nerals deluged the shore of Africa with blood; they acted with so much perfidy and intolerance, that they united against themselves the various nations of Mauritania. They had found them divided, as they now are, and all equally ready to shake off a yoke which was insupportable to them, if another yoke, still heavier and more abhorred, had not been offered in exchange. It is well known what resentment was cherished by the Moors against the odious Hugh de Moncade, who boasted of having belonged to the school of Cæsar Borgia, whose vices he possessed without his good qualities. Philippino Doria, ready to give him battle, hesitated not to set loose from chains the Moors of his own gallies, and to give them arms. These ruffians, still covered with the blows which they had received from the Genoese, for whom they were going to fight, darted forward, half naked, and with sabre in hand, against the galley of the cruel viceroy of Naples; and they gratified their thirst for the blood of him who has shed so much on the coast of Africa.

Good policy, which is that of humanity, of benevolence, of religious toleration, will always easily separate the Moors, the Berebbers, the Bedouin Arabs, and the cultivating Arabs, at the foot of Mount Atlas, from the Turks their oppressors. The latter are brave, it is true, but ignorant in the art of war; and European tactics secure to an able captain an immense superiority over such soldiers, notwithstanding the greatest disproportion of numbers. The glorious campaigns in Egypt prove it. M. Pananti would not wish the conquest of Africa to be attempted with less than a hundred thousand men. It is sad to think, that while so many hundreds of thousands have been put in motion by narrow and false views of ambition, by jealousy, by vengeance, and to stop the career of civilization, there is perhaps no chance that Europe will find a hundred thousand for a plan of conquest which humanity and philosophy could approve. Yet he calls for the formation of an European league to deliver Africa;-but we know what is the usual fate of leagues; how each member claims all the profit and all the honour of the enterprise, throwing upon others all the labour and danger. In an invasion of Africa, negotiation would be still more important than arms, since it would, first of all, be necessary to persuade the people, that their oppressors only were

to be attacked, and that the conquerors would respect their religion, their manners, their rights, and their happiness. But the contradictory projects of numerous allies, their injudicious measures, and their secret jealousies, would unquestionably thwart every negotiation.

Must we then banish every hope of redress to the land of chimeras, or, which is almost the same thing, to that of memory? We do not think so. France, Italy, and Spain, are particularly exposed to the provocations of the Barbary States. One of these nations, should it regain the vigour it once possessed, would be sufficient, with only a part of its force, to effect the conquest of Africa. In looking forward to an era which cannot be distant, though nothing yet shows its near approach, it is not useless to recall without ceasing the outrages of the piratical governments, to fix the attention of the public upon the advantages, and the probable success of a descent upon Africa; and to form such an opinion in Europe, that the moment a sovereign, from a just sense of offended dignity, should undertake a serious war against the Barbary States, no other would think it lawful to oppose him in so noble an enterprise. Under this point of view, M. Pananti appears to us, by his work, to have deserved well of humanity.

DUMB CREATURES.

All the notice that we lords of the creation vouchsafe to bestow on dumb creatures, is generally to abuse them. It is well, therefore, that here and there a man should be found a little womanish, or perhaps a little childish, in this matter, who will make some amends, by kissing and coaxing, and laying them in one's bosom. You remember the little cwe lamb mentioned by the prophet Nathan: the prophet perhaps invented the tale, for the sake of its application to David's conscience; but it is more probable, that God inspired him with it for that purpose. If he did, it amounts to a proof that he does not overlook, but, on the contrary much notices such little particularities and kindnesses to his dumb creatures, as we, because we articulate, are pleased to call them.

SOME ACCOUNT OF WERNER.

By M. Héron de Villefosse, Inspector of the Royal Corps of Mines, Associate of the Royal Academy of Sciences, &c. From Annales des Mines, Deuxième Livraison, 1817.

[SOME writers in this country, says the Editor of the Edinburgh Magazine, have more than once attempted to persuade the public, that the late illustrious Werner was a mere visionary, or, at best, a man fitted only for establishing distinctions amongst minerals. They have denied to him all originality of views in regard to the structure and formation of the earth,-his mode of investigating and tracing the connexions and relations of rocks and minerals, has been held in derision, and his talents as a useful practical miner, have been altogether disregarded. This presumption and ignorance have not failed to call forth the indignation of all those interested in the advancement of one of the most important departments of natural knowledge, and the attacks of Chenevix, and other philosophers, have been triumphantly answered by the general adoption of Werner's views in this island, and by the establishment of Societies,* whose object is not the support of any particular theory of the earth, but the investigation of its structure and composition, according to the method first pointed out by Werner. The members of these distinguished associations have, within a few years, brought before the public a vast body of important information in regard to the mineralogical structure of this island, which cannot fail to be of the greatest utility to the country in general, by the clue it will af ford to the miner in his researches after useful minerals. This, indeed, is another proof of the value of Werner's ideas, that lead not, as has been contemptuously remarked, always into the mazes of German metaphysics, or physics,—but to those objects that add to the greatness of a country, and to the comforts of its population. Werner, indeed, was the most learned miner of his time, he was the greatest benefactor to the important art of mining the world ever saw,-from his lecture-room proceeded all the most accomplished miners of the time when he flourished,-and these valuable men carried from Freyberg to the farthest corners of the earth, an admiration of the virtues and of the extraordinary talents and acquirements of their illustrious master. It affords us much pleasure to have it in our power to add to our feeble testimony of the splendid talents of the ever to be regretted and excellent Werner, that of his pupil, M. Villefosse, one of the most eminent scientific and practical miners in France.]

• Wernerian Natural History Society,-Geological Society of London, -Royal Geological Society of Cornwall.

Several months have elapsed since the journals announced the death of M. Werner, Member of the Council of Mines of Freyberg, in Saxony, Knight of the Royal Order of Merit, and Foreign Associate of the Royal Institute of France. More than one voice, doubtless, has been raised in Germany to pay homage to the talents and the virtues of this illustrious German. In many a subterranean mine-work the miners of Saxony will have been already melted into tears by the melancholy words, "Our Werner is no more!" This simple announcement must have excited the most lively regrets even in the remotest countries, where the success of the mines was in a great measure the result of the labours of Werner, as it will be, during many ages, the finest monument of his glory.

In one point of view, it would be of great advantage that Werner should be still better known in France than he generally is. For a long time, indeed, the reputation of the professor of Freyberg has been, so to speak, classical among the French mineralogists, but it appears to be confined to the cabinets of our men of science, and has scarcely found its way into our mines. This, however, in its proper place; it is from thence that we now propose to do homage to the memory of this true friend of the miners, who consecrated his life to the advancement of their extensive, important, and arduous labours, and who has thus acquired an incontestable right to the gratitude of every country which possesses mines.

Born about the middle of the last century in the iron-work of which his father was proprietor, in the vicinity of Werhau, in Lusatia, Werner perceived, almost from his infancy, that the miners stood in need of a guide capable of leading them into new luminous paths, of enabling them to distinguish mineral substances with promptitude and certainty,-of enlightening them in their researches, and in all their labours,-of collecting, comparing, and classifying the facts observed in the bosom of the earth;-in short, of forming, for the benefit of the mines of all countries, a common treasure of acquired knowledge. He resolved to be that guide, and he speedily became so.

Having been appointed an officer of the mines at Freyberg, he constantly directed his studies towards that association which he

had proposed to himself to effect between the practice of the art of mining, and the numerous sciences from which it may derive assistance. Werner, from observations on the mountains and mines of Saxony, anticipated, in some measure, the identity of structure which has been since observed in so many countries, in the rocks and mineral masses which constitute the exterior crust of our globe. From that time the mines of the whole world presented themselves to his mind as a subterraneous country, where the same general principles ought to prevail,-where the same terms of art, whatever might be the difference of idioms, ought to facilitate a useful correspondence not only between the miners of all countries, but also, and above all, between the man of science and the workman. It was in the school of the mines of Freyberg, founded by the king of Saxony in the year 1766, that Werner occupied himself incessantly in laying down these principles, and fixing that language. He succeeded in this in the happiest manner, by attaching a precise and intelligible meaning to the expressions employed by him in describing objects, by adopting almost always the terms of common language: and he often did not even disdain to employ the phraseology in familiar use among the workmen.

To produce this important revolution in the art of mining, which has for a long time made Freyberg be regarded as the metropolis of that subterranean country, Werner has published two works, neither of which exceeds a small volume in duodecimo. The first treats of the knowledge of minerals according to their external appearance, the second of the arrangement of the repositories of minerals in the bosom of the earth.

These works, originally written in German, have been translated into almost every language, and particularly into French.' The principles of the first have been developed, with their application, in the "Traité de Mineralogie," which M. Brochant, chief engineer of the mines of France, has published, according to the school of Werner; the second has been the subject of a ju

* The works above alluded to are, the Treatise on the External Character of Minerals, of which we have an English translation by Mr. Weaver of Dublin, the other is the work on the Natural History of Veins, which has been translated by Dr. Anderson of Leith.