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the Garigliano. The small river Fibrenus, which ran by Cicero's paternal villa, falls into it not far from Arpinum.

'The city of Rome itself was built on seven hills*: Mons Palatinus, in the center, then Capitolinus, Quirinalis, Viminalis, Esquilinus, Cœlius, Aventinus; the most extreme t, North and South, were Quirinalis and Aventinus. On the Esquiliæ were the splendid palace and gardens of Mæcenas. On the Palatine Hill was the celebrated Palatine library § of Augustus. This was the first inhabited part of Rome, and is sometimes put, by way of eminence, for the whole . Indeed, here was the residence of Romulus and the Roman Kings, of Augustus and the Roman Emperors; whence Palatium has ever since been applied to the residence of a monarch. On Mons Capitolinus was the Capitol, and Tarpeian Rock. Mons Aventinus was the burying-place of Remus; hence it was looked upon as a place of ill omen q. Between the Collis Capitolinus, Quirinalis, and the Tiber, was the Campus Martius, the principal ituation of modern Rome; and opposite Mons Palatinus, across the Tiber, on the Tuscan side, was the Janiculum. At the foot of the Capitol was the Forum Romanum, and on one side of it the famous Milliarium Aureum, or Golden Milestone, from which all the Roman Roads were measured. The nations in the immediate vicinity of Rome, during the earlier periods of the Roman history, were the Latini below Rome; the Æqui and Hernici East of Rome; the Aurunci below them, on the coast of Latium, towards Campania ; the Marsi East of the Equi; the Sabini North of Rome; and to the North West of it, the Veientes.'

From this transcript, our readers may form a judgment of the method which has been adopted by Dr. Butler: in which, we think, we can discover a certain confusion of poetic tradition with historical event; as if "a local habitation and a name" might as confidently be assigned to "airy nothings" as to the phænomena of nature. For instance, at p. 85. we are told that Neapolis was previously called Parthenope, from the name of

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Hence Horace :

Diis quibus septem placuere colles.

+ Hence Horace:

Cubat hic in colle Quirini,
Hic extremo in Aventino: visendus uterque :
Intervalla vides humane commoda.

Nunc licet Esquiliis habitare salubribus, atque
Aggere in aprico spatiari, qua modo tristes
Albis informem spectabant ossibus agrum.
§ Scripta Palatinus quæcunque recepit Apollo.
|| Hence Hor.

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"Si Palatinas videt æquus arces
Remque Romanam Latiumque felix.

Ut immerentis fluxit in terram Remi
Sacer nepotibus cruor.

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Carm. Sæc. 7.'

Epist. ii. 2.'

Hor. Sat. i. 8.' Hor. Epist. i. 3.'

Carm. Sæc. 65."

Hor. Epod. vii. 18.'

one

one of the Sirens who was said to have lived there;' and that it was the favourite residence of Virgil, who is said to be buried near the promontory of Misenum.' Here the tradition concerning a Siren is told in the very same phraseology which relates the historic fact that Virgil's humble tomb still remains on one of the horns of the crescent of the bay of Naples.

The third chapter treats of the Italian islands, or, as Mr. Pinkerton writes the word, ilands; and in fact it is derived from ei, water, and land, land; so that the s was introduced by mistaken etymologists, who traced the word erroneously to the French isle,

Chapter iv. is allotted to Britannia antiqua. Its divisions are carefully enumerated after Ptolemy: but nothing is said concerning the classification of the natives by their languages. Pinkerton seems first to have ascertained that the Caledonians of the north, and all the inhabitants of the eastern shore of Britain, were originally Piks, or pirates, of a Gothic stem. From the promontory Orcas to the isle Vectis, the whole coast was settled by Goths. The Belgæ, a Cimbric tribe, crossed from Gaul into Devonshire and Cornwall, peopled Wales, and overspred Cumberland: but these colonists of the western coast, though more civilized than the Goths of the eastern, must be of later introduction; because they have multiplied so much less, and have bequeathed their dialect to so small a portion of the interior. The Gauls, or Gaelic tribes, migrated from the west of France into Ireland, and thence expanded into the Scotish highlands, but do not appear to have ever settled any where in England. The Roman divisions of Britain are given with accuracy and attention by Dr. Butler; yet some notice was due to the fact of their appointing a Count of the Saxon shore, Comes littoris Saxonici, to govern the eastern counties; because this proves the eastern population to have been Gothic, and to have been in the habit of using a Saxon dialect, long before the arrival of Hengist and Horsa, at which period many of our historians wrongly date the first coming of the Saxons. The English language was already that of London in the time of Julius Cæsar,

In the fifth chapter, Dr. B. treats of Spain; in the sixth, of Gaul; and in the seventh, of Germany, At p. 124, among the tribes between the Elbe and the Weser, are mentioned the Angrivarii. It is very common for savages to confound the sounds of and r; the Peruvians call Rima the place which the Spaniards call Lima. We suspect this consonantal commutation to have occurred in the word before us, and that the Angles lie hidden in the Angrivarii.

Chapter viii. treats of the countries north of the Danube; and the ninth, of Gracia antiqua. This is a well composed

and an interesting chapter. The tenth relates to the Græcian isles of the Archipelago; and the eleventh, to Asia Minor, (a denomination neither classical nor rational,) or rather to Anatolia : — this, again, is a meritorious chapter. The twelfth describes the East. Of this chapter, Palestiné occupies but too slight and short a subdivision. It appears to us probable that, in the time of Solomon, the river Jordan, which now evaporates in a lake, was navigable into the Red Sea; and that the Tarshish of Cilicia, where St. Paul was born, was at the same period a sea-port. Huet of Avranches has been the founder of gross errors in sacred geography, by his unsound dissertations on that topic: it was he who dreamed that he had found in Spain the Tarshish of the antient Jews. Instead of tracing the progressive geography of Palestine according to the order of time, Dr. Butler begins with its condition under the Roman dominion, and concludes with its subdivision by Joshua. The thirteenth chapter sketches the unknown Asia, or most eastern world; and the fourteenth describes Africa, and terminates the volume.

In conclusion, we must observe that this work has the merit of filling an inconvenient chink or chasm of English literature, and is the best short vernacular volume on the subject; yet we think that it might be revised, interpolated, corrected, and arranged, and gain by many changes. The first thing, however, is to make a book, and the second is to render it complete. When the learned author has used in his school this introduction to antient geography, for a certain length of time, he will himself become aware of several of its imperfections, and will be anxious to remedy them. We doubt not that he will be found to have merited the gratitude of the instructors of youth, as well as of the pupils themselves; and to have swept from the floor of the antient world much dirt and rubbish, which concealed the nomenclature of its compartments, and the splendor of its pristine mosaic pavement. The lessons of human experience form the most important study of man; if chronology teaches the pace, geography teaches the path of history.

ART. III. Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, Vol. XI. [Article concluded from our last No. p. 418.]

WE

E resume the class of Science in this Volume, for the purpose of reporting the contents of those papers which

relate to

MATHEMATICS AND ASTROMOMY.

An Essay on the present State of Astronomical Certainty, with regard to the Quantity of the Earth's Magnitude, the Distance of

C 4

that

that Planet from the Sun, and the absolute Limit of the smallest possible Interval from the Sun to any of the fixed Stars. By the Rev J. A. Hamilton, D.D., Dean of Cloyne. The object of the author, in this memoir, is to present a correct statement of the several results deduced from the observations and calculations of the most eminent astronomers and philosophers, relative to the solar parallax, the distance of the earth from the sun, the magnitude and ellipticity of the former, and the nearest possible limits of the fixed stars from the centre of our system. This is done with the view of enabling persons, who are not in the habit of making astronomical calculations, to form correct ideas relative to these interesting particulars; and at the same time to induce those who may be qualified for such undertakings, to endeavour to correct the errors and imperfections which still attend these important elements of astronomical science.

With regard to the parallactic angle, Dr. Hamilton observes that it may, with almost actual certainty, be stated to lie within the limits 8".65, and 8′′.75: but, in order to avoid too contracted a scale, he assumes 8", 6., 8′′. 7., and 8". 8., and supposes the semi-diameter of the earth to be between 3945 and 3965 English miles: he then computes the absolute distance of the earth from the sun in English miles, corresponding with these several limits, of which we shall give his extreme results; viz.

Semi-diam. in Eng. m.

3945
3965

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93,513,000

Par. ang.

8".8.

92,467,000

95,097,000 94,002,000 92,963,000;

so that the extreme limits, as to the absolute distance, are 95,097,000 and 92,467,000 English miles.

As to the assumed semi-diameters, they are drawn from the results of the several geodetic operations that have been carried on in different countries, which are thus stated:

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all these being calculated on the hypothesis that the æquatorial diameter of the earth exceeds the polar by of the whole.' These results furnish the author with the following important conclusion:

• From a view of the table of the possible distances of the earth from the sun, it will appear, that with a given parallax, each difference of an English mile in the semi-diameter of the earth will occasion a difference of about 24,000 English miles in the distance; and that, the semi-diameter remaining the same, the difference of one-tenth of a second in the horizontal parallax alters the distance of the earth from the sum above one million of miles.'

While such trifling deviations from exact observation make such an enormous difference in the results, it seems truly astonishing that our knowlege on these subjects is brought within such near approximations as we have every reason to assign to it.

The rest of the author's memoir relates to the least possible distance of the fixed stars from the centre of our system: which, he states, cannot be less than 39,191,000 millions of miles; because, with a shorter distance, we should be able to observe their annual parallax.

Farther Considerations on the comparative Observations of the Difference of Right Ascension of the Moon's enlightened Limb, with the Sun's Centre, and with Stars under different Meridians: together with the actual Results of a great Number of such Observations, made in various Years, at the respective Observatories of Greenwich and Armagh. By the Same. This memoir relates to a method of determining the difference of longitude of two places, by means of a comparison of the true differences of the difference. of right ascension of the moon's enlightened limb on the meridian from one or more stars, with which it has been also compared on the same day, under the different meridians, whose longitudinal distances from each other it is required to determine. This method was published by the author in a preceding volume of the Irish Transactions. At that time, it was supposed to be applicable only to fixed observatories: but, from a number of careful and repeated trials and investigations, Dr. H. is now enabled to decide that it is not merely capable of the highest degree of accuracy, but that it is easily put in practice by persons who are furnished only with a good timekeeper and a portable transit instrument of no very high power or great size; and which, with a simple apparatus, may be set up in a few hours, under even a bell-tent, or other slight observatory. It is therefore peculiarly adapted to the use of scientific persons, who may chance to be employed on voyages either of commerce or discovery. As, however, the paper

contains

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