try
of sheep-walks and rabbit-warrens has been rendered highly productive;
and by dint of management, what was thus gained has been preserved and
improved even to the present moment. Some of the finest corn-crops in
the world are now grown upon lands which, before the introduction of the
turnip husbandry, produced a very scanty supply of grass for a few lean
and half-starved rabbits. Mr. Colquhoun, in his "Statistical
Researches," estimated the value of the turnip crop annually grown in
this country at fourteen millions; but when we further recollect that it
enables the agriculturist to reclaim and cultivate land which, without
its aid, would remain in a hopeless state of natural barrenness; that it
leaves the land so clean and in such fine condition, as almost to insure
a good crop of barley and a kind plant of clover, and that this clover
is found a most excellent preparative for wheat, it will appear that the
subsequent advantages derived from a crop of turnips must infinitely
exceed its estimated value as fodder for cattle. If we were, therefore,
asked to point out the individual who, in modern times, has proved the
greatest benefactor to the community, we should not hesitate to fix upon
the ingenious nobleman, whom the wits and courtiers of his own day were
pleased to laugh at as "Turnip Townshend." In something less than one
hundred years, the agricultural practice which he introduced from
Hanover has spread itself throughout this country, and now yields an
annual return which, probably, exceeds the interest of our national
debt.--_Sir Walter Scott--in the Quarterly Review._

_Coals in the East._

The Dutch newspapers state, that extensive coal mines have been
discovered in Sumatra and Bantam.

_Naphtha_

Has been found to burn much better than other oils in mines where bad
air prevails, and is less injurious to the health of the workmen. Oil of
colza and tallow are extinguished, where naphtha, petroleum, and oil of
bone, continue burning.

_Fossils._

Plates of above 600 fossil bones, (remains of a former world) recently
discovered in the neighbourhood of Issoire, in France, are preparing for
publication. They belong to more than 50 species of animals, now
extinct; among which are elephants, horses, tapirs, rhinoceri, eleven or
twelve kinds of stags, large cats, oxen, bears, dogs, otters, &c.

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SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

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