build ships and boats. They are famous fishermen, daring boatmen, and skilful pilots. They do all the loading and unloading of ships. They cultivate almost all the land, and raise ninetynine hundredths of the potatoes, onions, tomatoes, and arrowroot, which constitute the commercial wealth of Bermuda, and these are no inconsiderable items. They have been all but excluded from any influence in the government. The Legislature were so frightened in 1834 that they raised the property franchise to an amount beyond the reach of any excepting a few of the most fortunate of the colored race. That they are somewhat ignorant we grant; but what schools have been provided for them? A few miserable things. We shall ever stand up for the blacks. Our opinion is, that had they the government of the island in their hands for five years, they would not manage legislation worse than the whites, but would unquestionably put some life into the old stagnant system of Colonial polity.

The government of the Islands is the old irresponsible form of administration, which, till within a few years, prevailed in all the British Colonial possession. There is a Governor appointed by the Crown, and a Council or Upper Chamber, whose members, eleven in number, hold office for life, and are nominated by the Colonial Office. The Parliament proper, or House of Assembly, consists of four representatives from each of the nine tribes or parishes, into which the country is divided. These members of the Legislature must be residents, and must hold property in the parishes which they represent. For the Franchise there is also required a property qualification of considerable amount for Bermuda. The judiciary is formed upon the English model, and consists of a Court of Chancery, a Court of Errors, and a Court of General Assize.

Taking the Natural History of the Bermudas as a whole, from man, the crown and top of the Vertebrata, to the tiniest of the Porifera from the "Cedar to the Hyssop," in the domain of Flora and from the greatest to the least striking aspects of the inorganic land and sea, we find much to love and to admire, and reasons innumerable for unbounded praise to the God who made them all.

Miscellanies.

Introduction to Cryptogamic Botany, by the Rev. M. J. Berkeley, M. A., F. L. S. With 127 Illustrations on Wood, drawn by the Author. Lordon and New York: H. Bailliere. Price, $5. 1 vol. 8vo, pp. 604. Being Volume XII of Bailliere's Library of Standard Scientific Works.

An introductory work on the Cryptogams in the English language and at an available price, has long been wanted. Hitherto the student of these lower forms of vegetation could find no treatise to assist him excepting Dr. Lindley's Vegetable Kingdom, and more lately "The Micographic Dictionary," neither of which were special treatises, nor calculated to fill his necessities. No one was more competent to supply the want than the author of the work before us, who has devoted a good part of his life to the study of these organisms, and has in them earned a world-wide reputation among botanists. That the nature of the work may be the better understood, we extract the following from the preface, and give a summary of its contents:

"It remains only to state that the work is not intended nor calculated for persons who have not already some general knowledge of Botany. At the same time, it is believed, unless the Author has entirely failed in his attempt, that there is no part which is not intelligible to any one who has made himself master of Dr. Lindley's or Dr. Balfour's Introductions to the Study of Botany."

A concise and able introduction occupies the first 70 pages; we have only room for the following extract from it, to which we invite the attention of our microscopic readers:

"I shall not dwell upon the extreme and manifold interest of the several objects which come within the view of the Cryptogamist. If variety and delicacy of structure, beauty of form and colour, and the nicest transitions from group to group, from genus to genus, besides a host of curious questions of physiology and adaptation of means to particular ends, are worthy to engage attention, Cryptogams most surely will not be amongst the most

unprofitable objects of study. There will be scope, too, for the acutest powers of thought and observation, unless he is content merely to skim the surface of things. Even independently of the necessity of using optical instruments, a point very much exaggerated, for if the minuter points of physiology in Phenogams are deeply studied, no less an amplifying power is necessary, and perhaps even greater tact and skill in manipulation, the difficulties which arise from the wide limits within which not merely species but accredited genera are capable of varying, are sufficient to exercise the highest mental qualifications. It does not follow, however, that the end obtained should be at all proportional to the necessary labour. The objects which the accomplished Cryptogamist has in view are not comprised within the mere determination of species, or the admiration of the exquisite forms and combination which meet him at every turn. If he aims at nothing higher than the first, he may indeed be useful in his generation, provided he be cautious enough, and possessed of sufficient self-denial to prevent his striving to glorify himself, rather than to clear the road for investigators of higher pretensions. If beauty of form and singularity of structure be alone his object, his time may be passed agreeably enough; but in most cases, like ten thousand microscopists of the present day, he will be but a mere trifler, without any better aim than innocent amusement; or, if he be a dabbler in science, with some wish to attain reputation which he has not the patience to seek after by a continued course of study and mental discipline, he will be deriving general inferences from isolated, half-understood facts to the detriment and confusion of real science. Perhaps of all literary dissipation, the desultory observations of the mere microscopist are the most delusive. And even where the objects are higher, it is well that every one whose attention is much directed to this greatly abused instrument, should remember that if he wishes to penetrate the secrets of nature, he must look beyond his microscopist,—a fact of which some microscopists of considerable reputation do not seem at all aware. The paramount importance of the subject is to be seen in far different matters."

The author divides Cryptogamic plants into two great classes THALLOGENS AND ACROGENS, described and sub-divided as follows:

Class I-Thallogens.-Seldom herbaceous or provided with foliaceous appendages, * *** Spermatozoids not spiral.— Comprises

ALLIANCE I. Algales, (Sea-weeds.)-Deriving nutriment from the water in which they are submerged.-Occupying 150 pages. ALLIANCE II. Mycetales.-Deriving nutriment from the matrix or the surrounding air; mycelium more or less evident.Subdivided into

1. Fungales (Fungi). Occupying 137 pages. 2. Lichenales (Lichens). Occupying 57 pages. Class II.-Acrogens.-Mostly herbaceous, and provided with foliaceous appendages. * * * * Spermatozoids spiral.Comprises

ALLIANCE III.

Characeales (Charas) -Spores solitary.-A small order containing but three genera. Occupying 5 pages.

ALLIANCE IV. Muscales (Liverworts and Mosses).-Spores numerous, giving rise to a plant which produces one or more successive of fructifying arehegonia.-Occupying 70 pages.

ALLIANCE V. Filicales (Ferns and Allied Plants).-Spores numerous, producing a prothallus which bears a single set of archegonia, which yield fructifying plants.) Occupying 57 pages.

The absence of a synoptical table of contents, and of a running title to the right-hand page, is in some measure compensated for by the unusually full index at the end of the volume, where the reader will also find a valuable classified catalogue of the most note-worthy works relating to Cryptogamic Botany.

The Publisher has done his part to make the book valuable; the printing being good, the type clear, and the engravings though scant in numbers sparse-well executed. The paper of our copy is, however, uneven; the first half of the volume being of much better quality than the remainder.

A Scientific Exploring Expedition, consisting of three or four persons, is about to proceed, under the sanction of the government, through the Western portion of British America. It is intended that the party should proceed from Lake Superior to Lake Winnipeg, and from thence through the country lying between the northern branch of the Saskatcharan and the boundary of the United States. The government is desirous of making the Expedition as scientifically useful as possible; and with this view, the assistence and counsel of the Royal Society have been solicited. The Council has appointed a Committee to act in the matter, and a report has been drawn up. The Expedition is to be commanded by Mr. John Palliser.--Athenæum, April 25.

Memoir of John Dalton, and history of the Atomic Theory up to his time; by ROBT. ANGUS SMITH, Ph. D.F.C.S. (Published also as vol. xiii, New series, of the Memoirs of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester.) 298 pp. 8vo. London, 1856, H. Baillière. In the life of a philosopher or the history of a principle in philosophy, when either is faithfully executed, there is profound instruction. They not only teach us methods of research, but illustrate its true spirit and aim, and the secret of its strength. The young student will search the world over, unsuccessfully perhaps, for a subject for investigation. The philosopher finds a subject in the most familiar phenomena about him, and by steady scrutinizing labor, draws forth facts and principles of fundamental value. The history of Dalton and his atomic theory has for this reason as well as others a special value to the student in science. The work of Dr. Smith has a peculiar merit, from its bringing out Dalton's theory of atoms in its true relations to the speculations of former centuries. He treats briefly of the views on atoms among the ancient Greeks, and thence traces the subject through the period of Alchemy and the earliest. beginning of Chemistry to the development of Dalton himself when the mathematical basis of this science and its simple system of numbers were first made clear. A fine portrait of Dalton forms a frontispiece to the volume.-" Silliman's Journal."

Electric Illumination.-A few weeks since, some experiments on electric illumination were made at Paris, surpassing all that had before been done. The success was due to an electric regulator invented by MM. Lacassagne and Thiers, called by them an electro-metric repeator. It is complicated in structure and cannot well be described here. The inventors placed four of their electric lamps on the platform of the Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile, and projected the light one day on the Champs Elysées, towards the Place de la Concorde, and a second on the avenues of Neuilly or de l'Impératrice, the change having been made because of the numerous gas lights of the Champs Elysées. These gas lights were made to look dull and smoky, yet diminished the effect of the electric light; but in the aveuues of l'Impératrice the light presented intense brilliancy.

Each lamp was sustained by means of sixty of Bunsen's pairs, and furnished with a spherical reflector of metal, or of glass silvered by a battery in the manner described beyond.