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OPINIONS OF THE PRESS ON WEALE'S LONDON.

ation, and structure of London, its political organisation and constitution, its domestic habits and the statistics of its various trades and of Subjects connected with education and intellectual development, are well and ably done. Such topics, too, as its rapid railway intercommunication, its inland navigation, the various contents of its museums and public depositories of art, the character and purposes of its various public societies, its examples of the fine and useful arts their application to purposes of utility and grandeur, and of course such darker additions to the picture as its police and its prisons, are handled with very evident care and (considering the plan of the volume) great compleatness. The whole compilation shows in a high degree the impress of intelligence, real observation, and competent knowledge, thoughout its various departments. In design Mr.Weale's volume interferes little with Mr. Peter Cunningham's, offering to the man of business and science what the ingenious and excellent Handbook provides rather for the man of taste and literature. But each in its way is adınirable; and taking the two together we have a finished book of reference as to London, its existing interests and past associations, as valuable and suitable to the wants of the passing visiter as to those of the more studious inquirer. An elaborate map accompanies the volume, an excellent index, and some timely surgestions (apropos of our Exhibition visitors) for "Excursions to the vicinity." Let us add that London ought to be also held a convevenient central point for excursions far beyond its vicinity—seeing what Sir John Herschel tells us, and Mr. Weale repeats, of the fact (not a little interesting to Englishmen, and, combined with our insular station in that great highway of nations, the Atlantic, not a little explanatory of our commercial eminence)—that our great city occupies nearly the exact centre of the terrestrial hemisphere.-Eraminer, April 19, 1851.

The production of this work is very appropriate for the Exhibition. It is very elaborate, and will be a very useful guide for strangers. It embraces notices of the natural history of London, as well as of all its remarkable places and buildings. All the newest improvements are recorded. The statistics include an account of the newspapers, and the newest printing machine set up at the Times. The accounts of the buildings are very good, and the remarks on the old "White Tower" might be studied with great advantage by many modern architects. They might learn how to avoid the make-shifts and makebelieves, by which modern architecture is disgraced. There is always visible in it a struggle between means and effect-a show of richness with the most miserable poverty of invention-a great waste of power, or rather of wealth, to produce the paltriest effects. The description of the architecture of the metropolis is divided into different periods, which add to its value. The illustrations of the book are very useful, well chosen, and well executed. London, owing to the coming Exhibition, will now be more abundantly described than ever it was before; and of the many descriptions that are now issuing from the press, Mr. Weale's will be one of the most correct and claborate.-Economist, April 19, 1851.

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sense.

OPINIONS OF THE PRESS ON WEALE'S LONDON.

If the art of book-making is to be represented in the palace called crystal-lucus a non lucendo,—the first place and prize are undoubtedly due to the model guide book which Mr. Weale has prepared for the information of visitors to the great metropolis in the year fiftyone. When we say book-making, we use the term in no inviduous It is certainly a book made up from a thousand sources of information authentic and rare, but the whole is combined and arranged so skilfully, and illustrated and accompanied by explanatory treatises on so many subjects, that it well deserves to be ranked amongst original works of a high order of merit. It is a model guide bookthe best which has yet been offered for the instruction of London visitors. It would be impossible to give a tolerably comprehensive account, even in the most meagre outline, of a work comprising nearly a thousand closely printed pages. Perhaps the most accurate descrip. tion in the fewest words, is that it is an Encyclopædia of London, embracing every possible point-physical, institutional, social, artistical, or commercial, on which one can desire information. Many pens have evidently been employed in the elucidation of London's natural and physical characteristics, its antiquity and architecture, arts, manufactures, trade, and organisation; its social, literary, and scientific institutions; and its numerous galleries of fine arts. There is, however, a unity of design and intelligence throughout, which reflects the highest credit on the editor. It contains upwards of two hundred illustrations, embracing all the principal architectural features of the metropolis, in the first style of art. The first hundred pages are occupied by an admirable account of the physical characteristics of London, with a rare mass of statistics, arranged with a brevity and ability seldom to be found in such works. Connected with the Thames question, we take one fact for the information of Blackwall diners out. Salmon, shad, lamprey, and even the eels, have successively abandoned, or are abandoning, the mud of Father Thames. The only finny tribe which seem to stand the sewerage supply, and thrive, are the tiny whitebait. Here are more pleasant facts, from a statistical summary of London's greatness. The amount of customs' duties paid at the port is nearly £11,000,000; of postage, about £900,000. The yearly value of house property is about £8,000,000, and the amount of poor rates about £650,000. The amount invested in saving's banks was, in 1850, about £4,500,000. The peculiar features of our institutional system are well described in the sections on "legislation and goverment," and " municipal arrangements." The writer truly remarks that there is “a degree of federal independence not existing in any democracy, to be found throughout the English empire." It would have materially increased the value, without much addition to the bulk of the work, had this very competent writer pointed out, for the information of our foreign visitors, how this healthly system has been gradually encroached on by centralisation. The suggestion might be worthy of adoption in another edition. The account of the institutions of the city of London is very complete, learned, and interesting. The banking and commercial and trading systems of the metropolis, are described with clearness and intelligence. A very curious analysis will be found of the trading occupations of the in(Continued at the end.)

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EXHIBITED

IN

1852;

ELUCIDATING ITS

NATURAL AND PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS;

ANTIQUITY AND ARCHITECTURE;

ARTS, MANUFACTURES, TRADE, AND ORGANIZATION;
SOCIAL, LITERARY, AND SCIENTIFIC INSTITUTIONS;

AND

NUMEROUS GALLERIES OF FINE ART.

With Two Hundred and Five Ellustrations,

EXECUTED BY MR. ROBERT BRANSTON, MR. O. JEWITT, MR. J. R. JOBBINS,
AND OTHERS; INCLUDING

A NEWLY-CONSTRUCTED MAP, ENGRAVED BY MR. WILSON LOWRY.

SECOND EDITION.

EDITED AND PUBLISHED BY

JOHN WEALE.

LONDON: 1852.

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