The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-07-04 00:00:00

NETT' BOOKS.

The Scenery and Antiquities of Ireland, illustrated by
drawings, by Bartlett; the literary department by N.
P. Willis, Esq. London, G. Virtue.
We have received Part XXVI. of this work, which
continues to be got up with the same spirit and liberality
in illustration, and the same interest in the descriptive
department, that characterised the earlier numbers. This
part embraces some peculiarly interesting parts of Ireland—
the metropolis, and rortions of its romantic environs.
There are four beautiful engravings (on steel), by cele-
brated artists, namely, of Sackville-street, (with Nelson's
monument in the centre,) taken from the bridge across
the Liffey, at the south end ; Waterford, with its long
elegant pile-bridge, its shipping, &c. ; Carrickfergus
Castle, peering on a rock, washed by the sea ; and the
Augustinian Abbey of Adare, a noble gothic ruin, still
overtopped by a square embattled tower. These are all
executed in the finest style of the art, and are each so
beautiful that we know not which most to commend. The
literary portion i written with the author's accustomed
ability, and tact , conveying much pleasing information,
anecdote, and historical reminiscence within a small com-
pass. He briefly notices the celebrity of Ireland and her
universities in the early ages, and the causes of its gra-
dual decline ; describes the celebrated Hall of Tara ; gives
an account of the nature and extent of several of the vast
bogs of Ireland ; and passing from Trim to Dublin, by
way of Kilock, Maynooth, Carton, and Leixlip, furnishes
an animated and pleasing sketch of the metropolis, and
its diversified and romantic environs—to be continued in
the next number. The work would form an excellent
book of reference for the tourist, and will be found equally
acceptable in the parlour or the drawing-room. We
quote the following passage, descriptive of Leixlip, as a
specimen of the style, selected for its brevity, rather than
as being a favourable specimen of the author's general
powers, which are better displayed in subjects of higher
Import :
"The little town of Leixlip is delightfully situated
near the banks of the Liffey, in a richly diversified coun-
try: From the bridge the view is beautiful beyond de-
scription;
on either hand the river is seen foaming and
fretting over its rugged bed until lost between its pictu-
resque banks, while on a commanding eminence the old
castle of Leixlip lifts its embattled towers above the
thick oak wood that surrounds it. At a short distance
above the town is that romantic spot called the Salmon
Leap, where the river, tumbling over a succession of
rocky ledges, forms a beautiful cascade ; the precipitous
banks are thickly covered with wood, and the whole
scene, though not on so extensive a scale as many of the
celebrated falls in Scotland and Switzerland, is excelled
by few in,patural beauty. Indeed, but for the barbarous
intrusion of a modern, business-like, stone-built, and
slated mill, which has been erected close to the falls by
some plodding trader, it would be difficult to find a place
in which so many picturesque beauties are combined.
The Salmon Leap is a favourite place for picnic parties
of the citizens of Dublin, who make excursions to it in
the sumnaer months, dining on the grassy shore, or on
the broad tabular rocks which in the dry season are left
bare by the fallen waters, and afford convenient platform s

fur the accommodation of the gay groups assembled
there, who
' Forth from the crowded city's dust and noise,
Wander abroad to taste pure Nature's joys,
To laugh and sport, and spend the live-long day
In harmless merriment and jocund play.' "

Transactions ef Me Liverpool Polytechnic Society for
1842. Liverpool : Lace and Addison.
A neat pamphle t under this title has just been pub-
lished, and contains, besides the annual report of the
council, reports and abstracts of the papers read during
the last year, with brief notices of the discussions that
from time to time succeeded,—the whole concluding with
the able address of the president at the close. Amongst
the papers area everal of a high order—all by members of
the society—on chemical and mechanical philosophy and
on various othersubjects—viz., ventilation, imponderables,
the Alpaca wool manufacture, iron as a material for ship-
building, four and six-wheel locomotives, locomotive
cranks, the resistance of water to bodies moving through
it, the principles of harmony prevailing in the system of
nature, safety valves, the consumption of smoke in fur-
naces, &c. Several models and works of art which had
been exhibited are also here explained. The meetings are
held monthly at the Royal Institution. The object of the
society (as stated in the preface) is " to promote the use-
ful and ingenious arts in Liverpool, by securing to their
inventors those advantages which, in every department of
science, have been found to result from mutual encourage-
ment and co-operation, and from the interchange of ideas
in unreserved discussion ;" and judging from the proceed-
ings here recorded, which evince much ability and re-
search, as well as from the local and corresponding list of
members, including many of the most distinguished
scientific and literary men in the locality and elsewhere,
we cannot doubt but that the society is destined to become
a high ornament and advantage to the town—calculated
as it is

" to drive the mind
To its best use, the service of mankind."

Plane Geometry. Second Book of Euclid's Elements,
demonstrated by Algebraic Symbols, and applied to the
Solution of Problems; the composition and construc-
tion of Quadratic Equations, 3rc. By W. Dunlop,
Science Tutor, Dublin.

Part I. of this work is before us, and is evidently the
production of a practised mathematician. The author
states in a brief preface :—" The process of investigating
the principles here treated of, require little knowledge of
algebra; the well-known results of geometry are simply
compared together, and require only an acquaintance with
the simple principles to resolve them to the forms ob-
tained." The problems are clearly defined, and to the
student in geometry—a valuable branch of science in the
present age—the work will, we doubt not, be found a
valuable acquisition.

Notes on the Marine Glue. By Alfred Jefferey, patentee.

London : J. Tuelon

This is a brief, but (to shipowners, shipwrights, and
nautical men,) highly interesting account of the various
successful experiments made, both in the navy and the
merchant service with the Marine Glue, discovered by
Mr. Jefferey, of Limehouse, and which promises to be-
come of the greatest advantage for the tightening and
strengthening of ships and other vessels, and consequently
for the additional security of life and property afloat.
The writer was one of the early producers of copper-
plates by galvanic action, for the sheathing of vessels,
but finding that this method did not reduce the cost, and
was attended by other disadvantages, " the idea occurred
to him (he states) of applying soluble gums, as a protec-
tion to the bottoms of ships ; and he conceived that
by combining elastic gum with non-elastic, and charging
the whole composition with ingredients destructive
both to animal and vegetable life, the object he had
in view might be effectually attained ; inasmuch as such
a coating would protect the timbers from the contact of
water, and also prevent any adhesion or accumulation of
animal or vegetable matter, and resist the attack of the
ship-worm." In this he was very successful, in several
experiments on blocks of wood sunk in Portsmouth har-
bour; and in the course of his researches he discovered
the Marine Glue, possessing properties most useful and
important for shipbuilding and other purposes. This
substance is insoluble in, and impervious to, water; is
elastic, so as to contract or expand with strains, or the
vicissitudes of heat and cold ; sufficiently solid to fill up a
joint and give strength ; and so adhesive as to connect
the timbers firmly together. A number of experiments
have already been made with it in Woolwich Dock-yard,
in presence of Sir F. A. Collier, and the master ship-
wrights of the Queen's dock-yards in all our great naval
arsenals, with a highly gratifying result. These experi-
ments are detailed, and it appears from them that timbers
glued together with it. and after long submersion in wa-
ter, have withstood strains of many tons without being
separated—the wood giving way, while the joint in every
case remained firm. It appears, indeed, to connect tim-
ber as strongly, and to maintain its strength underwater as
firmly, as the best common glue does in a dry state, with
the additional advantage of elasticity. It is also applica-
ble to effectually filling up rents or fissures in blocks of
wood, and to the fishing or splicing of masts, sprung
yards, and other spars. Built masts are also so connected
by it as to be much stronger than if of one piece, and this
has been proved in the mainmast of the Eagle, 50-gun
ship, of that of the Trafalgar, 120-gun ship, and others.
It has also been applied in laying, the decks of the Victo-
ria and Albert steam-vessel, built for her Majesty and
Prince Albert ; and in this respect has been proved to be
greatly superior and more durable than pitch, in several
vessels that Lave made long voyages. It has been found
equally advantageous in tightening small craft and boats,
also for dock-gates, &c. The several experiments:are at-
tested by nautical men, and illustrated by plates; and we
strongly recommend a perusal of the pamphlet (which is
extremely well written) to all interested in shipping.
THE ARISTOCRACY OF ENGLAND.

rFrom Blackwood's Magazine for July.)
" Perhaps, however, the one capital force, operating for
good upon the British aristocracy, is—the paramount
reference of all accomplishments, of ambition through all
its modes, and of party connexions, to the public service.
This, again, which constitutes a fourth head amongst the
characteristics of English society, may be viewed as both
cause and effect with reference to our civil institutions.
Here we regard it as a cause. It is a startling assertion
to make, but we have good reason to think it true, that,
in the last great war with Jacobinism, stretching through
very nearly one whole quarter of a century, beyond all
doubt the nobility was that order amongst us who shed
their blood in the largest proportion for the common-
wealth. Let not the reader believe that for a moment
we are capable of undervaluing the pretensions of any
class, whether high or low. All furnished martyrs to that
noblest of causes. And it is not possible that this should
be otherwise ; because amongst us society is so exquisitely
fused, so delicate are the nuances by which our ranks
play out and in to each other, that no man can imagine
the possibility of an arrest being communicated at any
point to the free circulation of any one national feeling
whatsoever. Great chasms must exist between social
ranks, where it is possible for a sentiment of nationality
to be sundenly frozen up as it approaches one particular
class ; as a corollary from which doctrine, we have always
treated with derision the scurrilous notion that our rural
body of landowners, our country squires, could, by possi-
bility, differ essentially from the rest of us. Bred amongst
us, educated amongst us, intermarrying with us indis-
criminately, how by any means apparent to common sense
should it be possible for them to maintain an inheritance
of separate ignorance, separate prejudices, or separate
purposes, such as interested manufacturers and trivial
satirists assume? On the same principle, it is not
possible that, in questions of elementary patriotism, any
palsy should check the electric movement of the national
feelings through every organ of its social life—except only
in the one case where its organization is imperfect. Let
there be a haughty nobility, void of popular sympathies,
such as the haute noblesse of Russia or Hungary is some-
times said to be, and it will be possible that jealousy on
behalf of privileges should operate so noxiously as to
place such a body in opposition to the people for the sake
of what it holds separately, rather than in sympathy with
the people for the sake of what both hold in common.
With us, this is otherwise ; the very highest and most
feudal amongst our nobles are associated by common
rights, interests, and subjection to the laws, with the
general body of the people. Make an exception for
the right of demanding an audience from the so-
vereign, for the right of entree at St. James's, for the
right of driving through the Horse Guards, or for
Lord Kinsale's right of wearing his hat in the royal pre-
sence—reckon of the petty discount for privileges so
purely ceremonial, and absolute nothing remains to dis-
tinguish the nobility. For as to the practice of entails,
the legal benefit of primogeniture, Ikc., these have no more
essential connexion with the nobility, than the possession
of land or manorial rights. They are privileges attached
to a known situation, which is open equally to e%ery man
not disqualified as an alien. Consequently, we infer that,
the fusion and continuity of our ranks being perfect, it is
not possible to suppose, with respect to a great patriotic
interest, any abrupt pause in the fluent circulation of our
national sympaties. We, therefore, cannot be supposed
to arrogate for the nobility any separate privilege of pa-
triotism. But still we venture to affirm, that, if the total
numbers of our nobility and their nearest connexions were
summed; and if from that sum were subtracted all offi-
cers, being brothers, sons, nephews, of British peers, who
laid down their lives, or suffered incurable wounds in the
naval or military service of their country, the proportion
will be found greater than that upon the aggregate re-
mainder belonging to the rest of the nation. Life is the
same blessing for all ranks alike. But certainly, though
for all it is intrinsically the same priceless jewel, there is
in the setting of this jewel something more radiantly bril-
liant to him who inherits a place amongst the British no-
bility, than to him whose prospects have been clouded
originally by the doubts and fears of poverty. And, at
all events, the libation of blood in the course of the
last war was, we must repeat, on the part of the high
aristocracy, disproportionately large.
" In that proportion are those men unprincipled who
speak of the English nobility as an indolent class—de-
tached from public employments, and taking neither share
nor interest in the public service. Such representations,
where they are not deliberate falsehoods, point to a fact
which is not uncommon • from the limited number of our
nobility, and consequently the rare opportunities for really
studying their habits, it is easy to see that in sketches of
this order, (whether libellous amongst mob orators, or
serious in novels,) the pretended portrait has been founded
on a vague romantic abstraction of what may be supposed
peculiar to the condition of a patrician order under all po-
litical circumstances. Haughtiness, exclusiveness, indo-
lence, and luxury. compose the romantic type which the
delineator figures to his mind ; and at length it becomes
evident to any man, who has an experimental knowledge
of this order, that probably the ancient Persian satraps,

or the omrahs of Hindostan, have much more truly been
operatively present to the describers than any thing anci-
ent or modern amongst the realities of England. A can-
did person, who wishes to estimate the true, and not the
imaginary nobles of England, will perceive one fact
through the public journals, viz., that no class takes a
more active share in that sort of the public business which
naturally commends itself to their support. At least one-
half of the deliberative meetings connected with the innu-
merable charitiesof London, very many of the public din-
ners by which such charities are promoted or commemo-
rated, obtain the benevolent aid of noblemen as chairn.en
and presidents. Provincial asssemblies for the same pur-
poses, and, still more frequently, assemblies growing
out of the endless political questions incident to a nation
in our circumstances, receive the same influential
countenance. These labours, by no means slight,
added to the evening parliamentary attendance through
half the year, and the morning attendance on par-
liamentary committees, togetl-er with the magiste-
rial duties of many lords-lieutenants, sufficiently at-
test that in this point of public duties (exercised with-
out fee or compensation), our nobility is the only one in
Europe having almost any connexion at all with the
national service, except through the army. Some of this
small body are pretty constantly attached to the cabinet;
others act as ambassadors, as under-secretaries, or as
colonial governors. And so far are they from wishing,
apparently, to limit the field for their own exertions, that
the late Dukes of Manchester and Richmond sponta-
neously extended it, by giving the countenances of their
high stations to the governments of Canada, and even of
Jamaica. A marquis of ancient family has lately ac-
cepted the government of Madras; and gradually, as our
splendid colonies expand their proportions, it is probable
that many more of them will benefit at intervals, (in
their charities and public works,) from the vast revenues
of our leading nobles acting as their governors. Add to
these the many cases of junior nobles who sit in the
House of Commons; of those who keep alive the public
spirit of great provinces by standing costly contested
elections ; of those professionally pursuing the career of
arms in the naval or land service; and then, collating all
this activity with the very limited extent of our peerage
taken even with their families, not the very bigotry of de-
mocracy will deny that the characreristic energy of our
nation is faithfully reflected from its higher order."

THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD.

the wharf—my senses were clear, though the blow had
deprived me of all power to resist—and I could calculate,
the little chance still left me, when once I had reached
the river—when a loud yell, and a whistle was heard afar
off—another, louder, followed—the fellows around me
sprang to their legs, and with a muttered curse, and a cry
of terror, darted off in different directions. I could hear
now several pistol shots following quickly on each other,
and the noise of a scuffle with swords ; in an instant it
was over, and a cheer burst forth, like a cry of triumph.
" Any one wounded there ?" shouted a deep manly
voice, from the end of the street: I endeavoured to call
out, but my voice failed me. " Holloa there, any one
wounded?" said the voice again, when a window was
opened over my head, and a man held a candle out, and
looked into the street. " This way, this way," said he,
as he caught sight of my shadow where I lay. " Ay, I
guessed they went down here," said the same voice I
heard first, as he came along, followed by several others.
" Well, friend, are you much hurt, any blood lost ?"
" No, only stunned,' said I, " and almost well al-
ready."
" Have you any friends here—were you quite alone ?"
" Yes ; quite alone."
"Of course you were—why should I ask ? That mur-
derous gang never dared to face two men yet. Come, are
you able to walk ? Oh, you're a stout fellow, I see—come
along with us. Come, Ludwig, put a hand under him, and
we'll soon bring him up."
When they lifted me up, the sudden motion caused a
weakness so complete, that I fainted, and knew little more
of their proceedings, till I found myself lying on a sofa in
a large low room, where some forty persons were seated
at a long table, most of them smoking from huge pipes of
regular German proportions.-
" Where am I?' was my question, as I looked about,
and perceived that the party wore a kind of blue uniform,
with fur on the collar and cuffs—and a greyhound, worked
in gold, on the arm.
" Why, you're safe, my good friend," said a friendly
voice beside me—" that's quite enough to know at present,
isn't it?
" I begin to agree with you," said I coolly—and so,
turning round on my side, I closed my eyes, and fell
into as pleasant asleep as ever I remember in my life.