Jonas, a Swedish naturalist of eminent talents, and a distinguished pupil of the great Linnæus, was born in 1748. His father, a clergyman near Göttenburg, died during the minority, if not the infancy, of his son; in consequence of which the care of the education of the latter devolved on a maternal uncle. This was Dr Lars Montin, a member of the Stockholm Academy, known to the world by several botanical writings, and, amongst others, by an inaugural dissertation on the genus *Splachnum*, published under the presidency of Linnæus, 26th March 1750; and reprinted in the *Annales Academici*, vol. ii. 263. The early education of young Dryander, as far as we can learn, was chiefly in the University of Göttenburg; but he afterwards removed to Lund, where he took his degree of master of arts, or doctor in philosophy, under the presidency of Lidbeck, in 1776; on which occasion he published a dissertation, *fungos regno vegetabili viadicae*. He combated the ideas of certain philosophers, who, led by analogy rather than observation and judgment, were disposed to believe that fungi might, like corals and corallines, be the production of animals. But though Mr Dryander thus asserted the vegetable nature of these bodies, he subsequently imbued, from his friend and preceptor Linnæus, an insuperable dislike to their use as food; nor could the most delicate mushrooms of the most luxurious table ever tempt him to overcome this prejudice. We know not at what period he went to study at Upsal, nor how long he remained there. He became for some time domestic tutor to a young Swedish nobleman, after which he visited England, under the patronage of his countryman the well-known Dr Solander, who introduced him to the acquaintance of Sir Joseph Banks; and on the sudden death of Solander in 1782, he succeeded to the place of that eminent man, in the confidence and friendship of his distinguished patron. He was, in like manner, domesticated under the roof of Sir Joseph as his librarian, and continued in that situation as long as he lived. Mr Dryander also held the offices of librarian to the Royal and the Linnean Societies. He was one of the first founders of the latter in 1788; and took a principal interest in all its concerns, especially in drawing up its laws and regulations, when this society was incorporated by royal charter in 1802. He, moreover, fulfilled the duties of a very active vice-president, till the time of his decease, which happened towards the end of October 1810, in the sixty-third year of his age. His remains were deposited in the vault of St Ann's Church, Soho, the funeral being attended by a number of his friends, principally members of the Linnean Society.

The acknowledged publications of Mr Dryander on the subject of botany consist of the following dissertations: 1. *An Account of the Genus Alboca*, in the Stockholm Transactions for 1784, in Swedish; 2. *Observations on the Genus Begonia*, in the Transactions of the Linnean Society, vol. i. In this essay twenty-one species are determined, with an indication of nine doubtful ones, though the genus was previously supposed to consist of a solitary species only. 3. *On Genera and Species of Plants* which occur twice or three times in Professor Gmelin's edition of Linnæus's *Systema Naturae*; Trans. of Linn. Soc. vol. ii.

These corrections unfortunately extend no farther than Dryander, the class Octandria. Their author intended to have completed them, but other occupations intervened; and the book which was the object of his correction soon fell into absolute neglect, as far as regards botany; insomuch that its errors, however great and numerous, became harmless. 4. *Laudsea, a new Genus of Ferns*; Trans. of Linn. Soc. vol. iii. This genus is distinguished from *Paris*, by the involucrum opening outward. 5. *Botanical Description of the Benjamin Tree of Sumatra*, in the Phil. Trans. vol. lxxvii. The tree in question, about which great mistakes had arisen, is here shown to be a species of *Styrax*. This paper has been republished and translated.

The principal works published under the superintendence and correction of the subject of this memoir, were, the *Hortus Kecensis* of Mr Aiton, printed in 1789, and about half the second edition of the same work, interrupted by his death; as well as Dr Roxburgh's *Plants of the Coast of Coromandel*, a splendid and highly valuable publication, for which the world is indebted to the munificence of the East India Company. To both these the critical learning and accuracy of Mr Dryander were most usefully applied, especially in the typographical department. It would be vain to seek for an error in the printing of any thing which had passed through his hands. We have only to regret that the same critical correctness was not extended as a principle to every other department of the works in which he took a part. Had this been the case, the erroneous essential character of *Oldenlandia*, copied in *Hortus Kecensis* from Linnæus and Willdenow, would not have been allowed to contradict the plate and description of Roxburgh, cited underneath. But, above all, various inaccuracies and faults in nomenclature are propagated and confirmed by an authority which Mr Dryander himself never intended to give. He has often assured the writer of this notice, that, had he published in his own name, he would not have adopted such inaccuracies; which is mentioned here to prevent the errors of others being laid to his charge. The popular *Species Plantarum* of Willdenow being the avowed guide, the author of that work must be responsible for matters which it did not come within the scope of the author or editor of the *Hortus Kecensis* to correct. Many subjects, however, are most skillfully elucidated in this publication, as well as in the sequel of its second edition by Mr Brown, and these cannot escape the discrimination of an intelligent reader. Practical botany was but a secondary or occasional pursuit of Mr Dryander, and he had a diffidence of his powers, and a consequent distaste for the technical and descriptive parts of the science. The descriptions he had prepared for Mr Bauer's splendid figures of *Erica*, published by Mr Aiton, were readily and even gladly thrown into the fire, on occasion of a difference of opinion respecting the intended title of the work.

The study in which this most acute and correct man found ample scope for the exercise of his talents was bibliography. His *Catalogus Bibliothecæ Historico-Naturæ Josephi Banks*, is a model for all future writers in this line; but a model rather calculated to check than to excite imitation. A work so ingenious in design, and so perfect in execution, can scarcely be produced in any science; so faultless a specimen of typography we have never elsewhere seen. The frank and unvarnished sincerity of Mr Dryander's character was secondary only to his universal and fastidious exactness upon every subject that came under his notice. He could not be a silent witness of the slightest injustice, misrepresentation, or misconception. His impatience of contradiction arose more from the quickness of his penetration into the confusion and inaccuracy of ordinary intellects and charac- Dryden, John, an illustrious English poet, descended of a respectable family in Huntingdonshire, was born at Aldwincle, in that county, on the 9th August 1631. He was educated under Dr Busby at Westminster school, whence he removed to Cambridge in 1650, having been elected scholar of Trinity College, of which he appears to have been afterwards a fellow. In his earlier days he gave no extraordinary indications of genius; for even the year before he quitted the university, he wrote a poem on the death of Lord Hastings, which by no means exhibits a presage of that perfection in poetical composition which he was afterwards destined to attain.

On the death of Oliver Cromwell he wrote some "heroic stanzas" to the memory of the Lord Protector; but after the Restoration, being desirous of ingratiating himself with the new monarch, he wrote, first, a poem entitled Astraea Redux, and afterwards a panegyric on the king upon the occasion of his coronation. In 1662, he addressed a poem to the lord chancellor Hyde, presented on new year's day; and in the same year he published a satire on the Dutch. In 1668 appeared his Annus Mirabilis, or the Year of Wonders, an historical poem, intended to celebrate the Duke of York's victory over the Dutch. These pieces at length obtained him the favour of the crown; and Sir William Davenant having died the same year, 1668, Dryden was appointed to succeed him as poet-laureat and historiographer to Charles II.; and accordingly he entered upon the office, though his patent was not signed until the year 1670. The pension of the two offices was £200 a year. About this time also his inclination to write for the stage seems first to have evinced itself. For besides his concern with Sir William Davenant in the alteration of Shakspeare's Tempest, he in 1669 produced his Wild Gallants, a comedy, which met with very indifferent success. Yet the author, not discouraged by its failure, soon published his Indian Emperor, which having experienced a more favourable reception, encouraged him to proceed. He did so, and that with so great rapidity, that in the key to the Duke of Buckingham's Rehearsal he is recorded to have engaged himself by contract to write four plays in the year; and, indeed, in the years 1679 and 1680 he appears to have fulfilled this obligation. To this unhappy necessity which he lay under are to be attributed all those irregular and bombastic flights, and sometimes even puerile exuberances, for which he has been so severely criticised, and which, in the unavoidable hurry he usually wrote in, it was impossible for him to find time either to lop off or to correct.

In 1675, the Earl of Rochester, whose envious disposition did not allow him patiently to see growing merit meet with its due reward, and who therefore felt chagrined at the just applause with which Dryden's dramatic pieces had been received, was determined if possible to shake his interest at court; and he succeeded so far as to recommend one Crowne, an obscure author, to write a mask for the court, a service which of course belonged to Dryden as poet-laureat. Nor was this the only attack, or indeed the most formidable one, which Dryden's fame drew upon him; for, some years before this, the Duke of Buckingham, a man of licentious character, but of great wit, had severely ridiculed several of our author's plays in his piece called the Rehearsal. But though the intrinsic wit which runs through this performance cannot, even at the present day, fail to excite our laughter, yet, as ridicule is not always the test of truth, it ought not to form the standard by which to fix Dryden's poetical reputation, more especially when we consider that the pieces therein ridiculed are not the masterpieces of Dryden; that the very passages burlesqued are frequently, in their original places, much less ridiculous than when thus detached, like a rotten limb, from the body of the work, exposed to view with additional distortions, and divested of that connection with the other parts which gave it not only symmetry, but beauty; and, lastly, that the beauties, which the critic has kept in the back-ground, are infinitely more numerous than the deformities which he has thus industriously brought forth into immediate view.

Dryden, however, did not suffer these attacks to pass with impunity; for in 1679 there appeared an Essay on Satire, said to have been written jointly by himself and the Earl of Mulgrave, containing some very severe reflections on the Earl of Rochester and the Duchess of Portsmouth, who, it is not improbable, might have been instrumental in the affront shown to Dryden; and in 1681 he published his Absalom and Achitophel, in which the well-known character of Zimri, drawn for the Duke of Buckingham, is certainly severe enough to repay all the ridicule thrown on him by that nobleman in the character of Bayes. resentment shown by these peers was, however, different and characteristic. Lord Rochester, who was a coward as well as a man of the most depraved morals, basely hired three ruffians to cudgel Dryden in a coffeehouse; whilst the Duke of Buckingham, in a more open manner, took the task upon himself, and at the same time presented the poet with a purse containing no very trifling sum of money; telling him that he inflicted the beating as a punishment for his impudence, but bestowed the gold as a reward for his wit.

In 1680 was published a translation of Ovid's Epistles in English verse by several hands, two of which, together with the preface, were by Dryden; and in 1682 appeared his Religio Laici, designed as a defence of revealed religion, against deists, infidels, et hoc genus omne. Soon after the accession of King James II., our author changed his religion for that of the church of Rome, and wrote two pieces in vindication of the Catholic tenets: namely, A Defence of the Popers written by the late King, found in his strong box; and the celebrated poem, afterwards answered by Lord Halifax, entitled The Hind and the Panther. By this extraordinary step he not only engaged himself in controversy, and incurred much censure and ridicule from the contemporary wits, but on the accomplishment of the revolution, being, by reason of his new religion, disqualified from bearing any office under the government, he was stripped of the laurel, which, to his still greater mortification, was bestowed on Richard Flecknoe, a man for whom he had a most settled aversion. This circumstance occasioned his writing the severely satirical poem called MacFlecknoe.

Dryden's circumstances had never been affluent; but being now deprived of this little support, he found himself reduced to the necessity of writing for bread. We consequently find him from this period engaged in tasks of labour as well as genius, namely, in translating the works of others; and to this necessity perhaps our nation stands indebted for some of the best translations extant. In the year when he lost the laurel, he published the life of St Francis Xavier from the French. In 1693 appeared a translation of Juvenal and Persius; in the first of which he had a considerable hand, and of the latter the entire execution. In 1695 was published his prose version of Fresnoy's Art of Painting; and in the year 1697 he gave to the world that translation of Virgil's works which still does, and perhaps ever will, hold the first place amongst all attempts of the kind. The smaller pieces of this eminent writer, such as prologues, epilogues, epitaphs, elegies, songs, and the like, are too numerous to be specified here, though now all happily collected in Sir Walter Scott's edition of his works. His last work is what is called his Fables, consisting of many of the most interesting stories in Homer, Ovid, Boccaccio, and Chaucer, translated or modernized in the most elegant and poetical manner; together with some original pieces, among which is the Ode to St Cecilia's Day. This last composition, though written in the very decline of the author's life, and at a period when old age and distress had conspired to damp his poetic ardour, and enfeeble the wings of fancy, possesses nevertheless as much of both as would have been sufficient to render him immortal had he never written a single line besides.

Dryden married Lady Elizabeth Howard, the daughter of the Earl of Berkshire, who survived him about eight years, though for the last four of them she was a lunatic, having been deprived of her senses by a nervous fever. By this lady he had three sons: Charles, John, and Henry. After a long life, harassed with the most laborious of all fatigues, that of the mind, and continually rendered anxious by distress and difficulty, he expired on the 1st of May 1701. Dryden had no monument erected to him for several years; a circumstance to which Pope alludes in his epitaph intended for Rowe. Upon this hint Sheffield Duke of Buckingham erected a tomb, for which the following epitaph was originally intended:

This Sheffield rais'd—-the sacred dust below Was Dryden once; the rest, who does not know?

But this was afterwards changed into the plain inscription still to be seen on the monument, containing merely the dates of the poet's birth and death, together with the fact of the tomb having been erected by John Sheffield, duke of Buckingham.

Dryden's character has been variously estimated by different writers, some of whom have exalted it by the highest commendation, and others debased it by the severest censure. The latter, however, we must charge to that strong spirit of party which prevailed during the greater part of Dryden's lifetime, and which ought therefore to be taken with great allowances. From some parts of his history, however, he appears to have been unsteady, and to have too readily temporized with the several revolutions in church and state. But this might in some measure have been owing to that natural timidity and diffidence of disposition, which almost all writers seem agreed that he possessed. Congreve, whose authority cannot be suspected, has given us such an account of him as must make him appear no less amiable in his private character as a man, than he was illustrious in his public capacity as a poet. In the former capacity, according to Congreve, he was humane, compassionate, forgiving, and sincerely friendly; of extensive reading, tenacious memory, and ready communication; gentle in the correction of the writings of others, and patient under the reprehension of his own deficiencies; easy of access himself, but slow and diffident in his advances to others; and of all men the most modest and the most easy to be discourteous in his approaches either to his superiors or to his equals. In the latter the highest testimonies have been borne to his merits by some of the greatest men.

Pope had a very high opinion of Dryden. In a letter to Wycherly he says, "It was certainly a great satisfaction to me to see and converse with a man whom in his writings I had so long known with pleasure; but it was a very high addition to it, to hear you at our very first meeting doing justice to your dead friend Mr Dryden. I was not so happy as to know him; Virgilium tantum vidi. Had I been born early enough, I must have known and loved him; for I have been assured, not only by yourself, but by Mr Congreve and Sir William Trumball, that his personal qualities were as amiable as his poetical, notwithstanding the many libellous misrepresentations of them; against which the former of these gentlemen has told me he will one day vindicate him." But what Congreve and Pope have said of Dryden is rather in the way of panegyric than as an exact and impartial character. Other writers, however, have spoken of him with greater moderation, yet probably without doing him any injustice. Thus, according to Felton, "he at once gave the best rules, and broke them, in spite of his own knowledge, and the Rehearsal. His prefaces are many of them admirable upon dramatic writings; he had some peculiar notions, which he maintains with great address; but his judgment in disputed points is of less weight and value, because the inconstancy of his temper did run into his thoughts, and mixed with the conduct of his writings, as well as his life." Voltaire describes him as "a writer whose genius was too exuberant, and not accompanied with judgment enough;" and he adds, that "if he, Dryden, had written only a tenth part of the works he left behind him, his character would..." have been conspicuous in every part. But," says the philosopher of Ferney, "his great fault is his having endeavoured to be universal." "Perhaps no nation," says Dr. Johnson, "ever produced a writer that enriched his language with such a variety of models. To him we owe the improvement, perhaps the completion, of our metre, the refinement of our language, and much of the correctness of our sentiments. By him we were taught 'sapere et fari,' to think naturally and express forcibly. Though Davies has reasoned in rhyme before him, it may be perhaps maintained that he was the first who joined argument with poetry. He showed us the true bounds of a translator's liberty. What was said of Rome adorned by Augustus, may be applied by an easy metaphor to English poetry embellished by Dryden, 'lateritiam invent, marmoreum reliquit:' he found it brick, and he left it marble." The public voice, indeed, has assigned to Dryden the first place in the second rank of our poets; no mean station in a table of intellectual precedence so rich in illustrious names: and it is allowed that, even of the few who were his superiors in genius, none has exercised a more extensive or permanent influence on the national habits of thought and expression. In the following noble passage from an article in the Edinburgh Review (vol. xlvii. p. 29), the great attributes of Dryden's character and genius are unfolded with striking vigour of diction and splendour of illustration.

"If Dryden had died before the expiration of the first of the periods into which we have divided his literary life, he would have left a reputation, at best, little higher than that of Lee or Davenant. He would have been known only to men of letters; and by them he would have been mentioned as a writer who threw away, on subjects which he was incompetent to treat, powers which, judiciously employed, might have raised him to eminence, whose diction and whose numbers had sometimes very high merit, but all whose works were blemished by a false taste, and by errors of gross negligence. A few of his prologues and epilogues might perhaps still have been remembered and quoted. In these little pieces, he early showed all the powers which afterwards rendered him the greatest of modern satirists. But during the latter part of his life he gradually abandoned the drama. His plays appeared at longer intervals. He renounced rhyme in tragedy. His language became less turgid, his characters less exaggerated. He did not indeed produce correct representations of human nature; but he ceased to daub such monstrous chimeras as those which abound in his earlier pieces. Here and there passages occur worthy of the best ages of the British stage. The style which the drama requires changes with every change of character and situation. He who can vary his manner to suit the variation, is the great dramatist; but he who excels in one manner only, will, when that manner happens to be appropriate, appear to be a great dramatist; as the hands of a watch which does not go point right once in the twelve hours. Sometimes there is a scene of solemn debate. This a mere rhetorician may write as well as the greatest tragedian that ever lived. We confess that to us the speech of Sempurnius in Cato seems very nearly as good as Shakspeare could have made it. But when the senate breaks up, and we find that the lovers and their mistresses, the hero, the villain, and the deputy-villain, all continue to harangue in the same style, we perceive the difference between a man who can write a play and a man who can write a speech. In the same manner, wit, a talent for description, or a talent for narration, may, for a time, pass for dramatic genius. Dryden was an incomparable reasoner in verse. He was conscious of his power; he was proud of it; and the authors of the Rehearsal justly charged him with abusing it. His warriors and princesses are fond of discussing points of amorous casuistry, such as would have delighted a parliament of love. They frequently go still deeper, and speculate on philosophical necessity and the origin of evil.

"There were, however, some occasions which absolutely required this peculiar talent. Then Dryden was indeed at home. All his best scenes are of this description. They are all between men; for the heroes of Dryden, like many other gentlemen, can never talk sense when ladies are in company. They are all intended to exhibit the empire of reason over violent passion. We have two interlocutors, the one eager and impassioned, the other high, cool, and judicious. The composed and rational character gradually acquires the ascendancy. His fierce companion is first inflamed to rage by his reproaches, then overawed by his equanimity, convinced by his arguments, and soothed by his persuasions. This is the case in the scene between Hector and Troilus, in that between Antony and Ventidius, and in that between Sebastian and Dorax. Nothing of the same kind in Shakspeare is equal to them, except the quarrel between Brutus and Cassius, which is worth them all three.

"Some years before his death, Dryden altogether ceased to write for the stage. He had turned his powers in a new direction, with success the most splendid and decisive. His taste had gradually awakened his creative faculties. The first rank in poetry was beyond his reach, but he challenged and secured the most honourable place in the second. His imagination resembled the wings of an ostrich. It enabled him to run, though not to soar. When he attempted the highest flights, he became ridiculous; but while he remained in a lower region, he outstripped all competitors.

"All his natural, and all his acquired powers, fitted him to found a good critical school of poetry. Indeed he carried his reforms too far for his age. After his death our literature retrograded; and a century was necessary to bring it back to the point at which he left it. The general soundness and healthfulness of his mental constitution, his information, of vast superficies though of small volume, his wit scarcely inferior to that of the most distinguished followers of Donne, his eloquence, grave, deliberate, and commanding, could not save him from disgraceful failure as a rival of Shakspeare, but raised him far above the level of Boileau. His command of language was immense. With him died the secret of the old poetical diction of England, the art of producing rich effects by familiar words. In the following century, it was as completely lost as the Gothic method of painting glass, and was but poorly supplied by the laborious and tesselated imitations of Mason and Gray. On the other hand, he was the first writer under whose skilful management the scientific vocabulary fell into natural and pleasing verse. In this department he succeeded as completely as his contemporary Gibbons succeeded in the similar enterprise of carving the most delicate flowers from heart of oak. The toughest and most knotty parts of language became ductile at his touch. His versification, in the same manner, while it gave the first model of that neatness and precision which the following generation esteemed so highly, exhibited, at the same time, the last examples of nobleness, freedom, variety of pause and cadence. His tragedies in rhyme, however worthless in themselves, had at least served the purpose of nonsense-verses; they had taught him all the arts of melody which the heroic couplet admits. For bombast, his prevailing vice, his new subjects gave little opportunity; his better taste gradually discarded it.

"He possessed, as we have said, in a pre-eminent de- gree, the power of reasoning in verse; and this power was now peculiarly useful to him. His logic is by no means uniformly sound. On points of criticism he always reasons ingeniously, and, when he is disposed to be honest, correctly; but the theological and political questions which he undertook to treat in verse were precisely those which he understood least. His arguments, therefore, are often worthless; but the manner in which they are stated is beyond all praise. The style is transparent. The topics follow each other in the happiest order. The objections are drawn up in such a manner that the whole fire of the reply may be brought to bear on them. The circumlocutions which are substituted for technical phrases are clear, neat, and exact. The illustrations at once adorn and elucidate the reasoning. The sparkling epigrams of Cowley, and the simple garrulity of the burlesque poets of Italy, are alternately employed in the happiest manner, to give effect to what is obvious, or clearness to what is obscure.

"His literary creed was catholic, even to latitudinarianism, not from any want of acuteness, but from a disposition to be easily satisfied. He was quick to discern the smallest glimpse of merit; he was indulgent even to gross improprieties when accompanied by any redeeming talent. When he said a severe thing, it was to serve a temporary purpose, to support an argument or to tease a rival. Never was so able a critic so free from fastidiousness. He loved the old poets, especially Shakspeare. He admired the ingenuity which Donne and Cowley had so wildly abused. He did justice, amidst the general silence, to the memory of Milton. He praised to the skies the school-boy lines of Addison. Always looking on the fair side of every object, he admired extravagance, on account of the invention which he supposed it to indicate; he excused affectation in favour of wit; he tolerated even tameness for the sake of the correctness which was its concomitant.

"It was probably to this turn of mind, rather than to the more disgraceful causes which Johnson has assigned, that we are to attribute the exaggeration which disfigures the panegyrics of Dryden. No writer, it must be owned, has carried the flattery of dedication to a greater length; but this was not, we suspect, merely interested servility; it was the overflowing of a mind singularly disposed to admiration, of a mind which diminished vices, and magnified virtues and obligations. The most adulatory of his addresses is that in which he dedicates the State of Innocence to Mary of Modena. Johnson thinks it strange that any man should use such language without self-detestation; but he has not remarked, that to the very same work is prefixed an eulogium on Milton, which certainly could not have been acceptable to the court of Charles II. Many years later, when Whig principles were in a great measure triumphant, Sprat refused to admit a monument of John Philips into Westminster Abbey, because, in the epitaph, the name of Milton incidentally occurred. The walls of his church, he declared, should not be polluted by the name of a republican. Dryden was attached both by principle and interest to the court; but nothing could deaden his sensibility to excellence. We are unwilling to accuse him severely, because the same disposition which prompted him to pay so generous a tribute to the memory of a poet whom his patrons detested, hurried him into extravagance when he described a princess distinguished by the splendour of her beauty and the graciousness of her manners.

"This is an amiable temper, but it is not the temper of great men. Where there is elevation of character there will be fastidiousness. It is only in novels and on tombstones that we meet with people who are indulgent to the faults of others and unmerciful to their own, and Dryden at all events was not one of these paragons. His charity was extended most liberally to others, but it certainly began at home. In taste he was by no means deficient. His critical works are beyond all comparison superior to any which had till then appeared in England. They were generally intended as apologies for his own poems, rather than as expositions of general principles; he, therefore, often attempts to deceive the reader by sophistry, which could scarcely have deceived himself. His dicta are the dicta, not of a judge, but of an advocate, and often of an advocate in an unsound cause; yet in the very act of misrepresenting the laws of composition he shows how well he understands them; but he was perpetually acting against his better knowledge. His sins were sins against light: he trusted that what was bad would be pardoned for the sake of what was good; what was good he took no pains to make better. He was not, like most persons who rise to eminence, dissatisfied even with his worst productions. He had set up no unattainable standard of perfection, the contemplation of which might at once improve and mortify him. His path was not attended by an unapproachable mirage of excellence, for ever receding and for ever pursued. He was not disgusted by the negligence of others, and he extended the same toleration to himself. His mind was of a slovenly character; fond of splendour, but indifferent to neatness. Hence most of his writings exhibit the sluttish magnificence of a Russian noble, all vermin and diamonds, dirty linen and inestimable sables. Those faults which spring from affectation, time and thought in a great measure removed from his poems; but his carelessness he retained to the last. If towards the close of his life he less frequently went wrong from negligence, it was only because long habits of composition rendered it more easy to go right. In his best pieces we find false rhymes, triplets in which the third line appears to be a mere intruder, and while it breaks the music, adds nothing to the meaning; gigantic Alexandrines of fourteen and sixteen syllables, and truncated verses for which he never troubled himself to find a termination or a partner.

"Such are the beauties and the faults which may be found in profusion throughout the later works of Dryden. A more just and complete estimate of his natural and acquired powers, of the merits of his style and of its blemishes, may be formed from the Hind and Panther, than from any of his other writings. As a didactic poem, it is far superior to the Religio Laici. The satirical parts, particularly the character of Burnet, are scarcely inferior to the best passages in Absalom and Achitophel. There are, moreover, occasional touches of a tenderness, which affects us more, because it is decent, rational, and manly, and reminds us of the best scenes in his tragedies. His versification sinks and swells in happy unison with the subject, and his wealth of language seems to be unlimited. Yet the carelessness with which he has constructed his plot, and the innumerable inconsistencies into which he is every moment falling, detract much from the pleasure which such various excellence affords.

"In Absalom and Achitophel he hit upon a new and rich vein, which he worked with signal success. The ancient satirists were the subjects of a despotic government. They were compelled to abstain from political topics, and to confine their attention to the frailties of private life. They might, indeed, sometimes venture to take liberties with public men,

Quorum Flaminia tegitur cisis atque Latina.

Thus Juvenal immortalized the obsequious senators who met to decide the fate of the memorable turbot. His fourth satire frequently reminds us of the great political poem of Dryden; but it was not written till Domitian had fallen, and it wants something of the peculiar flavour which belongs to contemporary invective alone. His anger has stood so long, that though the body is not impaired, the effervescence, the first cream, is gone. Boileau lay under similar restraints, and, if he had been free from all restraint, would have been no match for our countryman.

"The advantages which Dryden derived from the nature of his subject he improved to the very utmost. His manner is almost perfect. The style of Horace and Boileau is fit only for light subjects. The Frenchman did indeed attempt to turn the theological reasonings of the Provincial Letter into verse, but with very indifferent success. The glitter of Pope is cold: the ardour of Persius is without brilliancy. Magnificent versification and ingenious combinations rarely harmonize with the expression of deep feeling. In Juvenal and Dryden alone we have the sparkle and the heat together. Those great satirists succeeded in communicating the fervour of their feelings to materials the most incombustible, and kindled the whole mass into a blaze at once dazzling and destructive. We cannot indeed think, without regret, of the part which so eminent a writer as Dryden took in the disputes of that period. There was, no doubt, madness and wickedness on both sides; but there was liberty on the one and desperation on the other. On this point, however, we will not dwell. At Talavera the English and French troops for a moment suspended their conflict to drink of a stream which flowed between them. The shells were passed across from enemy to enemy without apprehension or molestation. We, in the same manner, would rather assist our political adversaries to drink with us of that fountain of intellectual pleasure which should be the common refreshment of both parties, than disturb and pollute it with the havoc of unreasonable hostilities.

"MaeFleeknee" is inferior to Abaloua and Achitophel only in the subject: in the execution it is even superior. But the greatest work of Dryden was the last, the Ode on St Cecilia's Day. It is the masterpiece of the second class of poetry, and ranks but just below the great models of the first. It reminds us of the Pedasus of Achilles—

By comparing it with the impotent ravings of the heroic tragedies, we may measure the progress which the mind of Dryden had made. He had learned to avoid a too audacious competition with higher natures, to keep at a distance from the verge of bombast or nonsense, to venture on no expression which did not convey a distinct idea to his own mind. There is none of that 'darkness visible' of style which he had formerly affected, and in which the greatest poets only can succeed. Every thing is definite, significant, and picturesque. His early writings resemble the gigantic works of those Chinese gardeners who attempt to rival nature herself, to form cataracts of terrific height and sound, to raise precipitous ridges of mountains, and to imitate in artificial plantations the vastness and the gloom of some primeval forest. This manner he abandoned; nor did he ever adopt the Dutch taste which Pope affected, the trim parterres and the rectangular walks. He rather resembled our Kents and Browns, who, imitating the great features of landscape without emulating them, consulting the genius of the place, assisting nature, and carefully disguising their art, produced, not a Chamouni or a Niagara, but a Stowe or a Hagley.

"We are, on the whole, inclined to regret that Dryden did not accomplish his purpose of writing an epic poem. It certainly would not have been a work of the highest rank. It would not have rivalled the Iliad, the Odyssey, or the Paradise Lost; but it would have been superior to the productions of Apollonius, Lucan, or Statius, and not inferior to the Jerusalem Delivered. It would probably have been a vigorous narrative, animated with something of the spirit of the old romances, enriched with much splendid description, and interspersed with fine declamations and disquisitions. The danger of Dryden would have been from aiming too high; from dwelling too much, for example, on his kingdoms of angels, and attempting a competition with that great writer, who in his own time had so incomparably succeeded in representing to us the sights and sounds of another world. To Milton, and to Milton alone, belonged the secrets of the great deep, the beach of sulphur, the ocean of fire, the palaces of the fallen dominations glimmering through the everlasting shade, the silent wilderness of verdure and fragrance where armed angels kept watch over the sleep of the first lovers, the portico of diamond, the sea of jasper, the sapphire pavement empurpled with celestial roses, and the infinite ranks of the cherubim, blazing with adamant and gold. The council, the tournament, the procession, the crowded cathedral, the camp, the guard-room, the chase, were the proper scenes for Dryden.

"But we have not space to pass in review all the works which Dryden wrote. We, therefore, will not speculate longer on those which he might possibly have written. He may, on the whole, be pronounced to have been a man possessed of splendid talents, which he often abused, and of a sound judgment, the admonitions of which he often neglected; a man who succeeded only in an inferior department of his art, but who, in that department, succeeded pre-eminently; and who, with a more independent spirit, a more anxious desire of excellence, and more respect for himself, would, in his own walk, have attained to absolute perfection."

Among the various editions of Dryden's works may be mentioned, the Prose Works, by Malone, 1800, in 4 vols.; the Poetical Works, with notes by Warton, and edited by Todd, 1812, in 4 vols. 8vo; and the whole of his Works, with a Life by the late Sir Walter Scott, Edinburgh, 1808, in 18 vols. 8vo.

DRY ROT,

A most destructive, and apparently infectious disease in timber, which, by decomposing the fibres, deprives it of all strength, and in no great length of time reduces it to a mass of dry dust; a circumstance from which it seems to have derived its name, which, perhaps, would better be expressed by that of sep rot.

Though this disease must from its nature have been co-existent with timber-trees, it would not seem to have excited much attention, and perhaps was not known, certainly not by its present name, before the middle of the last century; at some period, we rather think, of Sir John Pringle's presidency of the Royal Society of London. But for a long time after this little notice appears to have been taken of it; its ravages being, in all probability, inconsiderable, in comparison with what they have been of late years. Even now, the disease is in fact chiefly confined to modern built houses and modern built ships, and more particularly to the ships of the royal navy. The proximate cause of it has, therefore, rightly enough, as it would seem, been ascribed to the unseasonable state of the timber, when placed in certain situations, and under particular circumstances. It could not fail, in the course of the late long protracted war, to become a matter of general observation, that a more rapid decay than usual had become almost universal throughout the fleet, and especially amongst the newest and most recently repaired ships. Many anxious inquiries were instituted, and experiments made, with the view of ascertaining the real cause of a decay, the further prevention of which was so highly important to the national welfare and security. The alarm was greatly increased when, in 1810, the Queen Charlotte, a first-rate ship of war, shortly afterwards launched at Deptford, was discovered, after a close examination, to have all her upper works infected with the dry rot; or, in other words, the ends of most of the beams, carlings, and ledges, the joinings of the planks, &c. were observed to be covered with a mouldy, fibrous, and reticulated crust, and the parts of the timber so covered to be perfectly rotten. All the newspapers and journals of the day were filled with this alarming fact, and in consequence thereof a multitude of dry rot doctors proffered their assistance; one having a nostrum for eradicating the disease where it had made its appearance; and another for preventing its further approach. Some of these specifics were expensive and inconvenient, many of them impracticable of application, and most of them futile and objectionable in one way or another. These doctors, in fact, like the physicians for the human body when the seat of the disease is unknown, were labouring altogether in the dark, having no other guide to direct them than their own whims and fancies, each being ignorant of the effect of the respective experiments which they wished to try on this diseased machine.

Since the period in question a number of treatises have been written on the subject, for the prevention and cure of the dry rot in ships and houses; some wild and visionary enough, and others exhibiting the proofs of plain practical good sense, deduced from long observation, or the result of judicious experiment. Of the latter description may safely be mentioned A Treatise on the Dry Rot in Timber, written in 1815 by the late Mr Thomas Wade, who died previous to its publication, and whilst employed in making experiments in the dock-yards; and also another On the Prevention of Timber from Premature Decay, by Mr Chapman, 1817. A Treatise on the Dry Rot, by Mr Bowden of the Navy Office, is in many respects deserving of notice, in as far as the facts and his observations on the management of timber are carried; but he unluckily sets out with a fanciful theory, which, however, is not his own, concerning the generation of fungi, and their connection with the dry rot, to which, like most theorists, he endeavours to make all his facts subservient. In Mr McWilliam's Essay on the Origin and Operation of the Dry Rot, published in 1818, we find studded into a large quarto almost every theory and every fact gathered from preceding writers, from Aristotle down to Mr Ralph Dodd, civil engineer, who has also published his Practical Observations on the Dry Rot in Timber; which work appears to be little more than an advertisement of A Dry Rot Preventive, a nostrum which, it would seem, is too valuable to be disclosed, without calling in the doctor that he may get his fee. We have also in print the opinions and the specifics of Mr Gregory, Mr Ogg, and many others of minor note, all of whom profess to explain the cause, to secure the prevention, and to effect the cure of the dry rot.

These authors are at variance amongst themselves, whether the common rot in timber, and the dry rot, be not one and the same disease. A little reflection, however, will, we conceive, lead us to consider them as essentially different, both in the symptoms, the progress, and the causes, though the effect of destroying the fibre of the wood is pretty nearly the same. If a post of wood, for instance, be driven into the ground, seasoned or unseasoned, it will speedily begin to decay just at the surface of the ground, or, as it were, between the earth and the air; if driven into the earth through water, as in a pond, the decay will commence at the surface of the water; or, as it is technically expressed, between wind and water, whilst all above water, and all that is constantly immersed in the water, as well as the part in the earth, will remain sound. Thus also a beam of wood let into a damp wall will begin to rot just where it enters the wall; so will wooden bannisters when they are let through the top and foot rails. In these and similar cases the rot begins externally, and its progress is inwards, and is more or less accelerated by the alternate action of wind, heat, and moisture, being greatest when the alternatives of exposure to wet and drought are most frequent, and least when constantly immersed in water, or constantly preserved in a dry atmosphere. Such we conceive to be the usual process of the common rot in wood, and it is evidently occasioned by alternate exposure to the vicissitudes of the weather, to moisture and dryness, to heat and cold.

If the same post be well charred or covered over with a thick coating of paint, or varnish, or tar, no such effect the dry rot will be produced externally, the coating being sufficient to protect it against the action of the weather; but if it should happen to be a green or unseasoned piece of wood so tarred or painted, in no great length of time the wood will be found to have begun to decay internally, whilst the outer surface appears uninjured, but at length it will also yield to the disease. If this piece of wood had been placed in a warm cellar or close room where there is little or no circulation of air, and more particularly if the room or cellar were damp, there would be perceived, in no great length of time, a fine mouldy coating spread over its surface, of a brownish yellow or dirty white; and shortly afterwards it would be found, on examination, to resemble in its form and structure some of the beautifully ramified algae or sea weeds; which in process of time would become more compact, the interstices being so completely filled up as to give to the whole mass the appearance and consistence of leather. "At first," says one writer, "its appearance is that of fine fibres running on the surface in endless ramifications, resembling the nervous fibres of leaves; presently the interstices are filled up with a spongy or leather-like substance, assuming the character of that order of cryptogamous plants distinguished by the name of fungous."

By Mr Wade the general symptoms of dry rot are thus described: "The wood at first swells; after some time it changes its colour, then emits gases which have a mouldy or musty smell. In the more advanced stages of it the mass arises, and cracks in transverse directions. Lastly, it becomes pulverulent, and forms vegetable earth; and generally in some of these stages of decay the different species of fungus are found to vegetate on the mass." (Treatise on the Dry Rot in Timber. By Thomas Wade.)

These appearances do not invariably take place, the surface of the diseased timber sometimes remaining unchanged, while the process of rotting is going on within; they are, however, pretty constant. But however sound the surface may be, it will appear, on examining the piece of wood, placed in a situation similar to those above mentioned, that the whole of the interior fibres are decomposed, and become a mass of dust inclosed within a thin external shell. No charring of the surface, no paint, tar, or varnish, will prevent this process from taking place, when the seeds of the dry rot exist, and are placed in a situation favourable for their growth, though they may prevent the external character of mouldiness from taking place on the surface.

The symptomatic difference, then, between the common rot and the dry rot may perhaps be thus defined. Common rot is a disease in timber, occasioned by the alternations of the weather acting on its surface, and destroying its fibres externally inwards. Dry rot is a disease in timber, occasioned by being shut up in warm, close, and moist situations, the effect of which is to destroy its fibres by a process acting internally outwards.

Without stopping to inquire in what manner, and by what agency, chemical or mechanical, or both, the common rot acts on the external fibres of the wood, the effect of alternate exposure to the weather is too well known to require any further proof as to its being the immediate cause. The immediate cause of the dry rot is equally obvious; but the predisposing state of the timber to contract the disease is not so clear a problem. Accordingly, theories without end have been hatched to explain the phenomenon. A writer in a public journal, who has slightly touched on the subject, thus explains it. "It is well known," he observes, "that if a piece of green wood be laid across a fire, the air within, expanded by the heat, will drive out at each extremity a viscous fluid, possessing the property of disposing itself on the surface in reticulated filaments. The same appearance of nervous foliation is not uncommon in the intermediate spaces of the concentric layers of the albumen of wood; and the core or heart of trees, and particularly of the pitch pine, after its passage in the heated hold of a ship, is often enveloped with a membranous corticle, like that which lies immediately beneath the bark. All these appearances are certain indications of the dry rot; and they point out, with sufficient clearness, that the sap, or principle of vegetation, brought into activity, is the cause of the disease; the effect, though infinitely more rapid, is the same as that of the common rot. It is still a problem in what manner this sap circulates; but there is no doubt that the tubes and cells of the albumen, or sapwood, are filled with it in the spring of the year, and that they are empty in the winter; that it is organized matter, developing itself by heat in all the various forms of new bark, leaves, and branches. The stem of a tree cut down will, on the return of summer, make an effort to push out leaves; a more feeble effort of this organized sap ends in the production of fungus only." (Quarterly Review, No. 15.)

It is now, we apprehend, pretty well decided, that, like other vegetables, the fungi or mushroom tribe are propagated by seed so minute and numerous as to float about invisibly in the air, and to be carried into all manner of situations. The fine impalpable powder that issues from the common puff-ball, like a column of smoke, will give some idea of the almost inconceivable myriads of minute seeds which it incloses. Of these seeds, though myriads perish, yet others, by a concurrence of accidents, being thrown into proper situations favourable for their growth, reproduce the species. It cannot be supposed that the fibres found in the dung of animals, and particularly of the horse, known by the name of mushroom spawn, and from which our gardeners construct their mushroom beds, are generated spontaneously in the belly of the animal, but that the seeds being devoured with his food, have found that degree of warmth, moisture, and soil, favourable to the development of the future plant; and this plant which the fibres exhibit, by care and cultivation increases and grows to the perfect state of all plants, and throws out above the surface the parts of fructification which we call the mushroom. If it be asked why the dung of a cow, which feeds on the same food with a horse, does not produce the spawn of mushrooms, the only answer to be given is, that it is not a proper nidus for the germination of the seed.

In the same manner may the perfect plant be produced from the seed, carried up into the longitudinal tubes of a growing tree, by the rising of the sap; though it would seem that the process of vegetation in the parasite thus lodged will not commence so long as the vital principle of the sap in the tree remains in activity. Indeed it is pretty evident, from numerous observations, that the process of fermentation is necessary to the growth of all fungi; and this may explain why in the diseased and decayed parts of a tree only are fungi found to grow whilst it is in a living state.

The sap, therefore, may be the cause of the dry rot, in as far as it is favourable to the growth of fungi, as it would seem to be when in a state of fermentation, though it never can by any process be convertible into this order of cryptogamous plants. But the appearance of fungi, though frequent, is by no means a constant symptom of dry rot; and, therefore, Mr Bowden's definition of dry rot, with his whole doctrine, must fall to the ground. "The nature of dry rot is a vegetable substance," and this substance, he tells us, is fungus. Though not very happily expressed, his meaning is intelligible enough from what follows. "This secretion of nature (the juice of a tree) which was destined to appear in the form of leaves, branches, &c., being diverted from its original intention, assumes a new form from its own native energies. Vegetation commences in the various tubes of the wood, under the form of those fine fibrous shoots which have been already described (as mushroom spawn). It continues to increase in every direction, until, by an extraordinary manifestation, it happily averts the otherwise unforeseen but certain destruction of the vessel. It may confidently be asserted, therefore, that this is the primary, chief, and predisposing cause of dry rot; and this opinion may be further confirmed by an inquiry into the nature of the juices and fungi, and the manner in which the timber is affected." (A Treatise on Dry Rot, by A. Bowden.)

Mr Bowden having totally mistaken the nature of fungus, by adopting the erroneous principle of the writer in the Quarterly Review, labours hard to prove, and with considerable ingenuity, "that dry rot is caused by a vegetative substance, and that it is one of the species of fungi;" and this doctrine he illustrates in the case of speck bark from the tan-pits, of which he says, "when taken out and exposed to the heat of summer, the juices appear desirous of obeying the laws of nature; and being no longer capable of adding to the bulk of a tree, is satisfied with wearing the humble garb of a mushroom;" nay, so enamoured is he with the similarity of oak bark, and fungus, and taninia, that "an examination of the fungous coat taken from the end of a timber, would afford a strong presumption, from its exact resemblance to leather, that it owes its existence to no other cause than that which communicates such peculiar qualities." Into such absurdities will crude theories sometimes drive their authors.

Mr Wade has sounder notions on the nature of fungus; he knew they possessed the principle of reproduction, and that their seeds, under favourable circumstances, will vegetate; that the proper nidus for the reception of certain species of fungus appears to be wood in a state of progressive decomposition, or the remains of wood entirely decomposed; that, however, the effect produced by these plants and decaying timber is reciprocal, the latter furnishing food for the former, while the decomposition of the wood is accelerated by the growth of the fungus, the gaseous and soluble products being taken up by the plants, as quickly as these principles are disengaged. The whole tribe of parasitic fungi may, in fact, be considered as the wolves and tigers of the vegetable world, destroying ultimately every plant they fix upon, and most rapidly where the principle of vegetation has ceased to act, and the putrefactive fermentation of the juices has in consequence commenced.

The real efficient cause then of the dry rot, is that of the juices of the timber being brought into a state of putrefaction, occasioned generally by exposure to a moderate degree of heat and moisture in a stagnant atmosphere. "To favour this process," says Mr Wade, "as much as possible, the air and water should not be renewed, as they undergo a decomposition, which takes place very slowly."

From the structure of timber being composed longitudinally of an assemblage of pipes or tubes, it is only necessary that one end of a log of wood should be placed in a damp or wet situation, to occasion the moisture to be conveyed to the opposite end by capillary attraction; and hence arises the infectious nature of the disease, which will always spread wherever the moisture finds its way; and even where there is no moisture, it will be created by the filaments of the fungi working their way through the tubes of the dry wood, and carrying it with them. Hence, also, the rapid decay in ships of war, from the great internal heat occasioned by the number of men, the moisture, and the close air. Hence, also, in houses, the dry rot always first appears in the lower apartments, where the floors, partitions, skirting-boards, &c., are supplied with moisture from the wet walls on the ground. In the London houses there is generally a room on the basement story, called the housekeeper's room, which is boarded, and carefully covered over with an oiled floor-cloth. In such a room the dry rot is sure to make its appearance. The wood absorbs the aqueous vapour which the oil-cloth will not allow to escape; and being assisted by the heat of the air in such apartments, the decay goes on most rapidly; and, as Mr Wade observes, "if the seed of fungus be present, the plant is developed in all the superfluity of vigour exhibited in a hot-house, where the same means are resorted to, namely, an atmosphere scientifically and artificially heated, and highly charged with aqueous vapour." Timber may, in fact, have the seeds of dry rot within it, and yet by proper treatment be kept sound for a great length of time. Thus ships laden with particular cargoes afford remarkable instances of the effects of such cargoes on their duration. The warm moisture created by a cargo of hemp is communicated to the timber, and promotes a rapid putrefaction. Mr Chapman says, that the ship Brothers, built at Whitby, of green timber, proceeded to Petersburg for a cargo of hemp. The next year it was found on examination that her timbers were rotten, and all the planking, excepting a thin external skin. A lading of cotton is always injurious to the ship, and even teak is affected by a cargo of pepper. The timber which is brought from America in the heated hold of a ship, is invariably covered over, on being landed, with a complete coating of fungus. It was the too general use of this timber in ships of the royal navy that at one time increased the disease to such an alarming degree. Those ships, on the contrary, which are employed constantly in the coal and lime trade, are very durable, and have been known to last for a century. These effects are obviously to be ascribed to the exclusion of air in the one case from, and the free admission of it in the other to, the interior surface of the ship, assisted, in the latter instance, by the absorption of moisture, by the coals and lime, from the timbers and planking.

Prevention If we are arrived at the right conclusion as to the cause of dry rot, of dry rot in timber, we can be at no loss with regard to the mode of treatment for the prevention of the disease. The experiments for this purpose have been very numerous, but may be classed under three general heads; desiccation or seasoning; immersion in earth, sand, or water; and impregnation with some foreign matter, which will resist putrefaction.

The most simple and common mode of preventing the dry decomposition of vegetable matter, is by depriving it of its moisture. Various schemes have been put in practice for drying the juices in large logs of timber. Time alone will do it when the wood is placed in favourable situations, that is to say, in a dry atmosphere, and constantly exposed to a free circulation of air; but time will also produce the rot in timber when piled up in stacks in the open air, imbuing moisture from the earth, and exposed to the vicissitudes of the seasons, and the alternations of weather; scorched at one time by the heat of the sun, at another drenched with rain, and rent and split in every possible way by the freezing of the water which has insinuated itself into the pores and crevices of the wood. It was formerly, and, indeed, till very lately, the practice to let ships of war remain on the stocks in frame for two, three, or four years, to season, as it was called; but there never was so mistaken a notion. "When a ship," says Mr Wade, "is built, exposed to the weather, the lower part forms a grand reservoir for all the rain that falls; and as the timbers in that part are placed as close together as possible, the wet escapes very slowly. Those timbers are always soaked with moisture, and, to some distance from the keel, exhibit a green appearance; their green matter, when viewed through a microscope, is found to be a beautiful and completely formed moss, which vegetates at the expense of the timber. If to season timber be only to dry it, the sooner it is dried the better; and when completely dry, it cannot too soon be employed in ship-building, when it should be kept dry. It cannot answer any end to have seven years wear out of a ship on the stocks." At length our shipwrights are convinced of this truth, and the plan now generally adopted in ship-building is to protect the vessel by a roofed structure, with the sides open to admit a free current of air, but to exclude all moisture, as well as the rays of the sun (See Dock Yards); a practice which we have tardily adopted from the Swedes and the Venetians. A new system seems also to have been adopted on the piling the timber stacks. Instead of their being placed on old, useless, and often rotten logs of timber resting on the ground, they are now insulated from the earth on stone or iron pillars; and in place of their surfaces coming in contact with each other, pieces of wood are placed between them so as to admit of a circulation of air. Nothing further appears to be wanting but to protect the tops and the ends of the stocks or piles from the effects of the weather.

Of the various modes of artificial and rapid desiccation, that of charring is perhaps the best; but it is liable to two objections, the first is, that if the surface be completely charred, it diminishes very much the strength of the timber; and, secondly, it the more readily attracts moisture. The juices of timber may be drawn off or hardened by kiln-drying; but this also disturbs the arrangement of the fibres, and deprives the wood of a great part of its strength.

The experiments made by Mr Lukin for the rapid seasoning of green oak timber, promised at one time much kin's success, but ended in disappointment. He conceived, for seasoning that if the acid and the watery particles were driven out of a piece of oak timber by some process which should prevent the surface from splitting, the fibres would be brought closer into contact, and whilst the log lost in weight it would gain in strength. With this view he Dry Rot. buried a piece of wood in pulverized charcoal in a heated oven. The log wore a promising appearance; the surface was close and compact; it had lost in its weight and dimensions; but when divided with the saw, the fibres were discovered to have started from each other, exhibiting a piece of fine net-work, resembling the inner bark of a tree.

His next contrivance was to supply the place of the fluids driven out by heat, with some other substance of an oily or resinous nature, which, while it destroyed the principle of vegetation, should preserve the timber in a compact state. For this purpose he erected a large kiln in Woolwich dock-yard, capable of containing from two to three hundred loads of timber. At each end, on the outside, was a retort in which the saw-dust of the pitch-pine was submitted to distillation. From the heads of these retorts were iron pipes, perforated with holes like a cylinder, continued along the upper part of the kiln the whole length in the inside. By this arrangement it was expected, that while the heat of the kiln drove off the aqueous matter of the timber, the product of the saw-dust, which resembled weak oil, or rather spirit of turpentine, would drop through the holes in the tubes upon the logs, and supply its place. But before the process of transusion was judged to be complete, an explosion took place, which proved fatal to six of the workmen, and wounded fourteen, two of whom shortly afterwards died. The explosion was like the shock of an earthquake; it demolished the wall of the dock-yard, part of which was thrown to the distance of 250 feet; an iron door, weighing 280 pounds, was driven to the distance of 230 feet, and other parts of the building were borne in the air upwards of 300 feet. The experiment was not repeated.

The bad effects of applying artificial heat to the seasoning of green timber were strongly exemplified by a practice introduced very generally into our ships of war which had exhibited indications of the dry rot, particularly in the Queen Charlotte. Enormous fires were made in stoves placed in various parts of the ship, and the heat led in tubes to the cavities between the timbers, &c. The consequence of which was, as might be expected, an increase of the mischief they were intended to prevent. Every part of the ship was converted into a hot-house, and every part where the seeds of fungi had been deposited began to throw out a luxuriant crop of mushrooms; and where these did not appear, the juices of the wood were thrown into a state of fermentation, and, in the course of a twelve-month, a great part of her upperworks became a mass of rottenness. After starving the powder magazines of some of the ships, there appeared under their floors, which are contiguous to much moisture, numbers of large excrescences of a leathery consistence, of the size and shape of a quart glass-decanter; and in all such parts where two surfaces of the wood were imperfectly brought into contact, were whole masses of fungi.

Another mode, of very ancient standing, was practised for getting rid of the juices of timber. This was supposed to be effected by felling the tree in the winter season, when the sap had descended and the vessels were empty. But by this practice the bark of the oak, so valuable in the process of tanning, was lost, as it will strip only from the wood in the spring of the year, when the sap is said to be rising. The supposed superior quality of the wood when winter-felled, and the general practice of felling oak timber at that season, may be inferred from a statute of James I., by which it is enacted, that no person or persons shall fell or cause to be felled, any oaken trees meet to be barked, when bark is worth 2s. a cart-load (timber for the needful building and reparation of houses, ships, or mills, only excepted), but between the first day of April and last day of June, not even for the king's use, out of barking time, except for building and repairing his majesty's houses or ships.

The old Sovereign of the Seas is the standing example generally quoted to prove the beneficial effects of winter-felled timber. We are informed by one writer that, when taken in pieces, after forty-seven years' service, the old timber was still so hard that it was no easy matter to drive a nail into it, and all future writers have taken it for granted that this was owing to its being winter-felled. Mr. Pett, however, who built her, takes no notice of any such circumstance. He merely says he was commanded by the king, on the 14th May 1635, to hasten into the north to procure the frame-timbers, plank, and trenails, for the great new ship at Woolwich. But he left his son behind to ship the moulds, provisions, and workmen, in a hired ship, to transport them to Newcastle; that the frame, as it was got ready, was sent in colliers from Newcastle and Sunderland; and that, on the 21st December, in the same year, the keel was laid in the dock; and in less than two years after this she was launched. Now, as it was the middle of May before Mr. Pett received his majesty's commands to procure timber for this ship, and as she was on the stocks the same year, it is not very probable that the timber procured and sent in colliers from Newcastle to Woolwich was felled in the winter; much less could it have been "stripped of its bark in the spring, and felled the second succeeding autumn," as Mr. Wade has it.

Neither is there the least proof of the old Royal William, recently broken up, when a century old, being built of winter-felled timber. The fact is, that she was rebuilt half a dozen times, and the only old and original timber remaining in her was in the lowest part of her hull, always immersed in the salt water externally, and washed with the bilge-water internally; and the wood from this part of her, when broken up, was perfectly sound, but quite black, having the appearance of being charred.

As far as experiments have been made, there is no reason to conclude that timber felled in the winter is at all more durable than that which is felled at the usual time. In the year 1793, the Hawke sloop of war was ordered to be built, one side being of timber that had been barked in the spring and felled in the winter, and the other side with timber felled at the usual time. In 1803 she was reported to be in so bad a state of rottenness, that she was ordered to be taken in pieces, when no difference whatever could be discovered in the state of the timbers of the two sides. It is said, however, in Derrick's Memoirs of the Navy, "that the timber had been stripped in the spring of 1787, and not felled until the autumn 1790," and this is given as an explanation of the failure. Why the barking in the spring should add to the durability of timber, is not easily conceived, if the object be to fill the timber when all the sap-vessels are empty, as, if the sap descends at all, which is doubtful, it might be expected to descend more freely when the bark is on than off the tree. This subject has not escaped the attention of the commissioners of the royal woods and forests, and various experiments have been made with a view to throw more light on a subject so vitally important to the British navy. In France, so long ago as 1669, a royal ordinance limited the felling of timber from the 1st October to the 15th April; and the conservators of the forests directed that the trees should be felled when the "wind was at north," and "in the wane of the moon;" and we find an instruction of Bonaparte, that "as ships built of timber felled at the moment of vegetation must be liable to rapid decay, and require immediate repairs, from the effect of the fermentation of the sap in those pieces which had not been felled at the proper season;" the agents of the forests should abridge the time for felling naval timber, which should take place "in Dry Rot: the decrease of the moon, from the 1st November to the 15th March."

The facts are so numerous and so strong in favour of the durability of timber when steeped in water or buried in earth or sand that no doubt whatever can be entertained of the efficacy of such a practice. At Brest all the timber used in ship-building is deposited in the narrow creek of the harbour which runs through the middle of the dock-yard, and it is said that the Brest built ships never had the dry rot. The same practice prevailed at Cadiz and Carthagena. Indeed there is reason to think that steeping in fresh water is a preventive of dry rot, probably by dissolving the juices of the timber. It was an ancient practice, and we believe is still followed in some parts of England, to place the timber intended for thrashing-floors in the midst of a stream of water, to harden it; and all the oak plants intended for the wainscoting of the old mansions were previously steeped in running water.

"I know it," says Mr Chapman, "to be the opinion of some well-informed men, whose sentiments are highly deserving of notice, that the sap of trees does not descend, but, like the arterial blood, is prevented by valves from returning; as a proof of which, it is asserted, that fresh-cut timber, if laid in a running stream with the butt-end towards the current, will have the water percolating through it, and carrying off the mucilaginous matter, but not otherwise." "There can be no doubt," he adds, "that the effect will be produced sooner in this direction than the other, and it should therefore be attended to." The reason is obvious; the extractive matter, which is the chief, though not the only, cause of putrefaction, is dissolved and driven off. The usual mode of preserving timber for masts, is to keep it immersed in water in what are called mast-locks. The mast of the Kangaroo sloop of war was dug out of the mud at the bottom of the mast-pond, at Deptford dock-yard, where it had been fifty years, and was one of the most serviceable masts in the navy. Burying timber in sand is a usual process for preserving it in warm climates. Yet, with all these facts and long experience, it was but very recently that the steeping of timber in salt water was practised in the king's dock-yards, and this originated in an accident. The Resistance frigate went down in Malta harbour. But as she had been reported in such a state of dry rot, or rather the surface of her timbers so covered with fungus, as to render it expedient to send her home, she was suffered to continue under water for many months. On her arrival in England it was observed that all appearance of fungus had vanished, and she remains a sound ship to this day. Yet even this fact does not seem to have attracted much attention. But when the dock-yard was removed from the northern to the southern side of Milford-haven, a few loads of timber that was covered with fungus were suffered to remain in the water for several months; and it was observed that, after being taken out and stacked in the new yard, the timber did not exhibit those appearances of dry rot which the same timber did most abundantly which had not been immersed in the salt water. This fact being reported to the navy board, it was proposed to sink one of two sister ships, the Mersey and the Eden, both alike infected with the dry rot, in Plymouth Sound. The Eden was the ship selected for this purpose. She remained under water for about eighteen months, and, on being raised, every trace of fungus had totally disappeared, whilst the Mersey was almost wholly covered with it. After remaining a year at home perfectly sound, she was sent out to the East Indies.

It is said, and there seems to be no reason for doubting the fact, that the planks of ships near the bows, which are obliged to be boiled in water or steam in order to bend them, are never infected with the dry rot: if the water in which they are boiled be strongly impregnated with salt, the effects would probably be more durable and decisive.

In a lecture read by Mr Ogg, a salt refiner, to the Plymouth Institution, on the prevention and cure of dry rot in ships of war, common salt is strongly recommended, for its cheapness, its wholesomeness, and its easy application; but he proposes a saturated solution of salt, in which he would steep not only single logs or planks, but the whole frame of a ship, or even the ship itself. "Let every ship in the navy," says the salt refiner, "be immersed a sufficient time in this fluid, and let every new ship be prepared in the same way, and dry rot would be heard of no more." But how is this to be accomplished? I answer, provide a dock or docks sufficiently capacious to receive five, ten, or twenty ships, and the work is done." As common sea-water will answer the purpose equally well, the apparatus of extensive docks and water saturated with salt are wholly unnecessary. But Mr Ogg, like Mr Bowden, appears to mistake the real cause of dry rot. "I affirm," says he, "that dry rot is occasioned by the vegetative principle; brine will destroy this principle; then sink the ship in brine." The experiments in the case of the Resistance and the Eden show that brine is not necessary.

The Dutch having observed that their busses, in which the herrings were caught and stowed away in pickle, lasted longer than any other craft, adopted the practice of filling up the vacancies between the timbers and planks of ships with salt, and of boring holes in the large timbers and cramming them full of salt. The Americans also found, that the ships employed in carrying out salt for their fisheries and domestic purposes were the most durable; and both they and the Dutch are glad to get a cargo of salt into a new ship, as the surest means of preserving her. The carpenter of the Franklin, an American seventy-four gun ship, when at Spithead, told some of her visitors, that at the junction of the beams, and at the butt-ends of the timbers, pieces were cut, and the hollow part filled with salt, and covered over with felt, for the purpose of preserving those parts where two surfaces are imperfectly brought together, from the dry rot, where it is always most prevalent.

There are, however, very serious objections to the immersion of ships in a strong solution of salt, and the practice of inserting salt in the vacant space between the timbers, which may not, perhaps, apply with equal force to their immersion in sea-water. It is observed by a writer in the Quarterly Review for October 1814, that "the attraction for moisture which salts and acids possess, would keep the whole interior of the ship dripping wet; which would not only destroy the ship with the wet rot, but the ship's company also, whose health, experience has proved, is best preserved by keeping the ship as dry as possible; and thus the remedy would be worse than the disease." These bad effects have unquestionably been experienced, the nitrate of magnesia, which exists in sea-water, being one of the most deliquescent salts; but whether the abstraction of moisture from the atmosphere be of long duration, is a fact which remains to be proved. In corroboration of the injurious effects above described, Mr Strange, in his Evidence, observes, "that the practice at Venice of the fresh cut timber being thrown into salt water prevents its ever becoming dry in the ships, and that the salt water rusted and corroded the iron bolts." Mr Chapman also observes that "the Florida, a twenty gun ship, taken from the Americans, and subsequently commissioned in the British service, had been salt-seasoned; and the result was, that in damp weather every thing be- came moist, the iron work was rusted, and the health of the crew was impaired; in fine," he adds, "vessels so circumstanced are perfect hygrometers; being as sensible to changes of the moisture in the atmosphere as lumps of rock salt, or slips of fluci, or the plaster of inside walls where sea-sand has been used."

Mr Chapman, however, is of opinion, that vessels impregnated with bay-salt, or the large grained salt of Linghamton or of Liverpool (being pure muriate of soda, without admixture with the bitter deliquescent salts), will possess decided advantages, as would also vessels laden with saltpetre, if it has been dispersed among their timbers; and Mr Ogg sees no difficulty in refining salts so as to deprive it of its deliquescent quality. But if a very weak solution of salt, or even fresh water, shall be found to answer the purpose, the objection against immersing timber in sea-water seems to be got rid of. That it will immediately destroy all vegetable life in the delicate fibres of the fungus, and also prevent its future growth, is quite clear; and if it shall be found to prevent also the putrefactive process, it may be considered as the most advisable way to prepare timber for all purposes of house carpentry and ship-building.

A great variety of substances besides common salt, indeed almost any salt or acid, will destroy and prevent the growth of fungus. Sir Humphry Davy recommends a weak solution of the corrosive sublimate as the most efficient. A solution of sulphate of iron or copperas is much used in Sweden for hardening and preserving wood for wheel-carriages, &c. It is first boiled in this solution for three or four hours, and then kept in a warm place to dry, by which process it is said to become so hard and compact that moisture cannot penetrate it. "The wooden vessels," says Mr Chapman, "in which the sulpho-feruginous solution is finally placed for the copperas to crystallize, become exceedingly hard, and not subject to decay." A solution of alum has been recommended; but Mr Chapman seems to think that its earthy basis would become a nidus of putrefaction. The wood, however, which is used about alum works, becomes hard and durable, and resists fire in an extraordinary manner. All timber, in fact, when completely saturated with saline matter, is more or less indestructible, and absolutely incumstibule. A solution of arsenic has not been found to prevent the dry rot. With regard to the impregnation of oils there are various opinions, some thinking them beneficial and others injurious to the durability of timber. It is known, however, that ships in the Greenland trade have their timbers and planks preserved as high up as they are impregnated with whale oil from the blubber; and Mr Chapman says, that one of the masters of a Greenland ship having payed her upperworks with twelve or more successive coats with whale oil in hot weather, they became covered with a thin varnish, much harder and more compact than if filled with successive coats of turpentine. Resinous substances, however, are probably better than oil.

After a variety of experiments and sensible observations, Mr Chapman sums up the three great operations by which timber may be brought to resist the tendency to dry rot.

1. To deprive the timber of its mucilage, which is very liable to fermentation. 2. To impregnate timber with any strongly antiseptic and non-deliquescent matter. 3. To dry timber progressively by the sun and wind, or by the latter alone; and then to close its pores completely with any substance impervious to air and moisture, and at the same time highly repellant to putrefescency.

Mr Wade recommends the impregnation of timber with sulphates of copper, zinc, or iron, rejecting deliquescent salts, as they corrode metals, and would destroy the bolts and metal fastenings of a ship. He observes, that timber impregnated with saline matter is no longer capable of fermentation, and that, of course, the gases necessary for the nutriment of fungi are not evolved. Selenite is recommended as being insoluble, or nearly so, and not liable to any alteration in the ordinary temperature of the atmosphere; but all salts, he observes, composed of barites, should be rejected, because, though they are plentiful, cheap, and have some qualities eminently fitting them to be employed for this purpose, yet they are, without any exception, very poisonous.

From all experiments that have been made, it appears that the most effectual method of preventing the dry rot, and of giving durability to timber, is that of depriving the sap of its mucilage, more especially in the albumen, where it most abounds; for though seasoning in the dry way will coagulate and harden the extractive matter of timber, yet when exposed to heat, moisture, and a stagnant air, the process of putrefaction will commence, and all the symptoms of dry rot will speedily make their appearance. It will be preferable, therefore, that such timber as is likely to be exposed to the vicissitudes of weather, should be seasoned by immersion or impregnation, rather than by the dry way.

In this disease, as in those incident to animal life, prevention is much easier than cure. In fact, there is no dry rot other cure for the part affected than excision, and the sooner it is done the better, as the disease spreads most rapidly when fungi are propagated, throwing their minute fibres into the tubes of the contiguous sound wood, and producing that moisture which is a condition absolutely necessary to the putrefactive process. If, however, the fibre of the wood is still sound, and the roots of the fungi extend not beyond the albumen near to the surface, immersion in sea water, as in cases of the Resistance and the Eden, or impregnation with some of the solutions above mentioned, may stop the progress of the disease; but the only safe cure, we apprehend, is that of cutting out the infected part. The sinking of the Royal George at her moorings has not been the means of preserving her timbers. On being visited in the diving-bell, her oaken sides were broken down into a confused mass of timber and black mud; having, no doubt, been too far gone in decay when the fatal accident happened; but her fir deck appeared as sound as the day when she sunk.

It is a great mistake to suppose that the ancients were unacquainted with the dry rot, or premature decay of timber. Pliny has a number of valuable observations on the preservation of timber, and on its decay occasioned by the juices; and, among other things, recommends that a tree should be cut to the heart all round, in order to let the juices escape, and that it should not be felled until the whole had run out. He knew that the sappy part of oak was more subject to rot, and advised that it should be cut away in squaring. He knew, too, that resinous and oleaginous matter in wood preserved it; observing, that the more odoriferous a piece of timber is, the more durable. He knew that much depended on the close texture of timber, and that box, ebony, cypress, and cedar, might almost be considered as indestructible. We also know that cedar, teak, and mahogany, are very durable woods.

The felling of timber while young and full of vigour, making use of the sap-wood or albumen, and applying it to ships and buildings in an unseasoned state, have no doubt contributed to make the disease of dry rot infinitely more common and extensive than it was in former times, when our ships were "hearts of oak;" and when in our large mansions the wind was suffered to blow freely through them, and a current of air to circulate through the wide space left between the panelled wainscot and the wall. In those old mansions which yet remain, and in the ancient cathedrals and churches, we find nothing like the dry-rot, though perhaps

perforated sars.

And drill'd in holes, the solid oak is found.

By worms voracious eaten through and through.

Numerous examples of the extraordinary duration of timber may be produced, both from complete desiccation and exposure to the air, and from the complete exclusion of air and immersion in earth or water. Without adverting to the surturbrandt of Iceland, covered with several strata of solid rock, or the logs of wood dug out of peat-moss, the antiquity of which is mere conjecture, we may instance the mummy cases of Egypt as being in all probability the most ancient timber in existence that has been worked by the hand of man. When Belzoni entered the splendid tomb of the kings of Thebes, in which was the transparent sarcophagus of gypsum, he found two human figures larger than life sculptured in wood, in as good preservation as if it had been worked in his own time; but the sockets of the eye, which had been copper, were entirely wasted away. We are told by Pliny, that the image of Diana at Ephesus, supposed to be of ebony, remained entire and unchanged, though the temple itself was ruined and rebuilt seven times. He adds that, in his own time, the image of Jupiter in the capitol, made of cypress wood, was still fresh and beautiful, though set up in the year after the foundation of Rome 551, nearly three hundred years before. He farther says that there was a temple of Apollo at Utica, the timbers of which, being of Numidian cedar, are said to have stood 1188 years. The roof of Westminster Hall, which is constructed of oak, has stood for more than three hundred years, and is probably better now than when newly erected. Similar instances of the long duration of timber have occurred in situations where the atmospheric air has been excluded. In the Leverian Museum was a post said to be dug out of Fleet Ditch, charred at the lower end, having the name of Julius Caesar cut into it. The foundation on which the stone piers of London Bridge are laid consist of huge piles of timber driven close to one another, on the top of which is a floor of planks ten inches thick, strongly bolted together; on these the stone piers rest, at above nine feet above the bed of the river, and, at low water, may be seen or felt at a very few inches below the surface. These piles have been driven upwards of six hundred years, and, from the solidity of the superincumbent weight, it may be concluded that they are perfectly sound. In the old city wall of London, timber is frequently dug out as sound and perfect as when first deposited there. As the last instance of the extraordinary preservation of timber, we may mention that in digging away the foundation of the Old Savoy Palace, which was built about six hundred and fifty years ago, the whole of the piles, consisting of oak, elm, beech, and chestnut, were found in a state of perfect soundness, without the least appearance of rottenness in any part of them, and the plank which covered the pile-heads was equally sound. Some of the beech, however, after being exposed a few weeks to the air, but under cover, had a coating of fungus spread over the surface; which affords a striking proof of the immense length of time that the seeds of this parasite will remain dormant, without parting with the principle of vegetable life, which is called into activity from the moment that they are deposited in a situation favourable to their growth. In this instance we have only to suppose that the indurated juices of the wood became dissolved by its exposure to the moist atmosphere, and the phenomenon of fungous vegetation is capable of receiving a satisfactory explanation.

(J.B.—W.)