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another ingredient, a fufficient quantity of our own country fuper ftitions concerning witches; their beards, their cats, and their broomsticks. So that his witch-fcenes are like the charm they pre pare in one of them; where the ingredients are gathered from every thing backing in the natural world; as here, from every thing abfurd in the moral. But as extravagant as all this is, the play has had the power to charm and bewitch every audience from that time to this. WARBURTON.

Muft we for ever controvert the truth, only because it has been brought to light by another?-Or can it be worth while to equivocate, or mifreprefent, on an occafion fo little interefting as the elucidation of a paffage merely poetical ? \

• Wierd comes from the Anglo-Saxon pynd, and is used as a fubftantive fignifying a prophecy by the tranflator of Hector Boethius in the year 1541, as well as for the Deftinies by Chaucer and Holinfhed. Of the weirdis gevyn to Makbeth and Banghuo, is the argument of one of the chapters, And Gawin Douglas, in his tranflation of Virgil, calls the Parca the wierd fifteris: The other method of fpell ing was merely a blunder of the tranfcriber or printer.

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The Valkyrie, or Valkyriur, were not barely three in number. The learned critic might have found in Bartholinus, not only Gunna, Rota, et Skullda, but also Scogula, Hilda, Gondula, and Geirofcogula. Bartholinus adds that their number is yet greater, according to other writers who fpeak of them. They were the cup bearers of Odin, and conductors of the dead. They were distinguished by the elegance of their forms, and it would be as juft to compare youth and beauty with age and deformity, as the Valkyria of the North with the Witches of Shakespeare. STEEVENS.'

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On the following line of the fame tragedy, Mr. Steevens's comment is inconteftibly preferable to that of Dr. Warbur

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ton.

And on thy blade, and dudgeon, gouts of blood,'

Certainly, if on the blade, then on the dudgeon; for dudgeon fignifies a small dagger. We fhould read therefore,

And on THE blade of TH' dudgeon,

WARBURTON'

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Though dudgeon does fometimes fignify a dagger, it more properly means the haft or handle of a dagger, and is ufed for that particular fort of a handle which has fome ornament carved on the top of it. Junius explains the dudgeon, i. e. haft, by the Latin expreffion, manubrium apiatum, which means a handle of wood, with a grain rough as if the feeds of parfey were firown over it,

STEEVENS.'

Mr. Steevens, by his extenfive refearches for the illuftration of his author, has not only rescued feveral ancient customs from oblivion, but likewife afcertained the fenfe of many ob folete modes of phrafeology.-But having already extended this article to a very confiderable length, we fhall refume our account of the work in our next Number,

VI. The

IV. Encyclopædia Britannica; or a Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, compiled upon a new Plan. In which the different Sciences and Arts are digefted into diftin&t Treatifes or Systems; and the various technical Terms, &c. are explained as they occur in the Order of the Alpbabet. Illuftrated with 160 Copper-Plates. By a Society of Gentlemen in Scotland. 3 Vols. 4.10. 31. 35% Dilly.

THE

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HE method hitherto adopted in the feveral Dictionaries of Arts and Sciences, of treating of each fubject promifcu oufly, according to the alphabetical order of arrangement, was, in the opinion of the authors of this work, attended with great inconvenience to the reader, by interrupting the profecution of his refearches, and involving him in a maze of references; and to remedy this defect, they have executed the prefent undertaking. Lexicons being in general but compilations, the fubjects of which they treat do not always admit of critical remarks, and provided that the ftyle be perfpicuous, a high de gree of elegance is not required. As works of this fort, how ever, are written by feveral hands, a difference of ftyle is of ten difcernible in many places, and that under our confidera. tion is not void of the blemishes attendant on haste.

The article Congruity difcovers more elaborate compofition than the other parts of the work, and poffeffes the merit of novelty.

Dictionary, contains remarks on that of Dr. Johnson, and fome obfervations upon lexicography, which merit attention.

Grammar is evidently borrowed from Harris's Hermes, but many new obfervations are included in it. The author of this article appears to be partially fond of the English language, and has been at pains to combat feveral opinions which grammarians have adopted, relative to the Greek and Latin lan guages, without fufficient foundation. Had he more fully digefted his fubject, it might have proved of confiderable utility, but evident marks of precipitancy may be obferved through the whole.

In the article Language, which feems to be the production of the fame hand, the thoughts are new, and the defign good; but the execution is alfo carelefs, and the printing extremely incorrect.

Winds, under the article Pneumatics, are treated of more fully than in Mufchenbroeck, and a fatisfactory account given of the causes of the monfoons. As a fpecimen of the work, we shall lay before our readers a part of this article.

A a 4

Having

Having thus explained the nature and causes of the general trade-wind, we now proceed to take notice of the principal deviations which take place in the torrid zone. The general trade-wind, when thus altered at particular seasons, is now known by the name of monfoons. There are other variations, which, although as ge neral, are yet of fmaller and more limited influence. These are known by the name of breezes ; and as they blow periodically from the fea, they are denominated fea or land breezes, and take place more or lefs in every fea coaft within the tropics. As the caules of the monfoons will be more clearly comprehended after the nature of these breezes is explained, we shall first confider them.

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The fea and land breezes of the torrid zone are gentle periodi cal winds regularly fhifting twice every day, and blowing from the fea towards the land during the day time, and from the land towards the fea in the night. These breezes do not blow with an equal degree of force throughout the whole day and night, but are perpetually varying, being always ftrongest about mid-day and midnight, and becoming gradually weaker till the time of change in the evening and morning about which time the air continues for a fhort space perfectly calm but in a little the breeze begins to be felt on the fide opposite to that from which it blew laft, fo faint at firft as hardly to be perceived; but by degrees acquiring greater strength, it goes on increafing for five or fix hours, after which it again as gradually finks and dies away. They always blow directly off or towards the shore, and never extend their influence to a great distance from it, although this is varied by particular circumstances in different places; as they never extend fo far from the points of capes and promontories, as in deep bays; nor upon the windward, as lee-fhores.

Thefe breezes are produced by the fame caufe which gives rise to the trade-wind, viz. the heat of the fun. In these warm regions the days and nights are nearly of an equal length throughout thẹ whole year; the fun rifing high in the day time, and defcending almoft perpendicularly at night; which occafions a much greater variation between the heat of the day and night than is experienced in the more temperate climates; and it is this great difference between the heat of the night and day which produces the breezes. For the rays of the fun are reverberated from the land during the day-time, much more powerfully than from the fea, whofe furface is conftantly evaporating; and the air above the land is rendered much warmer, and confequently more rarified, than above the fea; To that a current of air neceffarily takes place at that time from the fea towards the land, increafing and diminishing in ftrength as the heat increases or declines. But when the fun defcends below the horizon, the evaporation from the furface of the fea is ftopt, or greatly diminished, and the cold which it occafioned is of confequence removed; the reverberation of the fun's rays from the furface of the earth is likewise removed, and the air above the land quickly refumes its natural degree of cold, which is always greater than the fea, when the influence of the fun is withdrawn, fo that the air above the fea becomes warmer during the night than that above the land, and a current of air is of course established from the land to the fea, which forms the land-breeze, which acts as uniformly, although lefs powerfully, than the fea-breeze; blowing at first gently as the air begins to cool, and gradually gathering

strength

Atrength as the fun retires below the horizon; till his influence begins to be full again in the morning, when it gradually gives place. to the more powerful influences of the fea-breeze. These breezes are not however, entirely confined to the torrid zone. They are even felt in more northern regions the fea-breeze in particular being almoft as perceptible during the fummer feafon along the coafts of the Mediterranean and the Levant, both on the African, and European and Afiatic fhores, as within the tropics. Even in our own colder climate, the effects of this are often fenfibly felt during the fummer feafon; although, from the length of the day and fhortness of the night, the difference between the heat of these is far lefs than in warmer climates. And although the fhortness of our nights prevents us from feeling a nocturnal breeze, fimilar to the land-breezes of the torrid zone; yet in every ferene evening we have an opportunity of obferving a phenomenon, proceeding from a fimilar cause with that which occafions them in warmer climates. For as the waters retain their heat longer than the earth after the fun withdraws, the moisture which was raised during the heat of the day to a small distance from the earth's furface is quickly condenfed by the cold of the evening, and falls down in copious dews; whereas that which is above the furface of the water is more flowly condenfed, by reafon of the heat which that element retains longer, and hovers at a fmall diftance above it in the form of a denie vapour, which flowly fubfides as it lofes its heat. This is the caufe of thofe low mists which are so often seen hovering above the surface of rivers and other waters in the evenings towards the end of fummer.

It was already obferved, that in the Indian ocean the general trade-wind only took place in fome parts to the fouth of the equator. To the north of the line, and in some places to the south of it in that ocean, the general trade-wind only blows regularly for fix months, and during the other fix months the wind blows in a direction entirely oppofite. It is thefe winds, which shift thus regularly, which are called monfoons, although they are also sometimes called trade-winds.

At the equator the days and nights are always of an equal length throughout the whole year; fo that the heat being thus equally divided, it never arrives to fuch an intenfe degree as to be infupportable to the inhabitants. And as there is no viciffitude of feafons at the equator, fo at the Poles they never experience the more pleafing viciffitudes of day and night, the fun never fetting during the fummer feafon, nor rifing above the horizon during the winter and although the day decreases in length as we recede from the pole, from fix months to twenty-four hours; yet in all high latitudes the fun defcends for fuch a short space below the horizon, and in fuch an oblique direction, that the difference between the heat of the day and night is but very inconfiderable. From which it follows, that during this feafon, when the fun continues to act with fuch uninterrupted influence upon the furface of the earth, the air will then be rarified more above the dry land than upon the furface of the water; so that a wind would naturally set in at that time from the fea towards the land, fimilar to the diurnal feabreezes in the warmer climates; and on the contrary, during the winter feafon, the air in thefe northern regions being colder above the land than the water, the winds will naturally blow from the

land

land towards the fea, fimilar to the land breezes of the torrid zone. But as the influence of the fun, although of longer continuance, is in general more languid in climates of a high latitude than in thofe near the line, it is not to be expected that these effects will follow with the fame regularity as in the torrid zone, being more apt to be interrupted by leffer caufes which affect the atmosphere and produce winds in different directions. Yet thefe are not fo totally interrupted, but that we can easily trace their effects even in our own cold climate for during the fummer feafon, the large continent to the east of us, being more heated than the Atlantic ocean weftward, produces a general tendency of the current of air towards the east, infomuch that wefterly winds are observed to prevail more than any other, not only here, but in all the frontier countries on the continent, during the fummer feafon. And easterly winds become again more prevalent in the winter and fpring. On the contrary, it is obferved in North America, that the easterly winds prevail more in fummer than at any other time; and the weft winds always prevail during the cold months of winter. The fame effects take place with a greater degree of conftancy in other parts of Europe, particularly in Greece, and the countries in that neighbourhood; as the antient Greeks have particularly remarked, that the winds blew from the fouth during the heat of fummer, particularly about the dogs-days, and from the north during the cold weather of winter.

Any attentive reader, who has accompanied me thus far, will readily fee, that the monfoons which take place in the Indian ocean proceed from the fame general caufe. For when the fun, in his annual courfe, has croffed the line, and comes to act very strongly upon the extenfive countries of Arabia, Perfia, China, and the other parts of India, these become heated to a much higher degree than the ocean to the fouth of them; and the air above thefe extenfive countries being fo much rarefied, naturally draws the wind towards that place, which, by overcoming the general tradewind, produces the foutherly moonfoons which take place in all thofe feas during the months of April, May, June, July, Auguft, and September. But when the fun has again retreated towards the fouthern hemisphere, this great degree of heat in these countries fubfides, and the genuine trade-wind again refumes its natural courfe; forming what they call the northerly monfoon, which blows in the months of October, November, December, January, February, and March and as the continent of Afia now affumes a greater degree of cold than the Atlantic or Pacific oceans in the fame latitude, it produces a brifker and more fteady gale during the continuance of this monfoon, than is ever experienced in the general trade-wind.'

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If the article on Smoakey Chimneys be not new, we at least do not remember to have met with it elsewhere; and it has fome claim to ingenuity.

The merit of this Dictionary confifts chiefly in the method of arrangement, of which, perhaps, the advantage may still be questioned.

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