NOTES AND NEWS. MRS. SYDNEY DOBELL writes to us that she would feel greatly obliged to all those friends who possess letters, of any length or importance, from her husband, if they would send them to her address, Tocknells House, Painswick, near Stroud, Gloucestershire.

In all instances these letters would be copied and returned to their owners, and it need hardly be said that only those portions would be used for publication which are of general interest, and do not touch on private affairs.

MESSRS. SAMPSON, LOW, AND Co. have in the press a translation of a work on Photography, giving a history of the art, and a description of the various mechanical processes which are based upon it. The original is from the pen of M. Gaston Tissandier, who so nearly lost his life in the late perilous balloon ascent which proved fatal to his companions, Messrs. Sivel and CroceSpinelli.

MESSRS. T. AND T. CLARK, of Edinburgh, have in preparation a Chronological and Geographical Introduction to the Life of Jesus Christ, by Ch. Ed. Caspari, with the author's latest additions and corrections. The work is translated and edited by Mr. Maurice J. Evans, B.A. UNDER the modest title of Beiträge zur PaliGrammatik, Dr. Ernst Kuhn has just published a valuable treatise on Pali Grammar (Berlin: Dümmler, 1875). It is very much on the same plan as F. Muller's Beiträge zur Kenntniss der PaliSprache published in 1869, but its superiority in depth and extent to the latter work affords a pretty accurate measure of the advance made in Pali scholarship in the last six years. Dr. Kuhn's work is done with the accuracy and thoroughness characteristic of German Oriental scholarship.

MESSRS. RIVINGTON have in preparation, under the care of Mr. H. W. Eve, of Wellington College, a selection from Sainte Beuve's Causeries du Lundi, the 'text in French, with notes for use in schools.

THE first portion of Mr. J. F. Bright's History of England is half way through the press, and may be expected in about two months' time.

THE Rev. P. Bowden Smith, of Rugby School,

has also in hand for the same firm an edition of La Fontaine's Fables, with notes; and M. Vecqueray, of Rugby School, a German Accidence.

THE centenary of the birth of Leyden, the early friend of Scott, and himself a distinguished poet and Oriental scholar, falls on September 8 next, and the "Border Counties Association" are to celebrate the event by holding a festive meeting at Hawick on that date. Messrs. J. and J. H. Rutherfurd, Kelso, will publish a new illustrated centenary edition of the poet's works. The illustrations will include a portrait of Leyden which has never hitherto been published.

A PAMPHLET by Mdme. Jules Michelet, which will cause a great sensation, is to appear immediately, with the title of La Tombe de Michelet. It will be in the recollection of our readers that after the death of the illustrious writer, his son-in-law demanded that the funeral should take place at Hyères, while Mdme. Michelet, in accordance with her husband's well-known wish, desired that Paris should be the place of burial. Mdme. Michelet immediately brought an action against M. Dumesnil for the right of transporting the remains to Paris, and the memoir addressed by her to the judges in the suit is now published as a brochure. It contains not only an eloquent vindication of the widow's rights, and curious particulars of the relations between Michelet and M. Dumesnil, but also a statement of Michelet's ideas on Death and Immortality, together with unpublished fragments of the highest interest. On its title-page it bears these striking words of Michelet :-"J'ai toujours donné aux morts, trop oubliés, l'assistance dont j'aurai peut-être un jour moi-même besoin."

MESSRS. MICHEL LEVY will publish early in May the second volume of Michelet's History of the Nineteenth Century. It is largely concerned with this country, against which, as is well known, Michelet entertained those prejudices which were prevalent among the majority of Frenchmen reared under the First Empire.

MR. HALLIWELL, approving of the forthcoming pamphlet, "Shakspere's Plays: a Chapter of Stage History. An Essay on the Shaksperian Drama, by A. H. Paget," has presented 600 copies of it to the New Shakspere Society, for distribution to

its members.

LIEUTENANT-COLONEL CUNNINGHAM is the fortunate possessor of Charles Lamb's copy of the 1679 folio of Beaumont and Fletcher's Works, the very volume to which Lamb devoted an Elia Essay. It has all the passages marked for his Specimens, and better still, a good many manuscript notes by Coleridge, the last of which is, "I shall not be long here, Charles! I gone, you will not mind my having spoiled a book, in order to leave a relic.-S. T. C., Oct. 1811." Charles Lamb has made two good emendations in The Two Noble Kinsmen, in which Fletcher helped Shakspere. In the poor prefatory song, with its poverty-stricken "daisies, smelless, but most quaint,"-and this of Chaucer's "day-es eyes," which, of course, is not Shakspere's, and possibly not Fletcher's, Lamb alters the first two lines of the last verse, and makes chough ryme to cuckoo. At p. 338, vol. xi., Dyce, Lamb well emends:

:

Hip. Though much unlike (unliking),
You should be so transported, as much sorry
I should be....

WE understand that Professor Delius's paper on the Quarto and Folio Editions of King Lear will appear in English in the New Shakspere Society's Transactions at the same time as it does in German, in the German Shakspere Society's Jahrbuch. The paper has been translated by Miss Eva Gordon, of Pixholme.

MR. F. C. S. ROPER, F.L.S., President of the Eastbourne Natural History Society, has just completed a Flora of Eastbourne; being an Introduction to the Flowering Plants, Ferns, &c., of the Cuckmere District, East Sussex. The volume will be published by Mr. Van Voorst.

MR. BELL, Head-master of Christ's Hospital, writes to the Times on the subject of the He proposed memorial to Charles Lamb. has received suggestions to devote the fund that should be raised to one or more of the following objects:-An English essay prize, in the shape of books or medals (which might bear on one face the profile of Lamb); a scholarship for the encouragement of the study of English literature and composition; a "mural or sculptural record." The first proposal has received the most support; but we are sorry to learn that the sum yet raised for the purpose amounts only to 251. 138. The popularity of the Essays of Elia is so great, and the value for students of English literature of the brief comments accompanying the Selections from the Dramatists so unique-to say nothing of Lamb's other claims on our regard and almost on our affection-that we cannot help thinking that the proposal must have escaped the notice of Lamb's thousands of admirers. We have great pleasure in most cordially recommending it to their notice.

A MOVEMENT has been started for placing a memorial tablet over Byron's grave at HucknallTorkard. Mr. Richard Edgcumbe takes the lead in this project, which is supported by some ful names- -Tennyson, Disraeli, Wilkie Collins, Murray, &c. The venerable Trelawney accords a qualified sanction to the scheme. But many will agree with him in considering that the limits which it assumes are altogether too cramped, and that nothing short of a public statue to Byron in

London is deserving of much consideration. In fact, the precise proposal of a tablet at Hucknall is hardly intelligible: there is already a tablet there, and, as far as we know, it is in sound repair, and serves every requirement for that otherwise obscure and torpid little country church. Besides, it has acquired by this time an historical value which could not pertain to any substitute, even if executed in a rather more elaborate or sightly style. It is a burning shame to the English people-a reflection on their common sense, and we may say their common honesty, for cant and hypocrisy are at the bottom of it all-that fifty-one years after the death of Byron, and fifty-three years after that of Shelley, those two radiant geniuses remain without any public monumental recognition in their own country. Mr. Edgcumbe has dropped a very small stone into a very secluded part of the stream; but possibly the circles from it will spread into wider reaches. Any man, however prominent in public life or in letters, would do himself honour by coming forward decisively, and saying: "The time has arrived, and more than arrived, for raising a monument to Byron and to Shelley. Let a few of us subscribe for the purpose at once, appeal to all sorts and conditions of men to complete the subscription, commission a good sculptor to produce the statues without tedious delay, and then see whether a public site in London will be refused to us." A little boldness would probably produce a conspicuous success. As to the IIucknall Torkard project, we are reminded by it of that other scheme now going on for tinkering Keats's grave in Rome. We wish well-meaning people could be persuaded that it would not be possible for human ingenuity to better the tombstone as it stands; for this simple reason—that the personal interest attaching to that stone, as having been actually put up soon after Keats's death, and conformably to his directions, is deeper than any which could attach to a well-executed work of art-bust or what not-of the present day. We may next be hearing of a project to step a few paces to the right from the tomb of Keats, and honour the still more illustrious Shelley by violating his grave, and transporting his ashes to England: indeed, this idea has been mooted before now. But fortunately Trelawney might have something to say to any such proposal, by right of proprietorship, and he would know what sort of answer to return.

COUNT LOUIS PASSERINI and the Chevalier Gaetano Milanesi are engaged upon a new edition of the works of Niccolo Machiavelli. This new edition, of which two volumes have already appeared, will include a mass of unpublished documents existing in the National Library (the Magliabechian), and will be in every respect the most complete and valuable edition of the works of Machiavelli ever published.

THE Count Passerini only a few days ago lighted upon a document in the National Library of interest to Englishmen and students of English history. Its date is March 8, 1554, and it is an application to Pope Julius III. for the deprivation of Thomas Cranmer from the See of Canterbury on account of his evil life. It is signed Roger Ascham, and is apparently written by him; and is countersigned by Mary and her husband Philip. It is in perfect order, and beautifully written. Mary signs "Maria" in a small, round, and clear hand. Philip's name is written with a lighter ink, and manifests a royal indifference to good caligraphy.

SINCE we announced the appointment of Professor Waitz to the directorship of the Commission for power-editing the "Monumenta Germaniae," more definite arrangements have been made as to the mode of conducting the publication, and with regard to the selection of those to whom the special departments are to be entrusted. It has been determined that Dr. Waitz himself shall superintend the editing of the Scriptores, which will continue to be issued in

folio, while the remainder of the volumes will be in quarto, Wattenbach taking the Epistolae, Dümmler the Antiquitates, and Sickel the Diplomata. No editor for the Leges has as yet been definitively appointed. The first edition of the "Monumenta," of which about 750 copies were printed, is now only to be bought at fancy prices, on which account the directing committee has in contemplation to issue a new and revised edition of the separate volumes as they originally appeared.

THE Revue des Deux Mondes of April 15 contains a well-timed and interesting essay, by M. Emile de Laveleye, on Ancient Irish Law, drawing the attention of continental scholars to the Brehon law, and to Sir Henry Maine's Early History of Institutions, some of the principal conclusions of which are skilfully advocated by M. de Laveleye. Probably the part of his essay which will be read with chief interest in England is

that relating to feudalism. He adopts Sir II. Maine's theory, which traces feudalism in part to an economical origin. The chief, with more cattle than pasture, furnished the free tribesmen, who had more land than cattle, with the necessary stock, and the borrower of the cattle sank by degrees into the tenant or serf of his creditor. M. de Laveleye concurs with Mr. Cliffe Leslie,

that the ancient Irish had both deliberative assem

blies and courts of justice; but he seems to attach

more weight than Mr. Leslie's article in the Fortnightly Review does to the Crith Gablach and the Book of Rights, the authority and antiquity of which are questioned by Mr. Leslie, although Dr. Sullivan lays great stress on the former in support of his own theory of the advanced development of

Irish institutions in the seventh and eighth centuries. A translation of the Crith Gablach will be found in the third volume of Dr. Sullivan's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish.

Ir is announced that Professor Dümmler of Halle has been invited to accept the Chair of History at Göttingen, vacated by Dr. Waitz's removal to Berlin; and that Councillor Kuno Fischer will not leave Heidelberg, as was previously

announced.

Ar a recent meeting of the Academy of Sciences at Vienna, Professor Sickel read a paper on the various manuscript collections extant of Alcuin's Letters, of which there are three, believed to be genuine, which have special claim to notice. One of these, made under the direction of the Abbot Adalhard of Corvey, soon after the year 814, forms part of the Harleian MSS. in the British Museum; and two collections, belonging to a period a few years earlier than the former, are now both in the Imperial Court Library of Vienna, whither they appear to have been brought from Salzburg. One of these codices contains numerous interesting letters written by Alcuin and others to Archbishop Arno of Salzburg, during his ten months' sojourn at Rome, and his subsequent visit to the royal German Court in 799, one year before Charlemagne assumed the imperial

title.

These letters are full of curious references to the social condition, topography, and current events of Italy and Germany, while the letters contained in the other Vienna Codex, which belong to the years 802-807, are chiefly concerned with political matters, and these were evidently regarded as of a more confidential nature, and were not so widely copied by the scholars of Alcuin, to whom we are, however, indebted for the numerous more or less complete copies of the correspondence of their master which are to be found in the public libraries of Germany.

come next to the Classics in the opinion of the Chinese, and is illustrated with plates and dia| grams.

PROFESSOR JOAQUIN MALDONADO MACANAZ

contributes to the Revista de la Universidad de Madrid a biography of St. Francis Xavier, the Apostle of India. The last portion published

contains some severe strictures on Buddhism.

Señor Vicente de la Fuente gives a sketch of the early history of the University of Salamanca based on original documentary researches; and the Spanish Mystics form the subject of an interesting series of papers from the pen of Señor N. M. Mateos.

WE learn from Polybiblion that M. le Duc de la Trémoille has just privately printed the letters of Charles VIII. to Louis de la Trémoille preserved in the archives of Mdme. de la RocheJaquelin. They relate chiefly to the campaign of

1488 in Brittany.

THE following Parliamentary papers have lately been published:-Appendix to Third Report on Endowed Schools and Hospitals (Scotland), vol. i. (price 28. 4d.), vol. ii. (price 2s.); Twenty-seventh Report from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners for England, with an appendix (price 7d.); Twentyfourth Report from the Church Estates Commissioners (priced.); Report and Evidence of the Enquiry held at Hull into the Loss of the Steamship Viceroy (price 4d.); Returns relating to Election Charges, Mercantile Marine Offices, Merchant Ships' Crews committed to Prison, Foreign Import Duties, &c.; Returns relating to Life Insurance Companies (price 1s. 10d.); Copy of Mr. Erskine's Despatch relative to the Operation of the Swedish Tariff upon the Manufacturing Interests of Sweden (price 1d.); Papers relating to Her Majesty's Colonial Possessions, part i., 1875 (price 18. 1d.); Reports from Her Majesty's Consuls on the Manufactures, Commerce, &c., of their districts, part ii. (price 18. 2d.); Report of the Working of the Public Health Act, 1872 (price 1s. 8d.); Report of the Royal Commissioners appointed to enquire into the Treatment of Immigrants in Mauritius (price 68. 3d.); Appendixes to ditto (price 5s. 9d.); Correspondence relating to ditto (price 3d.); Code of Regulations, &c. (1875), issued by the Scotch Education Department (price 24d.); Return of Import Duties levied in Europe and the United States upon the Produce and Manufactures of the United Kingdom; Tables showing the estimated average Produce of the

Crops in Ireland for 1874, the Emigration from Irish Ports, &c. (price 6d.); Correspondence relating to the Complaints of the Mercantile Community in Hong Kong against the action of Chinese Revenue Cruisers (price 7d.); Papers relating to the Famine, East India (price 1s. 1d.); Copies of Correspondence between the Colonial Office and any of the Colonial Governments on the subject of Copyright, &c. (price 3d.); General Analytical Index to the Reports, Minutes of Evidence, &c., before the Royal Commission on Unseaworthy Ships (price 74d.).

Yonanga Lake, and endeavoured, but unsuccessfully, to procure a guide to conduct him across the wooded mountains to the eastward, to the Ngunie River, the natives being afraid of hostile tribes and gorillas, which are numerous. He observes that as far as the coast tribes are concerned, habitations are only to be found on the banks of rivers, where trade in caoutchouc can easily be carried on with the Europeans. The Jesuit mission on the Gabun River is flourishing, and carpentry, joiner's work, tailoring, shoemaking, and smith's work, besides gardening, are taught. Dr. Lenz states that the slave trade is in full swing by Cape Lopez, and that hundreds of slaves come from the interior, and are sold to the Portuguese at St. Thomas and I. do Principe. The mulattoes from the Congo country, and they agents for this traffic are chiefly Portuguese live in the neighbourhood of Cape Lopez, where the numerous mouths of the Ogowai favour their

operations. The slaves, bound together with chains, are conveyed in long canoes, each containing sixty people and upwards, across the sea to Ilha do Principe and St. Thomas, where they and conveyed thence to the plantations in the are landed on unfrequented parts of the coast, interior of those islands. Dr. Lenz is unable to

say if any re-exportation takes place; he is certain, however, that over a thousand slaves are exported annually from the Ogowai delta to the As far as regards the slavery

islands mentioned.

in vogue among the inhabitants on the Ogowai and Gabun, it is of a very mild description, and the slaves are treated more as members of the

family than anything else. Dr. Lenz was proposing soon to undertake his journey up the Okanda river, up which Messrs. de Compiègne and Marche had travelled in 1873. The natives speak of an important tributary coming from the south three or four days east of Lope, on the left bank of the Okanda, and of a dwarf race to the eastward about three or four feet high, called Akoa, both of which points Lenz is anxious to investigate, the latter being especially interesting on account of the probable connexion with Schweinfurth's Akka tribes.

THE recently revived shark fishery of the Northern Ice Sea in the Bay of Tereberskya, and the Peninsula Kola, is the subject of an interesting article in Das Ausland, April 5. Two kinds of shark are found in this region, Scymnus borealis, the Greenland shark, and Selache maxima, or basking shark. It is stated that these sharks specially frequent places where sea-currents meet, and, contrary to the assertions of many naturalists, assemble in shoals; so that boats engaged in the

fishery are often surrounded by a hundred or more of these sea hyaenas greedy for prey. The boats employed for fishing in deep water are from twenty to thirty tons burden, and carry five or six men, who obtain from one to two hundred kilogrammes of oil from a single fish.

Forty years ago, one Paschin received a subvention from the Russian Government to pursue this fishery, which went on slowly till 1851, when a Norwegian emigrant, Sul, took to the business. In the autumn of that year he began his sharkhunt in Tereberskya Bay, throwing into the water kitchen waste and excrement. This attracted a thousand sharks, and many were caught with hooks baited with sea calves' flesh, and for some time, but at last he was robbed and his dispatched with harpoons. Sul was prosperous tackle sunk. His example, however, excited the people of Kola to take up the occupation.

The Russians fish near the coast with small choring at a certain distance from the land, boats which can scarcely hold four men. Anthey sink a vessel pierced with holes, containing oil, tallow, or other fat, which the sea currents distribute in the neighbourhood. This causes the sharks to assemble, and they are caught with baited hooks attached to iron chains, as they could instantly bite through the strongest rope. Three of the men watch an opportunity of pulling

the fish towards the boat, and the fourth stands ready with a wooden hammer weighing twenty pounds, to strike with all his force the moment the head appears. The fish is then cut open by means of a knife with a very long handle, the oil taken and its swimming bladder inflated by a long pipe. It is then cast adrift to float. If allowed to sink, the men say, the other sharks would eat it and not care for other bait. The long handle of the knife is to secure the safety of the operator's hands from a bite by other sharks that keep swimming round the boat. Sometimes the sharks surround a boat so thickly that it cannot escape, and the crew fall victims to their intended prey.

THE Turkish papers, says the Levant Herald, speak highly of a number of maps of Asia Minor, Roumelia, Servia, and Yemen which have been executed by means of photo-lithography, by seven or eight officers of the Imperial Ottoman Navy, under the direction of Mustapha Djelal-ed-din Pasha. At the present moment these officers are engaged in drawing up a map of Montenegro.

THE Turkish Government is, we are happy to learn, at last grappling with the terrible famine in Asia Minor with some measure of success. But its difficulties are seriously increased by the cattle disease, which is now prevalent throughout the Empire. We are indebted for the following extract to the Levant Herald, a paper which has honourably distinguished itself by the zeal and discretion with which it has espoused the cause of the starving populations of Asia Minor:

"We hear of it [i.e., the cattle disease] in Bagdad, and in Trebizond, the extreme points north and south of the eastern boundary of the empire. At Scala Nova, in the province of Smyrna, and at the Dardanelles it has wrought terrible ravages. Private letters state that in the neighbourhood of the Dardanelles the most lucky have lost fifty per cent. of their sheep, and that of many large flocks only five in every hundred are left. A recent visitor to the plains of Troy remarked the skeletons of thousands of sheep lying bleaching upon the ground. From Smyrna, we hear of vast flocks totally destroyed, and one letter tells of a shepherd who, stripped by the murrain of his entire flock, has become insane, and takes out to pasture a pocketful of white pebbles which he fondly believes to be the fleecy tribe in the possession of which he was a few weeks ago comparatively rich. What the disease has wrought in the famine districts of Asia Minor has already been told by Mr. Farnsworth. From European Turkey the accounts are no less distressing. From Adrianople, we learn that 30 per cent of the horned cattle and horses have been lost, and that sheep have died in a very much greater ratio... . In Macedonia, there is not only scarcity of pasturage, but also of food for human consumption. From the province of Gallipoli the accounts are very bad indeed. In the district of Enos, in this province, the sheep are affected by lung disease. The sanitary physician of Varna reports a like affection of the flocks in the Dobrudja."

IN his recently printed consular report from Beyrout, Mr. T. S. Jago gives some interesting notes on a journey which he made through Central and Northern Syria, a country, as he says, little, if ever, visited by European travellers. From Tripoli to Latakia, a distance of about seventy-two miles, the chief thing that struck him was the almost total absence of population. The sparse cultivation met with is mainly confined to cereals; the implements used are of the rudest kind; the cattle of the peasantry are puny and undersized; and the abject appearance and condition of the denizens of the mud villages and the three small towns of Tortosa, Gébélé, and Markab, show a state of affairs the reverse of prosperous. The means of communication are simply the tracks made in the course of ages by camels, mules, and other beasts of burden. No fewer than thirteen rivers and streams have to be crossed in this distance, and there are only three bridges fit to be used. Education among these "fellaheen" is unknown, and the only person who can read is generally, besides the scheik of the village, the

resident agent of the Tripoli or Latakia moneylender, who owns the village or who advances money upon the crops. Their food is coarse bread and sour milk in summer, while in winter a few olives and dried fruit take the place of the milk. A mat of reeds, with a coverlet and a rude pillow, forms their bed. Mutton fat, with a strip of cotton rag for a wick, supplies them with a little light for their dwellings. Meat, coffee, and sugar are luxuries, like rice, sparingly partaken of by the more affluent on the occasion of marriages, religious feasts, &c. Comforts of the rudest kind are wanting with them, and their condition is one of extreme ignorance and apathy.

The best Latakia tobacco is cultivated in the most northern and elevated parts of the Ansariyeh mountains. Great care is bestowed thereon by the mountaineers, who depend upon it for their chief support. The small strips of land near their houses are carefully prepared, the earth being well pulverised and manured, and the seeds planted. The beds are afterwards thinned, the young plants pricked out, and watered once when put into the ground. The tobacco harvest is in October in the mountains, and earlier in the lower ranges. leaves are gathered and strung upon strings of goats' hair, then left to dry in the shade, after which they are hung to the rafters of the houses for fumigation or otherwise, and thus left till the tax-gatherer comes. They are sold in loads of 100 or 150 strings. The very best kind of Latakia is known by the name of "abou riah," or father of scent, but of this a very small quantity is annually raised.

GEORGE HERBERT AT CAMBRIDGE.

The

Having recently pointed out an error in Walton's life of Herbert relating to the presentation to Bemerton, I should like to draw attention to his life at Cambridge. Herbert's reply to Melville's Anti-Tami-Cami-Categoria was written there, as one set of verses is addressed to Charles Prince of Wales, a title which he did not bear till 1616, and another refers to the attack of Melville on the candlesticks on the Royal Comolim. How long after 1616 the verses munion Table as something which took place

were

written I cannot say for certain. If Mr. Grosart is right in holding that the verses addressed to the Bishop of Winchester were intended for Andrewes, the date must have been subsequent to 1619. But I strongly suspect that Montague is the bishop meant. If so, the date of some of the lines is between 1616 and 1619, though it does not follow that they were all written at the same time.

We have thus two important writings for the Cambridge period of George Herbert's life, the second being the speech addressed to Prince Charles on his return to Spain, which shows that with all his efforts at being a courtier Herbert, if he had not the qualities of a statesman on the one hand, was deficient in those of a mere courtier on the other. Everybody at court knew that Charles had come home disgusted with the Spanish match, and half inclined, if not quite inclined, to drive his father into war with Spain. Herbert, with all courtliness of tone, deliberately refused to worship the rising sun. He goes through an elaborate panegyric on the excellences of peace, applauds Charles for going to Madrid in order to seek it, and resigns himself to the prospect of war, only because he is quite sure that James will not declare war unless it is absolutely necessary. By means of these two pieces one comes to see that Herbert may really have admired James as a king who kept the peace and maintained the ceremonies of the Church. Herbert's patrons, too, Hamilton and Lennox, voted in favour of peace, so that Herbert would find himself all abroad in temporal matters when the new reign set in.

Taking these writings together, one finds that there was a certain honesty in Herbert, even in

The new volume of poems by Sully Prudhomme, entitled Les Vaines Tendresses (Lemerre), which I announced in January, is just out, and it is in all respects worthy of the author of Stances et Poëmes, Epreuves, and Solitudes. It even bears evidence of progress-not that it contains poems in themselves more beautiful than those by which Sully Prudhomme had already in his former volumes earned his right to be ranked in the first order of contemporary poets, but a loftier and more ideal inspiration permeates the whole collection. His poems are all based on the same idea, namely, the want of harmony existing between man's aspirations and the weakness, the powerlessness, the narrow limits to which nature condemns him :"A quoi bon nos miettes d'aumône? Si la plebe veut s'assouvir; Ou nos rêves d'Etat sans trône? S'il plaît au peuple de servir.

A quoi bon rapprendre la guerre?

S'il faut toujours qu'elle ait pour but
Le gain menteur, cher au vulgaire,
D'une auréole et d'un tribut.

A quoi bon la lente science?

Si l'homme ne peut entrevoir,
Après tant d'âpre patience

Que les bornes de son savoir.
A quoi bon l'amour? si l'on aime
Pour propager un cœur souffrant,
Le cœur humain, toujours le même
Sous le costume différent.

A quoi bon si la terre est ronde,
Notre infinie avidité?

On est si vite au bout d'un monde
Quand il n'est pas illimité."

This idea, or rather sentiment, which is expressed in the poet's earlier works likewise, forms the keynote, the one prevailing note I might almost say, of the volume before us. He has given it an admirable philosophic expression in the lines "Sur la Mort," where he describes the anguish of the soul beside the coffin of a beloved friend, stirred by an overpowering yearning for the infinite and the eternal, yet feeling that they have no existence for it, and being alike unable either to believe or to refuse to believe in their reality. It is love that makes the poet feel how eternal and strong is the spring of hope in the human breast, rudely snapped though it may be at every moment by the crushing weight of a stern reality. Hence the title of the book, Les Vaines Tendresses, vain for all, but more particularly for him, for we can read in his guarded confidences the whole story, a noble and pathetic story, of an unfortunate love, voluntarily unfortunate that it might remain noble and pure. Such love as this has been the inspiring theme of many beautiful lines, but it has never found more forcible, yet at the same time more delicate expression than Sully Prudhomme has given it in the poem called L'Obstacle." But in the volume before us it seems as if the wearied and wounded soul were beginning to reap the reward of its self-denial, the accents of despair and the traces of unavailing struggle give place to resignation, a resignation sad, indeed, but nevertheless calm and gentle, at times even happy. This is the predominant feeling traceable in "Le RendezVous and in "Ce qui dure." By renouncing all claims to earthly joys the poet puts himself

out of reach of the deceptions which earthly joys bring with them; and he experiences a sense of peace and harmony which he has beautifully expressed in two of his most exquisite little pieces, called "L'Epousée" and "Le Conseil." The volume opens with a poem, "Aux Amis Inconnus," addressed by the author to those who, without knowing him, may have been touched by his verses and have found in them an echo of their own feelings and their own griefs. These lines admirably express the tie that binds Sully Prudhomme and his readers together-a tie of gratitude rather than one of admiration. He has soothed their griefs, first by sharing them, and then by ennobling them in verse-"Haud ignara mali, miseris succurrere disco." Sully Prudhomme's poems often recall to my mind William Blake's Songs of Experience, though he has no heavenly visions as Blake had to unlock the gates of Paradise to his dreams; he is not a mystic, but a philosopher trained in the school of Lucretius.

The spring of 1875 seems to be specially favourable to the production of good poetry. Besides the more profound and delicate effusions of Sully Prudhomme, which have little charm for the multitude, but whose beauty establishes their author's title to lasting fame, there is poetry of a more stirring and spirited kind, verses that are "Moins écrits que pensés, moins pensés que vécus," warsongs that have the true military ring, like the blare of a trumpet and the tramp of soldiers. Before the war broke out M. Déroulète, who is a nephew of M. Emile Augier, had been a young dilettante author, and had written a drama called Juan Strenner, which was produced at the Théâtre Français, but without any particular success. The war transformed him into a soldier and a poet. In 1873 he published Les Chants du Soldat; they met with a most favourable reception, and have been followed by Les Nouveaux Chants du Soldat, and these are at present quite the rage. The first volume has in the course of a few weeks reached a fifteenth edition, and the second volume a ninth. Patriotism of the most genuine kind has kindled the poetic impulse in the writer of these songs: they are full of the true Gallic vivacity, and though their form is often defective and even sometimes a little prosaic, there is an atmosphere of health and vigour about them, and a loyal spirit running through them that are their special attractions. "A ma Mère," "Jeanne la Lorraine," "En Avant," and some few military songs, are really remarkable. On the other hand, there is not much to be said for the comic poem in which M. Déroulète, with a singular want of taste and without any conceivable object or purpose, ridicules

the weakness and want of endurance of some of his comrades in the war, nor, indeed, for the more ambitious pieces, such as, for instance, the one called "Othoniel." This sprightly and joyous young soldier can blow the trumpet-call to arms, but epic poetry is clearly not in his line. Yet it is impossible to avoid feeling genuine sympathy for the young poet who voluntarily chose to remain in the army when the war came to an end, that he might assist in training up soldiers for his country who shall be as patriotic as he is himself. His verses are all written with a view to the same purpose, and cannot fail to be productive of some result.

M. André Lemoyne's poetry is animated by a very different spirit. He is one of nature's poets, the bard, the lover of the meadow-flowers and of the woodland birds, of everything in the realm of nature that helps us to forget the stern and pressing realities of life. He is preparing a new volume of poetry for Lemerre's Collection elzévirienne," in which his Roses d'Anton and his Charmeuses first came out. Meanwhile, not to put the patience of his friends to too severe a test, he has had a hundred copies of a fine-paper edition of his Paysages de Mer et Fleurs des Prés printed for them, which contains a choice selection of his most perfect little poems,

gems which show the labour of the file, and the polish of a skilful and persevering hand. There is one piece called "La Bataille " in this collection, a piece suggested by the opening scene of Dickens's "Battle of Life," which, according to my judgment, is the finest thing he has ever yet written. He blends deep human emotion with that sympathy with nature which first-hand knowledge of nature awakens, and reaches the highest and best results. Among the young poets of the day M. Lemoyne is a type of the most curious and interesting description. He has been a clerk for more than twenty years in the firm of MM. Didot the publishers, and is engaged in mechanical and tiring work from morning till night. He obtains relief from the monotonous reality of his daily life by means of the joyous exuberance of his nature, which is brimming over with gaiety and vigour, and makes him the most jovial of companions, and by such poetic dreams as are most diametrically opposed to the trivial preoccupations of daily life. He caresses his verses, shapes and polishes them one by one with the utmost fondness and deliberation, and at long intervals produces short poems whose chief characteristic is the ideal serenity that pervades them; they neither bear the stamp of genius, nor are they remarkable for brilliancy of colour; but the harmony of the verse is faultless, the form perfect, and every word exquisitely chosen. Lately, M. Lemoyne tried his skill in the domain of fiction, but without success. His Idylle Normande is devoid of life, the first quality necessary to a novel. The characters are not beings of flesh and blood, but incorporeal souls and ideas.

M. André Theuriet, who is also a poet, and writes pure and melodious verse, promises to become a really good writer of fiction. His two last novels, Malle. Guignon and Le Mariage de Gérard (Charpentier), are works of considerable merit, elevated in tone and sentiment, though they posAlphonse Daudet's works, nor the popular vigour sess neither the brilliant Parisian originality of and pith of Léon Cladel's peasant tales, nor the by Ferdinand Fabre. M. Theuriet's descriptions power of psychological analysis which is displayed of nature are evidently drawn by one who is himself a genuine lover of the country, one who has lived in it and has made it a part of himself, and his pictures of la vie de province are painted with engaged on a new book called La Fortune d'Angèle, striking truth of observation. At present he is which combines all these qualities in a much higher degree, and which testifies to the real progress he is making. We greatly need good novelists in France. Those who were the most

distinguished some years ago are growing old and have nearly written themselves out. ErckmannChatrian have all but exhausted the vein of popular tales which has been the source of their

brilliant successes. Hector Malot, who seemed at one time as though he were going to follow in the steps of Balzac, pours forth novel after novel from his pitiably prolific pen, of which it can only be said that they are carefully and conscientiously written, for they are wanting alike in force and imagination, without life and without originality. Gustav Droz, who displayed real power of observation in some of the pages of the Cahier Bleu de Malle. Cibot, has just committed a strange error in his choice of a subject for his new novel La Femme gênante (Hetzel), which shows a singular want of taste in a man of his ability. A widower has had the body of his dead wife carefully embalmed, and has kept it in the house beside him: after a time he wants to marry again, and then he does not know how to dispose of La Femme gênante. His perplexity might be amusing through a few pages, but it becomes intolerably wearisome dragged out through the length of a whole volume. Jules Verne, who has so much wit and intelligence, such learning and vivid imagination, has just been putting his powers to their full use in his Chancellor (Hetzel), but his joyous fancy is always enlisted in the cause

of science, and his object is to instruct his readers while he amuses them, and therefore his writings belong to the instructive rather than to the literary order of books. Lastly, Victor Cherbuliez, whose rare talent as a writer no one can dispute, and whose refined, cultivated judg ment, artistic feeling, and brilliant intelligence are undeniable, has just published a novel, Miss Rovel (Hachette), which does little credit to the author of Comte Kostia and Ladislas Bolski. This is not the public opinion clearly, for not one of Cherbuliez novels has met with such a favourable reception as this; but I consider it inferior to all his former ones, on account of the pretentious style in which it is written, the poverty of inven tion and the want of elevation it displays. The English lady, who first indulges in a thousand vagaries, and then goes off to Africa with a Wesleyan missionary to convert the blacks, and ends by becoming the wife of a negro king, is a gro tesque conception, it must be owned, hardly worthy of such an author as M. Cherbuliez. He has just left Geneva, with the intention of settling in Paris, where he is to have some share in the editing of the Revue des Deux Mondes. It is to be hoped that the change will give a new impulse to his literary talent. An interesting experiment has just been made in the domain of fiction by a young man who bears a name that is doubly famous. M. Gilbert Augustin Thierry is a son of Amédée Thierry, and a nephew of Augustin Thierry. He has tried in his Aventures d'une Ame en peine (Didier) to bring the historical novel to life again. The period he has chosen for his story is the close of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century, and he gives a picture of the ecclesiastical and legal classes as they were in those disturbed times, when witchcraft still played an important part in society, and the administration of law and justice was still influenced, as in the Middle Ages, by cruelty and prejudice. It is a which is an ill-assorted union of the bad taste strange book, confused throughout, crammed full of ill-digested learning, and written in an odd style teenth century. It shows, however, on the writer's and extravagance of modern sentimental diction, with a wearisome imitation of the style of the sixpart a laudable effort at describing, not only the outward aspect of a bygone time, but also the sentiments specially characteristic of a state of M. de Martincourt, the chief personage in the book, is civilisation differing from our own. vigorously pourtrayed, and leaves a lasting impression on the imagination.

But the historical novel is an anomaly even at its best, and M. Gilbert Thierry is hardly justified in his desire to bring it back to life. Can any historical novel bear comparison with actual history, history when it is well and vividly written? Camille Desmoulins, by M. J. Claretie, is a striking proof of the truth of this. Such a life is in itself a romance. This young genius, with his easy, careless, fantastic, generous temperament, throws himself with all the impetuosity of youth into the turmoil of the revolution. He leads the populace to the taking of the Bastille; by his pen he contributes as much as any to hasten on events and make them bloodier, more violent, more irreparable; he rouses the people to the assault of the Tuileries on August 10, 1792; he stands by and sees the September massacres going on; not satisfied with having been one of the most active abettors in the death of the king, he labours to bring about the fall of the Girondins, their trial and final sentence. After which a horror of all the massacres and bloodshed comes

upon him, a sudden revulsion of feeling takes place, and he becomes an eloquent and fervent advocate of clemency. He enlists in the new cause with the same generous impetuosity with which he had served the old, and tries to stem the torrent he himself had let loose, but it is too late, and he in his turn is dragged off and dies for having preached the new doctrine of gentleness and humanity. In the middle of this tempestuous