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ferved, and lead to no important conclufions, we shall not detain the reader with any particulars of them. The volume concludes with the ufual meteorological journal.

ART. III. Commentationes Societatis Regiæ Gottingenfis, &c. i. e. Memoirs of the Royal Society of Gottingen, Vois. X. and XI. for the Years 1789-1792. 4to. About 450 Pages in each Volume. Gottingen, 1791 and 1793.

THAT we may not prolong this article beyond the length neceflary for communicating the information which the volumes before us may contain, we fhall proceed directly to give a fhort view of the memoirs included in them.

PHYSICS.

Defcription of ten fspecimens of human skulls, of various nations. By Profellor BLUMENBACH.

The Profeffor introduces his differtation with obferving that, of the feveral branches of natural hiftory, that which relates to the varieties of the human fpecies feems to have received the leaft attention: he tells us that it attracted his notice from its connection with anatomy, and that, inftead of trufting to the mere narrations of travellers, he endeavoured to enrich his mufeum with fpecimens of the skulls collected from various countries, by which he might investigate the characteristic diftinctions peculiar to the inhabitants of each. After having mentioned the cautions necefiary to be obferved in this ftudy, he proceeds to inquire in what manner the diftinguishing characters are to be afcertained: rejecting Daubenton's and Camper's rules for determining them by the occipital and by the facial lines, he thinks they ought to be fought in the frontal and maxillary bones, on the form of which the whole structure of the head depends.

He divides the human race into five claffes; 1. the inhabitants of Europe, of the western parts of Afia, and of the north of America-2. thofe of the remaining parts of Afia and of many parts of North America, who are of a dark brown colour, have a flat face with fmall eyes, and thin hair;-3. the negroes-4. the copper-coloured American Indians, with ftraight ftiff hair, and heads moulded by art into various fhapes ;-and, lafly, the inhabitants of the Pacific ocean and the most eastern Indian iflands: who are for the greateft part of a dark brown colour, with prominent features, a broad nofe, large mouth, and thick bushy hair.

Of the first of thefe varieties the Profeffor gives four fpecimens, accompanied with accurate drawings. One is the skull of an Egyptian mummy, remarkable for the narrowness of the head in proportion to the length, efpecially toward the upper part;

the

the forehead is fmall, but well arched; the brows are arched and prominent; the orbits are large and near to each other, the os ethmoides being very narrow; and the fofa molaris, behind the foramen infraorbitale, is greatly depreffed. We have mentioned the characters of this head, because the Profeffor obferves that it exactly correfponds with that of an antient image. of Ofiris in his collection, and because it seems to confute the hypothefis, maintained by fome, concerning the fimilarity between the Chinese and Egyptians. The next fpecimens are heads of a Turk and two Coffacs; the fkull of the Turk is remarkably fpherical, and we are told that their heads are moulded into this form by their nurses; because it is most fuitable to their turbans.

As a fpecimen of the fecond variety, the Profeffor defcribes the head of a Calmuc Tartar; the third is illuftrated by three fkulls of negroes, and the fourth by that of a North American Indian, and of a Caribbean of the island of St. Vincent.

On the combination of lead with antimony and zinc. By M. GMELIN.

We have here a collection of experimen:s performed with a design to ascertain whether fome useful metal might not refult from a mixture of lead with antimony, or with zinc. The only trial that seemed to promife any utility was that in which fixteen parts were combined with one of regulus of antimony; producing a metal which, M. GMELIN thinks, might be used as moulds for printing types. The inflammation of the zinc, when melted, was prevented by excluding the external air, and by removing it from the fire as foon as the leaft fign of this phenomenon was observed.

A collection of chemical obfervations and experiments. By the

fame.

This memoir contains an account of its author's attempt to analyze a vitreous fubftance found in Bafaltes, and fome kinds of clay difcovered in Hungary.

MATHEMATICS.

As the articles under this clafs do not contain any new discovery, a particular account of their contents would not be very interefting; we shall mention only their titles:

On the application of objective micrometers to terrestrial objects. By M. KAESTNER.

On cylindrical fections as applied to arched roofs. By the

fame.

On calculating the perturbations of the planets. KLUGEL

By M.

Obfervation

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Obfervation on Herfchel's Planet, in its oppofition. By M. Dɛ ZACH.

M. DE ZACH's intention was to compare M. de la Place's tables of this planet with thofe calculated by M. de Lambre. The former agreed beft with his obfervations, according to which the oppofition took place on the 26th January 1790, at 16h. 49′, I ́ ́ ́, 4. mean time, or 16h. 35′, 58, 2. true time. The error of M. De la Place's tables was only -6′′, 6 in heliocentric longitude, and +15", 1 in latitude.

HISTORY and PHILOLOGY.

Defcription of the Oriental Coins preferved in the Royal Library at Gottingen. By M. TYCHSEN.

We recommend the perufal of this memoir to those who are fond of that ftudy of antiquity, in which tedious inveftigation terminates in doubt; and this concerning objects which, when difcovered, are of no importance; for most of the coins here defcribed are fuppofed to have been caft by princes who are fcarcely known in hiftory, even by name. Many of them, however, are of ineftimable value; as they are fo worn that their infcriptions are not entirely legible, and may thus afford full fcope for profound difquifition and learned conjecture.. On the origin of the antient Egyptians. By M. MEINERS.

After having perufed this tedious memoir, the learned writer of which deals more in conjecture than in argument, we find his opinion to be that Egypt, and all the eastern coafts of Africa, were originally inhabited by negroes, but that they were conquered by fome more warlike and comely race of men from India.

The works of antient artifs illuftrated by paffages from Greek Epigrams. By M. HEYNE.

On feeing the name of HEYNE, we hoped to have been able to entertain our readers with an account of fome interesting article of literature: but in this hope we are for once disappointed; though we do not deny the utility of the memoir before us to those who devote themfelves to the ftudy of antient statues, pictures, and feals. The profeffor has here collected and arranged under proper heads all thofe paffages in the Greek Anthologia, which relate to antient pieces of fculpture and painting, most of which are now loft. The notes are judicious and well written.

On the difcoveries and commerce of the Greeks in India. By A. L. HEEREN.

This memoir difplays much learning, but affords little information, except fuch as the English reader may find in Major

Ren

Rennell's Memoir for illuftrating a Map of Hindostan, and in Profeffor Robertfon's hiftorical Difquifition concerning the knowlege which the antients had of India. M. HEEREN first inquires what knowlege the Greeks had of India previous to the time of Alexander the Great. This, he obferves, was owing to the Perfians, who first became acquainted with the river Indus and the adjacent countries, under the reign of Darius the fon of Hyftafpis. That nothing more of India than these parts was known to the Greeks, till the time of Seleucus Nicator, the author endeavours to fhew from all the fragments. of history that have reached us; in the investigation of which he takes great pains to disentangle truth from the fabulous ornaments in which it is involved: but in this part of his work he difplays no mall fhare of credulity; efpecially with refpe& to the ftory of Ctefias about the Pygmies, whom he fuppofes to have been monkies. In delineating the expedition of AlexThat of Seleucus is deander, he follows Major Rennell. fcribed as proceeding by Delhi and Agra, to the junction of the Jumna and Ganges, where now ftands Ahallabad, and thence to the city of Palibothra, which is supposed to have been fituated near to the town of Patna. The voyages of individuals are next mentioned, and first that of Nearchus, which appears to have been merely along the coafts: from what is faid of this by Arrian, M. HEEREN concludes that, if either the Phenicians or the Jews ever had any commerce with India by means of the Perfian gulf, the knowlege of it must have been loft in the time of Alexander. The voyages of Jambulus, Eudoxus, and Patroclus are related by the antients with fo many improbable circumftances, that very little information can be collected from them. The island, which Jambulus is faid to have reached, is, by most of the commentators on Diodorus Siculus, fuppofed to be Taprobana, which is generally thought to be Ceylon :-but, if the Greeks were fo ignorant of the navigation of the Indian feas as our author with great juftice fuppofes, how came they to know any thing of this island? This question is here answered by obferving that the iflanders themselves might have brought the produce of the country to Bengal, and there have traded with the Greeks at Palibothra. In fhort, M. HEEREN, after a careful but rather tedious examination of all the evidence that can be collected from the antients, concludes that the Greeks knew no more of India than the countries between the Indus and the Ganges, and that the peninfula was firft difcovered by Hippalus.

On the Origin and Progrefs of Pantheifm. By M. BUHLE. It has often been fuppofed that the fyftem taught by Spinoza was little more than a revival of the notions of the Eleatic phi

lofophers

lofophers among the antients. In order to fhew the error of this opinion, M. BUHLE takes a particular view of the fentiments of these fages; from which he endeavours to prove that, though fome of their fundamental maxims were the fame with thofe of Spinoza, the fyftem built on them by that philofopher was very different from their theory. He obferves that the Mythic, Ionic, and Pythagorean philofophers, who lived before Xenophanes of Colophon, when they faw that most of the objects of fenfe might be refolved into more fimple fubftances, pronounced thefe to be the first elements of all things, and indulged various notions concerning their origin. Some of the Mythics derived them from night, others from chaos, others from the ocean, out of which they faid the world was produced by a certain phyfical neceffity. The Ionics, on the contrary, believed that there was a certain primary element, containing the nature of all things, from which, by the operation of a certain moving caufe, inherent in the element, all things were produced. Others again had recourfe to the hypothefis of an active and a paffive nature, by the conjunction and mutual operation of which all things were brought into being. M. BUHLE imagines that difguft at thefe vifionary theories, which implied existence without a caufe, led Xenophanes to establish his maxim that, from nothing, nothing can be produced. However the various writers who have mentioned this philofopher may differ concerning fome of his fentiments, they all agree in representing him as refolving all existence into the Deity, as maintaining that whatever exifts is eternal, is God; and that God is one moft perfect and excellent Being, capable of no form except that of a sphere. In order to reconcile this doctrine of the unity of the univerfe with the various phenomena of nature, he denied all human knowlege, and fuppofed that mankind had only vague uncertain opinions of things. Hence he fell into many contradictions and inconfiftencies. BUHLE confiders his fyftem as containing the first principles of Pantheifm; though not clearly explained, nor well connected. Of the fentiments of Parmenides fo little is known, that all which is here faid concerning them is mere conjecture. Our author thinks that he went farther than Xenophanes in afferting the Deity to be finite, and that he endeavoured to remove the inconfiftency between his principles and the evidence of the fenfes, by maintaining that the latter were deceived by fpecious appearances. Meliflus is faid to have agreed with the preceding philofophers, in afferting the unity of the univerfe: but he also maintained its infinity, and affirmed it to be one, not fecundum rationem, but fecundum materiam. He did not controvert the evidence of the fenfes, but faid that, of human opinions, whe

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