account, Mrs. Loudon once more put forth her energy and talent, and for many years supported her family by her own labours. Her works were now principally on botanical subjects, of which The Ladies' Flower Garden,' in six quarto volumes, 'The Amateur Gardener's Calendar,' 'The Ladies' Country Companion,' 'Botany for Ladies,' 'Gardening for Ladies,' 'British Wild Flowers,' and 'The Ladies' Companion to the Flower Garden,' were the principal. Most of these works have been extremely popular, and 'The Ladies' they are all interesting and useful. 'The Ladies' Companion to the Flower Companion to the Flower Garden' has been Garden.' through seven large editions, and had a circula tion of more than 20,000 copies. Mrs. Loudon's last literary labour was preparing a new edition of that and The Amateur Gardener's Calendar,' both of which were completed shortly before her death." "The wealthy, productive and venerable county of Kent, possessing two cathedrals, and including St. Augustine's Priory, St. Martin's, the earliest ecclesiastic foundation in England, the oldest Roman castle," had until this year been without "any organized body to collect and record its archæological features and chronicle discoveries," and the Athenæum of August 7th gives an account of the first meeting of the Kentish Archæological Society, held at Kentish Canterbury on the 30th of July. "The Society The first and its friends assembled in the Guildhall, under Archæological the presidency of the Marquis Camden, and after Society. preliminary reports on business matters adjourned to the chapter-room of the cathedral. Here they were addressed by Canon Stanley, who pointed out the leading architectural features and historical associations connected with the buildings around them." Afterwards the members in spected the walls and castle, the church of St. Martin and the Pilgrims' Inn, the College of St. Augustine, &c. Mr. George Combe's death is recorded on August 21st. He was born in 1788, and married a daughter of Mrs. Siddons in 1833. "A score of years ago, thousands were discussing his 'Constitution of Man.'......He was a quiet but a zealous worker for the benefit of his fellows; an unostentatious but a determined preacher, teacher, and practitioner; an often unsuccessful but the most persevering of philosophers in establishing his peculiarly useful tenets. This instruction and example have carried with them rich fruits, and further results, not less valuable, will yet be reaped by those who may be brought to listen to, and put in practice, the simple rules laid down by Mr. Combe......The good old man will be missed and regretted by friends and admirers in every quarter of the world." George Combe. William William Henry Curran died at Dublin on the Henry Curran. 25th of August, in his sixty-ninth year, and the obituary notice on the 4th of September states that "he was favourably known in the literary world by his biography of his father, the orator, and also by the Sketches of the Irish Bar,' in which series he was joined by Sheil......His best writing was his personal sketch of a day of O'Connell's life, in his Sketches of the Irish Bar,' and his humorous and racy portraiture of Mr. Serjeant Goold." Mr. Cureton. On the same date the death of Mr. Harry Osborn Cureton, the well-known numismatic dealer, is noticed. He died at his apartments in River Street, Pentonville, on the 23rd of August, in his seventy-fourth year. He had many years previously given the Goldsmiths' Company (of which he was a liveryman) 3,000l. to found a charity for the blind, and by his will he bequeathed an additional sum of 2,000/. in furtherance of the same object. On the 5th of August, 1747, Watson proved that the electric current could be passed through 2 miles of wire, and on the 5th of August, 1858 -twelve months to the day from the laying The Atlantic down of the first wire at Valentia-the first Cable: first messages were flashed from nation to nation beneath the waters of the Atlantic. England and America were joined by the laying down of messages. 2,050 miles of wire from Valentia, in Ireland, to Newfoundland. Congratulatory messages passed between the Queen and the President of the United States, Mr. Buchanan. The Athenæum, in an article on August 28th, mentions among other curious coincidences that it was "on the 3rd of August the squadron left the Cove of Cork for Valentia Bay, and that on the same day just 365 years previously—a grand year of years intervening-Columbus put out from the little port of Palos, in Andalusia, to go in search of that new world which is now really linked to our own." Unfortunately the insulation of the wire gradually became faulty, and on the 11th of September it is announced that "the Great Cable has for the moment ceased to convey intelligible messages, and the engineers are anxiously inquiring into the causes." comet. The comet of Donati arrived at its least dis- Donati's tance from the earth about midnight on the 10th of October, the distance on that date being rather over 51,000,000 miles, and the Athenæum of October 2nd gives an account of Mr. Hind's observations. In a somewhat hazy sky "the apparent length of the tail was about 12°, corresponding to a real length of 16,000,000 miles. As usual in great comets, the tail is very visibly curved in the opposite direction to that of the motion of the nucleus. After it is lost to view Dr. George in Europe the comet will traverse the southern extremity of the constellation Sagittarius, and thence pass through Telescopium into Indus, where it will be found about Christmas, not far from the star a in Pavo. It will remain in the same constellation during January and part of February, slowly approaching the principal star in Toucan, and, indeed, will continue in that part of the heavens until it has nearly completed its next revolution round the sun, and again presents itself to the gaze of another Donati a few hundred years hence." Dr. George Peacock, Dean of Ely, died on the 8th of November, and on the 20th a long obituary notice is given, written by Prof. De Morgan. "Peacock's mind was, in some respects, differently framed from those of the young men who usually distinguish themselves. The University examinations cultivate two kinds of power: acquisition of knowledge, called bookwork, and solution of such applications as can be done by good heads in a few minutes, dignified by the name of problems.......Peacock was one of those who, as stories ran in our undergraduate days, 'never did a single problem.' A sarcastic review of Cambridge men and things, which made some noise at the time, reckoned him up thus: He has read three times as much mathematics as any man in Europe, but has not a |