apron, in the corner of which she has collected some wild-flowers. Her hair falls upon her snow-white neck like a shower of gold, and her face is loveliness itself. We have gone repeatedly to look at this picture, and have never left it but with that sort of regret, which one would feel from seeing such an example of misfortune in real life, and from hearing the affecting story of the misplaced, or ill-requited affection, which had been the cause of the calamity. The ill-fated girl is standing between her afflicted parents, who are trying to pour into her soul the balm of sweet and affectionate words. Every thing looks as if copied from nature; there is no effort of epic finery; it is a rustic tale, told after Miss Mitford's fashion. In the group behind there are two or three braces of lovers, who are differently affected by the melancholy scene. One girl is evidently hesitating whether she will receive any further attentions from her swain, lest she should be treated as this poor victim was, and lose her understanding. Another points to her own forehead, telling to her companion the story of this maid, as if with a view to end it in a serious moral. These episodes serve to give variety and relief to the principal subject, and they are managed with great taste.

Under Etty's picture in the great room, there is an Italian family, in the costume of Cavi, near Palestrina, by Eastlake, which is remarkable as a specimen of the true Italian form and features, displayed in a group just above the order of peasantry, and living in easy circumstances, composed of a villager, his wife and infant child. The babe is asleep upon its mother's bosom, as if after she had just given it the breast; the father's manly countenance, chiselled in the Roman outline, is wreathed in smiles of paternal tenderness while he gazes upon his offspring; the mother is all content and happiness; no anxiety casts its shade upon her cheek; her child is hushed to rest, and she no more remembers the pain which it had cost her. Our own English beauty is in all its varieties truly enchanting; nevertheless, we could not behold this Italian mother, without feeling that there is a beauty of a very different kind, that possesses, at least, equal power to charm. A traveller may wander over every village in that land of lovely women, without meeting one more perfect, in every respect, than this fair one from Cavi. Youth and health, and the unbought grace of nature, combine to render her the most pleasing object of contemplation we have ever beheld.

Mr. M. A. Shee, son of the President, seems resolved to illustrate Gil Blas. Last year he attempted a sketch from that inexhaustible collection of scenes of Spanish life, and, with some taste, exhibited rather a larger share of gaucherie in the management of his subject. His performance this year, in the same line, is a decided failure. It is a representation of that interview between Gil Blas, and Aurora de Guzman, in which he declaims his thanks to her for looking upon him with eyes of favour. In his appearance there is not a

single trait, which our associations allow as answering in any manner to Gil Blas. And as to the lady, we need only observe that her right wrist is nearly twice as thick as her left. But the principal fault of the picture is the barrenness of its invention. It has not a spark of poetical fire, and no man ever will succeed as a historical painter, who has not a very considerable share of poetry in his soul.

Near this painting there is a capital "Interior," by Fraser, "Tapping the Ale Barrel," which is worthy of the Dutch school. "Solomon's Sacrifice, at the dedication of the Temple," by J. H. Nixon, is a truly magnificent composition. The altar is raised to a great height (not too great) in the sacred building, and the king, wrapped in enthusiastic devotion, with arms outstretched towards heaven, offers the glorious pile to the worship of his GOD. The elevation of the altar, and the consequently vast distance at which Solomon stands from his attendants, tend to give a sublimity to his person and action, worthy of the solemn ceremony in which he is engaged. The drapery of the attendants below, and the victims prepared for the sacrifice, afford the artist an opportunity of displaying the freedom and vigour of his pencil, as well as the fertility of his invention. This production must excite the most sanguine hopes as to Nixon's future career.

We were much amused with Gray's "Villagers returning from the fair."

In the Model Academy we were most struck by Sharp's “Boy and Lizard," in marble, and S. Nixon's "Infant Moses." Turne relli's bust of Lady Morgan, Sievier's busts of Dr. Turton, and Baron Bolland; Westmacott's "Ascanius carried away by Venus," and his statue of the late Mrs. Rawson, of Nield, in Yorkshire; Chantrey's busts of His Majesty and the Duke of Sussex; and Westmacott junior's "Mischief," are also wel! entitled to be mentioned as distinguished works of art.

ART. X.-Essays and Orations, read and delivered at the Royal College of Physicians; to which is added an account of the opening of the tomb of King Charles I. By Sir Henry Halford, Bart., M. D., G. C. H. President of the College. 8vo. pp. 192. London: Murray.

1831.

SIR Henry Halford has conferred a valuable kindness upon society, by publishing these papers in their present form. Though treating of subjects principally medical, yet they will be found, for the most part, acceptable to the general reader. Many of the topics which they discuss are interesting to us all; the climacteric disease, the Tic Douloureux, Insanity, the influence of some diseases of the body upon the mind, may well attract the attention of persons who are in no degree connected with the profession, the more particularly as the author, avoiding all technicality of expression, has uni

formly adopted language which every body may understand. His experience and great eminence as a Physician, render his communications important, beyond the ordinary mass of such productions; and his admonitions upon several points of practical utility, will, necessarily, be received with the greatest respect.

With respect to what is usually called the "climacteric disease,' the author holds that it would be absurd to fix it at any stated epoch of advanced life. Much depends upon the influence which moral causes have exercised over our progress from youth onwards, much also upon the various accidents and habits of living, 'which more frequently determine the number of a man's years, than the strength of the stamina with which he was born.' The climacteric may be said to have commenced when the flesh falls away in the decline of life without any obvious cause. The pulse becomes quicker than usual, and the expression of the countenance undergoes an extraordinary alteration. This generally happens between fifty and seventyfive years of age, though, within that interval, men have frequently rallied from their feeble condition, and enjoyed good health for many years after. So gradual is the approach of this disease, that we seldom take notice of its commencement. We are more easily fatigued than usual; the frame grows thin and languid; the appetite becomes impaired; sleep flies our pillow, or ceases to afford refreshment. Headach and vertigo follow, and what are supposed to be rheumatic pains; the stomach loses its powers; the mind is torpid, and the lamp of life goes gradually out, rather from a want of its usual aliment, than from the effects of a mortal distemper.

This is the malady in its simple form, a form in which it is seen only in patients whose previous life had been entirely healthy. Generally speaking, it is found in combination with other complaints, whose character it assumes, and whose course it accompanies so evenly, that it cannot often be distinguished from them. Its presence is, however, to be supposed, when those complaints are unusually exasperated, particularly if the countenance indicate that peculiar character of expression, which the climacteric disease always produces. Sometimes it adopts the symptoms of the gout, sometimes those of a common cold, or any other accidental disorder, with which it connects itself, and thus, for a time, baffles the patient, who wonders that his fit of the gout does not go off as usual, leaving him refreshed and strengthened, or that his cough continues so long beyond the ordinary period. The disease would appear to occur much more frequently in men than in women. Perhaps, correctly speaking, it is only less perceptible in the latter, whose strength, seldom so great as that of man, is weakened, long before the approach of age, by the pains attendant upon labour, as well as by their less active habits. A common cold often causes it, or an act of unusual intemperance; a fall, which may appear of no consequence at the moment; a marriage contracted late in life, and, above all, sorrow or great anxiety of mind. In the early stages of

life, grief produces little effect upon the health. If disappointments then occur, the man of fortitude and energy feels that he is still young enough to repair any disasters which he may have suffered. Not so when he reaches the period of the "sere and yellow leaf." 'At this time of life,' as Sir Henry Halford affectingly expresses himself, it may be, the partner of all his happiness and all his care has been torn from him; or a child who had grown up to be his comfort and support; or perhaps a friend or contemporary, with his regret for whom there is mixed an apprehension that the next blow may fall on himself; and if, at this moment, a survey of past life be not more consolatory than the prospect of what remains, adieu to that animating and enlivening hopewhich is cheerfulness-which is health.'

For such a disease as this there can be no real cure. Physicians cannot treat it too gently. Active remedies are altogether out of the question. The change which it operates in the constitution, is, most probably, owing to a deficiency in the energy of the brain, and an irregular supply of nervous influence to the heart. The most effectual palliative on such an occasion is the consciousness of internal purity and peace. To be able to contemplate with complacency either issue of a disorder, which the great author of our being may, in his kindness, have intended as a warning to us to prepare for a better existence, is of prodigious advantage to recovery, as well as to comfort; and the retrospect of a well-spent life is a cordial of infinitely more efficacy than all the resources of the medical art.'

In an exceedingly sensible and well written paper on the necessity of caution in the estimation of symptoms in the last stages of some diseases,' Sir Henry has thrown out several suggestions, which are of great general utility to families as well as to physicians. The latter he particularly warns, against giving their opinions of the probable progress of particular maladies in too hasty a manner; and he mentions some striking cases, in which the necessity of great caution was particularly necessary, in order not to awaken false hopes on the one hand, or to produce unnecessary pain on the

other.

His dissertation upon that most harassing and most baffling of all distempers, the Tic Douloureux, is a most valuable contribution to medical science.

The Tic Douloureux, in its severest form, is one of the most painful and intractable diseases to which the physician is called to administer. 'By its severest form, I mean that which involves the several branches of the fifth pair of nerves, expanded over the face and the fauces, attacking with electric plunges, as it were, and in a manner so peculiar, that no other pain is expressed like it. It is distinguished by its intensity, from the milder species of disease to which nerves in other parts of the body are sometimes liable; the latter generally depends upon some derangement of the digestive organs, and usually gives way to a mode of treatment calcuVOL. II. (1831.) No. II.

U

lated to bring on a better action of the several abdominal viscerá, and tó restore the nervous system to its healthy tone. The former does not yield to any particular treatment with which we are acquainted at present, though it may be mitigated, and the frame may be held up harmless under its pressure, for a great length of time, by paying attention to the general health.

'That the seat of pain is not the seat of disease always, is made manifest by the failure of attempts to cut off the communication of the suffering nerves with the brain. It may be a sympathetic disease, therefore; but to what disorder in the system the association belongs, pathologists do not yet seem to agree.

May I venture to throw out an opinion, founded on the observations with which my experience has furnished me, that the disease is connected with some preternatural growth of bone, or a deposition of bone in a part of the animal economy, where it is not usually found, in a sound and healthy condition of it, or with a diseased bone?

"The following cases have occurred to me, and seem to give a degree of probability to this surmise: and I throw it out for the consideration of the profession, in order that a number of facts may be collected from which a safe inference at length can be drawn.

'A lady, forty years of age, suffered under the violent form of tic douloureux, at Brighton, notwithstanding the careful attention and skill of a very judicious physician there. On returning to town it was observed that the rending spasms, by which the disease is marked, were frequently preceded by an uneasiness in one particular tooth, which exhibited, however, no signs of unsoundness; but the constancy of this symptom was enough to justify the extraction of the tooth in this instance, (though the failure of this expedient to afford relief in general, does not encourage recourse to the operation,) and, on its being drawn, a large exostosis was observed at the root of the tooth; and the lady never suffered more than very slight attacks, and those very seldom afterwards.

The Duke of G. was attended by Dr. Baillie and myself for six weeks, under this disease, in its most marked and painful form, without deriving benefit from our prescriptions. At length, we thought it best to advise him to repair to the sea-coast, in hopes of renovating his shattered system, by taking bark there. After he had sojourned a month by the sea-side, a portion of bone exfoliated from the antrum Highmorianum, and the duke recovered immediately, and has never suffered the disease since. The bone had been hurt, probably, by a fall from his horse, which the duke had met with some months before.

The late Earl of C. underwent martyrdom by this disease, and excited the warmest sympathy of his friends, by the agonies he sustained for many years. He submitted to the operation for the division of several branches of the fifth pair of nerves repeatedly, by Sir Everard Home and by Mr. Charles Bell, without obtaining more than mere temporary relief. At length he was seized by apoplexy, and lay insensible for some days, and in great peril from the attack, but finally recovered. After the apoplexy, the paroxysms of the tic douloureux became less frequent, and less severe, and were administered to satisfactorily by an ingenious physician, who wrote. his inaugural exercise on the disease. For the last year or two of his life, his lordship had ceased to suffer from the tic, and died at an advanced age,