countries, with a large body of statistical information upon the subject; an article of great interest, but perhaps undue length:—­Death, which conveys much information on a subject as to which the grossest and most deplorable misconceptions prevail; an article equally remarkable for its careful and minute presentation of the phenomena of death and for the placid and philosophical spirit in which it is written:—­Deluge, in which, with the ingenuity before shown in the treatment of similar subjects, the various accounts of that event, and the facts and theories relating to it, are laid before the reader in a manner to which no one, of whatever creed, can object, and a new and very ingenious and rational mode of accounting for the phenomenon in question is proposed;—­Dog, the fulness of which makes it acceptable to the lover of natural history, the sporting man, and the general reader:—­and the last article, Education, one of great value, which describes the systems of instruction pursued in all ages and countries, and which, without entering upon the support of any one of them, presents to the reader such an impartial and detailed summary of the distinguishing features of them all, that he can form an intelligent opinion upon them for himself.

The volume is so meritorious, that we have not looked for faults; but, as we turned the leaves, we noticed a few such as the following:—­that the river Dove, in England, should be mentioned as “noted for its picturesque scenery,” and yet its association with Izaak Walton and Charles Cotton, its chief glory, be passed unnoticed; and that Discord should be defined as, “in music, a combination of sounds inharmonious and unpleasing to the ear”; whereas, although, out of music, discord means a sound inharmonious and displeasing to the ear, in music discord is the golden bond of harmony, the life and soul of expression, that for which the ear yearns with a yearning that is inexpressible, and enjoys with poignancy of pleasure.  We asked, too, if Thomas Dowse should be honored with a page and a half, in which his fall from a tree, his rheumatic fever, and the head winds which prevented him from visiting Europe are chronicled,—­while the eminent French painter, Couture, whose use of the pallet is marked by such striking originality, that it has produced an impression upon the works of a generation of painters, has twelve lines!  And we can hardly be accused of hypercriticism, in directing the attention of the editors to a sentence like the following, in the article Diptera, p. 498, 2d col.:—­“Though this order contains the bloodthirsty mosquito, the disgusting flesh-fly, and many insects depositing their eggs in the bodies of living animals, it is a most useful one, supplying food to insectivorous birds, and themselves [who? what?] consuming decomposing animal and vegetable substances,” etc.  But these are instances of oversight in not very important matters, or of inaccuracy of expression, or of difference of judgment between the editors and ourselves as to plan, which even in our judgment do not affect the value of the work in which they occur.  Graver errors could be found in almost every work of great scope that ever came from the press.  We indicate them that we may afford some help toward a nearer approximation to that perfection which is unattainable.