We notice with much pleasure a handsome volume under the above popular title, which represents that delightful science in the very attractive form of a series of dialogues between a mother and her children.  The Huttonian and Wernerian systems and the Mosaic Geology, are here familiarly explained, and illustrative phenomena and recent discoveries glanced at in the progress of the conversations.  How much more profitable are such family recreations than sitting hours over spotted pieces of paper, counting the pips of dice, or simpering over fashionable novels and tales of scandal run mad.  Bookish families are usually the happiest, at least if we rightly estimate the term.  In an early number we shall endeavour to find some portion of these “Conversations” for our columns.

“Arcana of Science for 1829.”

This work will appear early in January.  It will be on the same plan as the volume of last year, and will contain at least thirty engravings, on copper and wood.  The mechanical department is unusually copious, and there are some abstracts in the chemical, which are of high value.

Rice.

Trials have recently been made to grow the dry rice of China in Italy; and it is expected that in time an advantageous cultivation of it may be introduced in France.

Turf.

A correspondent of a French work on gardening thinks that green turf may be obtained in France by trenching the ground, freeing it from stones, covering the surface with two or three inches of rich compost, and then laying on the turf.  The improved soil, he thinks, will retain moisture sufficient to keep the turf growing all the summer, and, consequently, green.

Garden of the Hesperides.

Lieutenant Beachey, in his Travels in Cyrene, recently published, has thrown some curious light on the ancient account of these celebrated gardens.  It appears, that, like many other wonders, ancient and modern, when reduced to simple truth, they are little more than common occurrences.  Baron Humboldt and Mr. Bullock have reduced the floating gardens of Mexico to mud banks, with ditches between; and lieutenant Beachey makes it appear, that the gardens of the Hesperides are nothing more than old stone quarries, the bottoms of which have been cultivated.

Preparation of Cinnamon.

The rough bark is first scraped off with knives, and then, with a peculiar instrument, the inner rind is stripped off in long slips; these are tied up in bundles, and put to dry in the sun, and the wood is sold for fuel.  The operation was thus explained to bishop Heber by the cinnamon peelers; but in the regular preparation, the outer bark is not scraped off; but the process of fermentation, which the strips undergo when tied up in large quantities, removes the coarse parts.  The peelers are called Chaliers.

Power of the Sun’s Rays.