The Sun.
London, England, 1830-01-30 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

VALPY'S CLASSICAL LIBRARY. Vot.
LONDON', 18SO.

If this volume possessed no further recom-
mendations, the two beautifully executed en-
gravings of Sallust and Demosthenes would be
quite sufficient to ensure it a considerable sale.
But it has superior claims to public favour. It
has Doctor It °se's translation of that eloquent
and forcible composition, the " &Mum Catilina-
rium" of Sallust :—an historian whose works,
even in the comparatively humble disguise of an
English dress, teem with materials for reflection
and amusement. The volume, we should add,
is neatly printed, on excellent paper, in a port-
able shape, and at an accessible price.

LARDNER'S CA BINET:CYCLOPiEDIA.—DOMES-
TIC ECONOMY, Vol,. I.—LoNnox. 1830.:
This is truly a treatise on Domestic Eco'
nomy. Almost every thing that appertains di'
reedy or indirectly to a household establish
ment—the arts of brewing, of distilling, of
wine-making, of baking, together with marl
more arts of the same useful practical character,
are here brought together, abridged, simpli.
ficd, and rendered intelligible, as the Eton
Latin Grammar says with far less justice--..“ to
the meanest capacity," in the small compass of
one portable and elegantly embellished duode-
cimo. It is to Mr. Michael Donovan, Pro-
fessor of Chemistry to the Company of Apothe..
caries, that we arc Indebted for this able treatise.
In searching for extracts, we can find few more
entertaining and curious than the following stronglY
attested instances of human combustion produced
on the part of the victim by a destructive tend-
ency to spirituous liquors. The subject how-
ever is not new to us, as we remember to have
seen it ingeniously advanced in Mr. M'Nish s
well-known Essay on the evils and phcenomena
of Drunkenness.
Mary Clues, aged fifty, was much addicted to intoxica-
don. Her propensity to this was such, that for about
year scarcely a day passed in which she did -not kink
at least half a pint of rum, or aniseed water. Het'
health gradually declined ; she was attacked with jaun-
dice, and was confined to her bed. She still continued
her old habit of drinking. One morning she fell on the
floor ; and her weakneas having prevented her getting
up, she remained so till some one entered and put her to
bed. The following night she wished to be left alone. A
woman, on quitting her, had put coal on the fire, and
placed a light on a chair at the head of the bed. At live
in the morning a smoke was seen issuing through the
window ; and the door being broken open, same
flames which were in the room 'were soon extinguished.
Between the bed and the chimney were found the re-
main: of the unfortunate Clues. One leg and a thigh were
still entire; but there remained nothing of the skin, the
muscles, or the viscera. The hones of the cranium, the
breast, the spine, and the upper extremities, were entirely
calcined. The furniture had sustained little iriiury. The
side of the bed next the chimney had suffered most the
wood of it was slightly burnt; but the feathers, clothes,
and covering were safe. Nothing except the body ex-
hibited aoy strong traces of fire.
Grace Pitt, aged about 60, had a habit of coming down
from her bid-room, half-dressed, to smoke a pipe, One
night she came down as usual. Her daughter, who slept
with her, did net perceive she was absent till next
morning, when she went down to the kitchen, found
her mother stretched out on the right ride, with her head
near the grate, having the appearance of a log of wood
consumed by fire, without an apparent flame. The
foetid odour and smoke, which exhaled from the body
almost suffocated some of the neighbours who hastened
to the girl's assistance. The trunk was in some mea-
sure incinerated, and resembled a heap of coals covered
with white ashes. The head, the arms, the legs,
and the thighs, had also participated in the burning..-'
This woman had drank a large quantity of spirituous
liquor. There was no fire in the grate, and the can-
dle had burned entirely out in the candlestick, which
was close to her. Besides, there were found near the
consumed body the clothes of a child, and a paper screen,
which bad eustaioed no injury, The dress of this woman
consisted of a cotton gown.

CONSTANTINOPLE, 1828.—Loxporr, 1829.

We merely allude to these entertaining vo-
lumes, which have now been, comparatively
speaking, a long time before the world, in order
to observe that the second edition, which is in
two volumes octavo, and to which is attached
an appendix, containing observations and
remarks, up to the autumn of 1829,
has been materially improved. A work
of this nature is at the present moment
an almost indispensible addition to a gentleman's
library ; more especially as the author has taken
little for gi anted, or on hearsay, but drawn all
his materials from his own personal sources of
information. His opportunities of seeing and
commenting on all that was worthy in Constanti-
nople were abundant, and he has availed himself
of them accordingly. The plates, particularly
the one of the view on the Bosphorus, arc
beautiful.