societies, and the list of his contributions to their Transactions is long and varied, ranging from "Problems on Contact" to "Spenser and the East Lancashire Dialect." In conjunction with the late Mr. Harland, he wrote the two works by which he is best known to the general reader. Lancashire Folk Lore (1867), and its sequel, Lancashire Legends and Traditions (1873), take high rank among books of this class. He died on February 6, and the funeral, which took place on the 10th, was attended by representatives of the societies named, of the corporation, and of most of the public institutions of Burnley. As a mathematician, bibliographer, and antiquary, he had a more than English reputation, and his genial disposition and readiness to impart information will make him greatly missed by his numerous literary friends. His MSS., it is understood, have been left to the Chetham Library at Manchester. His last literary work was published only last month, being a revised and enlarged edition of the Ballads and Lyrics of Lancashire, issued some years back by Mr. Harland.

A SUM of 1,050 fr. was given last week in Paris for a receipt signed in Rome, in 1548, by François

Rabelais.

As the English public will not give its Early English Text Society money to enable it to print quickly enough the manuscripts which contain the early history of our language and our social state, Germany is coming to the rescue, as she did long ago in the case of French manuscripts. Professor Carl Horstmann, of Magdeburg, has just published at Paderborn (F. Schöningh), a most valuable selection of Early English Legends, the Childhood and Birth of Jesus, Barlaam and Josaphat, and St. Patrick's Purgatory, and means to follow it up by another volume containing the legend of Gregorius (from a unique MS. in the Bodleian, of the time and style of King Horn, early thirteenth century), the Miracles of our Lady, and the Legend of Pope Celestine. In his present volume Professor Horstmann gives "The Childhood of Jesus" from the early thirteenth century Laud MS. 108 (believed to be unique); "The Birth of Jesus" in parallel texts from the early fourteenth century MSS., Ashmole 43 and Egerton 1993, with the long continuation from the Egerton MS. alone; "Barlaam and Josaphat "from the fourteenth century MS., Bodley 779; and "St. Patrick's Purgatory," from the Ashmole MS. 43, the Egerton 1993, and the Laud 108. In Appendixes he adds "A Dispution bitwene chi(1)d Jhesu & Maistres of be lawe of Jewes" from the grand Vernon MS. in

the Bodleian, before A.D. 1400; and two more versions of "Barlaam & Josaphat," the first from the Vernon MS. in the Southern dialect, and the second from Harleian MS. 4196 in the Northern dialect. A full preface on the Early English Legend-manuscripts, giving lists of the Lives in all the British Museum and Bodleian MSS., with comments, a list of exceptional rhymes and the assonances in his texts, &c., complete this volume, which is a credit to its editor and a welcome help to all Early English scholars and students.

MESSRS. MACMILLAN have in the press a Practical Treatise on the Diseases of the Eye, by R. Brudenell Carter, F.R.C.S., ophthalmic surgeon to St. George's Hospital. The work will be copiously illustrated by lithographs and woodcuts, and is intended to be a familiar exposition of the present doctrines and modes of treatment of English ophthalmic surgeons, adapted to the wants of both practitioners and students.

We have received a corrected reprint of a very admirable address delivered by Mr. James Parker of Oxford, on January 27, to the members of the Reading Archaeological and Architectural Society. Passing in review the chief points of interest in the early history of the ancient borough, its conflict with the Danes in the ninth century and its mention in the Norman Survey, Mr. Parker enlarged upon the grandeur of the Abbey, and the

good portrait. We would suggest that the time had fully come for another reprint of Dr. Dasent's translation of Asbjörnsen's and Moe's Tales from the Norse, which has long been unattainable.

prosper.

M. MICHEL CHEVALIER has published the opening lecture of his course of Political Economy for the present session in the College of France, under the title Des Moyens pour un Etat de refaire ses Finances. This subject has, of course, more importance for France at the present moment than for most other countries, but M. Chevalier's lecture discusses it on principles of general application. The emancipation of production and trade from all restriction is the method of financial reform he advocates. We had thought it hardly possible to say anything new on the point, but M. Chevalier bas succeeded in giving freshness and novelty to its exposition. We are glad, too, to observe that, uncompromising free-trader in the widest sense though he is, he does not go the length, with Mr. Bright, of regarding adulteration as a form of competition with which the State ought not to interfere. Nor does he oppose the intervention of the State in assisting the construction of railways in countries where private enterprise is unequal to the task. But he appears to overrate the extent of competition between railway companies in England, where the constant tendency for some time has been towards amalgamation or combination, and consequent monopoly. We can recommend M. Chevalier's instructive lecture to experts as well as beginners in political economy; but, on the subject of English railways, we think those who can read German would do well also to study the remarkable work of Dr. Gustav Cohn, lately published at Leipzig.

Ir is reported that the late Professor of History at Zürich, Dr. H. H. Vögeli, who died at the close of last year, has left important manuscripts referring to the Transactions of the Oecumenical Council, which will shortly be published. The Swiss Chronicle for 1873, which appeared not long before his death, and in which he had given a most useful summary of the events of the year, will, it is stated, be continued by the publishers, Messrs. Schwabe, of Basle.

THE Royal Scandinavian Society of Literary

Antiquities ("Kongelige Nordiske Oldskriftselskab") has just celebrated its fifty years' jubilee in Copenhagen. The society was founded on January 28, 1825. The president, the King of Denmark, received the members in the Palace of Amalienborg early in the morning. Vice-president Worsaae opened the meeting with an eloquent address, in which he recapitulated all the society had accomplished since its foundation by C. J. Rafn, and enumerated its most important pubricanae, had attracted the attention of the whole lications, some of which, as the Antiquitates Amelearned world to Denmark and to the Society. The accomplished Vice-president then mentioned that several important works were at this moment passing through the Society's press, among others a splendidly illustrated monograph on the remains discovered at Jellinghöj, and a large as well as a small edition of Njálssaga. Before the meeting closed, the names of the King of Greece and of the Czarewitch were added to the list of mem

bers.

A FRENCH translation of Alfred Larsen's Life and Works of P. Chr. Asbjörnsen has been printed in Christiania and circulated privately throughout Europe. It will, without doubt, tend to widen the circle of the personal acquaintance of this great writer. To be so widely known throughout the literary world is an honour that few authors, and still fewer comparative mythologists, attain during their own lifetime. The book is adorned with a

A NEW monthly journal of philosophy and science is to appear at Naples, under the direction of Professors Francesco Fiorentino and C. M.

e lettere, scienze morali e politiche.

A VERY touching exchange of presents has just taken place between the Queen and the Empress Eugénie. Her Majesty the Queen sent to the widow of Napoleon III. immediately after her return to Chislehurst from her visit to Windsor

Castle, the first volume of Theodore Martin's Life of the Prince Consort; and this week the Empress Eugénie has presented to Queen Victoria a superbly bound copy of the first two volumes of Mr. Blanchard Jerrold's Life of Napoleon III.

In accordance with the financial reports recently published at Berlin, the German budget is charged with a sum of 923,980 mark. for the Prussian universities, including Münster and Braunsberg. Of this sum 60,000 mark. are assigned to the purposes of augmenting the salaries of teachers, and assisting meritorious students. This falls short by nearly 29,000 mark. of the amount appropriated last year for the same object, owing to the fact that some university chairs have been better endowed in the interval, and no longer need further supplementation. A provision is made in the budget for "assistant teachers" at the universities, whose position is now for the first time officially recognised by a grant of 54,000 mark. for the payment of their stipends. The University of Berlin, which has been enlarged by the establishment of several new forty-two extraordinary professors, five of each chairs, has now a staff of sixty-three ordinary, and grade belonging to the faculty of Theology, eight

of the former and two of the latter to that of Law; and, while fifteen ordinary and eight extraordinary professors compose the medical staff, the faculty of Philosophy is presided over by as many as twenty-seven extrathirty-five ordinary and ordinary professors.

THE last number of Unsere Zeit (February 5) has an article on the present condition of Strassburg, from which it appears that the University and Town Library is rapidly recovering its former prestige. As many as 44,500 volumes have been secured for it during the last year, of which 33,000 were obtained by purchase, and the remainder through private donations, and by these additions the entire collection has been raised to upwards of 344,000 volumes in all.

THE Theological Review for January contains an article on Ewald's History of the Hagiocracy in Israel, by Francis R. Conder, which is not quite worthy either of its subject or of the review in which it appears. The author entertains an exaggerated belief in the later Jewish tradition, of development, which rules in all other histories, and takes Ewald to task for extending the principle to the history of Israel. He treats the history of the people of Israel somewhat as uneducated preachers are apt to treat the words of the Bible: to judge by the language he uses, it was brought out in England the other day. His knowledge of Judaism is drawn not from the really great Jewish critics, but from the Abbé Chiarini. And his Semitic scholarship may be measured by his derivation of Bedouin from Midianite, change of one servile letter for another turning Medeen into Bedeen."

"the

IN the Fortnightly Review the editor begins a study on Diderot, a subject much worthier of an estimable writer than Voltaire or Rousseau. Professor Cairnes concludes his protest against certain tendencies of Mr. Herbert Spencer's Sociology; but, as Mr. Herbert Spencer reminds us, in a note on Professor Cairnes's article, we must wait till

the Principles of Sociology, in three octavo volumes, are published before we can tell whether criticisms based on a comparatively concise and popular work are premature or not. Mr. Swinburne's unknown poet is a certain Mr. Wells, a contemporary of Keats, who wrote a play on Joseph and his Brethren, with no construction, but much command of the poetical dialect of the Elizabethan age. George Smith, the author of the Cry of the Brickfield Children, has an article on our Canal Population. He has not asked himself whether they are miserable as well as barbarous.

In the Contemporary Review, Professor Lightfoot deals with the series of confusions and misquotations by which the author of Supernatural Religion has bolstered up Volkmar's view, that a plausible and ambiguous statement of Malalas, a very inaccurate author of the sixth century, is to supersede the mass of evidence that Ignatius suffered at Rome. Professor Clifford treats of the postulates of the science of space in somewhat the same spirit as Mr. G. H. Lewes in the Fortnightly Review for August 1874, with a fuller development and illustration, perhaps with less maturity and precision of thought. Mr. Fitzjames Stephen gives an account of the curious penalties to which unpopular thinkers are still legally liable; for instance, Mr. Mill might have lost his place at the India House and been imprisoned. Father Bridgett attempts to rebut Dr. Lyon Playfair's charge that the mediaeval Church proclaimed the Sanctity of Dirt, on the ground that the extreme neglect of their persons by some saints was exceptional, and that, as a rule, the Church did nothing but protest against self-indulgence. This falls short of

the truth. The bath was the standing luxury or necessity of southern cities, as the daily pint or dram is the standing luxury of northern cities now. "In cute curanda plus aequo operata juventus" found the pleasant sense of being alive all over which followed the daily bath the best thing the day could give. The Church, rightly or wrongly, thought this pleasure dangerous, as the Mahometans think it now, and for whatever reason, when civilisation began to reconstitute itself in Southern Christendom, the bath did not reappear.

IN Macmillan Mr. Freeman informs us that most of his examinees at Oxford think Orange is in the Netherlands, along with much other instructive matter about that little Burgundian principality. Professor Munro replies with much force, and not a little natural severity, to Mr. Kebbel's strictures on recent Latin verse. He succeeds in showing that the school to which Gilbert Wakefield belongs are not faithful to their original, and are more or less slovenly in language and thought. Does he succeed in showing that they have not a superficial likeness to Latin, an appearance of clearness, almost a reality of ease and flow which have disappeared in the work of their successors, who have escaped their faults? Is Fraser Professor Newman has an interesting paper on Vegetarianism, chiefly from the economical point of view, insisting on the growing difficulty of supplying large towns with an increasing quantity of meat, and on the certainty that a larger area is required to feed a meat-eating than a vegetarian population. F. R. C. has another rabbinical article on the literary history of the word "Messiah," implying that the current argument from prophecy rests mainly on an arbitrary patristic cento from the Targums. Mr. Carlyle's abridgment of Snorro is continued to the death of St. Olaf.

THE most interesting article in the Cornhill, Séquard's researches; the writer is inclined to adopt his theories, but to question their practical utility. "Thoughts about Thinking" is a collection of genial and sensible observations on a subject too close at hand to be other than unfamiliar. A writer who has been permitted to use the unpublished materials for Shelley's life, states posi

"Have we Two Brains? is based on Brown

his

tively that he was little to blame for the way first marriage ended. "S. C." has a learned article on Piero della Francesca, who, it is conjectured, took to mathematics at the age when, according to Vasari, he left off painting, because he lost his eyesight. Vasari's other bit of declamation about the ingratitude of Pacioli in profiting without acknowledgment by Francesca's writings, is refuted by copious acknowledgments in more than one of Pacioli's, from the last of which it appears that Francesca was still alive in 1494.

In the Revue des Deux Mondes for February 1, George Sand begins a novel, the subject of which recalls our "penny dreadfuls." The story is appropriately narrated by a valet de chambre, but still

the ineffaceable distinction of the author is a relief after M. Cherbuliez's recent story, told with inconceivable "impudence" in the etymological sense, of how an English "Miss" threw herself at the head of a moody and handsome French savant, and brought him down at last. M. Othenin d'Haussonville, one of the three recruits from the Right Centre who gave the historian of St. Louis a chance of organising the third republic, concludes his pitiless study of Sainte-Beuve with a ferocious phrase of Cousin's, who said when Mérimée and Sainte-Beuve were being discussed, "Savez-vous la véritable supériorité de Mérimée sur Sainte-Beuve? Je vais vous la dire: Mérimée est gentilhomme, Sainte-Beuve n'est pas gentilhomme." Gaston Boissier has an article on M. Luce's edition of Froissart, which contains an interesting account of the three redactions of his great work, and several ingenious and unforced historical parallels.

been published:-Statement exhibiting the moral THE following Parliamentary Papers have lately and material progress and condition of India, during the year 1872-73, with maps, &c. (price 88.); a Return of the Provisions made by each School Board for the Religious Teaching of Admiralty and the Rev. C. M. Ramus on certain Children (price 9d.); Correspondence between the Experiments conducted by them, with sketches, &c. (price 38. 8d.); Return of the Population, Number of Electors, &c., of each City, Town, and Borough, returning a Member or Members to Parliament; Appendix to the Fortieth Report of the Commissioners of National Education in Ireland (price 38. 6d.); First Report of the Civil Service Enquiry Commissioners, &c., &c.

WE have received The Report of the Proceedings at the Dinner of the Cobden Club, July 1, 1874 (Cassell); Protection from Fire and Thieves, by G. H. Chubb (Macmillan); The Problem of Irish Education, by Isaac Butt, M.P. (Longmans); The Dramatic Works of William Shakspere, edited by S. W. Singer, F.S.A., vol. iii. (Bell); A Vision of Creation, by Cuthbert Collingwood, M.A., second edition (Edinburgh: Paterson); The Rudiments of Physical Geography for the use of Indian Schools, by H. F. Blanford, F.G.S., third edition (Macmillan); Theism, an Address, by Brinsley Nixon, Esq. (Longmans); Charles Kingsley, a Sermon, by A. P. Stanley, Dean of Westminster (Macmillan).

THE forthcoming Part IV. of Mr. Alexander J. Ellis's great work on Early English Pronuncia

tion

" contains his illustrations from contemporary writers of the pronunciation of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, an account of received English pronunciation, and the introductory matter to the new collections of English dialects which have been made for his work, in order to register dialectal pronunciation with a completeness hitherto unattained and even unat

tempted, as a necessary basis for understanding the

graphy, which was wholly dialectal. These collections pronunciation underlying our Early English orthothemselves, which have been already made to a sufficient and by no means scanty extent, will form Part V., to be published in 1875. That part will therefore be devoted to English Dialects. After it is completed, Mr. Ellis contemplates allowing at least two years to elapse before he begins Part the Sixth and last."

In his present Part IV., "thanks to the labours of the great Teutonic linguist Schmeller, Mr. Ellis has also been able to show the variations which interpenetrate one great branch of the High German dialects, the Bavarian (pp. 13571368); and, thanks to the extraordinary collection made by Winkler, just published in Dutch, to give English readers a general view of the present state of those Low German and Friesian dialects to which our own Anglo-Saxon language belongs, as they have developed under merely native influences, without the introduction of any strange element, like Celtic, Norman French, and Old Danish (pp. 1378-1428). These modern dialectal forms are invaluable for a study of our Early English dialectal forms, for, although chronologically contemporaneous with the English of the nineteenth century, they are linguistically several hundred years older. And they enable us to appreciate the state of our own English dialects, which are in fact merely a branch of the same, left untouched by

Winkler, because, like our own, these Low German dialects (with the exception of modern Dutch, which developed entirely without the control of the gramis a literary form of provincial Hollandish), have marian, the schoolmaster, and the author."

NOTES OF TRAVEL.

THE very able and interesting paper on the subject of the Arctic Expedition, read by Admiral Richards at the meeting of the Geographical Society last Monday, conveyed some information respecting the instructions to its commander. There cannot be any doubt as to what the instructions to Captain Nares ought to be, and what the people of this country desire they should be— namely, to use his own discretion in carrying out region as possible, according to circumstances the exploration of as large an area of the unknown which cannot be foreseen. But it appears that he is to be trammelled by restrictions; he is not to go beyond the Pole; he is not to go east or west of certain meridians; but to advance due north towards the North Pole, as if he was some

Alpine climber trying to reach a maiden peak. Nothing can be worse than the spirit which could conceive restrictions of this kind. They prove that there is no comprehension in high places either of the real character of the work that is required to be done, or of the best means of performing it. If Captain Nares is fit to command an Arctic expedition, he is fit to be trusted fully and unreservedly; and the country will not endure that he should be tied by foolish restrictions.

THE names of the Arctic exploring ships have now been decided upon. That of the Alert will not be altered. The Bloodhound will henceforward be the Discovery, a good old name formerly borne by Baffin's ship when he discovered Smith Sound, and by Captain Cook's second ship in his third voyage. Captain Nares has not yet decided which of the two ships shall be the advance and which the depôt vessel; but all the work connected with strengthening and fitting is progressing rapidly and satisfactorily.

WE understand that Professor Newton, of Cambridge, has undertaken the Ornithological section of the Arctic Manual. It certainly could not be in better hands; and complete information as to all that is known of the birds of the far north will be specially valuable and interesting to the officers of the expedition.

THE despatch of the Arctic Expedition has stimulated the adventurous spirit of amateurs. Mr. Rickaby is a young sportsman who went up Baflin's Bay in the Eric in 1873, the same year in which Commander Markham made his voyage in the Arctic. In 1874 Mr. Rickaby hired the yacht Sampson, and visited Spitzbergen; and this year it is his intention to get a vessel and again to make a voyage up Baffin's Bay, in the direction of Smith Sound.

WE hear that Lieutenant Payer, the intrepid Austrian Arctic explorer, is making enquiries and preparations with a view to crossing the continental glacier of Greenland, from east to west.

The attempt has been made several times from the western side, but it has always been found impossible to penetrate further than from thirty to fifty miles. A success, or even a partial success, would lead to most valuable results in the elucidation of the important phenomena in physical geography connected with the formation of continertal ice

in the present and in past ages. Certainly a desperate adventure could not be undertaken under better auspices; for Julius Payer is one of the most renowned Alpine climbers in the AustroHungarian Empire.

THE collection of dried plants from the banks of Lake Tanganyika, made and sent home by Lieutenant Cameron, is now in the hands of Dr. Hooker. Unfortunately the specimens were injured on the way down to the coast, but they have been sufficiently preserved to be of use. The journal has also arrived, as well as the observations during Cameron's cruise round the lake, and a series of sketches. The carefully-prepared map of the lake, or rather of that portion south of Ujiji, is now in the hands of the Royal Geographical Society, and will shortly be published in the Proceedings of that body. It is as good and careful a piece of geographical work as has ever come from the interior of Africa.

Morgenbladet states that the German Polar Society in Kristvigen seems to be in a depressed state. The two newest, best, and most seaworthy of its ships have just been sold. It will be deplorable if this institution should fall into decay after the expenditure of so much money and thought.

A CURIOUS geographical problem is suggested by the appearance at the mouth of the Seine, near Havre, in the course of the present month, of one of the hermetically-sealed bottles in wooden cases which were thrown overboard during Prince Napoleon's North-Polar Expedition in 1860. Wooden-covered bottles of this kind were thrown into the sea daily in the month of June of that year from the Prince's ship, in the expectation that the course taken by them would lead to the elucidation of the direction of the greater oceanic currents, but during the fourteen and a half years that have intervened since then, none of these bottles have been seen till the present one was washed ashore. Its appearance at the mouth of the Seine seems to indicate that a polar current must be borne into the German Ocean, and must be carried thence through the Channel to the western coasts of France.

THE botanical products of the Queensland North-East Coast Expedition, the report of which we have recently received, are more important from an economic point of view than from any great novelties or peculiarities that they present. The discovery of extensive districts the soil of which cannot be surpassed in quality, and supports a truly tropical vegetation, including the bamboo, tara, and banana, is of more importance than new gold-fields. In some places, too, the timber trees were very fine, particularly of Calophyllum Inophyllum, Eugenia grandis, Terminalia melanocarpa, Hernandia ovigera, Cardwellia, Cedrela, Alstonia, Castanospermum, &c., &c. The rapid rise of Cooktown, on the Endeavour River, though not owing to the agricultural capabilities of the surrounding country, can only be maintained by its proximity to a district rejoicing in a fertile soil. Indeed, the settlement of this coast depends greatly upon this point, and the explorations thus far have resulted very satisfactorily, though barren wastes alternate with river valleys and alluvial lands.

BARON MUELLER, government botanist, Victoria, in his last report gives some interesting details of the results of recent explorations in the Upper Yarra, Hume River, and other districts. As might be expected, although the general physical features and the nature of the flora and fauna of most districts are known, every trip adds

new species to those previously known. In the forest regions of the Upper Yarra and the southern branches of the Goulburn River measurements were taken of some of the larger trees of Eucalyptus amygdalina var. regnans, the highest being approximately 400 feet, but it is believed that there are higher specimens, which, however, could not be measured on account of the labour of clearing away the dense jungle to get a base line. The magnificent grass, Festuca dices, first discovered in West Gippsland, was found in the same districts. This grass grows from ten to twelve feet high, or even as much as seventeen feet in the rich soil of the fern-tree gullies. In the Hume district an entirely new tree, "probably of medicinal value," Bertya Finlayi, was discovered. Many Tasmanian

forms were traced northwards into New South

Wales, and many facts observed are of great interest in phyto-geography. A list of additions to the genera of Australian plants during the year numbers fifty, and includes Corynocarpus, michaelia, Ilex, Lagerstroemia, Agrimonia, EmCarmichaelia, Ilex, Lagerstroemia, Agrimonia, Embothrium (sect. Oreocallis), Ulmus (sect. Microptelea), Moraea, Areca, Wolffia, and others equally interesting to the student of the distribution of plants, besides fourteen absolutely new genera.

many

Elton, on Mti Sandarusi, or Gum Copal Trees of A SHORT report from Zanzibar, by Captain Dar-es-Salam, has just been printed among the Parliamentary papers. Captain Elton fully endorses Dr. Kirk's Report, published in the Linnean Society's Journal (Botany, vol. xi., paper on "Copal of Zanzibar and the Trachylobium Mossambicense"), for he was astonished at the immense number and size of these trees, far exceeding anything he had before imagined. The height of an average tree is about 60 feet, and the girth at bottom upwards of 4 feet. On stripping off the bark, the gum was found deposited in many places between it and the wood in a liquid form. The trees are suffering greatly from the attacks of swarms of ants and other insects, and are being slowly but surely destroyed, piece after piece, branch after branch. They are all festooned with the long intertwined ropes of the india-rubber Uiana, the thickly-matted cords of which, pendant from the main limbs and knotted into a sort of rigging, become an easy means of ascent to the natives looking for the resinous deposits on the branches. This india-rubber was worked rather extensively here at one time, but was soon given up as unprofitable, in consequence of the number of slave-lads carried off by leopards.

THE North Otago Times says that partridges appear to be spreading in that district. A brace have been repeatedly seen on Mr. Murray's land at Hampden recently, and pheasants are also pretty frequently flushed in the neighbourhood of that township. The goldfinches, either some of those liberated four years ago, or their progeny, are also occasionally met with, and that they are breeding is proved by the circumstance that a nest with four eggs was recently taken in mistake for that of a native bird.

AT Oamaru, New Zealand, says the Southern Mercury, a harbour light was displayed for the first time on December 1 last. It is visible for fifteen miles, and is situated on the point of a bluff above the harbour at an elevation of 160 feet. The

lantern is of an octagonal shape, five sides being glazed, so that the light can be seen from N.W. to S.W.

THE same paper says that there is a chance of the vigneron industry being established on the west coast, as 200 two-year-old grape-vines, designed to form the nucleus of a vineyard, have been imported to the Lake Brunner district, to the order of an Italian settler, who, it is hardly thoroughly, and is fully satisfied that they will necessary to add, understands their culture flourish well in that locality.

THE ROYAL

AND

ARCHAEOLOGICAL

HISTORICAL
ASSOCIATION OF IRELAND.

THE January meeting of this Association was held annual report shows that there has been an on the 20th ult. at Butler House, Kilkenny. The accession of forty-two members and four fellows

during the past year, and that the publications of

this Association are in great request with the

public. Several objects were presented to the museum, including bronze celts and spear-heads, an oaken paddle found with a single-tree canoe near Inniskillen and an Abyssinian MS. A fine specimen of the archaeological mare's-nest was destroyed by Mr. Hewson, in reference to a silver pin having a coin for a head. The coin had been identified by an eminent numismatist as belonging to a kind called sceattae, of Danish, or at all events Northern origin, and had been consequently engraved in the last number of the Journal. Mr. it is a comparatively modern East Indian piece. Mr. Hewson subsequently compared the coin with others in his own collection, and has ascertained that Prim communicated a description of a stone-roofed oratory near the Abbey of Louth, which seems to have been hitherto unnoticed. The local legend ascribes its origin to miraculous power. St. Mochta, a contemporary of St. Patrick, while state of ecstatic contemplation, which lasted for walking in the fields near the Abbey, fell into a 100, or, as some versions of the story say, 300 years. On coming to himself he returned to the Abbey, and was, naturally enough, refused admis sion. He accordingly went to sleep in the open air, and in the morning this building was found raised over him. It consists of two storeys, connected by a staircase in the thickness of the wall;

and is therefore not so old as the similar structures at Kells, Killaloe, and Glendalough, in which the only means of access to the upper room was by a ladder and a hole in the floor.

In the Journal of the Association for the past year, there is an account, illustrated by engrav ings from photographs, of the shrine of St. Manchan, which was exhibited at the Dublin Exhibition in 1872. This curious relic is preserved in the Roman Catholic chapel at Lemanaghan, and the peasantry in the neighbourhood are accustomed to swear by it, or by the bones of the saint, which are said still to rest there. The shrine is formed of yew boards in the shape of a high-pitched gabled roof, about two feet long. On each side is a Greek cross, of bronze, with bosses at the ends of each limb and in the centre, enriched with interlaced ornaments, the interstices filled in with enamel. The borders are composed of similar work. But the most remarkable feature in this ancient work of art is a row of

bronze figures in high relief, placed in the spaces formed by the arms of the cross. Originally there were, on both sides, about fifty of these figures, but now only ten remain. They wear ornamental kilts and jackets, and hold swords or other weapons in their hands. As representations of the human figure they possess but little merit, and contrast strangely with the beautiful design and workmanship of the more decorative portions of the shrine. The Rev. James Graves has identified two similar figures-one in the pos session of the Royal Irish Academy, and the other in private hands-as having formerly belonged to covered. One of these represents a bishop holding the shrine, and hopes that others may yet be disa pastoral staff, while all the figures still in situ are clad in the costume of the laity.

Mr. Wakeman contributes the results of a careful examination of the round tower at Devenish, the model round tower of Ireland. Though not the largest tower in Ireland, being only from all its compeers by the beauty of its ma84 feet 10 inches in height, it is distinguished which underlies the conical roof. This cornice sonry, and especially by the ornamental cornice is decorated partly with a Romanesque scroll and partly with rows of discs, standing out in low relief; and over the four highest windows are four

heads, three with beards interlaced after the fashion so commonly seen in Irish MSS., but the fourth beardless. Mr. Wakeman conjectures that these sculptures represent Saints Patrick, Columba, Molaisse, and Bridget, but gives no reasons for his conjecture. His remarks are illustrated by a view of the tower and by drawings of the cornice and other portions of the building. The Journal contains many other papers of great interest and value, which we have no space to notice here: especially one by Mr. G. M. Atkinson on "Ogham Writing," illustrated by facsimiles from several MS. treatises. Everyone who takes any interest in the Ogham inscriptions (and considering the numberless discussions to which they have given rise, all antiquaries must do so to some extent) will do well to study this paper with care.

RECOLLECTIONS OF MR. FINLAY, MR. FINLAY was of Scotch extraction. I have reason to think that he studied in Germany in his youth. He came out as a volunteer in the Greek Revolution, when he became acquainted with Lord Byron, who said to him, on being introduced, "You are young and enthusiastic, and therefore sure to be the more disappointed when you know the Greeks as well as I do." Mr. Finlay attained the rank of colonel in the course of the war, and, after the establishment of Greek independence, believing in the future of the new-born country, purchased land in Attica, an investment which obliged him constantly to reside at Athens, as the collection of rents, paid under the metairie system in kind, involved that personal surveillance which could not be safely delegated to another. This enforced exile, if not to his own advantage, was turned to good account by him in the interests of literature. After making himself thoroughly acquainted with the modern Greek language and with most of the countries which formed part of the Byzantine Empire, he composed his History of the Greeks from the Macedonian period to the present day, a work which in every page shows not only the ripe learning and conscientious and impartial judgment of the author, but also that minute and far-ranging local knowledge of the countries of which his History treats which could only have been acquired by travel and long residence. One of the most interesting of his tours was one in which he accompanied Karl Ritter in a cruise through the Archipelago.

many

Mr. Finlay took an active interest in the political affairs of Greece, and the letters which he contributed as Times correspondent for years show how thoroughly he appreciated the people among whom his exile was passed. It could hardly be said of his account of Greek politicians that he was "to their virtues very kind, and to their faults a little blind." He told the

truth about Greece fearlessly, and with no tinge of partisanship, and it is to the credit of the nation that they appreciated his impartiality; and all through their many political vicissitudes respected the one foreigner who, living in their midst, had the courage to tell them of their faults. Of Mr. Finlay it may be said that though he passed a lifetime in the Levant, he never became à Levantine. He was every inch an English gentleman from the beginning to the end, and his loss will be deeply felt by all of his countrymen who have had the advantage of enjoying at Athens his genial hospitality and instructive society. C. T. NEWTON.

SELECTED BOOKS. General Literature and Art. CROWNE, JOHN, The Dramatic Works of, with Prefatory Memoir and Notes. Vols. III. and IV. Edinburgh: Paterson.

DIDOT, A. F. Alde Manuce et l'hellénisme à Venise. Paris: Firmin Didot.

MALVEZIN, T. Michel de Montaigne, son origine, sa famille. Bordeaux: Lefebvre.

HANZONI, A., Lettere in gran parte inedite di, pubblicate per

cura di Giov. Sforza. Milano: Brigola. SCHROER, K. J. Die deutsche Dichtung des 19. Jahrhunderts in ihren bedeutenderen Erscheinungen. Leipzig: Vogel.

FÖLDVARY, A. Les Ancêtres d'Attila. Etude historique sur
les races scythiques. Paris: Sandoz et Fischbacher.
HOOK. W. F. The Lives of Grindell, Whitgift, Bancroft, and
Abbot. Forming Vol. X. of the "Lives of the Archbishops
of Canterbury." Bentley. 15s.
MATTHAEL PARISIENSIS, monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Ma-
jora. Edited by H. R. Luard, M.A. Vol. II. Rolls Series.
PERRENS, F, T. Etienne Marcel, prévôt des marchands (1354-
1358). Paris: imp. nat. 30 fr.
RECESSE, die, u. andere Akten der Hansetage von 1276-1430.
3. Bd. Leipzig: Duncker u. Humblot.
Physical Science.

ETTINGSHAUSEN, C. v., und A. POKORNY. Physiotypia plantarum
austriacaruin. Prag: Tempsky. 800 M.
FISCHER, KUNO. Francis Bacon und seine Nachfolger. Zweite
völlig umgearbeitete Auflage. Leipzig: Brockhaus.
HUME'S ESSAYS: Moral, Political, and Literary. Edited by
T. Green and the Rev. T. H. Grose. Longmans. 28s.
MANTOVANI, P. Descrizione geologica della Campagna Romana.
Torino: Loescher. L.5.

Philology.

HENTSCHEL, J. M. Quaestionum de Lysiae oratione Epicratea (xxvii.) capita duo. Leipzig: Krüger. 90 Pf. OPPERT, J. L'Immortalité de l'âme chez les Chaldéens (suivi d'une traduction de la Descente aux enfers de la déesse Istar Astarté). Paris: Maisonneuve. 1 fr. 50 c. PARISH, W. D. A Dictionary of the Sussex Dialect. Lewes : Farncombe. 78. 6d.

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE CENTURIE OF PRAISE.

4 Victoria Road, Clapham, S.W.: Feb. 9, 1875.

Will you allow me to correct an oversight in my article on Dr. Ingleby's Centurie of Prayse? I said that Shakspere's name does not occur (except after his death), in the greater writers of the day. Among these I mentioned Webster. Webster is, however, a very significant exception to my generalised statement, as is shown by an extract, dated 1612, given by Dr. Ingleby, p. 45. The extract was new to me, and I overlooked it. R. SIMPSON.

IRISH TEXTS.

Stonyford, Ireland: Feb. 8, 1875. Some time since a correspondence relative to the formation of an "Irish Text Society " was comprojected society was to issue, for the use of stumenced in the columns of the Athenaeum. The dents, the texts of ancient Celtic MSS.; and that there are practically unlimited materials any one who has read Professor O'Curry's Lectures on the

Manuscript Materials of Irish History must allow. The projector or projectors of this new society seemed, however, to forget that there was already an organisation in existence for the same purpose, which only wants support to make it able to Irish Archaeological and Celtic Society, whose noble supply Irish texts in abundance. I allude to the

AN UNPUBLISHED LETTER OF COLERIDGE.

The following letter of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the original of which is in my possession, will, I think, prove interesting to many readers of the ACADEMY. It belongs to a large collection of autograph letters bequeathed by the late John Kenyon to Mr. James Booth, to whose kindness I am indebted for it and many others. It is addressed on the cover, "J. Kenyon, Esq., 9 Argyle Street," and bears Mr. Kenyon's endorsement, "Letter to me from Coleridge, autograph."

38 Clanricarde Gardens.

R. CHILDERS.

"Nov. 3, 1814. "Mr. B. Morgan's.*

"My dear Sir,-At Binns's, Cheap Street, I found Jer. Taylor's Dissuasive from Popery, in the largest and only compleat Edition of his Polemical Tracts. Mr. Binns had no objection to the paragraph + being transcribed any morning or evening at his House: and I put in a piece of paper with the words at which the Transcript should begin and with which end-P. 450, line 5th to P. 451, 1. 31-I believe. But indeed I am ashamed, rather I feel awkward and uncomfortable at obtruding on you so long a task-much longer than I had imagined. I don't like to use any words that might give you any unpleasure, but I cannot help fearing that like a child spoilt by your and Mrs. Kenyon's great Indulgence I may have been betrayed into presuming on it more than I ought.Indeed, my dear Sir! I do feel very keenly how exceeding kind you & Mrs. K. have been to me—it makes this scrawl of mine look dim in a way, that was less uncommon with me formerly than it has been for the last 8 or 10 years. But to return, or turn off to the good old Bishop. It would be worth your while to read Taylor's letter on original sin, & what follows. It is the masterpiece of Human Eloquence. I compare it to an old Statue of Janus, with one of the Faces, that which looks toward his opponents, the controversial Phiz, in highest Preservation-the face of a mighty one, all Power, all Life!-the Face of a God rushing on to Battle; and in the same moment enjoying at once both Contest and Triumph. The other, that which should have been the Countenance that looks towards his

of

Followers-that with which he substitutes his own Opinion-all weather-eaten, dim, noseless, a Ghost in Marble-such as you may have seen represented in many of Piranesi's astounding Engravings from Rome & the Campus Martius. Jer. Taylor's Discursive Intellect dazzle-darkened his Intuitions: & the principle of becoming all Things to all men if by any means he might save tecting Epidermis of the Tact-nerve of Truth any, with him as with Burke, thickened the prorank of volumes, the Irish texts edited by O'Donointo something too like a Callus. But take him van, O'Curry, Todd, Reeves, and Whitley Stokes, all in all, such a miraculous Combination of are before me. I would also call attention to the Erudition broad, deep, and omnigenous, Irish texts placed within the reach of Celtic stu- Logic subtle as well as acute, and as robust dents by means of the publications of the Royal as agile; of psychological Insight, so fine yet so Historical and Archaeological Association of Iresecure! of public Prudence and practical Sageness land, of which I have the honour to be Secrethat one ray of creative Faith would have lit up tary. Besides several important tracts from the and transfigured into Wisdom; and of genuine Leabhar na Huidri and Book of Ballymote, printed Imagination, with its streaming Face unifying all in the quarterly Journal of the Association, I at one moment like that of the setting Sun when would allude to the Corpus Inscriptionum Hiber- thro' one interspace of blue Sky no larger than nicorum, forming its annual volume, which has itself it emerges from the Cloud to sink behind the been issuing in quarto yearly parts commencing mountain-but a face seen only at starts, when with 1870, and has now reached the second volume. some Breeze from the higher air scatters for a These lapidary texts are amongst the most ancient moment the cloud of Butterfly Fancies, which we possess; and as they are not only printed flutter around him like a moving Garment of ten under the care of the best Irish scholars, but also thousand colors-(now how shall I get out of facsimiled in numerous plates by the accomplished this sentence? The Tail is too big to be taken editress, Miss M. Stokes, they may be depended up into the Coiler's mouth)—well, as I was sayon as very valuable, not only in an artistic pointing, I believe, such a complex man hardly shall of view-and many of them are exquisite examples of Celtic_art-but also as forming the most trustworthy Irish texts we possess. JAMES GRAVES, A.B., M.R.I.A.

we meet again.

* Here follows a word which is quite illegible. †The symbol § is used for this word.