progress of the tubercles. I have my own peculiar views on this subject, having had many opportunities of judging this malady; and if my professional pursuits admit of it, I shall place my notes in order, and lay them before the public. The deviations from the normal state of the spine, are sometimes constitutional, at other times only the effects of attitudes and bad habits. It is most important for parents and governesses, to see the deviation in its origin. I have been careful to enumerate the symptoms, by the aid of which parents might arrest the future progress of the evil, by curing it in the commencement. In all cases science affords ample means for treating these different states. Among so many systems, enthusiastically lauded, it was necessary to make a choice, and I have thus been brought to examine the divers orthopedic means, and to give my opinion on the most advantageous and inoffensive measures. As I am in the habit of treating these diseases and deformities, an impartial account of the actual state of science will be found in this work.

Stammering is also a deformity that physical education may prevent and cure; I have made known the best methods of so doing. The blind and dumb, being peculiarly situated, demand a special education;-all Europe justly lauded the discovery made by the Abbé de Lépée, and

that of Mr. Hauy. The education of the deaf and dumb, is a step to that of some individuals, who have been wrongly considered as incapable of improvement, and unworthy of education. This subject terminates the third book.

The fourth book is devoted to the physical and cerebral education of weak minded children, or idiots. I here claim the merit, however trifling it may be, of having opened a new path for the education of these imperfect beings, 1 do not imitate Dr. Voisin, and seek to discuss or ascertain the greater or lesser degree of criminality that may be attributed to their unreasonable actions; it is not the moral question I desire to solve, but I wish to effect for these unhappy and ill-organized beings what has been effected for the blind, and deaf and dumb. I establish, as a principle, that while an individual is accessible to any sensation, he is susceptible of education.

The education, it is true, must be appropriated to the particular state of the imbecile or idiot. I have examined the value of the craniologic system, and have done so with independence, regardless of prevailing opinion, for my views are founded on facts. I do not say that Gall's system is wholly false, but I decidedly think it cannot be universally applied; it is only an element, that may help to shew the intellec

tual state of the individual: and I do not admit the possibility of judging man's strength of mind, or degree of intelligence, by the size and the external shape of the head, without the aid of other means. I should prefer judging the intellect from its produce. I form my opinion of the talents of an individual by their results; at the same time, I admit the influence of material organization on the mind-but merely, according to the expression of Condorcet, as opposing obstacles to its activity, or as giving the power of employing it with more constancy and liberty.

The disciples of Gall endeavour to shew, that the absence of the function corresponds with the absence or weakness of part of the brain, but they have gone no further.-This fact being admitted in an absolute manner, the function could never be acquired,-a conviction that. would indeed be painful, and but little fertile. Were there no further progress, it must result, that the blind would never make up for their want of sight, and the deaf and dumb would be unfit to receive any species of education; yet we have proofs to the contrary. The imbecile and idiot are seldom completely deprived of any sense; why not, therefore, seek to give activity even to the function of the imperfect sense remaining? It is certain that the blind read by

means of the fingers; it is also true, that the deaf hear by means of the vibrations of sonorous agents that are within their reach. Is the imbecile always beneath the blind, and the deaf and dumb? I should think not; but what has hitherto been done to give activity to their senses, and to make up for those that are wanting? I have rapidly shewn what might be expected from music, gymnastic, the language of signs, and prepared scenes, or lessons in action, to be given to imbeciles, and to idiots. Imitation is a faculty common both to them, and to children. Imbeciles and idiots are mostly but children stopped in their mental progression. I regret to say, that the part of my work relating to this important subject, is but a sketch; my avocations: as a medical man, and the constant calls to which I am subjected, would not allow of my enlarging it at the present moment. I am quite resigned to dispense with any literary palm, if what I offer new to the public prove useful; and if others, beginning where I have terminated, give to the subject a higher degree of interest. The work concludes by a chapter treating of the influence of the mind on the body.

This treatise may, perhaps, be thought to contain too many technical terms for general readers, which may be excused, as emanating from the pen of a physician.

This modest edifice, dedicated to mothers, has been erected on the neutral territory of science. All nations have, more or less, contributed to it; England, by Locke and Jenner; France, by l'Abbé de Lépée and Itard; Switzerland, by Rousseau and Salzmann; Germany, by Gall; America, by Mrs. Leigh, and Spurzheim. I regret I have not space to name all the authors, in whose different writings may be found even some few pages, on physical education; but no work, until the present, was devoted entirely to the physical education of girls. As destined to become wives and mothers, it has been my anxious desire to preserve them, from infancy to womanhood, from diseases and deformities, and to enable them to accomplish the high and important part the divine Creator has allotted to them, as depositories of future generations.

BUREAUD RIOFREY, M.D.

22, Newman Street, Oxford Street.