Searches displayed in the exposition, evinced the deep study bestowed on the subject. Those evidences are now submitted to the public, and all classes are interested in affording them a dispassionate consideration. As the benefit of mankind is the object, open discussion must be a public advantage; and the friends of truth, on either side, have powerful motives for promoting a calm, impartial decision. No person of candour and good sense will reject a proposed improvement without full and sufficient inquiry, nor persevere against an unbiassed refutation. The inestimable value of education is a general theme, and in the late session it occupied the wisdom of Parliament. Perhaps no system ever offered to the world, opened a more important field for investigation, than the probable effect of Phrenology on education, morals, and manners."

FORFAR." It gives us much pleasure to learn that a society has been established in this place for promoting the study of Phrenology. The means for attaining this end are-1st, the formation of a library illustrative of its doctrines; and 2d, the procuring of a set of casts, &c., for experimental practice. It is gratifying to know that the prejudices against which Phrenology has so long struggled are at length giving way, and that an earnest desire for information on this interesting science has become more prevalent, not only here, but generally throughout the country. Instead of being assailed with unmeaning ridicule, it is now viewed as an important system in the philosophy of the human mind; and the longer it is pursued with a desire to learn, the better will it stand the test of inquiry. It is proposed that essays on the principles and practice of the science shall be read by the members at their monthly meetings. These essays will either be original or selected; and as the society already includes amongst its members several professional gentlemen, their knowledge of anatomy, so important in the study of Phrenology, will be brought to bear on the subject. In the mean time, we wish the institution every success, and shall rejoice to hear of its usefulness." - Montrose Review.

In December last this Society consisted of about thirty members, among whom are the Sheriff-substitute, Town-clerk, and other gentlemen of the legal and medical professions. At the first meeting Dr Murray gave a lecture on the osteology of the cranium, and at the second Dr Allan submitted some remarks on the structure and physiology of the brain.

MONTROSE. Mr W. A. F. Browne has been requested by the Directors of the Scientific Association here, to deliver twelve lectures on Phrenology, and has accepted the invitation. He has received also requisitions to lecture in Forfar and Kirriemuir.

AMERICA. Several numbers of the Annals of Phrenology have failed to reach us, though regularly published. We hope to be able to give some account of their contents in our next. The following is extracted from a letter dated Albany, N. Y., 1st March 1835 :- "Mr Price of St Paul's Episcopal Church, where I attend on Sundays, has been delivering a course of sermons on the evidences of Christianity, and said at the close of them, that he would take the liberty of recommending a few books to those of his hearers who might be inclined to follow out the subject. The first book mentioned was Combe on the Constitution of Man."

A paragraph, copied from the Gazette Medicale, relative to the head of Lacenaire, a French criminal, has lately appeared in several English papers. It states that the head of that individual has an excellent configuration, wholly at variance with his character. Such averments are exceedingly common, and uniformly turn out to have been either dishonestly or ignorantly made. We have instituted an inquiry into the facts of the case, and confidently anticipate a similar result in the present instance. The writer of the paragraph seems to look for bumps alone as the signs of strong propensities; for he speaks of the cranium presenting a "remarkable smoothness of the two sides, and particularly in those parts which are said to correspond with robbery and murder." Did it not occur to him that a smooth surface is as compatible with great development of certain regions of the brain, as the extensive plains among the Andes are with an altitude of many thousand feet above the level of the sea? [Since the preceding remarks were sent to

the printer, we have received an answer to our inquiry from a phrenological friend in Paris, who has examined the skull of Lacenaire. His remarks are these: Veneration small; Benevolence moderate; Imitation very large; Destructiveness, Combativeness, and Secretiveness, very large; skull very broad; Cautiousness large; Acquisitiveness very large; Amativeness large; skull very thin at Acquisitiveness and Destructiveness. M. Dumoutier is to have, in a few days, an article in the Lancette, utterly refuting the Gazette Medicale." Such is the true version of the circumstances listen now to the Gazette:" Lacenaire, whose cold-blooded cruelty and want of feeling, under the most t frightful circumstances, has astonished and disgusted all France, was phrenologically endowed with all the qualities of a good, kind, mild, sensible, and religious man, holding injustice and robbery in horror, and a hundred thousand leagues from being an assassin. Thus there is a marked develop. ment of all the anterior and superior parts of the cranium, and as remarkable a smoothness of the two sides, and particularly in those parts which are said to correspond with robbery and murder. The organs of Benevolence and, above all, Veneration are largely developed." We call upon those journals which have given currency to the falsehood now to publish the truth.

It

PHRENOLOGICAL QUACKS. We are glad to perceive that our Phrenological contemporary has taken these gentry in hand. would be disgusting, if it was not so absurd, to witness the mountebank performances of some persons who profess Phrenology. They thumb the heads of gaping or of laughing audiences at sixpence or a shilling each, and pronounce, ore rotundo, the elaborate characters of Styles and Noakes, who, fifty to one, have got no cha racters at all. We have been at some of these exhibitions, and a more complete travestie of a science we never in our lives have seen. We hope the philosophical phrenologists will put this egregious humbug down.- MedicoChirurgical Review, Jan. 1836.

We have received several phrenological pamphlets by Dr Caldwell of Lexington, Kentucky, containing much important matter, to which we shall ad, vert more fully hereafter. A reprint of his Thoughts on Physical Education, and on the Means of Improving the Condition of Man, will shortly appear in Edinburgh. We anticipate that this impressive, eloquent, and eminently practical treatise, will have a wide circulation in Britain, and contribute to give its author that celebrity to which he is so justly entitled.

Dr Brigham's Remarks on the Influence of Mental Cultivation and Mental Excitement upon Health, of which we expressed a very favourable opinion in our 45th Number, has been reprinted by Messrs John Reid and Co. of Glasgow, with many valuable notes by that talented phrenologist Mr Robert Macnish. The extensive circulation which this work is obtaining cannot fail to be productive of great improvements in the treatment of children in their early years.

A translation of Mr Combe's Elements of Phrenology, by Dr Fossati, has recently been published in Paris

Although by far the greater part of our present Number is occupied by the communications of correspondents, a few are still unavoidably postponed, along with several articles by the conductors themselves. Among others are the communications of Mr Grattan, Dr Maxwell, and Dr Inglis; and Mr George Hancock's reply to Mr Watson. We entreat correspondents to study brevity above all things, as by the absence of this qualification the chance of insertion is considerably diminished.

The verses from Galashiels are defective in structure, and not quité suitable for our pages. The sentiments expressed are, however, excellent.

We despair of finding room for the communication of our respected correspondent, C. T. W... The subject has already been so largely treated of in the Phrenological Journal, that we are forced to give a preference to articles on more novel topics. - Mr Saunders's little work, "What is Phrenology?" has been received.

F

Notices of the Journal of the Phrenological Society of Paris, and of The Mo

ral Reformer, are deferred for want of room.

EDINBURGH, 1st March 1836.

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INDEX

TO THE

NINTH VOLUME..