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Prince EUGENE of Savoy.-7thly, Two Treatifes of the late M. GALAND, which are become exceedingly rare: the one entitled, REMARKABLE SAYINGS OF THE EASTERNS, and the other ORIENTAL MAXIMS.-It must not be omitted, that this 4to edition of HERBELOT has the peculiar advantage of being improved by the ADDITIONS of M. SCHULTENS, lately chofen profeffor of the oriental Languages at Leyden, in the place of his learned and worthy father; and who reflects new honour on the very refpectable name he bears. This learned profeffor,

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tafte is as elegant as his erudition is extenfive, has furnished rticles to the work before us, and corrected fome of the

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Ak T. XIII.

oyens que la faine Medecine, &c.-Concerning the Means that be employed by a wife Practitioner in Medicine, to render Individuals of one Sex more numerous than those of the other. M. SAURI, M. D. Correspondent Member of the Royal Acay of Sciences of Montpellier. Paris. 1779. (Price 1 Livre ols.)

HIS is the Sixth Part or Number of the Opufcula of Dr. Sauri; and a curious piece it is, both with respect to the of the fubject, and the manner of treating it: more curideed, than important; for the prefent proportion bethe numbers of the two fexes, feems to be well enough. d for the purposes of fociety, and the merit, manners, and genius of the male and female orders in our islands, as elsewhere, are become fo equal, both in kind and dehat it seems of no great confequence which of the two be ocked with individuals. However, if, in any future fhould become a matter of moment to have more caps gs, or the vice verfa (which is more likely to be the cafe, gs confidered), M. SAURI'S book will deferve the atof our political economists. His method of proceeding llows: After expofing to view the different hypothefes. fophers, with refpect to the nature and mechanism of on, and adopting that of M. Buffon, with certain mons which do not alter it effentially, he concludes, from ory and his own repeated obfervations, that the indivithe two fexes who poffeffes the generative faculty in the, degree (we fuppofe he means at the time of their union), or her fex to the off-fpring;-and, if we may believe JRI, this takes place both in the human and the animal The confequence is, that if medical fcience can give a ty to the generative faculty of male or female, it must be of determining the fex of their progeniture. Our Auiks he has difcovered a method of giving the medical art

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this fingular influence; nay, the means prescribed are remarkable for their fimplicity. Those who defire information on this head, may confult the work itfelf, for which they must apply to the Author; who acknowledges no copies to be genuine, that do not bear his fignature. He lives at Paris, in the street Richlieu-Sorbonne, in the College des Treforiers.

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ART. XIV.

Obfervations fur la Formation des Montagnes et les Changemens àrrivis au Globe, &c.-Observations on the Formation of Mountains, and the Changes and Revolutions which have taken place in our Globe; compofed with a View to the Natural Hiftory of M. de Buffon. By P. S. PALLAS, Member of the Academy of Peterf burg, in 12mo. pp. 90. Price 24 Livres. Printed at Paris. 1779. HIS laborious and intelligent Author, who by the order and peculiar encouragement of the Empress of Ruffia, travelled through her dominions in Europe and Afia, to examine the state of Nature in thefe vaft regions, has communicated to the Public, in the fmall work now before us, a confiderable number of important observations. The origin and formation of mountains, is the object that has more particularly employed his attention in this work. He undertakes to refute, by undoubted facts, the opinions, much in vogue, of certain Naturalifts, who suppose, that the mountains arofe out of the waters, and derived exiftence and formation from the ocean. His ob fervations, repeated in different places, have convinced him that the great ridge or chain of primitive mountains, that binds together the various parts of the globe, as the beams do the masonry of a building, neither has been, nor could be, the production of the waters. This majestic chain, which he follows in an ample and interefting defcription, is all granite, with a bafis of quartz, more or less mixed with fpars, mica, and little portions of bafaltes, fcattered without order, and in irregular fragments. This ancient rocky fubftance, and the fand produced by its decompofition, form (according to M. Pallas) the bafis of all the continents. But this rocky granit is never found in ftrata or beds; it is either in blocks, or at leaft in maffes, accumulated the one upon the other, and never exhibits the least mark or veftige of petrifaction, or of any organical impreffion whatever. Befides thefe primordial mountains, M. PALLAS maintains, that there are others of a more recent origin. Thefe he calls fecondary and tertiary: the former, which are febiftous, were produced at the fides of the primordial mountains by the decompofition of the granites; the latter arife from the wrecks and contents of the fea, raifed and tranfported by volcaaic eruptions and confequent inundations.

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Here we have our Author's hypothefis. Having lived for ten years in the midst of these mountains, and ftudied their majestic beauties, which are as much adapted to suggest systems to the Naturalift, as numbers to the Poet, he comes after the Burnets, the Whistons, the Woodwards, the Mallets, the Scheuchzers, and the Buffons, and fays,-Gentlemen, -with your leave,I also am a fyftem-maker. Suppofing then, fays he, that the high granitic primordial mountains formed, from the origin of things, ifles at the furface of the ocean, and that the decompofition of the granite produced the first accumulations of quartzeous and sparic fand, and of a micacious mud, of which the grains and schistes of the ancient chains or ridges were compofed,-what then? why then the fea must have carried along with it, to the fides of the land, the light, ferrugineous, and phlogisticated matters, produced by the diffolution of thofe multitudes of vegetables and animals, which it contained, and by filtrating these principles into the ftrata, which it had depofited on the granite, must have formed thofe heaps of pyrites, the furnaces of the first volcanos, whofe fucceffive eruptions were afterwards obferved in different parts of the globe. Thefe ancient volcanos, whofe marks and veftiges have been loft in the lapfe of ages, demolished the frata, which had become folid through time, and under which their explosions had been made they changed and modified, in different manners, by fufing or calcinating them by the activity of fire, the substances of thefe ftrata, and thus they produced the firft mountains of the fchiftous band, which correfponds in part with the beds of clay, and of the fand of the plains, and alfo formed thofe calcareous mountains, whofe vault is folid and without any appearances or veftiges of petrifications. It was then, that, in -the caverns and chinks, accumulations were made, and veins were formed of quartz, fpars, minerals, phlogifticated subftances, &c.: the fea, washing the lower parts of the mountains, depofited there marine productions, which imperceptibly formed banks of corals and fhells: and new volcanos forcing the fea to retire, raifed thefe banks and produced the huge calcareous Alps of Europe. But there must have happened a prodigious conuulfion in our globe, and an inundation of a moft violent and dreadful kind. Our Author could no longer doubt (fays he) of the certainty of a general deluge, when he found in Siberia the remains of the huge animals of India, the bones of elephants, rhinocerofes, and monftrous buffaloes, fometimes difperfed here and there, fometimes accumulated in heaps, and in fuch quantities that they are become an important object of commerce for that province. What furprised him the moft, was his finding in thofe frozen regions, that lie on the borders

of the Vilozzi, the carcafs of a rhinoceros, with its whole fkin, and the remains of tendons, ligaments, and cartilages. He has depofited the parts that were beft preferved, in the cabinet of the academy of Petersburg, and he wishes that fome zealous and accurate obferver of Nature could arrive at thofe mountains, which lie between the rivers Indigifka and Kolyma, where the huntfmen affirm, that they have feen feveral carcaffes of elephants and other gigantic animals. These obfervations, and thofe made by Mr. Juffieu, upon the ferns and Indian plants, whofe forms are vifibly imprinted on the ftegania or flates in the European quarries, prove evidently, according to M. PALLAS, that the inundation which brought them into our northern regions, came from the South or the Indian Ocean. M. PALLAS attributes this terrible deluge to the violent eruptions of a quantity of volcanos, which he places in the Indian Archipelago. The firft eruption, which raifed the bottom of a very deep fea, and which, perhaps, at one fhock, or feveral which followed each other clofely, formed the ifles of Sunda, the Moluccas, the Phillipines, and the Auftral Sands, must have driven away, on all fides, fuch an enormous mass of water as furpaffes imagination. This mafs, impelled with violence against the strong barrier which the continued ridge of Afiatic and European mountains oppofed to it on the North, and preffed ftill forward by new inundations, muft have produced the most dreadful havoc and confufion, and the most enormous breaches in the lands of these continents: it must have carried along with it the banks of fand, fhells, &c. that were formed before their coafts, as alfo the higher ftrata of the first lands; and, rifing above. the lefs elevated parts of the chain, which forms the middle, the continent must have tranfported to, and depofited on, the. oppofite declivities all thefe wrecks and frag-ments, mixed with the fubftances which the eruption had already blended with the waters of the ocean; it must likewife have buried without order, the fhattered remains of the trees and animals that were enveloped in this general ruin, and formed, by thefe fucceffive tranfportations (depôts), the tertiary mountains, as our Author calls them, and the terrene acceffions, or alluvions (atteriffemens), of Siberia.-Finally, this enormous mafs of water, fet in motion by volcanic erruptions, directed its courfe towards the Pole, with the whole body of water that as yet covered the plains, and thus formed the inequalities, the valleys, the veftiges of rivers, the lakes, and great gulphs of the Northern ocean, overturning, in its courfe, the most ancient ftrata, and fill carrying along with it a fufficient quantity of heterogeneous fubftances to fill up a part of deeps of that ocean, and to occafion the fhelves, fhallows, and fand-banks, that are found near its coafts.

Such is the hypothefis of M. PALLAS: and it may have its day-and why fhould it not? for it does not hang in the air, upon the tail of a comet, like the Epochas of Nature; and though it lies open to difficulties and objections, yet the theory it contains, with refpect to the formation of the mountains, draws many lines of probability from Natural Hiftory, and an obfervation of the prefent ftate of the globe. Natural History is the indulgent parent of all the fyftem-makers :- they all appeal to her; and the appears to bear teftimony to them all: at leaft, they all fay fo.

ART. XV.

Legiflation Orientale.-Ouvrage dans lequel, &c.-Oriental Legiflation. A Work, in which, by a Difplay of the Fundamental Principles of Government in the Turkish, Perlian, and Indian Dominions, it is proved,-First, That the Manner in which most Writers have hitherto reprefented Defpotifm, as if it were abfolute in these three Empires, is entirely illufory, and groundlefs.-Secondly, That in Turkey, Perfia, and Indoftan, there are Codes of written Law, which affect the Prince, as well as the Subject.-Thirdly, That in these three Empires, the Inhabitants are poffeffed of Property, both in moveable and immoveable Goods, which they enjoy with an entire Liberty. By M. ANQUETIL DU PERRON, of the Academy of Infcriptions and Belles Lettres, and King's Interpreter for the Oriental Languages. 4to. Paris and Amfterdam. 1779.

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HIS title exhibits the plan of our Author's work, and this plan is executed in fuch a manner, as might be expected from the extenfive erudition and capacity of the Writer. We found a certain propenfity to adopt his opinion, even before we faw the arguments by which it is fupported; for surely it is a great relief to humanity to find, that fo confiderable a part of our fpecies are not fuch wretched flaves, as hath been fo often faid. The authorities on which he builds his fyftem, are those very travellers who have mifled the Public, by confounding arbitrary acts, and periods of violence and diforder, with the ufual and permanent state of things. To the teftimony of travellers he adds his collection of original papers and records, fuch as à Daily Gazette of the Mogul court, in which an account is published of the affairs of the empire.-A circumftantial enumeration of the functions and departments of the different minifters, taken from a book called Akbar-namah, composed by Aboulfazel, fecretary to Schah-Akbar,-and from the copy of a deed or contract of fale, in which the forms obferved in transactions of that kind are accurately mentioned. We leave the reader to judge, by perufing this inftructive work, how far the Author has fucceeded in proving his hypothefis. As for our part, we have been more entertained and inftructed by his learning and dexte

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