least of whom, in comic feeling, was certainly not the least to name of this period, for he was one of the merry founders of the school of caricatura, namely, Jack Laquerre, the son of the painter of that name, who assisted Signor Verrio in painting the walls and the ceilings of our royal palaces.

Marquis Townshend,-I mean the old marquis,-had a happy turn for humorous composition. There was more naivete in his lordship's sketches, than in those of any of the burlesque works of amateur caricaturists, excepting Bunbury's. One of this facetious nobleman's designs, and etched by himself, touched off the portrait of a celebrated John Bowles, at the sign of the Black Horse, in Corn-Irish physician, a vis-a-vis resemblance, seen from behill, was among the first patrons of the old school of comic hind. draughtsmen. His prices for works of art, however, were not sufficient to pamper the appetites of the thoughtless candidates for his favor. This old gentleman frequently

An old-fashioned bed, the curtains closely drawn, the physician's head thrust between, his wig only seen; yet the fashion of the said wig, the hat held behind, the cane, the cut

of the coat, &c. depicted this venerable son of Galen as completely as any front view.

It was said of the marquis, (General Townshend,) when viceroy of Ireland, that he had not only caricatured every officer on the staff, but every officer who carried a staff, even down to the last comical constable of Dublin. Paul Sandby would droll with his pencil equally well with the best of them. Once he had the temerity to caricature Hogarth himself! After this they became acquainted, and were social friends. Paul was then in the May-time of his studies, but Hogarth was sitting under his vine, in the October of life.

The subject in which he had made free with the figure of the great little painter, was in a design where he, with other artists in a committee, were laying their wise heads together in the forming a Royal Academy.

Captain Baillie, too, had a turn for caricatura. So had a friend of his, Mr. of Somerset House. The honourable John Byng gave a theme, wherein Baillie was made the subject of a graphic squib.

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The captain, as you know, Mr. Hardcastle, was a great frequenter of Christie's. He one day had a genuine dirty Guido knocked down to him for fifteen pounds. By the powers! I thank you Mr. Christie," said he, adding in his exultation," and gentlemen I thank you all, for throwing away to me this fine Guido for an old song."

He took the dirty Guido to Chelsea, and scowered it into a clean specimen of the master. This good luck travelled to the Stamp Office; Baillie himself told it to his brother commissioners. "Pshaw! it is not a Guido," said Mr. Byng.

Baillie was angry; "I tell you it is a true Italian picture, Sir.""It is the work of an Irishman," rejoined the facetious commissioner Byng," painted by some countryman of yours, my dear captain; not by Guid-o, but by one -O-Guid!" The captain laughed at the joke, and made an etching of the story.

John Nixon. Alas! my old friend John, who among the wits and wags of the day has not to say, "I have taken my mutton with Jack Nixon in Basinghall-street?" John was a noted amateur draughtsman of humorous subjects. He gave good dinners, the hospitable worthy: military time at five.

Providore, of the Beef Steak.-He caricatured all the members of that thrice jovial club, from the Great Duke, of ten feet girth about the shoulders, to the merry little comedian. of five feet and an inch, in his highheeled shoes. These days are no more! Yet who can forget the golden gridiron, appended to the ribbon of the Providore!

Mr. Bunbury. The Humours of a Barber's Shop; The Country Club; or Patience in a Punt-all delectable. Long may we toast the memory of this truly original designer of the burlesque, my worthy Editor. Nought personal in his vast volume of designs; all mirthful, playful, quizzical, and full of fun the very Momus of the art was he. Ten ages, and perchance another Bunbury may not appear again, to spice with wit and gaiety, and harmless mirth, the insipid cup of

fashionable life.

Woodward, another of the mirth inspiring school of art, if art that may be called, which did out-herod Herod, in these whims, and put the mask on caricature itself. No one like him could outrage truth, and give to monsters such additional monstrosity, and yet bewitch the imagination into laughter, even to the dubbing of these wild chimeras with the rank and title of humanity. Yet, shall generations hence of sucking babes, when long past their teething, show their white teeth, and grin in loud concert over a folio of his fun.

The Babes in the Wood, would have made the sad Heraclitus to have cracked his sides with mirth, and his frolicksome neighbour, old Democritus, to have wept with laughter.

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John Collett, the gravest of the grave, would sit at the Turk's Head behind his pipe, and smoke both Oroonoko and his neighbours, until St. Clement's midnight bells chimed," My soul praise the Lord."

He stocked old Bowles's old shop front with humourous designs, and helped to keep the game alive at Thomas Overton's.

Robert Dighton, painter, engraver, musician, and player, once partner with old loyalty, Charles Dibdin, in the Putagonian Fantocini, did a thousand comical cuts, which are recorded in the volumes of the humour of these days, and may still be had, for money, or good bills, I wot, at Bowles and Carver's, by St. Paul's, and at the successors to old Mr. Sayer, either plain or coloured in all the gaudy tints of the peacock, or the paroquet.

Thomas Rowlandson, the merry wag, he who has covered with his never flagging pencil, enough of charta puru to placard the whole walls of China, and etched as much copper as would sheath the British navy. Of his graphic fun and frolic we have seen, Heaven knows, full many a ponderous folio.

Master Roley, so friendly dubbed by many an old convive, would have taken higher flights of art, had he so willed, for he could draw with elegance and grace; and for design, no mind was ever better stored with thought-no genius more prolific. Nothing, even allowing for caricature, could exceed in spirit and intelligence some of the off hand compositions of this worthy.

Predilection for outline and the pen, has ruined many a genius, who would have done honour to the arts. Mortimer, Porter, and another living artist you and I could name, good Mr. Editor, and others now no more, have sacrificed their talents and their fame, to the indulgence of doing that with the pen, (confound both goose-quill, crow-quill, and the reed!) that should have occupied that fitter instrument the pencil, aforetime called the painting brush.

FROM THE FRENCH.

SHE comes by night, a dream of light,
With all her glories round her;
She seems to rest upon the breast
To which so oft I've bound her!

And many a word with rapture heard, And whisper'd vow scarce spoken, Unon a bliss as deep as this

Like summer light hath broken!

She seems to smile as once ere-while
She used to smile upon me;
The voice, the tone, all, all her own,
As when their sweetness won me!

I hear them float, each simple note,
Her own accustomed numbers;
It does not seem a fleeting dream'
To vanish with my slumbers!

Away! away! thou joyless day!

My heart has no such pleasure As that it feels when back it steals By night to my heart's treasure!

I would not wake, I would not break A spell so sweet, so charming, Unless to find the dream resign'd For her, my bosom warming!

Just Published-Part 2,

3.

A SELECTION OF ANCIENT COINS, chiefly of
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general usefulness; which, indeed, its excellent arrangement is calculrted to promote. There is no station in which it may not be attended with essential advantage."-New Times. 2.

THE LAWYER'S COMMON PLACE BOOK; arranged on a new Plan. With an Alphabetical Index of upwards of Six Hundred and Fifty Heads which occur in general reading and practice. 4to. 108. 6d.

"To point out the utility of the present work, scarcely a single word is requisite. Every man who desires to read with advantage, must be aware of the necessity of observing upon what he reads. The only merit to which this publication lay claim, is that of having arranged under its proper title, nearly every subject to which referance is necessary, and by this means of relieving the reader from no small portion of very tedious and very unprofitable labour."

A book of this nature has long been a desideratum with medical practitioners and students. There are few men who have not, in the course of their practice, occasionally met with cases of peculiar interest, which, on some future period they have been most anxious to recal to their minds, but without success. A few intelligent practitioners, have already rendered great service to the medical profession, by keeping faithful records of the cases that have been under their inspection; and many important discoveries we are convinced would be made in the nature of the disease, if such a praetice were to become more general The present work is proposed with the view of enabling those gentlemen who are thus desirous of benefiting themselves and the public, to accomplish this desirable object without difficulty and with little trouble; great pains have been taken in the selection of the most useful terms, that occur in the extensive duties of a general practitioner. The leading terms in the Practice of Physic, Surgery, Midwifery, Chemistry, &c. will be found arranged alphabetically, and under each list, a blank space has been left for the insertion of any additional names that may be hereafter found necessary. Such a book kept by a hospital pupil, under the direction of the visiting surgeon and physician, would be a highly useful and valuable work to the students, and its publication be productive of great benefit to society in general.

To shew the use of this work, we will suppose a surgeon meets with a case of bronchocele, in the treatment of which he is eminently successful, and after the patient is discharged, he thinks it might be useful to him at a future period, if he were to make a few memorandums of the symptoms and treatment of the disease, which he does. In the course of a few months, perhaps, a patient with a similar affection comes to him. He then wishes to find the notes be made in the former case, but for want of a properly arranged book he is unable to succeed-had such a one as the present been in his possession, he would have looked in the index, and at the word bronchocele, have marked down the number of the first blank page, and on it have written down his account of the case. At any subse quent period, however distant, if he had occasion to refer to it, it might have been found, without the slightest difficulty, or loss of

time.

In addition to the above, which applies equally to gentlemen in practice, and to medical students attending hospitals and dispensaries we wish to point out to the latter, the great benefit they would derive, in carefully noting down any circumstance connected with their profession, which they may have heard or seen in the course of their day's study. It is a practice much censured by public teachers, for pupils to take notes during a lecture, as they must unavoidably lose one part of the discourse, while writing down another. But, if in the course of their daily studies, any thing in Surgery, Chemistry, &c. should particularly strike them, on their return bome, they can set it down in their common place book, marking the page to its proper head in the index, which will enable them to tind it with ease, whenever they may have occasion to recur to the subject. This will be productive of great advantage in affording them an opportunity of describing in their own words, the principal points connected with their profession, and give them an excellent opportunity of exercising their memory.

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