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rected that error; their history is well known *, but no effectual remedy against them is as yet difcovered. These infects are not very numerous in fpring, but as the fummer advances they encrease in a furprifing degree; to preferve the plant therefore from injury, it is neceffary to watch their firft attacks, cut off and deftroy the branches they first appear on, for when they have once gained ground they are defended by their numbers. We have feen fmall plants cleared of them by fprinkling Spanish fnuff on the infected branches, but for large trees this remedy is fcarcely practicable. The leaves are likewife liable to be curled up by a fmall caterpillar (Phalena Tortrix Linnai) which produces a beautiful little moth, fee Albin's Hiftory of English Infects, pl. 73. It is fed on by kine, goats, and fheep, but horfes refufe it.

To fhew the confufion of antient names it may not be improper to mention that this plant and Woodroffe (Asperula odorata) have been both called Matrifylva by the old botanic wriOur poets alfo have ftrangely confounded the names of this plant, SHAKESPEAR fays

ters.

So doth the WOODBINE the feet HONEYSUCKLE
Gently entwift.

MILTON feems to call this plant Eglantine, although that is an undoubted name for the Sweet Briar

Through the SWEET BRIAR or the Vine

Or the TWISTED EGLANTINE.

We find it plentifully in woods and hedges flowering from July to September; fuch plants as grow in fhady places produce bloffoms of a paler colour, and they univerfally fmell sweetest in the evening; at which time fome particular fpecies of Sphinges (Linnei) or Hawk Moths are frequently obferved in gardens hovering over the bloffoms, and with their long tongues, which are peculiarly adapted to the purpofe, extracting honey from the very bottom of the flowers.'

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This valuable publication, of which the first Fafciculus, containing feventy-two plants, now offered to the public, is published in monthly numbers, each containing fix plants. At the end of each volume, containing three Fafciculi, or 216 plates, the author promises a comprehenfive index. General botanifts may perhaps have fome reafon to complain, that many plants, already well drawn before, in that most excellent work the Flora Danica, published by order of his Danish majefty, are re-engraved by Mr. Curtis, and that the study of the fcience is thereby rendered more and more expenfive; but this may be excufed, fince the book is chiefly intended for our countrymen. A more material objection lies against the Latin terminology, which the author has preferved, and in lieu of • Vid. Reaumur and Geoffroy.'

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which we would recommend Dr. Withering's very apt and judicious English terms.

Verum ubi plura nitent,
Offendar maculis.

non ego paucis

An Account of the Tenia, or long Tape-Worm, and of the Method of treating it, as practifed at Morat in Switzerland. With CopperPlates. 8vo. 21. Wilkie.

THE

HE Tenia, or long Tape-worm, on account of its extraor dinary fize and the capacity of reproduction, not only excites the most alarming fymptoms in thofe whom it infefts, but is alfo extremely difficult to expel. A method for effecting this purpose was a few years ago practifed on the continent with fo great fuccefs, by Madame Nouffer, that the king of France was induced to make the acquifition of it for the benefit of the public. Her method of cure confifted in the occafional ufe of a foup, a clyfter, specific, and a purging bolus, which are thus defcribed,

No. 1. The Soup.

Take a pint and a half of water, two or three ounces of good fresh butter, and two ounces of bread cut in thin flices, add to this fait enough to season it, and then boil it over the fire to the confiftence of pannada.

• No. 2. The Clyfter.

Take a fmall quantity of the leaves of mallows, and boil them in a fufficient quantity of water, mixing with it a little falt, and when ftrained off, add two ounces of olive oil.

No. 3. The Specific.

Take two or three drams of the root of the male fern, gathered in autumn, and reduced to a very fine powder, in four or fix ounces of water diftilled from fern, or the flowers of the line tree. It will be right for the patient to drink two or three times of the fame water, rincing his glafs with it, fo that none of the powder may remain either in the glass or his mouth."

No. 4. The purgative Bolus.

Take of the panacea of mercury fourteen times fublimed, and select refin of scammony each ten grains; of fresh and good gamboge fix or feven grains; reduce each of these substances separately into powder, and then mix them with some conferve into a bolus.'

With respect to the use of those remedies, we meet with the following information.

Madame Nouffer requires of her patients no particular preparation till the day before they are to take the remedy. That day they are to avoid all aliment after dinner, till about feven

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or eight o'clock at night, when they are to take the foup No. 1. about a quarter of an hour after this, the gives them a biscuit and a glass of white wine, either pure or mixed with water; she even gives water alone, to those who have not been accustomed to wine. If the patient has not been to stool that day, or is naturally coftive, (which is not ufual however with patients in this way) Madam Nouffer directs the use of the clyfter No 2. after which the patient is to go to bed.

Early the next morning, about eight or nine hours after the fupper of the preceding evening, the patient takes the fpecific No. 3. in bed, and to avoid the naufea which this medicine fometimes occafions, it will be right for him to chew lemon or fomething else that is agreeable to him, or he may wash his mouth with any thing he likes, but he must be careful not to fwallow any thing. He may likewise smell to vinegar, to check the ficknels; but if, notwithstanding all his efforts, the naufea continues, and he is obliged to throw up the specific, it will be right for him to take a fresh dofe of it, as foon as the fickness. is gone off, and then he should try to go to fleep. About two hours after this, he must get up, and take the purging bolus No. 4. at one or two different times, washing it down with one or two dishes of weak green tea, and walking afterwards about his chamber.-When the bolus begins to operate, the patient is defired to take a difh of the fame tea occafionally, until the worm is expelled; then, and not before, Madame Nouffer gives him broth or foup, and he is directed to dine as is ufual after taking phyfic. After dinner he may either lie down or walk, taking care to condu& himself difcreetly, to eat but little fupper, and to avoid every thing that is not easy of digestion.

The cure is then compleat, but it is not always effected with the fame quickness in every fubject. He who has not kept down the whole bolus, or who is not fufficiently purged by it, ought to take, four hours after it, from two to eight drachms of Epfo falt diffolved in boiling water. The dofe of this falt may be varied according to the temperament and other circumstances of the patient.

• If the worm should not come away in a bundle, but in the form of a thread (which particularly happens when the worm is in olved in much tenacious mucus), the patient must continue to fit upon the close-stool without attempting to draw it away, drinking at the fame warm weak tea: fometimes this alone is not fufficient, and the patient is obliged to take another dose of purging falt, but without varying his pofition till the worm is wholly expelled.

It is unusual for patients who have kept down both the fpecific and purging dofe, not to discharge the worm beforet

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dinner time. This however fometimes happens when the dead worm remains in large bundles in the inteftines, so that the fœces becoming more limpid towards the end of the purging, pass by it without drawing it with them. The patient may in this cafe eat his dinner; and it has been obferved that the food, joined to the ufe of a clyfter, has brought about the expulfion of the worm.

• Sometimes the worm is brought away by the action of the fpecific alone, before the patient has taken the purging bolus; when this happens, Madame Nouffer only gives two thirds of it, or substitutes the falt in its stead.

• Patients must not be alarmed by any fenfation of heat or aneafinefs they may feel during the action of the remedy, either before or after a copious evacuation, or juft as they are about to avoid the worm. Thefe fenfations are tranfitory, and go off of their own accord, or by the affiftance of the vapour of vinegar drawn in at the nofe.

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They who have vomited both the specific and bolus, or who have kept down only a part of them, fometimes do not void the worm that day. Madame Nouffer therefore directs them to take again that night the foup No. 1. the wine and bifcuit, and, if circumftances require it, the clyfter No. 2. if the worm does not come away during the night, the gives them early the next morning another dofe of the fpecific, and two hours afterwards, fix drachms or an ounce of purging falt, repeating the whole procefs of the preceding day, excepting the bolus, which the fuppreffes.

She observes, that very hot weather diminishes in fome degree the action of her remedy, fhe therefore prefers the month of September for adminiftering it; but as the has not been always able to chufe the feafon, and has been sometimes obliged to undertake the care of patients in the hottest days of fummer, fhe then gave her specific very early in the morning; and with this precaution fhe faw no difference in its effects.'

The root of the male fern has long fince been mentioned by medical authors as a specific for the Tenia, and the efficacy of draftic purges is likewife well known; but as it is of advantage to be furnished with authenticated inftances where they have been ufed with extraordinary fuccefs, this fmall treatife, the editor of which is Dr. Simmons, may prove very acceptable to practitioners.

A Philofophical Effay concerning Light. By Bryan Higgins, M. D. Vol. 1. 800. 6. Dodiley.

THE greater part of this volume is preparatory to the inveftigation of Light, concerning which Dr. Higgins appears to entertain an opinion very different from that com

monly

monly received among philofophers. He begins with taking a view of the feveral diftinctions of matter, and establishing a theory refpecting its elementary parts; after which he proceeds to evince, that bodies are not mutable into each other, and that the properties of the atoms of any element are inde feafible. Having laid this foundation for his future enquiry, he next endeavours to refute the doctrine that attraction and repulfion are produced by the agency of fome ethereal fluid contending likewife, that the idea of an ethereal fluid is equally inadmiffible in all reasoning on optical fubjects. We shall lay before our readers fome of the arguments advanced on this abftract philofophical enquiry.

However different the notions of men may be, concerning the cause of attraction or repulfion, all who are fufficiently informed by experience, muft agree in admitting the following pofitions expreffing only their common fenfe of things and facts.

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• The smallest known parts or the bigger portions of matter do not at all attract each other: the fmallest known parts of the bigger portions of matter do not at all repel each other: and the bodies which attract each other, do not all attract with equal force, or with forces which are directly as their quantities of matter. Those who are unacquainted with the particular inftances comprehended in thefe general pofitions, may eafily collect them from the following fections, where they will be pointed out and illuftrated, with a view towards our theory of attraction, and towards the foregoing notions.

Now if we fuppofe that one ethereal element or fluid does produce, on the smallest known parts, and on the bigger por tions of different bodies, effects fo different from each other as attraction is from repulfion: if, for inftance, it be fuppofed that one ethereal fluid doth cause the parts of acid to recede from each other with great force, and the parts of alkali to recede from each other with the like force; and that it doth nevertheless cause the parts of acid to approach and adhere to the parts of alkali with confiderable force; we must conclude that this ethereal fluid acts, not by mere impulfe, but by election; aud that it hath different relations to different parts of matter, whether thefe parts be ultimate parts or particles and when we further confider the many different elective repulsions and elective attractions already discovered, we must conclude that the relations of the fuppofed ether, to different parts of - matter, are different and numerous.

As ether is matter: relative properties and elective relations widely differing from each other, are according to the hy pothefis attributed to different parts of matter: and as the fup

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