Masonic Notes And Quekies.

NOTES OiS LITERATURE , SCIENCE AND AET . Tin : subscription for a monument in memory of the historian Hallam approaches £ 500 . Among the subscribers arc the Marquis of Lansdowne , Lord John Russell , Karl Stanhope , the Lord Chancellor , the Bishop of St . David ' s , Lord Overstone , Lord Teignmouth , Lord AVensleydale , Mr . Gladstone , the Speaker of the Houso of Commons , Lord Monteagle , the Dean of St . Paul ' s . Sir Roderick Mui-cliison , & c .

Mr . Booth of Regent-street is about to publish witli all possible expedition , consistent with the work being satisfactorily accomplished , a fac-si' inili' edition of "Mr . AVilliam Shakespeare ' s Comedies , Histories , and Tragedies . Published according to the True Originall Copies . London : Printed by Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount , J ( .-23 ; " and to be reprinted in one volume , the size to range with all demy octavo editions of the poet ' s works ; yet , the bonk will be , page for pageline

, for line , word for word , strictly in accord with the old folio , and possessing carefully executed /«<• -: ¦ jfl . v'te of all the original typographical ornamentations ; and likewise a facsimile of the Dvoeshout portrait ou the title , as faithfully rendered as effort can accomplish . The work will be printed on three papers , the sizes , as announced above , also to range with all royal octavo editions , and in folio , the latter being on writing paper . There will likewise be a very limited impression of

each | ilay separately , the size , a small quarto . ~\\' e wish Mr . Booth success in his undertaking . A new biographical announcement of interest is made by the Messi ys . Longman—a life of the late President of the Royal Academy , Siv Martin Archer Shee , hy his son . lu the new number ofthe Cnrnhitl Magazinesome writers who have

, not appeared in previous numbers will be found . ' Inside Canton , " comes from the pen of Air . Albert Smith . A fragment of a sketch b y the late Charlotte Bronte will have a certain interest . The list of contents is more varied , aud combines the practical , the useful , and the

entertaining . Air . Lovell Reeve starts on the 1 st of Alay , a new periodical , ' ' The Floral Magazine . " A book connected with the history oi Arras was lately sold by auction at Cologne . It is the treaty concluded at Arras on the Sth of April , 1483 , by which Charles YII'f . repairs part of-the disasters inflicted on the Artesian capital by the violence of Louis XI . This treaty , which is

found in all diplomatic collections , aud has been published many times , was sold cm the jiresent occasion for -1 S 01 ' . It consists of twelve pages only , hut is valuable as being the first hook printed at Ghent . The book hitherto supposed to be the first was published ill September . 1483 ; but that now disposed of . as appears from a note on the hack , appeared in April of that year . The finipei'or of tho French has . just received the first minutes of the

limps of ancient Gaul , which he had commanded to be drawn up more than eighteen months ago , and ivhich it has taken the commission the whole of that period of unceasing labour and attention to accomplish . Tn this map . which his majesty has been pleased to mention as destined to be a . monument of his reign , the state of ancient . Gaul iu the days of Caviar will be clearly made out . It is considered , as far as it goes at jiresent , as the most perfect work of the kind that has ever appeared . So perfect , indeed , that historians have boon completely startled bv the

. mnoimeemcmt that the new translation of the Commentaries of Ctesar is rendered indispensable , and that the work has been put in hand by order of the emperor , so that it may appear at the same moment as the map , and the scholar lie thus enabled to follow the eomjueror through the countries he subdued . Former translations arc proved to he full of errors and niisjudgmo . iits ; while the familiarity with the great man , in whose intimate society the commission has been living day and night

for eighteen months , has enabled its members to accomplish the greatest , exactitude in their descriptions . General Orealy and 11 . Alexandre 1 ' eririind have been appointed to this portion of the work . Many of our readers are doubtless well acquainted with the Gorman reprints of English books known as the Tauclinitz collection of British authors . Of this elegant edition of the standard works of the press tho five hundredth volume has just been issued , under the title of "Five

Centuries of the English Language and Literature . " AVishing to set up this volume as a landmark of his grand undertaking , Herr Tauclinitz has made it a collection representative of the jirogress of British thought from the days of Ayickliffe to those of Thomas Gray ; and for this purpose he has adopted the sensible plan of giving complete specimens from the works of one writer in each century . In a preface to this series , Herr Tauclinitz expresses himself with just pride on the merits of his collection which , as a reprint in a foreign oonutrv of tho ivorks of a con-

Masonic Notes And Quekies.

temporary literature , stands as yet unrivalled in tho annals of the world . ' ¦ Never could I have flattered myself ( says Herr Tauclinitz ) that I should be able to achieve such a result when , move than eighteen years ago , I published the first volume of the series , incited to the undertaking by the high opinion and enthusiastic fondness which I have ever entertained for English literature—a literature springing from the selfsame root as that of Germany , and cultivated , in the beginning , by the same Saxon race , ivhich still nourishes on this and on tho other side of the

Atlantic . As a German Saxon it gave me particular pleasure to promote the interest of my Anglo-Saxon cousins by rendering their writings as widely known as possible beyond the limits of the British empire . This development , ivhich 1 conceive to be dependent in some degree on the realization of my scheme . I am really proud to say , has bean accomplished . And why should I not be proud when I look upon the splendid series formed bv these five hundred volumes , containinc . the works of the

classical aristocracy of English literature , especially of modern times ? Few names can be mentioned of those ivho have essentially contributed to the literary glory of Great Britain that have not found their representatives iu this "Collection , " which is , 1 . believe , unrivalled iu extent as well as in the influence it has exercised upon the jiublic , not only in Germany or even in Europe , but throughout the whole civilized world , by diffusing the standard works of England in cheap , correct , and elegant

editions . " Assuming every volume of this collection to have been circulated to the extent of four thousand copies only—au estimate rather below than above the mark—Hon- Tauclinitz may claim for himself the merit oi having propagated throughout the Continent two mfflwu volumes of the standard works of British authors . Englishmen , in making this calculation , cannot help feeling great satisfaction at the extent to ivhich the writers of his country are acknowledged by the

reading public of another but kindred nation . Dr . Livingstone has communicated to the Royal Society a seiies of valuable magnetical observations made recently in Africa . Last week Professor Owen delivered the sixth lecture of his course on fossil mammalia , at the Museum of Practical Geology , in Jennyn-sti-eet . Some of the fossil remains found in the red crag , a narrow stratum that lies exposed along the coast of Norfolk and Suffolk , formed the

immediate subjects of this lecture . The bones in that stratum are so abundant , that they have been extensively applied for manure ; for , though fossilized , the phosphate of lime can be extracted hy treating the hones with acid , by which means the phosphate is rendered soluble , and thus the remains of strange creatures that have been extinct for countless ages are made to contribute to the nutriment of existing animals . There are now many pits sunk down into the red crag , which extends inland under many square miles of surface , and a very lucrative business is carried on in those fossil bones . -Among the fossil treasures of the crag there ivas

found a hard bone , about six or seven inches long , which at first greatly puzzled the palaeontologists ; but , on microscopic examination , it was ascertained to be the tooth of a large whale—similar in its general character to the whales that now inhabit the southern ocean . Professor Owen described the peculiar dentition of tho whales now existing , in which thin plates of whalebone supply the place of teeth in the adult animal , though when young they possess rows of small teeth , that are

afterwards absorbed in the gums . The hardest of the . fossil bones found in the crag are large flat ear plates of the whales that lived at the period that stratum was deposited . These plates , which serve as the organs of hearing in whales , are harder than any ofthe bones of the skeleton , and are therefore better preserved than other remains of extinct animals . Pi-oicssor Owen explained the specific differences between the whales that , om-e lived in these seas , and those now living in the northern and

in the southern Polar regions . Thoy are . quite distinct , being insulated from each other effectually by the heat of the tropics . The fossil bones of tjuadruuiaua , or the monkey tribe , are found in several varieties in the Suffolk crag . These bones indicate that some of the apes of that period were of larger size than those which now exist , and attained a size nearly equal to that of the gorilla . There is , however , a marked difference in their dentition from those now living ; and in some instances

the eye teeth were elongated like the tusks of tigers . After noticing some of the distinguishing characteristics of this extinct qiiadrmiiami , among which was a long armed ape , Professor Owen briefly alluded to the diiiotherium , the head of ivhich 1 ms been found iu the same stratum , and he intimated that in his next lecture he should speak of the extinct mammoths . The Prince Consort has sent a cheque for £ 250 to the committee for the Great Exhibition Memorial . The first project for a memorial included a bust or statue of the prince as part of the design ; to tins th ?