A beginning is made towards the abolition of the duty on foreign books imported. Government have consented that certain learned societies, and a number of scientific individuals, shall receive, duty free, such scientific publications as may be sent to them from abroad. Considering that the whole amount realised by the present customs' charge is only L.8000, it is easy to believe that the authorities will shortly have to abolish it altogether. Another question in which books are concerned, is the dispute that has been going on for some time among the fraternity of booksellers, as to whether a retailer shall be allowed to sell books for any price he pleases, or not. Whether 'free-trade' or 'monopoly' is to prevail, will depend on the decision of the arbitrators who have been chosen. Leaving out all the rest of the kingdom, there are nearly 1000 booksellers in London; so the subject is an important one. This number affords a notable datum for comparison with other countries. In Germany, the number of booksellers is 2651, of which 2200 are retailers, 400 publishers only, while 451 combine the two. They are distributed36 in Frankfort, 56 in Stuttgart, 52 in Vienna, 129 in Berlin, 145 in Leipsic. The figures are suggestive. Another fact may be instanced: in 1851 the number of visits to the British Museum for reading was 78,419giving an average of 269 per day, the room having been open during 292 days. The number of books consulted was 424,851, or 1455 daily. This is an agreeable view of what one part of society is doing; but there is a reverse to the picture, as shewn in a recently published parliamentary report, from which it appears that in 1849 the juvenile offenders in England numbered 6849in Wales, 73of whom 167 were transported; in 1850, the numbers were respectively 6988, 82, 184, shewing an increase under each head. Of the whole number in confinement last November, 169 were under thirteen years of age, and 568 under sixteen: 205 had been in prison once before, 90 twice, 49 three times, 85 four times and upwards; 329 had lost one parent, 103 both parents; 327 could not read, and 554 had not been brought up to any settled employment. These facts may be taken as demonstrative of the necessity for multiplying reformatory agricultural schools, such as have been established in various parts of the continent with the happiest effects.
Among the prizes just announced by the French Académie, is one for 'the best work on the state of pauperism in France, and the means of remedying it,' to be adjudged in 1853. It is greatly to be wished that some gifted mind would arise capable of taking a proper survey of so grave a question, and bringing it to a practical and
satisfactory solution. Some people are beginning to ask, whether it would not be better, with the proceeds of poor-rates, to send paupers to colonies which are scant of labourers, rather than to expend the money in keeping them at home. The Académie of Literature, too, has offered a prize for an essay on the parliamentary eloquence of Englanda significant fact in a country where the legislature is not permitted to be eloquent, and where forty-nine provincial papers have died since the 2d of December. Coming again to science: the judicial savants have awarded a medal to Mr Hind for his discovery of some two or three of the minor planetsan acknowledgment of merit which will not fail of good results in more ways than one.
Various scientific matters, which are deserving of a passing notice, have come before the same learned body. Matteucci, who has been steadily pursuing his electro-chemical labours, now states that with certain liquids and a single metal he can form a pile, the electro-magnetic and electro-chemical effects of which are much greater than those obtained with the old piles of Volta and Wollaston, and come nearer to those of the batteries of Bunsen and Grove. As yet, he withholds the particulars, but they will shortly be forthcoming. M. Dureau de la Malle, in remarks on the breeding of fish, a subject which has of late occupied much attention in France, says, that he has now discovered the reason 'why domestic servants in Holland and Scotland, when taking a situation, stipulate that they shall not be made to eat salmon more than three times a week;' it is, the insipid taste of young salmon. It is safe to say, that however much M. de la Malle may know about fish, he knows but little of the habits of the countries to which he refers. M. Yvart mentions a fact that may be useful to graziersthe breed of cattle has been improved in France by the introduction of the Durham bull; but, as experience has shewn, it is at the expense of certain qualities deemed essential on the other side of the Channel. Here, we require meat as speedily as possible in young animals for consumption in our great towns; there, the great rural population use milk largely, and keep the animals longer before they are killed. The quantity of milk, it appears, is materially reduced in the Durham breed, and on this account M. Yvart suggests, that it should not be too much encouraged. Then there is something about dogs by Messrs Gruby and Delafond, who shew that the worms which have long been known to exist in the larger blood-vessels of certain dogs, are the parents of the almost innumerable filaria or microscopic worms, found circulating also in the veins. The number generally in one dog is estimated at 52,000, though at times it is more than 200,000; and being smaller than the blood-globules, the creatures penetrate the minutest blood-vessels. They are met with on the average in one dog in twenty-five, though most frequent in the adult and old, and without distinction of sex or race. The examination of the phenomenon is to be continued, with a view to ascertain whether dogs infested with these blood-worms are subject to any peculiar disease.