Sect. III, on the treatment after suppuration has taken place. Mr. H. is uncertain how far fuppuration can be increased by medicine or application.

Sect. IV, of collections of matter without inflammation. The diftinctions here laid down feem equally just and ingenious.

In Sect. VI. and VII. the effect produced on the constitution by these collections of matter, and by the fuppurative inflammation, are ably contrafted. It may be doubted, however, whether the chronic thickening procefs and the rapid inflammatory thickening procefs are not, at the bottom, the fame. Both at least have probably the common circumftance of for mation of new veffels.

Chap. V., of pus, contains three fections, one on the forma tion, another on the properties, and the third on the use, of this fluid. The obfervations contained under these heads are in great measure free from obfcure hypothetical fuggeftions; nor can any thing be better calculated to emancipate the minds of furgeons from inveterate prejudices, and, by confequence, to bring into difcredit pernicious practices fanctioned by fuch prejudices.

The fixth Chapter, on the ulcerative inflammation, gives the author occafion to expatiate on the uses of the abforbent system. He dwells particularly on the removal of whole parts of the body, whether in confequence of difeafe or not; in the former of which cafes, ulceration fometimes takes place.

The fections which follow this introduction elucidate phyfiology at large no less than the art of furgery. They are enti tled, 1. of the remote caufe (it fhould be, caufes) of the animal itfelf; II. of the difpofition of living parts to absorb and be ab forbed; III. of interstitial abforption; IV. of the progressive abforption; V. of abforption attended with fuppuration, which I have called ulceration; VI. of the relaxing procefs; VII. of the intention of abforption of the body in difeafe; VIII. the modes of promoting abforption; 1X. illuftrations of ulceration. There are many paffages in thefe fections which would afford interefting quotations; as, for inftance, what is faid of the different effects of external and internal preffure. We cannot, however, transfufe any more of the fubftance of this work: its spirit will appear from what has been already quoted.

Chap. VII., of granulations. The author explains the effect of exposure on granulations; like vegetation, they always tend to the furface. A cafe, however, is related, from which it appears that neither fuppuration nor exposure is abfolutely neceffary to granulation. In Sect. II. III. and IV. the extraor dinary vascularity, the healthy and unhealthy colour, the longevity, and the contractile power, of granulations, are described

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with great accuracy. This whole chapter will be found amufing; and, as the author has no pretenfions to the talents of á fine writer, it affords a proof that the account of a natural object needs only to be diftinct and faithful to be highly agreeable.

Chap. VIII., of skinning, of the nature of the new skin, of the new cuticle, of the new rete mucofum, which fometimes.

never forms at all.

Chap. IX. offers the reader much of Mr. Hunter's peculiar fpecies of fpeculation, on the confequences of inflammation to the conftitution, on hectic fever, and on that unaccountably fudden death which fometimes follows operations that usually do well. On this latter head, there are, however, a number of good obfervations.

Part III., of the treatment of abfceffes, confifts but of twelve pages, and is purely practical. Mr. H.'s intention is to lay down fuch general furgical rules for their treatment, and for many of their confequences, as will include almost every disease of this kind, confidered as an abfcefs fimply. In p. 514 we find him fpeaking with indecifion concerning the advantage and difadvantage of large and fmall openings. Whether this arifes from his opinion concerning the admiffion of air, or from his confidering the lumbar abfcefs as a collection of matter, not arifing from inflammation, but of fcrophulous origin, and fo not to his prefent purpose, we cannot certainly determine: but it feems proper to advise young furgeons to confider this point well before they proceed to a large incifion.

Part IV., of gunshot wounds, clofes this elaborate treatise. As this part lies in fo fmall a compafs as 44 pages; and as the author, befides his general eminence in the profeffion, enjoyed extenfive opportunities of attending to gunshot wounds, of feeing the errors and defects in that branch of military furgery, and of ftudying to remove them;' (dedication to the king ;) we cannot help feeling fome furprife that it has not been feparately published for the inftruction of army furgeons. At no time could fuch a feparate republication have been more opportune; and it would feem by no means fuperfluous; for the author himself remarks that, if we obferve the practice hi therto purfued, we fhall find it very confined, being hardly reduced to the common rules of furgery, and therefore it was hardly neceffary for a man to be a furgeon to practice in the army.'

Befides a characteristic head of the author, the volume is enriched with nine engravings, illuftrative of certain of Mr. H.'s doctrines.

No index is fubjoined; and in the copy on our table, we difcover no lift of prefs-errors, though they are numerous and tometimes very important.

In

In our analyfis, we have laboured to apprize our readers fully of the contents of this important production, and at the fame time to exhibit the fingularities of its character. No period, we believe, has given birth to an individual whofe refearches have fo compleatly elucidated the nature of those morbid actions, which fall under the cognizance of the furgeon. It is to be lamented that his discoveries fhould be encumbered by a theory, not lefs vifionary but far more perplexed than that which Sydenham affociated with his faithful obfervations of pathological phenomena. Mr. Hunter, in the bounty of his imagination, endows the feveral parts of the body with intellectual and moral faculties. According to him, they tranfact

Quicquid agunt homines

exactly in the way in which men tranfact it. To bring together all the paffages in the prefent volume, in which this theory is implied, would be extremely curious. Were they collected, it would appear that the following statement is rather unravelling what lay entangled in Mr. Hunter's mind, than a caricature of his fentiments: "On such and fuch an occafion, part A fends its compliments to part B, and begs it will take on fuch a mode of action: this invitation B either accepts or declines."

The obfcurity, of which fo many of Mr. Hunter's readers complain, arifes neither from depth of thought, nor from want of power over words; he is perfectly intelligible where he understood himself: but he rather infinuates than unfolds the whimfical analogies which we have pointed out. He did not perhaps fully unfold them to himfelf; and it is not surprising that the language of a man, who wrote in this puzzled ftate, fhould excite no diftinct ideas in the mind of his reader.

MONTHLY

CATALOGUE,

For SEPTEMBER, 1795.

EAST INDIA AFFAIRS.

Art. 15. A brief Account of the Tullagaum Expedition from Bombay; and likewife of the Sieges of Baffien, Arnol!, Callian, and Cannanore, on the western Side of India, during the Courie of the War, commenced on the 21ft of November, 1778. Extracted from the Journal of an Officer, who was actually employed on thofe Services. (Captain Frederic Jones.) 4to. Is. Printed at Brecknock, and

fold by Wilkie, London. 1794. THESE Circumftantial details of military movements will be chiefly interefting to readers who are perfonally acquainted with the fcenes of action here defcribed, particularly those who serve, or have ferved, in the armies employed by Great Britain in that part of the world. They may alfo, as Capt. Jones intimates in his dedicatory

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addrefs

addrefs to the Directors of the East India Company.' occafionally prove acceptable as a mite towards the information of any historical gentleman of greater abilities, who may chufe to write a general history of our wars in India.'

If intelligent officers, who are capable of ufing the pen as well as the fword, would, in like manner, (following the example of Capt. Jones, and fome others, formerly noticed in our reviews,) accustom themselves to commit their obfervations to paper, during their hours of relaxation from the duties of the field, they might thus afford confiderable affiftance to the historian, and (perhaps,) in fome inftances to the biographer; thereby contributing materially to the ufeful information and rational entertainment of pofterity, as well as of the age in which they live.

WEST INDIA AFFAIRS.

Art. 16. A Letter to Bryan Edwards, Efq. containing Obfervations on fome Passages of his History of the West Indies. 4to. 2s. 6d. Johnfon. 1795:

The flavery of the negroes in the Weft Indies is the interesting subject of this well-written addrefs to Mr. Edwards. The author is a confirmed enemy to this fpecies of cruelty to human creatures,-for which he confiders the very ingenious hiftorian as a too powerful apologift pleading as Mr. E. does, in his admirable work, for the continuance of the flave-trade, with all the advantages of eloquent language, and energy of argument, enforced by experience. The letter-writer acquits himself, as advocate in the cause of humanity, with fuch refpectable ability, that we are perfuaded Mr. E. will not be ashamed of a contest with fuch an opponent :-but this fubject has already been fo completely exhaufted, in the numerous publications to which it has given rife, and in our several reviews of them, that we may reasonably conclude it unneceffary for us to repeat, on the prefent occafion, what has so often been urged, by fo many good writers, in this hitherto unavailing contraversy. We may add, however, that, among those writers, Mr. P. is entitled to rank with the foremost for ability, candour, and urbanity of language,

LAW.

Art. 17. A. Treatife of the Pleas of the Crown, or a Syftem of the principal Matters relating to that Subject, digefted under proper Heads. By William Hawkins, Serjeant at Law. The feventh Edition, in which the Text is carefully collated with the original Work: the marginal References corrected; new References from the modern Reporters added; a Variety of MSS Cafes inferted; and the whole enlarged by an Incorporation of the feveral Statutes upon Subjects of Criminal Law, to the 35th of George the Third. By Thomas Leach, Efq. Barrister at Law. 4 vols. Royal 8vo. 21. 2s. Boards. Robinions. $795.

As the prefent edition is fo greatly enlarged, we fhall extract from the preface an account of the additions which have been introduced, and of the plan adopted by Mr. Leach;

William Prefton, Efq. Gloucefter-street, Dublin; the author of Poems, &c. See Rev. N. S. vol, xvi. P. 166,

The

• The first volume treats, in general, of those offences that are denominated crimes ;-the fecond is, with very few exceptions, confined to mifdemeanors;—the third defcribes the powers and authorities of the feveral courts of criminal jurisprudence, together with the learne ing relating to appeals ;-and in the fourth will be found the whole proceedings from the framing and finding an indictment or information, to the final execution of the law by the punishment of the offender.

⚫ Befides this general divifion of the work, many other alterations have been made in each of the volumes.

In the first volume, in the chapter of " Offences against the King," a new and more perfpicuous arrangement of the matter, particularly that part of it which relates to " counterfeiting the coin," has been made. In the chapters on LARCENY and ROBBERY alío, the various judicial decifions are made to form a part of the text, and the feveral ftatutes by which the different kinds of this offence are deprived of the benefit of clergy, with the conftruction they have from time to time received, are continued at the end of the chapter. The chapter on PIRACY alfo has been confiderably enlarged. But the moft material alteration in the volume, is a new collection of the whole code of crimes created by ftatute, arranged, as nearly as poffible, according to the method obferved by Sir WILLIAM BLACESTONE in his Commentaries. The extracts of thefe ftatutes from the Statute Book are, in general, much enlarged, and have been carefully collated with the originals; and at the end of each ftatute the judicial determinations which have been made upon it are inferted as a comment upon the text.

In the fecond volume, the law relating to PUBLIC HOUSES, which before was a mere chronological feries of the ftatutes on that fubject, has been digefted under different heads, and the new sta tutes, with the decifions thereon, inferted. Under the title MONOPOLIES also will be found a great variety of new matter refpecting the law of Literary Property, and the exclufive right which is conferred by patent or act of parliament to manufacturers in certain cafes. The chapter on USURY has been entirely new-modelled; and all the new decifions upon this fubject added. The laws relating to the SEDUCTION OF ARTIFICERS, to the EXPORTATION OF TOOLS; to GAMING, and to VAGRANTS, will also be found among the new matter contained in this volume.

In the third volume the law relating to the PoWER AND OFFICE OF JUSTICES OF THE PEACE, whether acting individually or in feffions, has been the particular object of the Editor's attention. The fubjects are now divided into diftinct chapters; arranged under new heads; and the whole law, as far as it was capable of being collected from manufcript notes and the modern reporters, inferted.

In the fourth volume a new chapter concerning INFORMATIONS Quo Warranto has been introduced; the matter relating to PROCESS BY Certiorari AND OUTLAWRY confiderably enlarged; as well as the chapter on EVIDENCE in Criminal Cafes.

To thefe alterations all the decisions which have been made fince the last edition, are inferted under their refpective titles; but the new

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