the refemblance of what they had been formerly when alive. Among these dead bodies there were many of an hundred years ftanding, which were as entire as the neweft, and you might handle their faces and hands without damaging them. the wall, feemingly in a devout pofture; when coming near to them, we found they were fo many dead men, all dry'd up, but with all the fleth and skin on their hands and faces entire, nor were the nerves rotted. This wonderful way of preferving their dead bodies they perform with the greateft eafe imaginable, only by extending their dead on four or five cross fticks, over a receptacle or fmall place built up of brick, hollow, and in form of a coffin; and fo the dead body continuing to lie thus extended or at full length over this hollow, fupported by the cross fticks, vents all it's corruption away, and in a year's time the ikin and fleth remain dry on the bones: and we faw feveral standing up that had been but a year, with an infcription on the bodies who they were; for, notwithstanding the bodies were all clothed in Capuchins habits, yet an abundance of them had been laymen and perfons of the best quality in Palermo; and that which is almoft incredible, the faces retained fome refemblance of the perfons to whom they did belong; for not only Mr. Gifford at firft fight called them by their names, faying, This was a very honeft fellow and my broker, this fuch a one, and fo of the reft, but the father who led us down did in particular point to one of the dead bodies, who had been a Capuchin, faying, This father was a very handsome comely man; and, indeed, it appeared fo, not only below, in refpect of the other dead, but also above ftairs, where he fhowed us the picture of that dead father, which he did to convince us that the dead had not loft This way of preferving the dead among the living is eafy, I imagine, to be practifed in any country; but in my mind it is but a very melancholy renewing of an acquaintance with our friends to fee them in this pofture; tho' in Ca.. tholic countries it ferves to put those who come to fee them in mind of praying for their fouls. Mr. Gifford told us, that he had already taken a place for himself to ftand in among the dead of this vault. The posture of two among thofe dead bodies was very remarkable; the one on it's knees, with it's arms extended, and hands clofed, as at prayers; the other with it's arms quite out at full ftretch, ftanding upright in pofture of one crucified. The account the fathers gave of these two was, that they had both been very devout in their life time; and that the body of that perfon which is in the posture of a crucifix could by no means be altered by the fathers, who had tied down the arms more than once when the corps was fresh, and ftill found it foon returned to that pofture, which therefore they judged to be the will of God that it should fo remain, fince it was known that perfon had been a great and devout contemplator of our Bleffed Saviour's paffion: the fame kind of an account they gave of the other body in the kneeling pofture, aver ring that they found it raised of itfelf in that fashion, going in to vifit the bodies that lay aventing in the clofe vault, which they open only for that end, or to put in a fresh body. Some Account of Mr. Braidwood's Academy in Edinburgh, for the teaching of Perfons, born deaf and dumb, to speak, write, and read, with understanding. From Mr. Pennant's Tour into Scotland. R. Braidwood, profeffor of the found myself furrounded, with num bers of human forms fo oddly circumftanced, I felt a fort of anxiety, fuch as I might be fuppofed to feel had I been invironed by another order of beings. I was foon relieved, by being introduced to a mot angelic young creature, of about the age of thirteen. She honoured me with her new acquired converfation; but I may truly fay, that I could fcarcely bear the power of her piercing eyes: the looked me through and through. She foon fatisfied me that he was an apt fcholar. She readily apprehended M'academy of dumb and deaf, all I faid, and returned me antwers has under his care a number of young perfons, who have received the Promethean heat, the divine inflatus; but from the unhappy conftruction of their organs, were (till they had received his inftructions) denied the power of utter ance. Every idea was locked up, or appeared but in their eyes, or at their fingers ends, till their master inftructed them in arts unknown to us, who have the faculty of hearing. Apprehenfion reaches us by the groffer fenfe. They fee our words, and our uttered thoughts become to them vifible. Our ideas, exprefled in fpeech ftrike their ears in vain: Their eyes receive them as they part from our lips. They conceive by intuition, and fpeak by imitation. Mr. Braidwood firft teaches them the letters and their powers; and the ideas of words written, beginning with the moft fimple. The art of fpeaking is taken from the motion of his lips; his words being uttered flowly and diftinctly. Their anfwers are flow, and fomewhat harth. When I entered the room, and with the utmoft facility. She read; the wrote well. Her reading was not by rote. She could clothe the fame thoughts in a new fet of words, and never vary from the original fenfe. I have forgot the book the took up, or the fentences the made a new version of; but the effect was as follows: Original Paffage. Lord Bacon has divided the whole of human knowledge into history, poetry, and philofophy, which are referred to the three powers of the mind, memory, imagination, and reafon. Verfion. A nobleman has parted the total or all of man's ftudy, or underftanding, into an account of the life, manners, religion, and cuftoms of any people or country, verfe or metre, moral or natural knowledge, which are pointed to the three faculties of the foul or fpirit; the faculty of remembering what is paft, thought or conception, and right judgment. I left Mr. Braidwood and his to be cultivated for the fupport of life. They have no parks or extenfive forefts, which are not near fo ferviceable to mankind by the wood they furnish, as prejudicial by preventing agriculture; and while they contribute to the pleafure of the great by the beasts that range in them, prove a real misfortune to the husbandman. Ia Chira, the beauty of a countryfeat confifts in its being happily fituated, furrounded with an agreeable variety of, cultivated fields, and interfperfed with trees planted irregularly, and with fome heaps of a porous stone, which at a dif. tance have the appearance of rocks or mountains. pupils with the fatisfaction which muft refult from a reflection on the utility of his art, and the merit of his labours: Who, after receiving under his care a being that feemed to be merely endowed with a human form, could produce the divina particula auræ, latent, and but for his fkill, condemned to be ever latent in it; and who could reftore a child to its glad parents with a capacity of exerting its rational powers, by expreffive, founds of duty, love, and affection. The rural Industry and Occonomy of the Chinese, propofed as an Example to all the other nations of the Univerfe, by the Abbé Raynal-From that Gentleman's Philofophical and Political Hiftory, &c. IN Na country where the government is fo ancient, we may cvery where expect to find deep traces of the continued force of induftry. Its roads have been levelled with the exacteft care; and, in general, have no greater declivity than is neceffary to facilitate the watering of the land, which they confider, with reafon, as one of the greatest helps in agriculture. They have but few, even of the moft ufeful trees, as their fruits would rob the corn of its nourishment. There are gardens, it is true, interfperfed with flowers, fine turf, fhrubberies, and fountains; but however agreeable thefe fcenes might be to an idle fpectator, they feem to be concealed and removed from the public eye, as if the owners were afraid of fhewing how much their amufements had encroached upon the foil that ought The hills are generally cut into terraces, fupported by dry walls. Here there are refervoirs, conftructed with ingenuity, for the reception of rain and fpring water. It is not uncommon to fee the bottom, fummit, and declivity of a hill watered by the fame canal, by means of a number of engines of a fimple conftruction, which fave manual labour, and perform with two men what could not be done with a thoufand in the ordinary way. These heights commonly yield three crops in a year. They are firft fown with a kind of radish, which produces an oil: then with cotton, and after that with potatoes. This is the commion method of culture; but the rule is not without exception. Upon most of the mountains which are incapable of being cultivated for the fubfiftence of man, proper trees are planted for building houfes or fhips. Many of them contain iron, tin, and copper mines, fufficient to fupply the empire. The gold mines have been neglected, neglected, either because their produce did not defray the expence of working them, or because the gold duft, washed down by the torrents, was found fufficient for the purposes of exchange. The fandy plains, faved from the ravages of the ocean, (which changes its bed as rivers do their courfe, in a space of time fo exactly proportioned to their different moments, that a small encroachment of the fea caufes a thousand revolutions on the furface of the globe) form, at this day, the provinces of Nankin and Tchekiang, which are the finest in the empire. As the Egyptians checked the courfe of the Nile, the Chinese have repulfed, reftrained, and given laws to the ocean. They have re-united to the continent tracts of land which had been disjoined by this element. They ftill exert their endeavours to oppofe that overruling effect of the earth's mo tion, which in conformity with the celeftial fyftem drives the ocean from east to weft. To the action of the globe the Chinese oppofe the labours of induftry; and while nations, the most celebrated in hiftory, have, by the rage of conqueft, increafed the ravages that time is perpetually making upon this globe; they exert fuch efforts to retard the progrefs of univerfal devaftation, as might appear fupernatural, if daily experience did not afford us ftrong evidence to the contrary. To the improvements of land this nation adds, if we may be allowed the expreffion, the improvement of the water. The rivers, which communicate with each other by caDals, and run under the walls of moft of the towns, prefent us with the profpect of floating cities, compofed of an infinite number of boats filled with people, who live constantly upon the water, and whofe fole employment is fishing. The fea itfelf is covered with numberless veffels, whofe mafts, at a distance, appear like moving forefts. Anfon mentions it as a reproach to the fishermen belonging to these boats, that they did not give themfelves a moment's intermiffion from their work to look at his fhip, which was the largest that had ever anchored in thofe latitudes. But this inattention to an object, which appeared to a Chinese failor to be of no ufe, though it was in the way of his profeffion, is, perhaps, a proof of the happinefs of a people, who prefer business to matters of mere curiofity: The manner of culture is by ne means uniform throughout this empire, but varies according to the nature of the foil and the difference of the climate. In the low countries towards the fouth they fow rice, which being always under water, grows to a great fize, and yields two crops in a year. In the inland parts of the country, where the fituation is lofty and dry, the foil produces a fpecies of rice, which is neither fo large, fo well-tafted, or fo nourishing, and makes the busbandman but one return in the year for his labour. In the northern parts the fame kinds of grain are cultivated as in Europe, which grow in as great plenty, and are of as good a quality as in any of our moft fertile countries. From one end of China to the other, there are large quantities of vegetables, particularly in the fouth, where together with fish they fupply the place of meat, which is the general 2 general food of the other provinces. But the improvement of lands is univerfally understood and attended to. All the different kinds of ma nure are carefully preferved, and fkilfully diftributed to the best adEvantage; and that which arifes from fertile lands, is applied to make them still more fertile. This grand fyftem of nature, which is fuftained by deftruction and reproduction, is better understood and attended to in China than in any other country in the world. A philofopher, whom the fpirit of obfervation has led into their empire, has found out and explained the cause of the rural economy of the Chinese. The first of thefe caufes is that character of industry by which these people are particularly diftinguithed, who in their nature require a lefs fhare of repofe. Every day in the year is devoted to labour, except the first, which is employed in paying and receiving vifits a mong relations; and the latt, which is facred to the memory of their ancestors. The first is a focial duty, the latter a part of domeftic wor ship. In this nation of fages, whatever unites and civilizes mankind is religion; and religion itfelf is nothing more than the practice of the focial virtues. Thefe fober and rational people want nothing more than the controul of civil laws to make them juft; their private worship confiits in the love of their parents whether living or dead; and their public worthip in the love of labour; and that labour which is held in the most facred veneration is agriculture. The generolity of two of their emperors is much revered, who, preferring the interefts of the ftate to thofe of their family, kept their own children from the throne to make room for men taken from the plough. They revere the memory of thefe hufbandmen, who fowed the feeds of the happiness and tabibility of the empire in the fertile bofom of the earth; that inexhauftible fource of whatever conduces to the nourishment, and confequently to the increase of mankind. In imitation of thefe royal hufbandmen, the emperors of China become hutbandmen officially. It is one of their public functions to break up the ground in the fpring; and the parade and magnificence that accompanies this ceremony, draws together all the farmers in the neighbourhood of the capital. They flock. in crowds to fee their prince perform this folemnity in honour of the first of all the arts. It is not as in the fables of Greece, a god, who tends the flocks of a king; it is the father of his people, who, holding the plough with his own hands, fhews his children what are the true riches of the ftatc. In a little time he repairs again to the field he has ploughed himself, to fow the feed that is moft proper for the ground. The example of the prince is followed in all the provinces; and at the fame feafons the viceroys repeat the fame ceremonies in the prefence of a numerous concourse of hufbandmen. The Europeans, who have been prefent at this folemnity at Canton, never speak of it without emotion; and make us regret that this feftival, whofe political aim is the encouragement of labour, is not established in our climate, instead of that number of religious feafts, which feem to |