both by my own diligent obfervations of the fymptoms, as well as by the happy and abfolute cures 1 have performed in confequence of them. If I am here deceived, I am happily deceived, and am not very folicitous to be delivered from the infatuation, fince in it I have fuch fuccefs with my patients. By the bye, I think the phyfician, who after having diligently examined into the fituation, and effects of the diforder, thould deny that affection of the ifchiadic nerves, could understand but little of the fabric of the human body. For as to what relates to the feat of the disorder, this is fo clear, that if the patient will but point out with his finger the track of the pain from the s facrum to the foot, we fhall find him, like a fkilful anatomift, tracing out the exact progrefs of the ifchiadic nerve.'

After offering many excellent preliminary observations, the Author obferves that, when the fciatica has not yielded to the remedies which he had before enumerated, or has gained ground by being neglected, it is then arrived to that flage in which a confirmed and completed dropfy has taken poffeffion of the vagine of the ifchiadic nerve.' In this flate of the difeafe, equally terrible and lingering, many daring but fruitlefs attempts have been made to relieve the patient. Among thefe he particularifes, and condemns, the exhibition of acrid clyfters, and the application of cauftics, at random, to different parts of the affected limb. Though cures have fometimes been effected by: the former, they have often proved inefficacious, and have been frequently productive of great torture to the patient. With regard to cauftics, though they are well-adapted to draw out the peccant matter; yet from an ignorance of the particular fpecies of fciatica in which they could be of fervice, and of the particular spot to which they ought to be applied; the cures fometimes effected by them must be ascribed to chance rather than to judgment.

This laft obfervation naturally leads us to the fimple method of cure propofed, and fuccefsfully practifed by the ingenious Author. A redundant and acrid fluid, accumulated and ftagnating in the vagina of the ifchiadic nerve, has diftended thofe vagina, and rendered them dropfical. What more rational or obvious method, fuppofing it practicable, can be undertaken for the relief of the diforders produced by this diftension, than that which is purfued in the dropfy of the chest, or abdomen ?— that is, the making an opening into the containing part, to let out the collected and acrid humor. Nevertheless, great apparent difficulties feem to attend the execution of this fcheme: for who can pretend to perforate a particular nerve buried under the muscles, or rather the vagina of the nerve, without. wounding the nervous fibres? or how can a fluggish fizey humor be expected to flow out through a fmall puncture made for this purpofe?

Here

Here anatomy comes to the Author's affiftance. Thence he learns the track of the ischiadic nerve, and remarks that that part of it which is the feat of the poflerior nervous fciatica, is coyered, in fome particular parts of its courfe from the knee to the foot, with only the common integuments; fo that the vagina may be perforated without wounding any mufele, and merely by making a paffage for the humor through the skin. Strong objections however occur against the attempting to make this aperture with a cutting inftrument: but the Author was led to expect that the action of a bliftering plaifter, applied to, the proper place, would reach to the vagina of the affected nerve, and produce an evacuation of the included humor: or, fuppofing its power not to extend beyond the fkin; yet as the pores of the fkin communicate with thofe of the vagina, the latter might be effectually evacuated by it.

Experience appears to have fully juftified this reafoning. The Author relates feveral cafes of patients, who after having tried a multitude of remedies without effect, have received a perfect and fpeedy cure by the mere application of a blistering plaifter on the particular parts where the ifchiadic nerve takes its courfe immediately under the fkin. One of thefe places is at the head of the fibula, and the other on the inftep. In a plate which accompanies this performance, a drawing is given of the leg and foot, on which the precife fpots where the bliftering plaifter ought to be applied are accurately marked. Indeed the cure intirely depends on a careful attention to this particular.

From this flight sketch our medical Readers will be enabled to judge of the Author's theory, and of the practice founded on it in the treatment of this ftubborn difeafe. We have dwelt the longer upon it, as we believe that the original of this work, and the fimple and eafy method of cure recommended in it, are but little known in this country, and appear to be highly worthy of their attention. In a prefatory advertisement, Mr. Henry Crantz, poffibly the Editor or Tranflator of this performance, declares that he could not refift the temptation of giving fome small token of the reverence and effeem he bears that famous man (the Author) and alfo of his attention and regard for his own pupils, who have impatiently waited for the publication of this treatife: adding that the good wishes and prayers heaped on the Author, by the multitude that he has fuccefsfully freed, in this country [what country, we are not told] from fo excruciating a torture, are more than fufficient teftimonies of its merit.'-The Baron Van Swieten likewife, in one of the paffages above alluded to, fpeaking of the Author and the pretent tract, recommends it as deferving of being univerfally read:- Cujus tractatus de hac re editus ab omnibus legi meretur.-De Rheumatifmo, Comment. Aphor. 1494. p. 683.

ART.

ART. III. A general Hiftory of Mufic, from the earliest Ages to the pre fent Period, &c. By Charles Burney, Muf. D. F. R. S. Vol. I. [Continued from Page 203, and concluded.]

AVING wholly confined ourselves, in the preceding Ar

Hticle, to the more fcientific or technical parts of the pre

fent work; it remains that we give the Reader fome account of the narrative or purely hiftorical part of it. This commences with the hiftory of Mufic in Egypt; a country where this science, in particular, evidently appears to have been fuccessfully cultivated in the moft early ages of the world. There are no memorials, the Author obferves, of human art and induftry, at prefent fubfifting in Rome, of equal antiquity with the obelisks that have been brought thither from Egypt; two of which, fupposed to have been originally erected by Sefoftris, at Heliopolis, near 400 years before the Trojan war, were fent to Rome by Auguftus. On one of thefe, now lying in the Campus Martius, is reprefented a mufical inftrument of two ftrings, with a neck to it; and which greatly resembles the Calafcione ftill in common ufe in the kingdom of Naples. Of this inftrument the Author exhibits a drawing made under his own infpection, and of the fame fize with the figure on the obelifk. In confequence of its having a neck and finger-board, it was capable, though it was furnished only with two ftrings, of producing at least feven or eight notes, by means of flopping, or fhortening each string :-an advantage which none of the Grecian inftruments, on the reprefentations of which no neck is ever obferved, seem to have poffeffed for many ages after the erection of this column. This inftrument therefore the Author very juftly exhibits, as offering an inconteftible proof that the Egyptians, in the most early ages of the world, had discovered the means of extending the mufical fcale, and multiplying the founds of a few ftrings, by the moft fimple expedients."

But the clearest and most decifive proof of the advanced state of practical mufic in Egypt, in the most remote times, is furnifhed by a letter containing much curious information relative to the ftate of mufic in Abyffinia, with which the Author was favoured by Mr. Bruce. This letter was accompanied with two exquifite drawings, one of which reprefents a lyre, and the other a harp. We fhall dwell particularly on the latter, on account of the ftriking beauty of its form, and the high antiquity of the painting in which it is reprefented.

The place in which the painting is faid to have been discovered by Mr. Bruce*, was among the fepulchres, according to tradition,

*It muft here be understood, en paffant, that although Mr. Bruce's veracity is taken for granted, the Reviewers will not be anfwerable for the reports of any traveller.

of the first kings of Egyptian Thebes, and at a small distance from the ruins of that capital. The magnificent tomb of Ifmandes, or Ofymanduas, fo particularly defcribed by Strabo, and whose ftupendous ruins ftill remaining are faid, by Dr. Pococke, to extend more than half a mile, contained rooms, according to this Traveller, the walls of which were still adorned with fculpture, and with inftruments of mufic;' which however neither he, or Norden, have defcribed. In a paffage of one of these very chambers, which Pococke appears to have vifited, Mr. Bruce, befide other figures moulded in baffo-relievo, faw and particularly attended to a picture of a man playing upon the harp, painted in frefco, and quite intire.

His left hand,' fays Mr. Bruce, feems employed in the upper part of the inftrument among the notes in Alto, as if in an Arpeggio; while ftooping forwards, he feems with his right hand to be beginning with the loweft ftring, and promifing to afcend with the moft rapid execution: this action, fo obviously rendered by an artist,' whom Mr. B. represents as one of the lower clafs, fhews that it was a common one in his time; or, in other words, that great hands were then frequent, and confequently that mufic was well understood, and diligently followed.'-An elegant drawing of this valuable remain of Egyptian antiquity is given in a plate, without the figure of the performer; that no part of the inftrument might be concealed from view.

Mr. Bruce concludes his interefting letter by obferving that the ftructure and capabilities of this Theban harp overturn all :the accounts of the earliest state of ancient mufic and inftruments in Egypt;'-that its form, ornaments, and compass, exhibit an inconteftible proof, ftronger than a thousand Greek quotations, that geometry, drawing, mechanics, and mufic, were at the greateft perfection when this harp was made; and that what we think in Egypt was the invention of arts, was only the beginning of the æra of their refloration.'

The Author likewise, after having calculated, from the best chronological data, that the discovery of this painting throws back the invention and use of musical inftruments in Egypt, near 4000 years before the prefent period; offers fome conjectures concerning the manner in which its thirteen ftrings are tuned; and concurs with Mr. Bruce in the opinion declared in the preceding quotation.

I have now,' fays he, to speak of the Theban harp, the most curious and beautiful of all the ancient inftruments that have come to my knowledge. The number of ftrings, the fize and form of this inftrument, and the elegance of its ornaments, awaken reflections, which to indulge, would lead me too far from my chief inquiries, and indeed out of my depth. The mind is wholly loft in the immenfe antiquity of the paint

ing

ing in which it is reprefented; indeed the time when it was executed is fo remote, as to encourage a belief that arts, after having been brought to great perfection, were again loft, and again invented, long after this period; and there can be no doubt but that human knowledge and refinements have shared the fame fate as the kingdoms in which they have been cultivated.'

The Author's next chapter is dedicated to the fubje&t of Hebrew mufic. Here he neceffarily takes facred history for his fole guide, and from thence extracts a connected and entertaining account of the state and progrefs of mufic from the days of Jubal, the fixth defcendant from Cain,-the father of all fuch as handle the harp and the organ: [Genef. chap. i. ver. 21.]' ftopping particularly at the æra of the royal practical musician, David; in whofe reign mufic was held in the highest estimation by the Hebrews, as appears from the enumeration, in the ift book of Chronicles, ch. xv. xvi. and xxiii. of the numerous band appointed by him for the fervice of the ark. In the 25th chapter of this book, the number of fuch as were instructed, and were cunning in fong, is faid to have been two hundred four-fcore and eight and in chap. xxiit, he appoints no less a band than four thousand of the Levites to praise the Lord with inftruments.

While mufic had obtained fo large and fplendid an establishment, in the days of David and Solomon, the Auguftan age of Judæa; the Greeks, as Dr. Burney obferves, had fcarce invented their rudeft inftruments. For Homer and Hefiod, the refiners, if not the inventors, of Greek poetry; and Orpheus, Mufæus, and Linus, to whom they attribute the invention of their mufic and inftruments, all flourished after thefe Hebrew monarchs.'

With respect to the modern Jewish mufic, the Author relates fome information refpecting it, which he received from an Hebrew high prieft; from which it appears that the little finging which is now ufed in the Jewish fynagogues is an innovation, and a modern licence; and that the only Jews now on the globe, who have a regular mufical eftablishment in their fynagogues, are the Germans, who fing in parts; and these preserve fome old melodies, or fpecies of chants, which are thought to be very ancient.'-A plate accompanies this chapter, in which the Author gratifies the curiofity of his readers by specimens of feveral Hebrew chants or melodies, which were fung in the fynagogues of different parts of Europe, during the two last

centuries.

Our Historian now enters upon claffical ground; proceeding first through the diftant and dark regions of fable and allegory, and accordingly taking poets and mythologifts-for unluckily no others are to be had for his conductors. His course through thefe