the lungs, and taken from the atmofphere received into them, and that in its circuit through the body it became decompofed, liberating the caloric from the oxygene air, which before held it in a neutralized or inactive state." This question, from its novelty, and being very ably defended, acquired him a very confiderable reputation in the University.

Having studied three years at Guy's Hofpital, his mother dying, he went upon his travels, and picked up whatever medical knowledge was to be acquired in France, Holland, Germany, and Ireland; and afterwards vifited moft of the watering-places in England.

Even when abfent from England, he never loft fight of the difcovery he had before made relative to the cause of animal heat; and upon his return, he wished to educe from it, if poffible, fome practical inferences. Dr. Beddoes, the learned Profeffor of Chemistry at Oxford, having gone to the Hot-Wells, Bristol, to make trial of the effects of hydrogene gas in confumption, Dr. Thornton followed the example, and fet about experiments with the powers of oxygene and other factitious airs, in a variety of different difeafes, of which London afforded an ample fcope; and by combining with thefe a complete knowledge of medicine, he effected a number of cures in cafes that had been given up by the first phyficians and furgeons in London and elfewhere, as incurable; and thefe fucceffes were publifhed by Dr. Beddoes, in a periodical work, entitled, "Confiderations relative to Factitious Airs."

As much prejudice, as well as envy, was excited by this combined practice, deemed by many empyrical; and the Brunonian fyftem, from the obscure language of the inventor, being very ill understood by the public at large, and even by many of the faculty, Dr. Thornton, adding to this fyftem all the new discoveries in medicine which had been made fince Dr. Brown's time, publifhed this amended fyftem, under the title of "The Philofophy of Medicine; or, Medical Extracts on the Nature of Health and Difeafe, including the Laws of the Animal Economy, and the Doctrines of Pneumatic Medicine," in five volumes, octavo. Never was work more eagerly read, or generally

approved of. It foon went through five editions. It ftamped inftantly for the author a reputation that never can be effaced. The plan of the work is liberal and comprehensive, the opinions profound, and the diction throughout extremely elegant. No practitioner in medicine thould be without this work; and it will afford even a fource of agreeable entertainment to thofe who wish to study me dicine merely as a fcience.

Our Author, obferving the fluctuating ftate of politics, and probably urged on by the wonderful fuccefs his Philofophy of Medicine had had, contrived, upon the fame plan, a fyftem of Modern Politicks, which he publifhed, in three volumes, octavo, under the title of "The Philofophy of Politicks; or, Political Extracts, on the Nature of Governments, and their Adminiftration." If here he has not been fo fuccefsful, it is rather from the na ture of the subject than from the execution of the work: for it displays, as did the Philofophy of Medicine, a vast erudition, and feems to have been planned with the beft defigns poffible, and without any party-bias.

We are glad to find him foon quitting the thorny and mazy paths of politics, for what feems more particularly adapted to his talents, the contemplation of the works of Nature; and however gratified with his former productions, we were more particularly pleafed at his propofing to give to the world a new and complete fyftem of Botany, under the title of "A New Illuftration of the Sexual System of Linnæus ;" and in iffuing propofals, he declared it to be a work which, in point of defign, paper, and type, was to exceed every other work on the fubject of Botany that had hitherto appeared. For this purpose no expence was fpared; and to use the words of the Author of Literary Sketches, "Whatever ideas might have been excited when this work was first announced, the mind of man was inadequate to conceive the splendour and magnificence of the execution when published. It was indeed a trophy of national tafte, which the furrounding nations may look upon with envy and aftonishment." The late Dr. Darwin, fpeaking of this work, declares, "That the botanical picturefque plates of the New Illuftration excite aftonishment in every beholder, and have no equal."

The

The Profeffor of Botany at Cambridge, the Rev. Mr. Martyn, publicly recommended this work to the ftudents of that University, as did Profeflor Rutherford at Edinburgh. They both were agreed, that the New Illuftration of the Sexual System is not only the most fplendid botanical work extant, but a ftandard example, fhewing to what a height one of the branches of the fine arts has attained in England. Dr. Smith, Prefident of the Linnæan Society, concurs in the fame approbation. The warm reception this work has met with from the Public, evinces the general belief of its excellence. Sixteen numbers, at twenty-five thillings each, are now out. This laft contains the Portrait of the celebrated Dr. Darwin, the only likeness that exilts of that eminent philofopher, poet, and phyfician, and for which he regularly fat but a week before his unexpected death, declaring to his friends, that his features in Dr. Thornton's work would poffe s immortality.

As a practical phyfician, we muft now fay fomething of Dr. Thornton. Amidit all thefe multiplied labours, he never has remitted any thing of the duties he owed to his profeflion, or family. For four years he distinguished him elf as Phyfician to the St. Maryle-bone General Difpenfary, a charity which demanded a very laborious exertion; and when retiring from this poft, at a general quarterly meeting of the Directors and Governors of that Charity, it was unanimously refolved, that a piece of plate should be prefented to Dr. Thornton, bearing this vote. "That Dr. Thornton has uniformly acted for the intereft of this charitable Inftitu tion, ferving the office of Phylician gratuitouДly upwards of four years; that his attention to the fick has been great, his humanity confpicuous, and his fuccefs in curing difeafe remarkable; and that the thanks of the Directors and Governors be communicated accordingly by the Secretary to Dr. Thornton, and the fame be ex, preffed in all the public papers." It is curious to remark, that nearly at the fame time his uncle on his mother's Side, Sir John Brathwaite, Bart. late Commander in Chief at Mad as, upon quitting the army there, was prefented with a fervice of plate, value 3oool,

by the General and Field-Officers compofing the army of the Honourable the Eait India Company on the Coat of Coromandel, as a public token of refpect, and of individual attachment.

Whilft Dr. Thornton was Physician to the St. Mary-le-bone Difpenfary, he difcovered a certain cure for the fcarlet fever, a dileafe that carries off thousands annually, in the virtues of the foxglove, and made his firft experience in the cow-pock, which he inoculared gratis to every one who would apply to the Difpenfary; an account of which, and his fubfequent practice, is given in an octavo book, entitled, "Facts decifive in favour of Vaccine Inoculation; with a Statement of the Evidence delivered before the Honourable the Committee of the House of Commons upon the Petition of Dr. Jenner, and their Report, with Remarks on the fame."

Dr. Thornton, we are informed, independent of the "Differtation on Scarlet Fever," announced as in the prefs, is engaged also in a translation of the famous "French Menagerie," of Lacepede and Cuvier, of the National Inftiture; and has iffued out propofals for publifhing, in the following month, "The Plants of Great Britain, arranged after the reformed Sexual Syftem, and illuftrated by Six Hundred Original Diffections of the Fructification of British Plants, chiefly executed for the late Earl of Bute by Miller." As alfo "An Eay Introduction to the Science of Botany ;” to form fix volumes, octavo, and to be published in monthly numbers, at half a-crown a number.

As a Lecturer at Guy's Hofpital on medical botany. Dr. Thornton incceed ed Dr. Smith, President of the Linnæan Society, and without notes he elo quently delivers his Lectures to his pupils ftanding up. Contidering his period of life, no Gentleman has ever done more to add to the ftores of fcience; and we only wonder how he could find time to have accomplished fo much. We must here conclude, with withing him a long life to enjoy those laurels he has laborioully earned in his younger days, and the completion of his great botanical views, which pro miles to conter upon him and his country a lafting monument of well-deferved praite,

Y.

A T the fiege of Turin, in 1706, the French had broke into one of the largeft fubterranean galleries belonging to the Citadel, and the French engineer was rewarded with two hundred louis d'ors for difcovering this paflage. The French now concluded, that they should make their way to the Citadel, by means of the fecret paffage, and accordingly polted two hundred grenadiers there. One Micha, a Piedmonte fe peafant, who had been compelled to ferve as a pioneer, and, by his good natural parts and long practice, had acquired fuch a fkill in it, as to be made a corporai of the pioneers, was then working at this place with about twenty men, in order to complete a mine. Hearing the French very bufy over his head, in fecuring themselves in the gallery, it immediately occurred to him that his work now became ufelefs, the enemy being poffeffed of a place which would

be of infinite detriment to the besieged; he was alfo convinced, that it would cost him his life to hinder it, his mine having no fauciffon with which he might fpring it with lets danger. There was no time for deliberation; he therefore immediately formed this brave refolution: To fave his companions, he ordered them inftantly to withdraw out of the mine, and fire a mufquet as a fignal when they were in a place of fafety; adding, that they should go and acquaint his Majefty, that Micha implored fubfiftence for his wife and children. Upon hearing the signal, he immediately fet fire to the mine, and thus facrificed his own life, and blew up the two hundred French grenadiers into the air. The King not only provided for Micha's widow and children, but fettled a perpetual annuity of fix hundred livres upon his defcendants.

ΤΟ

SIR,

Dublin, June 18, 1803. [N your Magazine for February last, you printed fome letters that paffed between Voltaire and Richard Rolt, which were both curious and interefting. They vindicate the former from being totally ignorant of the English language, as was afferted by Baretti, in a publication of his in 1777, in defence of Shak fpeare, from fome ob. jections of that French writer; and they also rescue the memory of Rolt from the injurious account with which it is degraded in the Biographia Dramatica 1782, 2 vols. 8vo. and by Bof. well, in his Life of Johnfon. That Rolt, at the early age of twenty-five, difplayed confiderable talents as an hiftorian, we have the teftimony of Voltaire in the letters above mentioned; and that he was not devoid of genius for poetry, we may appeal to his poem, entitled Cambria, which paffed through three editions. Poffibly an account of this now almost forgotten Writer, from a person who knew him well, may not be unacceptable to your readers.

RICHARD ROLT, who was born in 1724 or 1725, is believed to have been a native of Shrewsbury, but defcended from a refpectable family of that name in Bedfordshire. A Lady of this family being married to John Orlebar, Efq. one of the Commiffioners of the Excife, this Gentleman, who was of a very cultivated tafte, and had probably feen fome early productions of young Rolt, intended to provide for him in an advantageous fituation in that department. To qualify him for this, he was placed under an officer of the excife in the North of England. This happened about the time the Pretender made his inroad into that country in the winter of the year 1745; when Rolt, and one or two young excifemen, quitted their tations, and went to the rebel army, as they alledged, only out of curiofity,

He

But

but as was reported to their fuperiors, with an intention to join them. was in confequence fuperfeded, and obliged to give up all expectations from that quarter. Being alfo related to the celebrated poet Ambrofe Philips, then refident in Ireland, he foon after went over to him in Dublin. Philips was then preparing to leave Ireland, whence he removed to his native country in 1748, and foon after died; fo that Rolt failed of procuring any establishment in that country. While he was in Ireland, he is charged in the Biographia Dramatica, and by Bofwell, with having "published Dr. Aken fide's Pleasures of the Imagination as his own work, and under his own name." But the writer of this article, who for many years has conftantly frequented the bookfellers' fhops in Dublin, and examined the catalogues of auctions in that city; who hath alfo enquired of every bookfeller, and of all the literati that fell in his way, never faw, nor heard that any one had ever feen, a fingle copy of fuch publication. This story may therefore be fafely pronounced a downright falfehood.

Kolt had probably been bred to the law, for he is charged in the Biographia Dramatica with having been an hackney writer to an Attorney. But he had early recommended himself to perfons of diftinction; for his poem entitled Cambria, which had originally been compofed (in 1748) in five books, and was then intended for the patron. age of Sir Watkins Williams Wynne, Bart. the popular patriot of Wales, to whom Rolt was well known, was afterwards, when it had been corrected, and reduced to three books, fhewn to Frederick Prince of Wales, by General Oglethorpe and Lord Middlefex (who was himself an elegant Poet); and he had permiffion to infcribe it to Prince George, his prefent Majefty, when it was printed in quarto in the fpring of the year 1749. On the 25th of Sep

tember

.tember of the fame year, Sir Watkins Williams Wynne was killed by a fall from his horfe; and in the following month Rolt published a poem to his memory, which was highly admired, and very popular among his country.

men.

By the above-mentioned, and fome other eminent perfons, Rolt was encouraged to undertake his Hiftory of the general War which terminated in 1748. This was published in four fucceffive volumes, octavo, and procured him the Correspondence with Voltaire, part of which you have already printed. He was alfo engaged to write the Life of John Earl of Crawford, an officer of diftinction. The above publications do him no difcredit; and he fhewed confiderable ability in defending the Cafe of Clifford against the Dutch West India Company, and in a reply to the Anfwers of the Dutch Civilians in that Cafe; as alfo in a Series of Letters concerning the Antigallican Privateer and Prize, which had been illegally seized and confiscated by the Spaniards.

Being an Author by profeffion, he was conftantly employed by the bookfellers in fucceffive compilations, hiftorical, commercial, &c. and in periodical publications, in which he was concerned with SMART and others. In one of thefe, The Universal Visitor, he and Smart are faid to have been bound by a contract to engage in no other undertaking, and that this contract was to remain in force "for the term of ninetynine years." So abfurd an engagement we can only impute, with the Biogra phia Dramatica, to the dictates of rapacious avarice and fubmiffive poverty.

Rolt, who had no other refources but from his pen, which must have been liable to interruption by want of health or fpirits, while the demands of his family had no intermiffion, was doubtless poor enough: but that he was not fo low a creature as the above writers would infinuate, may be inferred not only from his writings, which are not devoid of merit, but from his connections before mentioned.

Of the expedients to which the trade of book-making compels its profeffors to have recourfe, we have a curious instance in one publication of Mr. Rolt:-Mr. Woodington, a relation

of his wife, being in India, became acquainted with Captain John Northall, of the royal regiment of artillery, the fecond in command at the fiege of Surat, where he died of an apoplectic fit in the march to that city in February 1759. This Gentleman having been ftationed at Minorca, had made an excursion, in 1753, to Italy, of which he completed an entire tour; and being a man of curiofity and talte, noted down in his pocket-book all the fine pictures, statues, &c. with fuch remarks as everywhere occurred to him. This pocketbook fell into the hands of Mr. Woodington; who, at his return to England, gave it to Rolt, and he from this manufcript journal, with the help of former printed travels, compiled a large octavo volume, which he published under the title of Travels through Italy; containing new and curious Obfervations on that Country: with the most authentic_Account yet published of capital Pieces in Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture, that are to be feen in Italy. By John Northall, Efq. &c. &c. &c. 1766.

But Rolt's chief fupplies were by writing Cantatas, Songs, &c. for the Theatres, Vauxhall, Sadler's Wells, and other places of public refort. Of thefe he compofed above an hundred, fupplying, at the fhorteft notice, the demands of mufical compofers for those diurnal entertainments during many years. He alfo produced two dramatic pieces, viz: Eliza, an English Opera, in three Acts, 1754, and ALMENA, a English Opera, in three Acts, 1764.

For the former of thete the mufic was compofed by Dr. Arne, and for the latter by his fon; and they were both performed with good fuccess at Drury-lane Theatre. In the Biogra. phia Dramatica is afcribed to him an other Opera, THE ROYAL SHEPHERD, 1763; but as he omitted it in a lift of his works, which he drew up to ac company propofals for a fubfcrip. tion in October 1769, it is doubted whether that omiffion must be ascribed to his not being the author, or to its having been ill received by the public, as is related in Biographia Dramatica.

The proposals for printing, by subfcription, his poetical works, was the laft attempt of Mr. Rolt, who died March 2, 1770, aged 45; having had two wives, by each of whom he left

a daughter.