freely from the pen ;-and when writing which has been executed with it is exposed to a considerable but gradual heat from the fire it becomes completely black, the letters being burnt in and charred by the action of the sulphuric acid. If the acid has not been used in sufficient quantity to destroy the texture of the paper and reduce it to the state of tinder, the colour may be discharged by the oxymuriatic and oxalic acids and their compounds, though not without great difficulty. When the full proportion of acid has been employed, a little crumpling and rubbing of the paper reduces the carbonaceous matter of the letter to powder, but by putting a black ground behind them, they may be preserved, and thus a species of indelible writing-ink is procured, (for the letters are in a manner shaped out of the paper) which might be useful for some purposes; perhaps for the signatures of bank notes. Brande's Journal. ADULTERATION OF SULPHATE OF QUININE. Some of the chemists having chose to adulterate this recent discovered and highly beneficial medicine, by mixing it with sugar, the following is a method proposed to physicians and pharmacopolists to detect this new species of fraud. Dissolve the salt in water, and precipitate the quinine by carbonate of potash. Filter the liquid, and evaporate to dryness; the residue being treated with alcohol, the latter dissolves the sugar and leaves the sulphate of potash, and the excess of carbonate untouched; on evaporating the alcohol the sugar is obtained quite pure. MEDICAL VIRTUES OF THE SPIDER'S WEB. Dr. Jackson, in his work on fever, pronounces that the web of the spider prevents the recurrence of febrile paroxysms more effectually than bark or arsenic, or any other remedy employed for that purpose. It is administered in pills of five grains every fourth or fifth hour, the patient being previously prepared by the usual evacuants. It is said to be useful also in spasmodic affections of various kinds, asthma, periodical head-aches, and general irritability; also as an application to ulcerated and irritable surfaces. The web should be that of the black spider, found in cellars, and dark and damp places. Anecdotiana. CARDINAL ANGELOTTO. THIS character notorious for the weakness of his intellect, and the meanness of his disposition, was extremely fond of detracting from the merit of others. One day, when Pope Eugenio, IV. was at Florence, a lad of ten years old was introduced to his Holiness, in the presence of the Cardinal. The youth addressed the Pope in a speech, which for gravity and wisdom, much exceeded his years, "It is common," observed Angelotto, when the rest of the audience praised the oration, "for young persons endowed with premature talents to fall into early decay of parts." "Then, my Lord Cardinal," replied the lad, "you must have had very extraordinary talents when you was young." Diary and Chronology. DATE. DAYS. DIARY. DATE. CORRESPONDING CHRONOLOGY. March 9 SUN. 3d. Sun. in Lent. March 3 St. Gregory Nyssen, was the younger brother of St. LESSONS for the DAY. 39 c. Gen. morn. 42 c. Gen, even. St. Gregory. Moon's last quar. 10 Mond. St. Dractovæus died 580. Sun ris 17m af. 6 -set 43m af. 5 11 Tues St. Eulogius. 12 Wed St. Gregory, the Sun ris 13m af. 6 52m af. 10 morn 18 Thur. St. Nicephorus 14 Frid. St. Boniface 34m af. 12 morn 15 Satur. St. Zachary. New Moon, 38m af. 9 even. Basil, he became bishop of Nyssa, in Cappadocia, but was deposed by the Arian faction. He drew up the Nicene Creed, by order of the Council of Constantinople He died A.D. 400. 1814. Fatal attack of the English on Bergen-opZoom, under Sir T. Graham. 10 1636. Sir Hugh Myddleton died on this day. He was a native of Denbigh, and a citizen of London, to which city he rendered the most important service, iu supplying it with water, by uniting two streams in Hertfordshire and Middlesex, and conveying the same through various soil, for a course of sixty miles. The effecting of this junction took five years to complete. 1792. Expired John, Earl of Bute, a nobleman, who for some time directed the education of Geo. III. He was prime minister in the early part of the late reign. 1820. Died, Benjamin West, Esq. the celebrated historical painter, and president of the Royal Academy. ETAT 82. 11 St Eulogius was elected archbishop of Toledo, but before his consecration he was put to death by the Saracens at Cordova, in 859. 1544. On this day was born Torquato Tasso, the celebrated author of Jerusalem Delivered, at Sorrento, in the kingdom of Naples. · 12 St. Gregory was born in 544. He was appointed prætor of the city of Rome, but being inclined to a religious life, he retired to the monastery of St. Andrew, of which he became abbot. On the death of Pelagius, in 590, he was elected Pope. He died in 604. He sent Austin, the monk to convert the English to Christianity. 1712. Queen Anne announced in the Royal Gazette her attention to touch publicly for the evil. 1713. On this day was published the first number of the Guardian, under the direction of Steele and Addison. 1825. Died, the Rev. Robert Bland, author of the Four Slaves of Cythera, a poetical romance, and several other works of a classical nature. 1791. Dr. Herschel on this day discovered the 14 St. Boniface was a native of England, and sent by 1799. Died at Bath, ET. 89, Wm. Melmoth, author 1803. Expired T. 80, Frederick Klopstock, the author of the Messiah. 15 St Zachary was Pope, and died A. D. 752, 41, B, C. Julius Cæsar was assasinated by Brutus and his associates, in the Senate House, at Rome, in the 56th year of his age. 1784. Expired, Dr. Thomas Franklin, the author of the Earl of Warwick, a Tragedy, and transla■ tor of Phalaris, Sophocles, and Lucian, which performances evince abilities and genius of the first order. ACCOUNT OF MOUNT ETNA AND ITS IRRUPTIONS. "THIS mighty and imposing mountain, which rises in solitary grandeur to the height of above ten thousand feet, and embraces a circumference of one hundred and eighty miles, is entirely composed of lavas, which, whatever subordinate differences may exist between them, all possess the appearance of having been ejected above the surface of water, and not under pressure. "In the structure of this mountain, every thing wears alike the character of vastness. The products of the eruptions of Vesuvius may be said almost to sink into insignificence, when compared with these coulées, some of which are four or five miles in breadth, fifteen in length and from fifty to one hundred feet in thickness, and the changes made on the coast by them are so considerable, that the natural boundaries between the sea and land seem almost to depend upon the movements of the volcano. "The height too of Etna is so great, that the lava frequently finds less resistance in piercing the flanks of the mountain, than in rising to its summit, and has i this manner formed a number of minor. cones, many of which possess their respective craters, and have given rise to considerable streams of lava. "Hehce an ancient poet has very happily termed this volcano the parent of Sicilian mountains, an expression strictly applicable to the relation which it bears to the hills in its immediate neighbourhood, all of which have been formed by successive ejections of matter from its interior. "The grandest and most original feature indeed in the physiognomy of Etna, is the zone of subordinate volcanic hills with which it is encompassed, and which look like a court of subaltern princes waiting upon their sovereign. "Of these, some are covered with vegitation, others are bare and arid, their relative antiquity being probably denoted by the progress vegetation has made upon their surface, and the extraordinary difference that exists in this respect seems to in dicate that the mountain, to which they owe their origin, must have been in a 10-SATURDAY, MARCH 15, 1828. state of activity, if not at a period antecedent to the commencement of the present order of things, at least at a distance of time exceedingly remote. "The silence of Homer on the subject of the eruptions of Etna is indeed often quoted in proof of the more modern date of this volcano; but to such negative evidence we have to oppose the positive statement of Diodorus Siculus, who notices an eruption long anterior to the age of this poet, as he says that the Sicani, who with the exception of the fabulous Cyclops and Lestrigons, were the first inhabitants of the island, and who are admitted on all sides to have possessed it considerably before the Trojan war, deserted the neighbourhood of Mount Etna in consequence of the terror caused by the eruptions of the volcano. "This is confirmed by Dionysius Halicarnassus, who states that the Siculi, who passed over from Magna Græcia about eighty years before the Trojan war, first took possession of that part of the island which had been deserted by the Sicanians so that it is probable that the mountain was at that period tolerably tranquil, and sup posing no eruption to have taken place from that time till the age of Homer, it is by no means unlikely, that in a barbarous age, the tradition of events so remote may have been in great measure effaced, and thus have never reached the ears of the Greek poet. "The earliest historian by whom the volcano has been noticed is Thucydides who says, that up to the date of the Peloponesian war, which commenced in the year 431 B. C. three eruptions had taken place from Mount Etna, since Sicily was peopled by the Greeks. It is probably to one of these that Pindar has alluded in his first Pythian Ode, written according to Heyné, in consequence of the victory obtained by Hiero in the year 470 B. C. It may be remarked that this poet particularly speaks of the streams of lava which if we may judge from Vesuvius, are less usual concomitants of the first eruptions of a volcano. "Diodorus Siculus mentions an eruption subsequent to the above, namely in the 96th Olymp. or 396 years B. C. which stopped the Carthaginian army in their march against Syracuse. The stream may be seen on the eastern slope of the mountain near Giarre, extending over a breadth of more than two miles, and having a length of twenty-four from the summit of the mountain to its final termination in the sea. The spot in question is called the Bosco di Aci; it contains many large trees, and has a partial coating of vegetable mould, and it is seen that this torrent covered lavas of an older date which existed on the spot. "Four eruptions are recorded to have happened between this period and the century immediately preceeding the Christian era, during which latter epoch the mountain seems to have been in a state of frequent agitation, so that it is noticed by the poets among the signs of the anger of the gods at the death of Cæsar. "After this for about a thousand years its eruptions are but little noticed, but during the last eight centuries they have succeeded each other with considerable rapidity. Referring however to the chronological list of the eruptions of the mountain for a specification of these, I shall here merely allude to such as have produced some remarkable change in the ́ character of the country. "In the memorable eruption of 1669, and in 1302 there was an eruption of Mount Epemeo in Ischia. From 1329 to 1719 there were forty-two eruptions of Etna, not quite one to a century. Vesuvius gave in the same time, or rather from 1306 to 1822, forty-two eruptions; the ratio of time a little more. "It appears from this table that the nearest coincidence between the eruption of the two volcanos was in 1694 and in 1811, when they occurred within a month of each other, and that on eight several occasions an interval of less than half a year elapsed between them, viz. that of Vesuvius December 2, 1754, was followed by one of Etna on March 2, 1755; Vesuvius August 3, 1779, by Etna May 18, 1780; Vesuvius October 31, by Etna July 28, 1787; Etna June, 1788, by Vesuvius February, 1799; again followed by one of Etna in June, same year; Etna March 27, 1809, by Vesuvius December 10, 1809; Vesuvius October 12, 1811, by Etna October 25, 1811; again followed by Vesuvius December 31, same year; Vesuvius May 27, 1819, by Etna, November 25, same year.” Laconics; OR, a rent twelve inches in length took place Pithy Remarks and Maxims, collected on the flank of the mountain above Nicolise, about half-way between Catania and the summit, and from this fissure descended a torrent of melted matter, which continued flowing for several miles, destroyed a part of Catania, and at length entering the sea, formed a little promontory, which serves to arrest the fury of the waves in that quarter, at the same time the accumulation of matters ejected, raised on the mountain two conical hills called the Monti Mossi, which measure at their base, about two Italian miles, and are in height more than three hundred feet above the slope of the mountain, on which they are placed." Ferrara. The earliest eruption of Etna that is recorded, was about 480 years before Christ, and there were nine others before that epoch, besides one of the Eolian Isles and one of Ischia. Vesuvius had no eruption during this period, nor is any previous one known, although it is certain that there must have been eruptions more ancient than any that are recorded of Etna, and the same remark may be made of Etna itself. were From the birth of Christ to 1824, there re only six eruptions of Etna; in the mean time there were nine of Vesuvius. In 1198, the Solfaterra was inflamed, from various Sources. |