Books are no longer written in Latin. For literature and learning that good old language has finally given way, in almost every country, during the present century. In the United States there have been produced some fifty volumes in Latin since the Revolution, nearly all of which are by foreigners. The Life of Washington, by Francis Glass, a western schoolmaster, is the most considerable contribution to Latin literature by a native American. In Europe only a few pedantic churchmen continue to write to dead nations, and it is perhaps well enough that they should do so, since scarce any of them have fit thoughts for the living age, or for tongues that have been used by free and thinking men. We find an exception to the prevailing law in De Caroli Timothei Zumptii Vita et Studiis Narratio August. Wilh. Zumptii. Every body is familiar with the name of Zumpt as that of one of the most learned Latinists of the last half century, and it is appropriate that his life should be written in a language to the study and illustration of which it was almost entirely devoted. The Lives of Hemsterhuys by Ruhnken, of Ruhnken by Wyttenbach, and of Wyttenbach by Mahne, have long been the delight of scholars, and have furnished some of the best specimens of modern Latinity. Zumpt will not take rank among philologers with these great lights of the eighteenth century, but he rendered services to learning which will deserve a memorial, and in moral qualities he was not inferior to any of them. He became in succession a teacher in other Gymnasia in Berlin, and ultimately Professor of History in the Military College, and of Latin Eloquence in the University. He published the first edition of his celebrated Grammar in 1818, and it soon became known throughout the civilized world. Of his other publications the most considerate is his edition of the Verrine Orations of Cicero; his Dissertations on the Population of the Ancient World, De Legibus Judiciisque Repetundarum, and several others, show that he was well versed in antiquities, but grammar, criticism, and style were his proper field. Wolf pronounced himself and Zumpt the only men in Berlin who could write Latin. His incessant labors undermined his constitution, and brought on a premature decay; and for some time before his death he had become entirely blind. He died at Carlsbad in 1849.
A third edition of Thibaut's well-known work, Uber Reinheit der Tonkunst, with a preface by the Minister R. Bahr, and a portrait of Palestrina, has just made its appearance, from the establishment of the well-known publisher Mohr, of Heidelberg.
A new course of Proces Celebres is to be published by Brockhaus, of Leipsic. Number one contains the Proces du Comte et de la Comtesse Bocarme.
Remak Rob. Untersuchungen über d. Enturckelung der Wirbelthiere, Berlin, 1851. All who are interested in theories of the development of organic life will welcome the appearance of this work, which has been received with cordial approbation by the most eminent German physiologists. This second volume is devoted to the development of "the chicken in the egg," and is illustrated with seven admirable copper-plates. Notwithstanding the researches of Everard Horne, Ratke, and others into this department, this work of Remak's is distinguished by an even more accurate and detailed examination of phenomena, and it may confidently be classed among the first of the age. This is the opinion of The Centralblatt. The engravings are by Haase. This Robert Remak is the brother of Gustav Remak, an eminent German lawyer in Philadelphia.
In the Archives for the Study of Modern Languages and Literature we observe a paper by one G. Jap, entitled, Why does the English Language, in its acquisition and combination of new words, rather incline to the classic tongues than the copious and flexible German element? To which we may answer, "Alas, why, indeed?" Why is not the study of the Saxon Testament generally introduced? and why are not school-boys familiarized with the older forms of our own language—as they are in Germany made to study the Neibelungen Lied, and Wackernagel's Reader? We can imagine no argument in favor of a study of Greek which might not be with equal force applied to Saxon and good old English.