door he stood still with surprise. It was almost ten o'clock, and his mother and Elmira had begun to make pies. His mother had pushed herself up to the table, and was mixing the pastry, while Elmira was beating eggs. "Mrs. Edwards looked around at Jerome. 'What you standin' there lookin' for?' said she with her sharp, nervous voice. 'Put them shoes down, an' bring that quart pail of milk out of the pantry. Be careful you don't spill it.' "Jerome obeyed. When he set the milk pail on the table, Elmira gave him a quick piteously confidential glance from under her tearful lids. Elmira, with her blue checked pinafore tied under her chin, sat in a high wooden chair, with her little bare feet curling over a round, and beat eggs with a wooden spoon in a great bowl. "What you doin'?' asked Jerome. Her mother answered for her. 'She's mixin' up some custard for pies,' said she. 'I dun'no' as there's any need of you standin' lookin' as if you never saw any before.' "Never saw you makin' custard pies at ten o'clock at night before,' returned Jerome, with blunt defiance. "Do you s'pose,' said his mother, 'that I'm going to let your father go off an' die all alone an' take no notice of it?' "'Dun'no' what you mean.' "Don't you know its three days since he went off to get that wood an' never come back?' "Jerome nodded. "'Do you s'pose I'm goin' to let it pass an' die away, an' folks forget him, an' not have any funeral or anything? I made up my mind I'd wait until nine o'clock to-night, an' then, if he wa'n't found I wouldn't wait any longer. I'd get ready for the funeral. I've sent over for Paulina Maria and your Aunt B'lindy to come in an' help. Henry came over here to see if I'd heard anything, and I told him to go right home an' tell his mother to come, an' stop on the way an' tell Paulina Maria. There's a good deal to do before two o'clock to-morrow afternoon, an' I can't do much myself; somebody's got to help. In the mornin' you'll have to take the horse an' go over to the West Corners, an' tell Amelia an' her mother an' Lyddy Stokes's folks. There won't be any time to send word to the Greens over in Westbrook. They're only second-cousins, anyway, an' they ain't got any horse, an' I dun'no as they'd think they could afford to hire one. Now you take that fork an' go an' lift the cover off that kettle, an' stick it into the dried apples, an' see if they've begun to get soft.' was "Ann Edward's little triangular face had grown plainly thinner and older in three days, but the fire in her black eyes still sparkled. Her voice strained and hoarse on the high notes, from much lamentation, but she still raised it imperiously. She held the wooden mincing-bowl in her lap, and stirred with a desperate resolution, compressing her lips painfully, as if she were stirring the dregs of her own cup of sorrow." The volume is illustrated with twenty-six excellent illustrations by A. I. Keller. It is one of the best American novels of recent years. (Harper and Brothers; $1.50.) * * * Another good book for good readers is Charles Dudley Warner's The People for Whom Shakespeare Wrote. Mr. Warner believes most cordially in Shakespeare as a power that makes for culture, and consistently enough argues that nothing is needed but opportunity for this influence to do its work. It is well that people are beginning to find out that it does not pay to hear lectures or read books that tell them nothing but what they knew before. I shall never forget the spectacle of a great audience leaning almost out of its chairs, with mouths agape and palms on knees, at the eloquence of a famous lecturer, who was discoursing to them of the greatness of Shakespeare's mind. Higher and higher mounted the gorgeous periods, more and more rapt grew the hearers, and yet from the beginning up to the climax and down to the close not one idea about the real Shakespeare that was not brought with them. "Shakespeare, the greatest of all poets, the great-greatest of all dramatists; Shakespeare, the first of thinkers, the chief among romancers, the nonpareil of intellects and imaginations,"-that was the refrain and the song as well. What people want is personal acquaintance with Shakespeare, not only as an Olympian or a demigod, but as a man, a true personal experience and appreciation of his noble sympathy and wisdom. Hence the growing contempt of commentators, and mentors, and learning by proxy. As with the dogma of Christ's divinity, men want less of exegetical authority and exhortation, and more genuine comprehension of the character and the life. Mr. Warner really states the idea and purpose of his volume in this paragraph (pp. 125): "The student who takes up Shakespeare's plays for the purpose of amusement or cultivation, I would recommend to throw aside the whole load of commentary, and speculation, and disquisition, and devote himself to trying to find out first what was the London and the England of Shakespeare's day, what were the usages of all classes of society, what were the manners and the character of the people who crowded to hear his plays, or denounced them as the works of the devil and the allies of sin. I say again to the student that by this means Shakespeare will become a new thing to him, his mind will be enlarged to the purpose and scope of the great dramatist, and more illumination will be cast upon the plays than is received from the whole race of inquisitors into his phrases and critics of his genius. In the light of contemporary life, its visions of empire, its spirit of adventure, its piracy, exploration, and warlike turmoil, its credulity and superstitious wonder at natural phenomena, its implicit belief in the supernatural, its faith, its virility of daring, coarseness of speech, bluntness of manner, luxury of apparel, and ostentation of wealth, the mobility of its shifting society, these dramas glow with a new meaning, and awaken a profounder admiration of the poet's knowledge of human life." There is only one thing more potent as a means of making Shakespeare a "new thing" to the reader, and that is a careful study of his modes and meanings,—as we are in the habit of saying in the university, of his "art." The book is made up largely from observations and comments of diplomats and travelers who made some sojourn in England in Shakespeare's times. The style of these is of course quaint and pleasing, and Mr. Warner adds to the flavor somewhat of his own delicately piquant manner. This passage will show how well he bears out the matter and manner of his sources: "About Shakespeare's time many new inventions and luxuries came in: masks, muffs, fans, periwigs, shoe roses, love-handkerchiefs (tokens given by maids and gentlewomen to their favorites), heath-brooms for hair-brushes, scarfs, garters, waistcoats, flat-caps; also hops, turkeys, apricots, Venice glass, tobacco. In 1524, and for years after, was used this rhyme: 'Turkeys, carpes. hops: piccarel, and beere, There were no coffee-houses as yet, for neither tea nor coffee was introduced till about 1661. Tobacco was first made known in England by Sir John Hawkins in 1565, though not commonly used by men and women till some years after. It was urged as a great medicine for many ills. Harrison says, 1573: 'In these days the taking in of the smoke of the Indian herb called "Tabaco," by an instrument formed like a little ladle, whereby it passeth from the mouth into the head and stomach, is greatly taken up and used in England, against Reumes and some other diseases engendered in the lungs and inward parts, and not without effect.' Its use spread rapidly to the disgust of James I. and others, who doubted that it was good for cold, aches, humors, and rheums. In 1614 it was said that seven thousand houses lived by this trade, and that £399,375 a year was spent in smoke. Tobacco was even taken on the stage. Every base groom must have his pipe: it was sold in all inns and ale-houses, and the shops of the apothecaries, grocers, and chandlers were almost never, from morning till night, without company still taking tobacco." The volume is daintily bound in orange silk-cloth, and there are twelve reproductions of engravings of the fifteenth and the sixteenth century illustrative of dress and manners in those times. (Harpers; $1.25.) * * * This department has received a copy of Professor Mantellini's translation of De Amicis's Cuore, or, as this volume has it, The Heart of a Boy. Everybody knows, or should know, of this famous work, which has now reached almost its two hundredth edition in Italy. It is eminently a teacher's book, and I venture to say has already provided more inspiration to representatives of that calling than all pedagogical literature proper in the world. The purpose of the volume was to furnish the boys and youth of Italy, in the critical years of their education and development, somewhat of quickening in their sympathies, in their emotional nature, towards nobler things. It was to have been, in short, a book specifically for boys. But the general public soon found out what the work was like and appropriated it immediately to themselves. So Cuore has become the most popular of all this brilliant author's works in his own country. I believe there are no less than four editions, or translations, now upon the market in this country. The present version seems to be very close and spirited, and has a material advantage in that many of the illustrations from the native or original edition have been retained. All teachers should own a copy of this book, and, I think, everybody else besides. (Laird and Lee; 75 cents.) ** The first volume of The Great Educators, bearing Thomas and Matthew Arnold as its title, is substantial and satisfying. In English educational history the elder Arnold is a man of power, and Matthew Arnold was considered the greatest of British critics for many years. The book in hand is divided almost equally between these great men. The early service of the son as an officer in the British Department of Education is very properly enlarged upon, as are also his services as commissioner in foreign countries. His work as a poet and critic is withal recognized to the extent of a chapter of thirty-three pages. (Scribners; $1.00.) The Magazines Harpers' Monthly for November.-With the Greek Soldiers. A Pair of Patient Lovers, Howells. Spanish John. The New Japan. The Great Stone of Sardis, Stockton. The Century's Progress in Biology. The Review of Reviews for November.-Progress of the World. Character Sketch of Henry George. The Crisis in Spain. From the Lakes to the Sea. The Referendum in American Elections. The first department is equal to a valuable magazine in itself. The Forum for November.-Dangerous Defects of Our Electoral System-I. Notable Letters from My Political Friends-II. Some Lessons of the Yellow Fever Epidemic. The Relation of Production to Productive Capacity. The Monetary Commission. Our Proposed New Sugar Industry. The Disuse of Laughter. The Mississippi River Problem. England and the Famine in India. How the Greeks were Defeated. Letters to a Living Author. American Archæologists in Greece. The Atlantic Monthly for November.-The Life of Tennyson. The Frigate Constitution. Democracy and the Laboring Man. The Peculiarities of American Municipal Government. Forty Years of the Bacon-Shakespeare Folly. Caleb West, chapters V-VII. Some Unpublished Letters of Dean Swift, III. A Game of Solitaire, a complete Story. The Coming Literary Re vival, 1. Penelope's Progress, II. Contributors' Club. On an Old Plate. The Chautauquan for November.-Goethe in Italy. The Modern Tall Building. Goethe: His Life and Work. The Physical Changes of Autumn. Imperial Germany. Sunday Readings. The Economic Power of Germany. A Gentleman of Dixie, story, chapters XI and XII. What We Have Learned About Lightning Since the Time of Franklin. A Glimpse of the Moonshiners. The Rise in the Price of Bread. The Japanese on the Pacific Coast, illustrated. Thanksgiving on Herring Hill, story. Fever Panics. The Friendly Letter. Current History and Op nion, illustrated. C. L. S. C. Work. Talk About Books. The Century for November.-Gilbert Stuart's Portrait of Elizabeth Bordley, frontispicce. Mrs. Cameron: Her Friends and Her Photographs-Tennyson, Watts, Taylor, Herschel. A Great Na uralist, Edward Drinker Cope. Strange Creatures of the Past-Gigantic Saurians of the Reptilian Age. Gallops-I. The Parish of St. Thomas Equinus; II. Braybrooke's Double Event Steeplechase. The Last Days of Louis XVI. and MarieAntoinette. Good Americans, I. The Cherub Among the Gods. The Growth of Great Cities. Andree's Flight Into the Unknown. The Story of Chitral. Rubaiyat of Doc Sifers. An Imperial Dream-Max milian, His Allies and Enemies. An Interview with Sultan Abdul Hamid. Mozart. On the Re-reading of Books. Gilbert Stuart's Portraits of Women. Topics of the Time. Open Letters. St. Nicholas for November.-Mister Hop-Toad, verse. The Buccaneers of Our Coast, chapters I, II, III, IV. The Arch Armadillo. A Thorn-Apple Trip, verse. When the Sewing Club Meets, verse. The Midnight Sun, verse. The Story of a Pine Board. Picture-"An Anxious Moment." The Kitten and the Bear. Picture"Tommy, the Foot-ball, and the Toy Balloon." Ye Lily Maiden and Ye Lyttel Taylor-Boye, verse. A Funny Little School. The Tufted Titmouse, verse. Picture"Rock-a-Bye-Baby" in Africa. My Narrowest Escape. A Baby Elephant. Figures of Speech, verse. Picture— "Melody." Plants and Their Enemies. With the Black Prince, chapter I. Running the Fast Expresses. The Magic Sword, play. For Very Little Folks-Toby and Trip, a picture story; The Thrilling Story of Johnny Bunn, verse; A Cake Walk, verse (illustrated by John Richards). The Letter Box. The Riddle Box (illustrated). Scribner's for November.-Frontispiece. The Business of a Wheat Farm, by William Allen White. The Workers, by Walter A. Wyckoff. With Dog and Gun, by A. B. Frost; six full-page illustrations: Ruffed grouse, ducks, snipe, woodcock, quail, English pheasant. City Vistas, by Edith M. Thomas, with illustration by G. A. Ship.ey. No Continuing City, by Blanche Willis Howard, with fourteen illustrations by Rene Reinicke. The Country Church in America, by William B. Bigelow, with many illustrations of typical churches. Unusual Uses of Photography-Aerial Photography, by Gilbert Totten Woglom. Confessions of a College Professor. The Durket Sperret, chapters XIII-XX, by Sarah Barnwell Elliott (conclusion). The Point of View-A Questionable Type, On the Discussion of Friends. The Field of Art-Art Prizes and Awards, Rene Reinicke. About the World-The New York Public Library, A Cherokee Pilgrimage. Some Recent Events Russia is said to be negotiating with other states to check British encroachments in Afghanistan, in Africa, and in the Pacific....China is reported to be raising a new loan in order to pay the Japanese indemnity before 1898....The Musselman notables in Crete have sent a petition for relief to the ambassador at Constantinople....Neal Dow, the great prohibition leader of Maine, died Saturday, September 30, 1897, at his home in Portland, Me. He was born in that city in 1804 and was, therefore, in his ninety-fourth year at the time of his death....The Canadian Pacific Railway Company will extend its railway into Rossland, British Columbia....Ex-United States Senator John R. McPherson of New Jersey died October 8, 1897... Ex-United States Senator S. R. McMillan of Minnesota died October 3, 1897....The girls' cottage at the State Industrial School in Plankinton, S. D., was burned October 6, and seven girls perished in the flames....The transfer of the congressional library to the new library building has been completed....A decree has been issued by General Weyler allowing the return to Cuba of 138 persons who had been banished.... Professor Sanarelli, who discovered the yellow fever bacillus, announced the discovery of a curative serum....The national council of Switzerland has adopted the bill providing for the purchase of the five principal railways in the country at a cost of about $2,000.000.000.... Members of the New Spanish cabinet took the oath of office on October 4....Ambassador Hay has been informed of the final decision of Great Britain to refuse to take part in any sealing conference with Russia and Japan. Two conferences will therefore be held, one by the governments of the United States, Russia, and Japan, and later another conference with England, Canada, and the United States....The municipal election in Indianapolis on October 12 resulted in the election of Thomas Taggart, democrat.... ExSenator Chas. W. Jones of Florida died at Detroit on October 12....Rear-Admiral John L. Worden, who commanded the "Monitor" in her engagement with the "Merrimac," died in Washington October 18....Ex United States Senator Robertson died in Columbia, S. C., on October 13....Chas. A. Dana, editor of the New York Sun, died Sunday, October 17, 1897....It is rumored that an investment of nearly $1,000,000 will be made in Colorado by eastern capitalists in sugar factories and refineries.... Associate-Justice Field of the United States supreme court has asked to be retired....The king of Corea has proclaimed himself emperor....The international court of arbitration, which is to pass on the British-Venezuela boundary, has been completed by the selection of M. Mertens, the distinguished Russian jurist, as umpire....Great Britain declines to enter upon a conference with other nations on the silver question....The first assistant postmastergeneral, in his report, advocates the extension of the rural mail carrier service.... The Fowler Bicycle Company of Chicago makes an assignment....Our government will utilize the reindeer in transporting food to the mines of Alaska....The resignation of Lord Salisbury is believed to be forthcoming very soon....Italy is thought to be contemplating a withdrawal from the dreibund.... Ex-Senator A. S. Paddock of Nebraska died at his home in Beatrice October 17, 1897....The Post-Glover Electric Light Company of Cincinnati has applied for a receiver for the city of Hamilton, Butler county, Ohio....A mid-winter "blizzard" strikes Denver and other Colorado cities on October 26. Damage very great....France and England are likely to have conflict over territory in West Africa....The New York Central train was thrown into the Hudson river on Sunday morning, October 24. The president of the road believes that dynamite was used by wreckers.... Possibility of legal difficulties among bicycle manufacturers on account of the chainless wheel....Spanish soldiers are incited to mutiny on being ordered to Cuba....Spain will again make a new issue of treasury bonds in order to meet heavy current expenses....The yellow fever epidemic in Louisiana and other southern states still unabated....Henry George died October 29. THE NORTH WESTERN MONTHLY A MAGAZINE DEVOTED TO THE CORRELATION OF EDUCATIONAL FORCES Vol. VIII THE CURRENCY REFORM. DECEMBER, 1897 The World in Review Everyone agrees that the United States ought to have the best currency system in the world. Business is showing a very marked improvement and the currency question keeps on growing. All admit and admire the outspoken manner of Secretary Gage on this important question. Like all great public questions, there are two important sides to this controversy, and each one believes that his judgment is the very best for meeting any adverse conditions that may arise in the future. The outcome of this interesting question will be watched with a great deal of interest in the coming congress. The message of the president and the recommendations of the secretary of the treasury, if in perfect accord, may affect the plans to be formulated. It does seem that the combined wisdom of congress, aided by the frequent suggestions of men greatly interested in the currency of our nation, ought to bring forth a plan that all can approve of and that will be well adapted to our needs. There has never yet been presented to our nation a single subject that our statesmen have not been able to solve in an admirable and feasable manner, and, I might add, in a way that reflects credit upon American statesmanship. No. 5 upon this question as they have tried to review the fifteen years of work since the first effort was made at Toynbee Hall, Whitechapel, London. Back of all this great work generally stands the universities and the churches, and because of this much of the misunderstanding has gone forth. The great object and aim is to study the social conditions of the different localities where the settlement is located and then seek to so improve the social standing and conditions of those for whom the work is undertaken. In the social settlements they take society as they find it, and by studying the lives of the people in a sympathetic way seek to improve their social environment. They try to put in force that which social science has determined is for the uplifting of humanity. Many a scientific ideal has been rudely shattered. Many logical results have been reached that were thought unattainable. Social settlement has broadened out many a narrow ideal. It has wonderfully revolutionized neighborhoods as the workers became acquainted with the real facts in the lives of those for whom and with whom they labored. The events in this far away WHO WILL land during the months have OWN AFRICA? been decidedly interesting. For several years there has been a sort of rough and ready policy, a hither and thither rushing to see which one could the more quickly plant its flag on a given shore. Ten years ago France would have been willing to have released to England for a paltry consideration. She would have exchanged everything for the small colony of Gambia. The offer was rejected, but in these ten years she has made rapid strides forward in the possession of property in the upper and middle Niger. A few years ago England would only have had to said come, and vast possessions would have been hers. It is interesting reading to see how they are prodding Lord Salisbury to go ahead in many of these matters, and the way this newspaper prodding has awakened the staid old Tory element is surprising. It has revolutionized affairs. The old cry, so loud last month, "On to Khartoum," is not so loud just now, and many of the splendid (?) theories of how it was to be done, as advanced by Major Griffiths, have been suddenly upset. As a matter of fact, the crisis is threatening. The official admission that Great Britain had postponed the advance upon Khartoum, coupled with the fact that General Kitchener's force could take it before Christmas if allowed to proceed, reads strangely. This action of the British gov. ernment subjects it to severe criticism, and the thinking public look at the pretended determination to resist the advance of France into West Africa as a great big bluff. It may accomplish the end sought, evidently to keep back a revolt on Lord Salisbury, but the real end is not yet. Last March, when the elections AUSTRIAfor members of the reichsrath be HUNGARY. gan, trouble was predicted because of the surprises that were given in the results attained, viz., the crushing defeat of the liberals and sweeping victory for the allied conservatives, clericals, and anti-Semites. Gathering themselves together from the defeat or victory, each party tried to make the best of the situation. delay, knowing full well the power they pos sess to wreck if they cannot rule. They have been holding their mass meetings at Brunn, Bozen, Eger, and other places, and as these meetings have drawn to a close the whole assembly would rise and with uncovered head sing "Die Wacht am Rhein." That song, in other places so suggestive and beautiful, at these meetings means revolution. During the past month the outcome has brought several disgraceful fights in the lower house, Poles and Czechs combining to outfight the Germans. In the meantime the situation decpens, because the tie that binds legally these two countries into one government ends in December. Unless it can be renewed there will be a lapsing of the government. Another unlooked for obstacle arises just at this time in the declaration of Kossuth, "that he will fight to death any bargain between the Hungarian parliament and the Austrian government acting without its parliament." It is well known that Kossuth can block the provisional Ausgleich at Pesth 'as easily as the Germans can block things at Vienna. Thus the possible destruction of Austro-Hungarian union seems to be near. the midst of the heated debate one day in November the minister of finance appeared before the body, and among other things spoke of the need of immediate action, and deploring such a state of affairs as would compel the government to in any way compromise matters, concluding as follows: "Do not force the government-I do not mean the government of Count Badeni, but the government generally-in such a way that it will be compelled to settle the question without the aid of parliament. Not as a minister, but as a colleague, I urgently warn you, in the most vital interests of parliamentarism, against driving the government to such a step." PACIFIC SALE. Trades and countertrades were in order until, in a comparatively speaking short space of time, the great Austrian reichsrath, or lower house of the diet, with 425 members, found itself split into twenty-five factions. Premier Badeni saw the crisis coming and prepared to step down THE UNION and out, but the emperor would not accept his resignation. Matters drifted on and many riotous scenes have been enacted. The Germans have stoutly resisted every advance made by the Poles or the Czechs. On the other hand, the Czechs have caused the ministry to recognize them and caused an edict to be issued to make the language of the Czechs equal to that of the Germans. Upon this the Germans are fighting out the issue. They inaugurated the policy of In There is a sigh of relief from all parts of the land in this one line, "the Union Pacific is sold and the government does not lose a dollar." The entire transaction reflects credit upon all parties who carried the matter through successsfully. Demagogues will Demagogues will denounce it. Why? Because it will cause them to quit voicing their old political war cries. It means the revising of a great many political speeches. It takes another element out of controversy, |