our lot to present these proofs of her liberality to the public, or, at least, to that portion of the public who honour our pages with a perusal. At her departure from St. Petersburgh, the Empress embraced her in a most affectionate manner, and the reigning Empress presented her with a pair of gold ear-rings, and a diamond necklace. The Emperor Alexander, not less sensible of her virtues, kissed her hands at her departure, and made her a present of a magnificent girdle of brilliants. She remained four months in Russia, during which time, she gave concerts at St. Petersburgh, Riga, Moscow, and Wilna, which produced her, exclusive of all expenses and the sums she bestowed on charity, upwards of 15,000 guineas. When she went from Moscow to Warsaw, she was presented, on her arrival, with a letter from the Muscovite nobility, offering her, as we have already observed, 240,000 roubles, if she would come and give ten concerts at their ancient capital during the winter. Apprehending her health would not endure the severity of the climate, she declined the flattering and advantageous invitation.

She made her second appearance in England in July last, (1822,) and gave a concert at the Argyle Rooms, on the sixteenth of that month, where she was received with the most enthusiastic applause. Nothing could equal the effect which she produced in singing Rhodes' violin variations. In this extraordinary exercise of her vocal powers, she displayed at once her surprising rapidity, strength, and sweetness. She gave another concert on the 30th of July, the profits of which amounted to upwards of £300, and which she devoted to the funds of

the Westminster General Infirmary; and indeed, the whole tenor of her life shews the mistaken prejudice which had been, at one time, excited against her in this country.

From London, Madame Catalani proceeded to Glasgow, and afterwards visited Edinburgh, Newcastle, York, and Liverpool: here she was joined by Mr. Yaniewiez, who has ever since been the sole director of her concerts. From Liverpool she proceeded to Leeds, and next visited Sheffield, where she was suddenly taken ill, while the audience were assembling, or, rather, after the greater part of them had assembled. The effect of her illness produced a temporary suspension of her vocal powers, and she continued for three days in this alarming state. She left Sheffield without a concert, promising to return shortly, which she did, after visiting Birmingham, Bath, and Clifton. From Sheffield, she proceeded to Nottingham, and from thence to London, where she still continues. During this excursion, she has cleared above £6000, over and above the heavy expenses, which she must have necessarily incurred. She is now performing in London, where her success is without example. At this, however, we feel no surprize; for, since she first commenced her musical career to the present moment, she has been not only the first singer in Europe, but, in fact, the only singer who may be truly said to have had no competitor. The public mind never hesitated a moment, between the comparative merits of her and any other performer; and when we say the public mind, we do not mean the English public alone, but that public, of which all the nations in Europe are

composed. No country could produce a second to her, though Italy, France, and England, have produced singers, of whom, perhaps, it would have been said, "the force of nature could no farther go;" and if the illustrious Angelica Catalani had been silently immured in a nunnery, and her transcendent powers known only to her cloistered sisters, their innocence or credulity would, in all probability, have deemed them rather the work of inspiration, than one of those unattainable gifts which nature bestows on her own peculiar favourites.

European Magazine,

EMBALMING AMONG THE EGYPTIANS.

THE Egyptians, of all nations of antiquity, are most deserving of our attention. To this wise and ingenious people, who made such advances in arts and science, in commerce and legislation, succeeding nations have been indebted for whatever institutions civilize mankind and embellish human life. The priesthood of this very religious people, to whom knowledge was exclusively confined, being wholly free from anxiety about secular matters, as they were provided for by the state, devoted themselves to the service of the community. Their time was divided between the performance of their sacred duties and the improvement of the mind. Study was their business, the good of the people was their sole object, and whatever could

contribute to the political or moral welfare of their country, was pursued with a zeal worthy of imitation in Christian societies. It is not then surprising that they made such amazing progress in physic and other occult sciences. And though the art of embalming, as practised by them, is now obsolete, and the medicated herbs which they used, may not now be ascertained, yet we may gather, from the custom, what study and attention they employed in discovering the virtues of simples, though the science of medical chemistry was probably unknown at that early period. The art of embalming the dead was peculiar to the Egyptians ; they alone knew the secret of preserving the body from decay. In the Pentateuch, we find that, when Abraham and Isaac died, they were simply buried; but Jacob, and afterwards Joseph, were embalmed, because those two Patriarchs died in Egypt. This mysterious trade descended from father to son, as an hereditary and sacred privilege: the embalmers were held in high repute, conversed with the priests, and were by them admitted into the inner parts of the temples. Embalming may have been practised in Asia, but as there is not any authority for this presumption, it may be inferred, that the custom prevailed among the Chaldeans, on account of the proximity of their country to Egypt, and the similarity of pursuits and doctines; an intercourse, no doubt, subsisted between these two philosophical nations from the earliest ages. After the death of Alexander the Great, the Egyptians and Chaldeans were ordered to dress the body in their own way, (curt. lib. subfin.) but this event was many hundred years after the times when Egypt flourished

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under the Pharaohs. The washing and dressing of the body, alluded to by Greek and Roman writers, was merely an external application of unguents, performed with facility and dispatch, not for the purpose of preserving the corpse, but in honour of the deceased. The ceremony among the Egyptians was sacred and solemn, and the process tedious, intricate, and expensive. In the patriarchal history, the sacred writer tells us, that forty days were employed in preparing the body of Jacob for sepulture. And Joseph commanded his servants, the physicians, to embalm his father, and the physicians embalmed Israel, Gen. 1, 2. And here it is to be observed, that the officers, called physicians, did not profess the art of curing; for physic, (as it is now called) was not, at that time, a professional pursuit; not a word is said of physicians being called in during Jacob's sickness. Besides, the Hebrew word is rendered in the septuagint, by those who prepare the body for burial; it is true, the author of the Pentateuch does not particularise this ceremony, but Herodotus, and Diodorus, are clear and diffuse in every thing relative to this interesting country. The Egyptians believed that the soul was immortal, or rather, that it was eternal; they imagined that it not only was not subject to death, but that it had existed from all eternity, having neither beginning nor end; they thought that as it was immaterial, it was increate, and as it was increate, that it was a part of the divine spirit, divinæ particula auræ, and co-existent with that being from whom it emanated. In order to substantiate this doctrine, they asserted that the soul had been in a state of pre-existence, and at the dissolution of