ty, to which the authors to a man,
and the great bulk of the public, had attached themselves. The
_Trade_, as the booksellers call themselves, while admitting that they
can no longer stand under a protective principle, feel certain
difficulties as to their future career, for unquestionably there is
something peculiar in their business, in as far as a nominal price for
their wares is scarcely avoidable. If so, the question is, How is it
to be adjusted? at a lower allowance for the retailer? In that case,
some would still undersell others; and the old troubles would still be
experienced. Ought there, then, to be no fixed retailing price at all,
but simply one for the publisher to exact from the retailer, leaving
him to sell at what profit he pleases or can get? In that case, the
publisher's advertisement, holding forth no price to the public, would
lose half its utility. Shall we, then, leave the retailer to
advertise? All of these questions must occupy the attention of
booksellers for some time to come, and their settlement cannot
speedily be hoped for. The general belief, however, is, that the cost
for the distribution of books from the shops of the publishers must be
considerably reduced, the prices of books of course lowered, and their
diffusion proportionately extended. It will perhaps be found that some
of the greatest obstructions that operate in the case are not yet so
much as touched upon.

The French have resumed their explorations and excavations at
Khorsabad, and will doubtless bring to light many more remains of the
arts of Nineveh; and Colonel Rawlinson has found the burial-place of
the kings and queens of Assyria, where the bodies are placed in
sarcophagi, in the very habiliments and ornaments in which they were
three thousand years ago! What an important relic it will be for our
rejuvenated Society of Antiquaries to exercise their faculty of
investigation upon! If discoveries go on at this rate, we shall soon
want to enlarge our British Museum.

The Registrar-General tells us, in his first Report for the present
year, that 90,936 persons were married in the last quarter of 1851--a
greater number than in any quarter since 1842, except two, when it was
slightly exceeded. It is altogether beyond the average, and confirms
what has been before observed, that marriages are most numerous in
England in the months of September, October, and November, after the
harvest. To every 117 of the whole population there w