Some highlights I find include: 

Archibald Allison opens the issue on the now famous "Year of Revolutions," 1848. 19 pages. 

James Wilson's essay (17 pages) in review of the new H.E. Strickland and A.G. Melville volume called: The Dodo and its Kindred; or, the History, Affinities, and Osteology of the Dodo, Solitaire and other Extinct Birds of the Islands Mauritius, Rodriguez, and Bourbon. The first book edition of this volume (London, 1848) is today worth its weight in gold.  

W.E. Aytoun reviews (16 pages) James Grant's new book, headed here "Memoirs of Kirkaldy of Grange."  

John J.R. Manner's essay (17 pages) in review of William Stirling-Maxwell's Annals of the Artists of Spain. Manners and Blackwood's here botch both the spelling and the proper name of the author of this notable three-volume first edition, calling the author sometimes "Sterling" and leaving out the "Maxwell" altogether. The volumes were published by the London firm of Ollivier. Perhaps the mistakes can be explained by the fact that this is the first of many contributions to the monthly by Lord John James Robert Manners, Duke of Rutland. At this date he had just turned 30 years old.  

Frederick Hardman's review (15 pages) of German Ferdinand Werne's work on the exploration of the White Nile. Hardman also pens a separate essay (12 pages) on "French Conquerors and Colonists" (in Algeria). 

The then energetic Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton's serial novel (13 pages of Part IX) The Caxtons. The novel was the first of Bulwer-Lytton's works to be serialized in Blackwood's Magazine. It took them 17 installments to get to the ending of The Caxtons.

Author identifications above are drawn from the Wellesley Index, I, p. 85.