encampment, the fosse of which, although degraded by running waters at one point, is still very evident. From its position, this would appear to have been an out-station to Alcester on the Ickneild Street, or a connecting point between that undoubted station, and the one at Warwick.

On Friday the 23rd, an excursion was made to the noble mansion, which, like Stoneleigh, has been erected upon the ruins of an old Cistercian monastery, fragments of the cloisters of which, decorated with Norman arches and pillars, still remain. The mansion itself, forming three sides of a quadrangle, is of several periods, the oldest apparently Tudor. The collection of paintings within contained many fine pictures and many portraits of high historical interest. The Rembrandts and the Vandycks were especially numerous, but the portraits and busts of Elizabeth of Bohemia, from the romantic interest of her history, and the literary associations connected with her career, attracted by far the most attention. Comb, or Combe, Abbey (from Cumm, a vale or hollow), was the only mansion visited by the Association, the noble proprietor of which (the Earl of Craven) was not present to honour the Association by a personal and hospitable reception.

This succession of delightful visits and intellectual excursions was, however, destined to conclude with a reception of surpassing kindness and hospitality, met with the ensuing day at Arbury Hall, the seat of the distinguished Conservative member, C. Newdigate Newdegate, Esq. The castellated mansion of the Astleys, which is attached to the same grounds, was made the object of a first visit, and the Association was conducted through the interior by its present tenant, Viscount Lifford, a nobleman who is himself distinguished in literature, and zealous in antiquarian pursuits. This naturally lent an additional interest to the examination of the stone bridge with pointed gateway, the embattled parapets and thick old walls, and the memorials connected with the ambitious father of the unfortunate victim of his ambition-the Lady Jane Grey. The church adjoining contained also many monuments of historical and archæological interest.

Arbury Hall, a splendid specimen of that "compendious style," as it has been called, of Gothic architecture, the taste for which was introduced into this country by Horace Walpole; with its richly decorated roofs, after Henry the Seventh's chapel, its valuable collection of paintings, rare furniture, and numerous objects of art and vertu, baffles description. The interior is only rivalled by the exterior, where rocks and grottoes, shaded by luxuriant foliage, and water trickling over pale green ferns, old barrows surmounted by aged trees, their far-spreading branches reflected in the glassy mirror-like waters beneath, formed a scene of positive enchantment. Nothing could exceed the hospitality shown by the worthy proprietor of this noble residence to the Association; a reception which he was further kind and tasteful enough to remark in his address to the Association, he considered due from the hereditary conservators of time-honoured monuments throughout the country, to those who also laboured in their preservation and illustration, from simple sentiments of respect, from the pure love of antiquity, and from zealous and ardent feelings of love, for the literary, intellectual, and artistic excellence of past ages. And with this cordial and dignified reception-one so characteristic of the truly Conservative English gentleman-the pleasures and the labours of the congress were brought to a close.

MR. LUMLEY AND GUISeppe Verdi.

Now really it is a very spirited thing in Mr. Lumley to fetch Guiseppe Verdi all the way from Venice, to make him write an opera expressly for Her Majesty's Theatre, and to stick him in the orchestra on purpose to conduct it. Show us any other manager who would have done as much. We have been contented to take our operas mostly via Paris, and if a work came from Italy to London direct without making a half-way house of "Les Italiens” it was thought no small feat. But here we import not the opera, but the composer, bring the maestro home, settle him in London apartments, and there bid him evolve, create, and fashion for the sake of the" British publie.” Mr. Lumley has an objection to circumferences, save that formed by the boxes of his house-especially when full. He wants to make the Haymarket the central point of operatic production. This shall be the land of cavatinas, and cabalettas and strettas, and what you will. The muse of Italian song shall reign in the vicinity of the park and the clubs, and regulate her measures by the Horseguards' clock. The publishers of "La Fama" and "Il Pirata" shall transfer their offices here, and expresses shall come from Milan to the Haymarket to ascertain if there be any thing new in the way of Italian opera.

Never mind the intrinsic value of Verdi's "Masnadieri." Granted it is no great affair. There are some very pretty airs for Jenny Lind, which she by her own exquisite singing renders effective, but altogether there is but little in the melodies, and we are, as usual, overdone with unison. Better luck next time, oh, beloved Guiseppe! We welcome thy coming,but we think thou hast not exactly put thy best foot foremost.

The real thing is the principle of making London an operatic centre, and for attempting to do this Mr. Lumley cannot be too highly commended. Every effort that he makes is marked by a noble ambition. He does not merely wish to see his theatre the arena for the aristocracy of England, but the focus to which the rest of the world shall point. The production of "I Masnadieri" is really a great event in the history of operatic policy.

It is certainly a wondrous thing to see how the Chevalier Maffei has turned Schiller's big play of "The Robbers" into a libretto rather under than above the usual size. The only miracle to be compared with it is that by which a whole pailful of spinach is brought within the dimensions of a small vegetable dish. Of course those uncouth individualities which make up the robber-band of Schiller-your Spiegelberg, and your Schwarz, and your Roller, who so fantastically combine rough comicality with fearful butchery-something like a court-jester at a feast of cannibals-of course, all these fearful merry-men are sucked up into the general abstraction of "Chorus," just as the horns of the snail are drawn into the mass of indistinct flesh. But the course of the story has been preserved remarkably well, and great has been the acuteness of Maffei in catching a thought or sentiment of Schiller's and pinning it down in his

recitative.

The ballet proceeds gloriously. Who has forgotten the Pas de Quatre? Who does not remember the Pas de Déesses? No one is in plight so unhappy. Read Rosati for Lucile Grahn and then you have all the old glories again-the never-fading Taglioni-and the buoyant Cerito-and the languishing Carlotta-and the bouquets-and the shouts -and the encores. In short, you have every thing.

OR,

REMARKS ON THE HEALTH OF TOWNS

AND THE MANUFACTURE OF

INODOROUS AZOTISED MANURE

FROM

ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE MATTER.

BY CHARLES F. ELLERMAN, ESQ.,

LATE HANOVERIAN CONSUL AT ANTWERP.

LONDON:

PUBLISHED BY GEO. PEIRCE, 310, STRAND.

1847.

PREFACE.

TO THE PUBLIC.

I COULD not have chosen a more propitious time for bringing out a process for Improving "the Health of Towns" than the present, while disease is borne upon the miasmatic odours that pervade our streets, and death is depopulating many of our cities. Nor could the manufacture of azotised or nitrogenised manure from animal and vegetable matter have been more opportunely discovered, than while our ports are filling with thousands of starving wretches from the sister country, and famine is threatening our own.

Now, if ever, is the time to seek for remedial measures; now, if ever, we are driven to look into nature, to seek for relief from natural miseries, and it becomes the legitimate duty of the man of science to join hands with the patriot, and to seek A CURE!

The "Health of Towns' Bill," now before Par

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