the Bishop of Bristol. This amiable young man was taken a prisoner at the age of 13, together with the brave and unfortunate Captain Wright, in the Vicenzo, and carried into France. After continuing there about five years, during which time he underwent much hardship and many cruelties, on account of the firmness of his determination, even at that tender age, not to give information which might affect his Captain, against whom the enemy was bitterly incensed on account of their suspecting him to have landed Pichegru, George, &c. on their coast, he finally succeeded in making his escape. But the sufferings which he endured from his long and repeated concealment in wet ditches, woods, and marshes, for upwards of three months, during the course of that escape, too visibly affected his constitution. His friends were often anxious with him for a change in his profession, but his attachment to it was unalterable; and, after staying with them for a few weeks only, he sailed as midshipman on board the Circe frigate, Captain Woolcombe, who has, in a letter from Gibraltar, announced his dissolution at the early age of nineteen. REPORT OF DISEASES, Under the Care of the late Senior Physician of the Finsbury Dispensary, from the 20th of December, 1810, to the 20th of January, 1811. THE Reporter was a few days since consulted by letter from a remote part of the country, with regard to the expediency of a chirurgical operation in a very grievous instance of ecrophulous disease. At a distance from the spot, and the case being of a nature partly surgical, it was of course only in a very qualified and conditional manner that he ventured to give his medical opinion. The circumstances and history of the complaint, however, were represented to be such, as led him to discourage the too hasty performance of the meditated operation. Scrophula being a disease of the constitution, is seldom to he remedied by the extraction or amputation of parts. The human frame rarely indeed suffers, unless when it is induced by external violence from any morbid affection that may strictly be regarded as local. The appearance of it may be superficial, or confined to a particular spot, but the real root is for the most part fixed in the interior, and is secretly ramified throughout the whole substance of the frame. For want of a due regard to this circumstance, limbs may be lost without life being preserved, or health in any degree amended by the deprivation. A case of epilepsy, that has recently fallen under the Reporter's notice, was a considerable time before anticipated, in a certain degree, by feelings which not unfrequently occur in a person who is destined, at some future period, to be the subject of this affection Not merely an acquaintance with the actual symptoms of a disorder, but with the previous history also of the patient, are highly interesting and instructive: the latter knowledge is often as necessary to the prevention, as the former is to the cure, of a disease. Itis of importance to know and to interpret rightly those signs which portend the approach of any formidable malady, that our fears may be aroused in time, and that we may seasonably oppose to the morbid tendency all the means of precaution and counteraction in our power. In complaints which fall under the denomination of nervous, this is more particularly incumbent. Upon minute enquiry of the patient alluded to, it appeared that several years before the complete formation of an epileptic paroxysm, she had been liable to a sleepiness, which was not removed by actual sleep, to a frequently recurring sense of intoxication, without having taken any inebriating draught or drug, to an almost habitual unsteadiness upon the feet, and sometimes to an actual staggering, She had been also remarkable for some months before her late, which was her first attack, of this complaint, for an incessant restlessness, and propensity to locomotion, a continual disposition to change her posture or her place. This mobility extended likewise to the mind, so that a permanent direction of it to one subject was an effort beyond her power. The atten tion was always fluttering on the wing. Not long before her epilepsy, she mentions having frequently experienced a variety of uncomfortable feelings, such as flashes of light before her eyes, head-ach, 'violent rushings as it seemed of blood towards the head, dizziness, dimness and confusion of vision, and a frequent sense of faintness approaching to syncope. She also states the having been subject to transient absenses of the intellectual faculty, which would seem to desert her for a few minutes, and then return in a manner that she could not account for. It is but seldom that we meet with a person whose previous life afforded so many admonitory hints of the specific danger which threatened her constitution; although perhaps it is for want of a scrutiny sufficiently strict that we do not ascertain, in every case of true epilepsy, the occurrence of most at least of these preliminary circumstances of awful presage. MONTHLY 1 MONTHLY COMMERCIAL REPORT. BRITISH TRADE AND MANUFACTURES.-Colonial produce, rum, sugar, coffee, and cotton, are very dull in the market for want of an opening to the continent. Sugars sell from, 69s. to 50s. per cwt. Jamaica rum 6s, per gallon, coffee 100s. per cwt, and West India cotton wool from 17d. to 23d. per lb. A large fleet sailed a few days ago from Portsmouth for the West Indies, few of the ships completely loaded. Their return with West India produce may be expected about June or July next, at which time we hope the market here may be more favourable than it is at present. PORTUGAL.-The principal part of the produce of this country has already arrived here, and the wines are of very inferior quality, owing to the want of brandies to make them up, added to the present distracted state of the peasantry, who attended formerly the vineyards, but now engaged in the warfare of the country. FRANCE. Owing to the recent failures in Paris, Burdeaux, &c. the little commerce enjoyed by this country is at a total stand, and a general want of confidence exists all over the continent, insomuch so, that bills of the most established banking-houses cannot be cashed or discounted without a premium of to 1 per cent, on the transaction, exclusive of a very heavy discount. The burning system of all British manufactured goods is carried on with the greatest avidity, and the spies and excisemen are the only people who benefit by this most unprecedented plan of Buonaparte's. SPAIN.-The commerce of this country at present consist chiefly in their export of sherry wine, fruit, and a few articles, the produce of their settlements in South America, the latter of which now come direct to Great Britain. ITALY. All the produce and manufactures of this country come to Britain with such accumulated charges, that little or nothing is done between the two countries, except in the article of raw silk, of which large quantities have lately been imported, very far inferior in quality to what we have formerly known it to be, and at very exorbitant prices. WEST INDIES.-The markets in this part of the world want a general supply of provisions, such as Irish beef, pork, and butter, for the supply of the plantations. However, very large quantities of all those necessaries have lately been shipped off from Cork, Dublin, and Waterford, and no doubt will get to a good market. The returned West India bills from London and Liverpool, &c. have proved very injurious to the planters and factors there, being attended with a loss of upwards of 20 per cent. re-exchange, costs, &c. &c. We sincerely hope for a stop to this detructive trade between the two countries. SOUTH AMERICA.-Hitherto the markets here have been glutted with all kinds of British coarse goods, which have been bartered with great disadvantage to our adventurers, and they now begin to find from experience, that no goods will sell to advantage here but of the very first quality. Irish linens, fit for shirtings, are in great demand, and yield a fair profit to the adventurer, as do all kinds of superfine printed calicoes, particularly of large showy patterns and of good bright colours. Metal pots, &c. well-chosen earthenware, and glass, meet a ready sale; and, in fine, nothing answers this market but goods of all kinds superior in their quality. NORTH AMERICA.-The commerce with this country continues steady, and the export of flax-seed has given new life to linen manufacture in the north of Ireland, where linens have fallen in price from 15 to 20 per cent, in consequence of the large supplies of this useful article. The seed of Boston, now nearly equal to that of Philadelphia, brings the same price in the Irish market, and is bought up, on landing, for ready money. A continuance of this commerce we wish long uninterrupted, being equally beneficial to both countries. We are concerned to observe, that the commercial failures continue to increase in number and consequence, in spite of the long and increased discount of the Bank of England, The average Prices of Canal Property, Shares, &c. in January 1811, (to the 24th) at the office of Mr. ScoTT, New Bridge-street, and Messrs. WOLFE and Co. No. 9. Change Alley, Cornhill.-Trent and Mersey, or Grand Trunk Canal, 12601.Birmingham, 10401.-Coventry, 8551.--Swansea, dividend 81. per share.-Monmouthshire, 1291. with 21. 10s. half year dividend.-Grand Junction, 2601.-Kennet and Avon, 421. to 431.-Rochdale, 521. 10s. 551.-West India Dock Stock, 1611.-Londan Dock, 1201. to 1281. NATURALIST's NATURALIST's MONTHLY REPORT. DECEMBER.-Dead winter month. Now joyless rains obscure Drive through the mingling skies with vapour foul; DURING nearly the whole of the present month the weather has been as variable as I almost ever recollect it. On the 1st and 20 the wind was northerly, accompa nied with a sharp frost. The 3d to the 6th it was westerly; north-west from the 7th to the 9th; south-west on the 10th; north-north-east on the 11th; westerly from the 12th to the 15th; north on the 16th and 17th; south-west and north-west on the 18th; easterly on the 19th; south-west and west on the 20th; westerly from the 21st to the 24th; north-west from the 25th to the 27th; northerly on the 28th and 29th, and north-east on the 30th and 31st. We had strong gales from the south-west or north-west, on the 6th, 18th, 21st, 234, 25th, and 27th, and hard gales on the 12th and 14th. The latter was a tremendous day. There has been rain on sixteen days of this month, but on the 31,-6th, 10th, 12t5, 18th, 20th, and 22d, much more than on any of the others. A hard frost commenced in the night of the 28th, and continued till the end of the month. In the night of the 31st, there was a considerable fall of snow, the first we have had this year. December 1. The season has hitherto been so mild, that several of the field flowers are yet in bloom. Among them I observe the Hedge Lychius, (Lychius dioica), Common fumitory, (fumaria officinalis), and gorse. December 6. A great quantity of herrings were caught in the evening of this day; and to the westward of this neighbourhood, herrings have continued to be caught during the greater part of the month. December 7. The weather was so warm that a large blue fly came in at the window of my sitting-room, and buzzed about the glass in the same manner as the flies do in summer. No pilchards have hitherto this year emigrated, so far eastward, as to our shores. December 13. Ewes have yeaned some days ago, and lambs are now, in several places, to be seen in the fields. December 16. So warm does the weather still continue, that a snake was this day seen out of its hole; and in the evening I observed black beetles of various species, (scarabæus stercorarius, &c.) flying about in every direction. December 17. Spiders appear upon their webs, and seem to be unaffected by the lateness of the season. The black, long-legged insects, which run about upon the surface of the water, and are usually denominated by the common people waterspiders, (cimex lacustris and stagnorum of Linnæus), continue to be seen. December 21. Bats are still to be seen flitting about in the evenings. The follow ing plants are in flower:-sweet-scented violet, wall-flower, mezereon, and hepatica, December 25 and 27. Snipes have in a great measure left the marshes, and are found in the dry lands. In the evening of each of these days there was much lightning. December 31. No wild fowl, except a very fow ducks and geese, have yet visited ns. The variable weather has no doubt been the cause of this. A tolerably severe frost, with the wind from the Eastward, are the usual prognostics of the arrival of these birds. Hampshire. MONTHLY AGRICULTURAL REPORT. The appearance of the wheat still continues sickly on that side, which, uncovered by the snow, remained exposed to the action of the northerly and easterly winds during the late frost, and the difference in hue and healthy countenance, between this, and that part covered and protected, is very striking. The changes, however, of wheat in the grass, so continual throughout every seasou, are of very little conzequence; the present unfavourable aspect will be readily improved by good weather. Bean planting, the immediate object of employment, is rather backward in general; but the lands work well, having received considerable benefit from the frost. All the various operations of husbandry proper to the season, are going forward without impediment, and almost universally, with degrees of improvement, and support from ample funds, peculiar and highly creditable to the present times. The practice of drilling, or sowing corn in rows, in order to facilitate the extirpation of weeds, is said to have declined in some particular districts, but to be increasing yearly, as a general practice. The stock of turnips and cattle food at present, very sufficient and good, remaining unhurt by the frost. The stock of cattle itself, very great, and markets going on in the general routine. Store pigs, although in considerable plenty, very dear; much pork expected to be made. Great demand from Ireland for breeding stock of this description. The florin grass, the uses of which have latety been discovered by Dr. Richardson, of Clonfecle, in Ireland, under experimental culture in various parts of England, Scotland, and Wales, and great hopes entertained of its utility. The wheat markets have been for some time at a stand, but to expect them cheaper, seems out of all probability, since the crop has at last turned out considerably below an average one; and the increasing demand, both for home corsumption, and that of our armies and allies abroad, will be fully equal to our power of supply, however considerable may be the imports. Smithfield. Beef, 5s. to 6s.-Mutton, 5s. 6d.-Veal, 6s. 8d. to 8s. 8d.-Houselamb, 7s. to 10s.-Pork, 5s. 4d. to 7s. 8d.-Bacon, 7s. 2d. to 7s. 6d.—Irish bacon, 69. 8d.-Fat, 4s. 6d. to 4s. 8d.-Skins, 25s. to 40s. Middlesex, Jan. 23. MONTHLY BOTANICAL REPORT. THE BOTANICAL MAGAZINE for last month contains, Aloe Radula of Jacquin, the attenuata of Haworth. Of the smaller alöes, which are better suited to the size of the work, Mr. Edwards has given some excellent specimens of his superior skill as an artist. Indeed we have seldom witnessed any thing superior, even in the splendid botanical productions of the Paris press. Aloe saponaria B. latifolia; one of the old varieties of perfoliata; a very large species, but of which a good idea is given by the insertion of a diminished outline, representing the habit of the whole plant. Mr. Ker has in this, as in all the tribe, taken great pains to elucidate the confused synonimy. He informs us that the smaller variety of this (a) minor, is the umbellata of Decandolle, excluding all his synonyms, which belong to A. picta; and is also the picta (B) minor, of the new edition of the Hortus Kewensis, as far as regards the synonym of the late edition; but that those quoted from Linnæus and Dillenius belong to A. picta. Although this species has been called American aloe, and Carolina aloe, it is not a native of America, but of the Cape. Taonus Eliphantipes, a female plant of the Cape Bryony, from Mr. Knight's collection in the King's-road, Chelsea. A male plant flowered in 1783, in the Kewgarden, from which M. L'Heritier had a drawing taken for his Sertum Anglicum; the engraving, however, though quoted in books, was never published; nor is there any figure of it that we know of extant. To those who have never seen this very singular plant, Mr. Edwards's outline sketch behind the flowering stem will not be easily understood. It represents the curious rootstock, which rises above the surface of the ground, and somewhat resembles a hemispherical section of the trunk, or rather of a warty excrescence, of some old tree. In this apparently lifeless state, it sometimes remains many months, now and then putting forth climbing stems, bearing alternate cordate leaves, with here and there branches of flowers in the axils of their footstalks, much in the same manner as the common black bryony. It is this shapeless, massive rootstock that has occasioned its being called, by the inhabitants of the Cape, the Elephant's-foot. Hermannia tenuifolia; a new species, which is probably lost to our gardens, as the drawing was taken in Mr. Curtis's time, and, except an imperfect specimen in the Banksian Herbarium, Dr. Sins has not been able to find any thing respecting its existence. Hermannia flammea, a beautiful little shrub from Mr. Knight's collection. Although we are presented with a good drawing of this plant, with flowers fully expanded, yet, as it is rarely seen in this state, we could have wished that some of the flowers at least had been represented in their very remarkably tight-twisted state, in which they look almost as if the tips had been rounded off with a pair of scissars. Mr. Andrews, in his Botanist's Repository, though his figure is otherwise very indifferent, has seized this peculiarity. The nocturnal fragrance of the flowers adds to the value of this plant. Astragalus sinicus. It seems remarkable that this pretty little annual should never have been before figured, though it has been at times in our gardens for forty years past. Tropaeolum peregrinum. This is at present a scarce, and considered as a tender plant; but being a native of the same country as the common tropœolum majus, there seems no reason why it should not become as hardy as that which is now almost naturalized to our clime: for Miller says, that this last will sow itself, and come up spontaneous the following summer, in favourable situations. There are several species of this this singular genus recorded in the Flora Peruviana, and it is not improbable, that distinct plants have been confounded under the name of T. peregrinum; Dr. Sims doubts if Feuillée's plant, cited as a synonym of this by all preceding writers, be the same, However this may be, there is no doubt respecting Jacquin's plant, well figured in his Hortus Schoenbrunensis. The ENGLISH FLORA, for last month, offers to our notice, Rubus saxatilis, a native of high mountains in the northern part of the island. The specimen from which the drawing was taken was gathered by Mr. Borrex, at Roslin, famous for its antique chapel, and delicious strawberries. Brasrica campestris. Dr. Smith remarks, that great uncertainty has existed among British authors, even from the time of Ray, respecting this plant. Hudson's campestris is a mere yellow variety of orientalis. According to Mr. Edw. Forster, this is the com¬ mon wild navew, growing abundantly by the sides of rivers, marsh ditches, &c.; and that the B. Napus of English Flora, is the rape, or cole-seed, so commonly cultivated. Hieracium prenanthoides. Brought from Scotland many years ago by Mr. Dixon, and has been ever since in Mr. E. Forster's garden, from whence the drawing was made. Dr. Smith observes that, in the Fiora Britannica, he had confounded this plant with denticulatum. There continues to be great difficulty in settling the species of this geuns. Dr. Smith believes, from the dried specimens he has received from Mr. G. Don, that the Scottish species are not yet all determined, but that the greatest attention to living plants can alone enable him to reduce them to order. When that is accomplished, he possesses ample materials for settling their synonyms. Carex Micheliana, introduced into Dr. Smith's Flora Britannica, he is now convinced is only a variety of recurva, as which he first received it from Dr. Beattie, of Aberdeen. The name of Micheliana being therefore superfluous, as Dr. Smith himself allows, ought not surely to have been suffered to stand as the title of this mere variety of recurva. METEOROLOGICAL REPORT. Observations on the State of the Weather, from the 24th of December 1810, to the 24th of January 1811, inclusive, Four Miles N.N.W. of St. Paul's. Highest, 30-10. Dec. 30 and 31. Wind N.E. Higheft, 57° Dec. 27. Lowest, 28-70. Dec. 25, Greatest 51 hunvariation in dredths of 24 hours." San inch. S.W. In the morning of the second inst. the thermometer stood at 29-87, and at the same hour on the third, it was по higher Lowest, 190 Jan. 10. Wind S.W. On the 10th of Jan. the mercury was, as is seen above, at 19o, but on the 11th it was at no time lower than 428. THE quantity of rain fallen this month is but small; it will be noticed in the next Report. It has rained six or seven days, but there was only a small quantity fell at a time. The average height of the thermometer, for the whole month, is only 31°; it will be in the recollection of all, that though at the commencement of our month, viz. the 25th ult. the weather was remarkably mild; yet, for about a fortnight from the 29th, it was very severe, during which a good deal of snow fell. There have been some very thick fogs, and much dark and dull weather; nevertheless, the number of brilliant days has been nine. The wind bas chiefly been in the northerly quarters, and some days it has blown very violently. Our correspondent from the Isle of Wight, has kindly transmitted to us the result of his observations, taken during the months of October, November, and December; by which it appears that the Average heat for Oct. was 50° nearly. Nov. - 44° By this it will appear, that in the island, as well as in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, those were very rainy months; in the whole quantity being rather more than 20 inches in depth. |