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Sir

reader. There are many points in Sir James's history, about which we seek in vain for information; and this defect is by no means supplied by the bulky correspondence, amidst which the thread of the narrative is often entirely lost. With regard to the correspondence itself, we are disposed to regret that there are, comparatively to their importance, so few letters of Sir James himself, and of his admirable father;-desiderata which are poorly supplied by the letters of persons who have no other distinction than the accidental one of title, or of office. James's correspondence with his friend Mr Davall, a young Englishman, whose circumstances obliged him to reside in Switzerland, will be read with great interest; and the letters of Mr Roscoe display the warm heart and the high accomplishments of that distinguished writer. The letters of Dr Goodenough, Bishop of Carlisle, form a pleasing memorial of his learning and botanical knowledge; but one-half of them might have been usefully replaced by the compositions of less elevated correspondents. The letters of the Abbé Correa, written in the double character of a botanist and of a distressed Portuguese refugee, will also be perused with considerable interest; and those of Professor John Sibthorp with sorrow and admiration.

In studying the Memoirs and Correspondence of Sir James Smith, we cannot fail to be impressed with the great progress in systematic botany which has been made in England during the last fifty years; but we at the same time learn, what is less flattering to our national vanity, that British botanists have been comparatively inactive in examining the structure of vegetable bodies,-in explaining their hidden functions, and in discovering those material elements which may be obtained from their fruit, their leaves, their juices, their pith, their bark, their flowers, and their root, for the purposes of food, luxury, and medicine, and which perform so prominent a part in many of the useful and scientific arts. We trust, however, that the botanists of the next age will apply themselves to these important objects, and follow the example which has been set them by our countryman, Mr Brown, (whom Humboldt has justly characterised as the Botanicorum facile Princeps,) in making the microscope and the dissecting knife indispensable instruments of their science. In the case of bodies whose vessels we cannot recognise, and whose seeds even almost elude the straining eye, it is in vain to explore their structure by any other means than by the most powerful and varied assistance which the organ of sight can receive from optical science. In pursuing his enquiries, the botanist has the same occasion for powerful microscopes that the astronomer has for telescopes of great penetrating and magnifying power, to enable him to

resolve nebulæ, to separate close double stars, and to discover new bodies which exist in the inmost recesses of the heavens.

Like Mineralogy, Botany has hitherto been chiefly a science of observation; and a botanist who knows a plant only by its parts of fructification, has made as little progress as the mineralogist, who pronounces upon a mineral, by throwing its lustre upon his eye, and by shaking it knowingly in his hand. Natural Philosophy, however, now claims Mineralogy as one of its most interesting branches, and Botany will, we doubt not, soon rise to the same dignity. The returning movements of the particles of the sap, as detected by the powerful microscopes of Amici,-the beautiful discoveries of Dutrochet-the inflammation of the odoriferous oil in the utriculi of the Fraxinella (Dictamnus aba,)the doubly refracting structure in the leaves of the Centaurea glastifolia, the existence of phosphorescent crystals of carbonate of lime in the chara vulgaris,-the secretion of siliceous solids from the juices of the bamboo and the teak-tree,-the disposition of crystals of silex in the epidermis of the Equisetæ, and some of the grasses, and their symmetrical arrangement round the glands of some of the same plants, are a few of the extraordinary facts which have been developed by physical research; and which hold out the promise of a rich harvest of discovery to the scientific botanist. We would, therefore, strongly advise the young and aspiring student to consider systematic botany only as the means by which he is to attain higher objects; and to pursue these objects assiduously and ardently, with the Microscope in one hand, and the torch of Chemistry and Physics in the other.

ART. III.-Answer of the Directors of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, to an Article in the Edinburgh Review for October, 1832. 8vo. Liverpool: 1832.

THE HE Directors of the Liverpool Railway Company have judged it expedient to publish a pamphlet, in answer to some observations on that concern, contained in our article on Inland Transport.' We are sorry to be obliged to express our surprise at the license with which its authors have misrepresented our statements. Not content with swelling into formal 'charges against the Directors' our observations on the management of the road, they have practised misquotation and omission to such an extent, as to present a very unfair view of

the strictures against which they have undertaken to defend themselves. They have been also pleased to intersperse their Answer with some remarks of a merely personal nature. To these we shall not deign to offer any reply. They are introduced in the worst taste; and the public can feel no interest whatever in topics altogether irrelevant to the merits of the points in dis

cussion.

The Directors state that the affairs of the railway have been reviled in no measured terms.' We feel assured that the public will not apply this term to our strictures. At a time when the possible success of steam-power applied to inland transport had excited the fears of canal proprietors, turnpike trustees, coach companies, agriculturists, and other classes, and had given rise to every species of misrepresentation and calumny in regard to Railroads in general, and the Liverpool Railroad more especially, we stood forward as champions of this extension of steam-power, and in so doing incurred some odium for the part we had taken. We do not state this as matter either of boast or of complaint. But it does seem strange that the very body whose battle we had fought, should turn upon us as its revilers; merely because we disapproved of certain details of management totally unconnected with the great principle at issue, and respecting which even strong disapprobation, though we have expressed it, could proceed from nothing but the interest felt in the ultimate success of the enterprise.

The first charge noticed refers to the original formation of the railway. So little ground is there for the charge of undue preference in the selection of the labourers employed in the formation of the road, that the Directors now, for the first time, have the subject brought under their notice in the form of a complaint.-Answer, p. 4, 5.

The Directors enter into a long statement to show, that the charge here alluded to is groundless; a large portion of the labourers being Irish, &c. We have merely to say that no such charge was made in this Journal. The only words having any reference to the subject are the following:

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We shall not here refer to the persons who may have been employed in the actual execution and completion of the railway: we are not in possession of sufficient data to enable us to speak with certainty upon the discretion and prudence shown in their selection.'

The next charge commented on is, that the Directors, by their proceedings, are said to have paralysed the whole enterprise 6 of the country.'- Answer, p. 3. We cannot imagine how the Directors can have been led to father upon us so preposterous an asseveration as that the whole enterprise' of Britain could be paralysed' by their proceedings. The article in

question does not contain the words pretended to be quoted from it, nor any similar words.

These are samples of charges' which have no other existence than in the imaginations of the Directors. We shall next give some instances of their disposition to exaggerate the case against themselves by misquoting our words, and misrepresenting the import of our statements.

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The Directors are charged with "having invariably rejected every suggestion for improvement coming from other quarters than the Company's engineer."-Answer, p. 3.

The Directors are charged with having, "by capricious objections, excluded engines and waggons belonging to collateral companies from the road." To this assertion they do not hesitate to give their absolute and unqualified denial.'-Answer, p. 13.

With regard to the more serious charge of "secretly inflicting injuries" on the competing engines, the Directors have heard of no such occurrence.'-Answer, p. 14.

Other points connected with the management of the railway might here be introduced, in reply to these unworthy charges of the Reviewer.' -Answer, p. 14.

Now, the truth is, that not one of the above statements was advanced by us as a charge against the Directors. They were referred to as matters of current report :-we said that they were subjects of common animadversion,' and that they excited 'great and universal disapprobation.' Our statements went merely to the fact that such charges had been commonly circulated; and the tendency of our reasoning was, that, whether true or false, they were injurious to the establishment, by exciting distrust, by discouraging talent, and by obstructing the benefits of free competition. Waggons of collateral companies' were certainly pointed out to us, by agents in the employment of those companies, as having been excluded, by capri'cious objections,' from the road. In reply to this, the Directors declare that engines and waggons of collateral companies are now working on the road without impediment or objection.' Without meaning to support the truth of the charge, we must take leave to say that the Directors have made no answer to it. It never was asserted that all waggons of collateral companies were at all times excluded from the road.

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We have the testimony of persons whose means of information are not inferior to those of the Directors, that the company have been commonly charged at Liverpool with virtually ex'cluding competition, though presenting the appearance of permitting it, by exposing the competitors to the most capricious objections on the part of the Company's engineer.' We are

further assured that this impression was universal,' and that appearances were strong against the Directors.'

Before they commence their justification on this point, the Directors pause to remark, that the prevailing sentiment in their minds is astonishment that any one, professing to enlighten the public in a matter of great and peculiar interest, 'should evince such ignorance of the subject on which he under'took to write,' as to charge them with a system of favouritism, in reference to the influence allowed to their engineer. Their astonishment may be very sincere; but we will venture to affirm that it is exclusively their own; for we fear they would find it hard to produce in Liverpool one individual, unconnected with the establishment, who shares it. The complaints against the system of favouritism have been universal both there and in Manchester. Need we call to their recollection the unavailing remonstrances, on this subject, of a respectable and intelligent minority of their own body? Do they not know that we could name those who have at their meetings raised their voices against the injurious appearance of favouritism which their management presented? Before we hazarded the remarks which have excited so much indignation, we had procured ample evidence on the subject. Indeed, the expressions we used, were taken from communications entitled to as much consideration and attention as any statement which the Answer contains.

We stated that the bulk of the men obtained their appointments through the influence of the Company's engineer, and that the consequence of this was, that they felt themselves enlisted as his partisans when any trial of power was made on the road between his engines and those of other engineers; that the confidence of the public in the fairness of such trials was thus impaired; that numerous reports were constantly circulated, impeaching the conduct of the men on such occasions; and we mentioned more particularly a report, that a safety-valve of an engine was overloaded on the occasion of such a trial, with a view to give unfair advantage to one of Mr Stephenson's engines. Whilst we stated these injurious consequences of the position in which the engineer had been placed by the Directors, we fully acquitted that gentleman himself of any participation or connivance, directly or indirectly, in such proceedings; and even stated, that under such a system it was not in his power to prevent its consequences. This has especially excited the indignation of the Directors: they deny that any considerable number of the men in their employment have obtained their appointments through the influence of the engineer; they say, that of upwards of 600, not more than sixty have obtained their places,

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