"At the sitting of the Academy of Sciences on the 30th ult., a very interesting memoir (the 4th) was read by M.A. Masson, with the title, Studies of Electrical Photometry. He thinks that he has ascertained the cause of electrical light. He ascribes the Aurora Borealis to currents of great intensity situate in the higher regions of our atmosphere." The Report of Lieut. J.C. Walsh on his soundings, was referred for examination to Duperroy, the member most eminent in hydrography.
Monsieur Pouillet, the great Professor of Physics, has published in Paris a work entitled General Notions of Natural Philosophy and Meteorology, for the use of young persons; and Mr. Boussingault, eminent as a scientific agriculturist, the second edition of his Rural Economy considered in its Relations with Chemistry, Physics, and Mineralogy. The Treatise of Mineralogy by Dufresnoy, the celebrated Professor, who is of the Academy of Sciences, is complete, and at least equal to any other extant. There are four volumes octavo. The 22d volume of the memoirs of the Academy was ready in September last; the 23d is in the press; the 11th volume of Foreign Communications will appear this month. Twelve vacancies from death of foreign correspondents, are soon to be filled by election. All merit is ascribed to the work of Dr. Fairet, entitled Clinical Instructions respecting Mental Maladies. The author, pupil and successor of Pínel and Esquirol, is the physician of the Salpetriere. Along with the able Doctor Voison, he has a noble Lunatic Asylum of his own, not far from the capital.
Sir David Brewster, it seems, has become a convert to that part of Animal Magnetism called Electro Biology, and which consists in willing a person to be somebody else. After describing some wonderful experiments, made in the presence of several scientific gentlemen, by a Mr. Darling, he says, "they were all as convinced as I was, that the phenomena which we witnessed were real phenomena, and as well established as any other facts in physical science. The process by which the operator produces them—the mode by which that process acts upon the mind of the patient—and the reference of the phenomena to some general law in the constitution of man—may long remain unknown; but it is not difficult to see in the recent discoveries of M. Dubois Reymond and Matteucia, and in the laws which regulate the relative intensity of the external and internal impressions on the nerves of sensation, some not very indistinct indications of that remarkable process by which minds of peculiar sensibility are temporarily placed under the dominion of physical influences developed and directed by some living agent."
Ladies' Fashions for Early Spring.
More attention than previously for many seasons appears to have been given this winter to ladies' fashions, and some that have come out are remarkably tasteful, while generally in fabric and manufacture they appear to be unusually expensive. We compile this month mainly from the London World of Fashion.
Bonnets are remarkable for a novel form, the front of the rims continuing large and open, the crowns round, low, and small. Of an elegant style are those made of Orient gray pearl, half satin, half velours épinglé, having a very rich effect, and decorated with touffes Marquises, composed of marabouts. Then, we see bonnets of green satin, ornamented at the edge, over the front, and upon the crown, with a stamped velvet imitating lace, and decorated upon the left side with a small plumet in a weeping feather, the ends of which are tied or knotted with green, of two different shades; this is a very favorite and recherché style. Also a bonnet of grayish green velvet, ornamented with a bunch of feathers composed of the grèbe and the ostrich. Drooping low feathers of every description are in request for decorating bonnets.