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ULLIVAN'S “NEW IRELAND."*—When we say that this book is thoroughly Irish, everybody will expect something clever, lively, and amusing, and he must indeed be a dull reader who finds that expectation disappointed. But "New Ireland" is something more than a refreshment for the jaded novelreader. We confidently recommend the book to every student of politics. But, in order to raise no false hopes, let us say at once that it is valuable for the materials it contains, not for the manner in which those materials are put together, or for the inferences which are based upon them. It is a series of sketches, not a history or a political treatise. And this is due, to a great extent, to the rapidity of the composition. No book ever bore more unmistakable marks of haste. The self-evident blunders with regard to dates are possibly due to the printer; but the looseness of style, arrangement, and reasoning are, of course, Mr. Sullivan's; and, in a writer of his ability and experience, they can only be accounted for by the importunity of a publisher joined to the growing pressure of public business. Mr. Sullivan's object is to bring before us the great changes in the social condition and political feelings of the Irish people since the days of O'Connell. The means he employs are a number of scenes, strung together in semi-chronological order, and representing now Irish life and now prominent events in recent Irish history. These scenes are of very various interest. Some are of great, and some of very little, importance; some, it must be confessed, of no importance whatever. It is hard to see for whose benefit Mr. Sullivan dragged in by the ears the story of the "Arbuthnot Abduction," unless he feared-a not unreasonable fear-that the sensational novel was dying of a want of incident.

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But though "New Ireland" is imperfect as a history, and sketchy even as a picture of manners, the author shows not only keen insight, but some yet more rare and valuable qualities. Mr. Sullivan's tone in dealing with the delicate subject of the differences between England and Ireland is both kindly and wise. is far juster to England than the majority of his countrymen. He gives us full credit for our good intentions-for our late but hearty repentance for the misgovernment of centuries; and only blames us-alas! how truly-for the want of sympathy, the ungraciousness which has marred even our good deeds.

"The English are just, but not amiable." In spite of all our fairness, nay, generosity, to other nations, we are intensely disliked. And who can wonder at it who observes the slightly contemptuous manner with which we temper even our kindness, because we cannot enter into the feelings of the stranger, upon whom that kindness is from a sense of duty conferred? With a highly sensitive people like the Irish that air of superiority (which finds its worst expression in the detestable sermonizing of the newspapers) has been sufficient to counteract the effect of many practical benefits. But perhaps we should rather rejoice than lament over a declining evil.

Most joyfully do we read every word that Mr. Sullivan says about the increasing respect and sympathy of Englishmen for the feelings of their fellow-citizens across the Channel. He sees in it a good omen for the cause of Home Rule. We see in it an influence which will make Home Rule unnecessary. But the growth of such sympathy is of more importance than the fulfilment of either hope.

* New Ireland. By A. M. Sullivan, M.P. London: Sampson Low & Co. 1877.

on special episodes in his life, as "Rabelais à la Basmette;" "Rabelais à Montpellier," a work which preserves and reproduces by photograph any document or scrap bearing his name in the archives of the University; "Rabelais à Meudon," and so on. And it is not long since a great architect thought it no waste of time to reconstruct that Abbey of Thelema which Rabelais so minutely and carefully describes.

M. Fleury has the merit of approaching the subject in an entirely novel manner, one which is so simple that we are surprised to find it new. He first gives what details are known of the life of Rabelais, and then proceeds to take his readers straight through the several books of Gargantua and Pantagruel, omitting nothing but what must be omitted; and explaining, as from a professorial chair, the origin, meaning, and aim of each episode as it occurs. The book is in fact a series of lectures on the subject. The lecturer brings to his task a large share of that common sense which makes good French criticism the best criticism in the world; he is not an enthusiast or a partisan; he has had the industry to read a vast quantity of the Rabelaisian literature; and in his running commentary he is able to bring his own stores of knowledge to the clearance of the many difficulties which the obscurities and local allusions of the original constantly present to the ordinary reader. The result is that, for the first time, this author is accessible to the general public. There is no longer any necessity to wade through the uncouth and exaggerated coarseness of Urquhart, nor to attempt the extremely difficult task of reading Pantagruel in the original, for we can now read him, with understanding and with ease, in the pages of M. Fleury.

The book ought to clear away a good deal of the rubbish which has been freely shot over the name and work of this great French writer. Above all, the absurdity of looking for contemporary figures in the characters of Pantagruel and his followers, should be finally buried and put away. Nor should those writers obtain any more a hearing who, endeavouring to seem wiser than their neighbours, hint at deep and hidden mysteries in the book, only to be revealed to the initiated. The imagined riddle of Rabelais has before now been shown, but never so clearly as by M. Fleury, to be as illusory as the philosopher's stone, and readers may now enter upon the study of the Pantagruelian philosophy in the great Trésor which contains it, without fear of meeting any more difficult teaching than the praise and magnifying of common sense.

There is, naturally, little that is new in the book to a student of Rabelais and his period, but even those who think they know their author profoundly will be astonished to find how many points they have missed, how many good things they have hitherto passed over, and how much light local allusions, hitherto unexplained, give to the text. And no one, certainly, has given a clearer and more coherent interpretation of the voyage to the "Dive Bouteille" than M. Fleury.

In one point we totally disagree with him. M. Fleury makes an elaborate attempt to show that Rabelais was an orthodox Christian. We think it can be proved beyond a doubt from internal evidence alone, that his attitude of mind was that of a pure sceptic. How, indeed, could the intimate friend of Dolet, Desperiers, and the band of scholars who gathered round Gryphe, the printer of Lyons, be other than a sceptic or an infidel? But of this union of scholars M. Fleury says next to nothing.

Perhaps the most important point brought out by the publication of this work is the fact, long contended by admirers of Rabelais, that the abominable coarseness of his book is not inherent but an appendage. He can be stripped of it. He stands before us, in M. Fleury's work, not as a grinning and capering buffoon, but dressed in his robes of Doctor in Medicine and Philosophy, with grave face, if with laughing eyes, and-with clean hands.

GLYNNE'S KENTISH CHURCHES.*-This book, containing nearly 350 pages of condensed information and detailed description, is part of a series of notes by the late Sir Stephen Glynne. The whole contains a survey of old parish churches throughout England and Wales, and comprises upwards of 5,530 of them. It is, as we understand from the preface, to be continued, if public interest in the present volume is found to justify the entire issue; and this seems highly probable. The work of taking the necessary notes on the spot extended over nearly the whole *Notes on the Churches of Kent. By the late Sir Stepben Glynne, Bart. Illustrated. London: Murray.

of the author's life, and we think it entitles him to equal credit as traveller, architect, and antiquary. No one could have collected these materials without acquiring a knowledge of England which must become more and more rare as railroads have their perfect work on our habits, and people grow accustomed to be carried at sixty miles in every dangerous minute, past all centres and interests except those of trade. We stand reproved before these descriptions, feeling somewhat more familiar with the churches of Nuremburg or Venice than with the ecclesiology of our native land. There is no help for it, and the history of Europe has its claims on all. Perhaps, had our author's interest in history been equal to his architectural knowledge, his book would have attracted a greater number of readers; and some hints of the associations connected with Upchurch, the Cray, and the Isle of Thanet, would have been most pleasing, without largely increasing the size of the volume. But it will always have its value for architects and antiquaries, and all who take interest, or are afflicted with a smattering, in either science; and it will give pleasure to all men of Kent, and their friends in the sheers, as the east countrymen persist in calling the rest of England. Only the older buildings, of date anterior to the Restoration, are dealt with; and Sir Stephen Glynne's chief aim was, to trace out and record old and original features; so that his descriptions are independent of partial or transient restorations (or mere defacements, where restoration has not yet supervened). They are supplemented by brief and excellent notes up to the date of publication, which we owe to the editors, the Ven. Archdeacon Harrison and the Rev. Canon Scott Robertson, Hon. Secretaries to the Kent Archæological Society. At Upchurch, for example, the complete and highly judicious restoration, under Mr. Blomfield and the Rev. B. St. John Tyrwhitt, is duly chronicled; and so it ought to be, for it has not displaced a single stone worth preserving, and it has restored to sight an early English wallpainting of great interest. Two or three words might, perhaps, have been added in the note, as to the interest of the great Roman potteries in the neighbourhood, which are mentioned in Mr. Green's "History of the English People."

The illustrations are good plain woodcuts, and well-chosen: we may instance those of Hawkhurst church* in particular, though the church appears of disproportioned length at p. 80. It is very gratifying to find that the restorations which come under Sir Stephen Glynne's observation seem to have given him satisfaction in most instances.

We fear that, as the new time grinds the old smaller and smaller, the honourable race of field antiquaries, who went to see things for themselves, and took their time and peaceful pleasure in their work, must diminish or become extinct, or expatriate at all events. Handbooks, woodcuts, and photographs, do much and have great value, especially the latter; but an English antiquary, who loves England, and her less grand or sumptuous edifices, and so gives much of his life to their records, has done something to deserve the thanks of his countrymen, and ours are due to the memory of the author of this volume.

ESTELLE.-The grace, the artistic colouring, and the happy blending of playfulness and pathos in this charming story are a sufficient raison d'être to need no other, yet it is evident that another exists in the author's desire to present a picture, at once faithful and attractive, of modern English Judaism. In the household of Dr. Hofer-his ancestors had been Von Hofers once, in Denmark-we are introduced to a Jewish family who impress a friend not of their race as "refined, well-bred, educated, with just that freshness of idea, and peculiarity of principle, and firmness of faith, that heightened their charm, and added piquancy." The Jews are indeed a "peculiar people," seems the view the author would urge upon us, in that they have a descent, and solemn memories, and sacred traditions and customs, in which a stranger can have no part; still, as the heroine, Estelle Hofer, claims for her people, they are not to be considered "only from that point of view that beholds us as if we were fine or funny pictures. We should be judged apart from adventitious aids of tents and palm-trees now, surely. We are in, and of, England." Very skilfully has the author arranged the details of her story, so as to bring out this main idea of a Jewish household clinging closely to their ancient faith, and proud of the heritage they have received from their sires, yet sharing in the intellectual and artistic life around them, in which, of course, it is the influence of

* From an account in the Archæologia Cantiane, by the vicar, the Rev. Canon Jeffrev.
Estelle. By the Author of "Mercer's Gardens," &c. 2 vols. London: G. Bell & Sons.

Christianity, not of Judaism, that is everywhere conspicuous. We find Dr. Hofer inhabiting a picturesque old mansion, known as "The Ivy House," bordering on the Close in the cathedral city of Stadchester—which, from certain allusions, we take it, stands for Canterbury-and from their earliest years his children have delighted to wander into the grey cathedral, listen to the organ, and admire the stained windows. The shy, sensitive Estelle, who cherishes deep down in her heart the hope, unbreathed to any one, of being one day a painter, practises herself in her beloved art, not only by sketching as she has the opportunity from nature, but by copying over and over again "every fold of the drapery, every tint and soft curve of her photographed Madonnas;" and her sister, the bright, wilful, wayward Alexina, or "Lexie," rejoices to exercise her bird-like gift of song on the grand music of the Catholic Church, somewhat astonishing her visitors with Cherubini's "O Salutaris!" and Rossini's "Pro peccatis." But, all the same, we are never allowed to forget that it is a Jewish household we are contemplating, and the author interests us much by some descriptions, beautifully executed in every way, of the observances and worship of the "peculiar people "-the lighting of the "Sabbath lamp," to be lighted “week after week, as the late afternoon or summer eve of Friday ushered in the day of rest; " the eating of the Passover; the "scant and spare" service of the synagogue with which the Jews have had to be content since the loss of their Temple; the solemn week of mourning for the dead, which had its origin, it is said, "when Joseph and his brethren threw themselves on the threshing-floor of Atad, and made a very great and sore lamentation' for seven days," on their road to inter their dead father in Canaan; and the fast of the month Ab, the anniversary of the destruction of the second Temple. But, although "Estelle " is to our thinking to be regarded as primarily a novel with a purpose, it is besides, considered as an ordinary story, one very perfect of its kind, full of human interest, and of fine and delicate touches of thought, observation, and humour. Estelle Hofer, the girl with a countenance "partly royal, partly mystic, inexpressibly sad and pathetic, and wholly attractive," and a mind which some one is made to describe as having been "fed on poetic visions, and nourished by overdrawn humility and restless aspirations," who for so long passes as commonplace, if not a little stupid, in her own home-circle, and her sister, the beautiful, impulsive "Lexie," whose wit is so ready, who is so enthusiastic in her admiration of selfsacrifice in theory, and so graciously and coaxingly selfish in practice, are heroines showing nothing less than genius, who will live long in the reader's memory. The twins, too, Ruth and Gabriel, are an admirable pair of children; the quaint, somewhat priggish Ruth, with her odd combination of shrewdness, self-importance, and simplicity, being a most entertaining little personage. Estelle's story we had better leave the reader to learn for himself. It is on the whole a sad one, for she misses her heart's desire; but then, as one of her friends, whose bodily infirmity has but quickened her spiritual perception, says, "for Estelle I never could imagine a life of joy," and the reader is made to feel this impression about her almost as clearly as Edith Craven. The book is one of high mark, bearing from end to end the distinct impress of culture; and let us add that many of the verses scattered through it, especially the lines "To Alexina at the Piano," and those on "The Sabbath of Trees,"-founded on an old Hebrew legend,-are graceful and of far more than ordinary merit.

JOHN ORLEBAR, CLK.*-This is a clever book, overflowing with animal spirits and good nature, and with very few unsatisfactory pages. As a whole, indeed, it is not satisfactory, because it wants unity, and it too much resembles a crowded note-book; but it abounds in felicitous raillery and allusion, and is now and then truly witty. The author writes always in undress, and often slides into something too much like flippancy. Yet it is easy to see that he is at bottom a serious man; that he is a cultivated one lies upon the surface. Some of the reviewers of Culmshire Folk" have made up their minds that he is an Irishman, and his manner of using the optative mood confirms this. The quotations with which he heads his chapters are far too numerous and too irrelevantly chosen. In these and in other parts of the book we see traces of carelessness. On page 84

the words

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"Comes the blind Fury, with the abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life"-

* John Orlebar, Clk. By the Author of Culmshire Folk. London: Smith, Elder & Co.

are attributed to Johnson, and towards the end of the story we are told that Burnham wood has come to Dunsinane. Again, the incidents of the narrative are as recent as they could well be, and yet we hear of one of the characters being threatened with transportation for life.

One Miss Arderne has a bad father and a bad step-mother; and between their wickedness and that of a lawyer, who is as bad as either, she is near being cheated of her inheritance and her social position. John Orlebar, a country clergyman, falls in love with her, and eventually she becomes his wife-the wicked people being discomfited of course. John Orlebar, who was never a clergyman with deep convictions of the sacredness or even genuineness of his function, renounces his position in the Church, and sets to work to play model landlord, and improve his tenantry. There is an unpleasant passage about the new social gospel, ending with this pleasantry :-" In Shakspeare's day there were sermons in stones, now we have them from sticks-that will account for a good deal." We hope the author of "John Orlebar" does not take that for a good or even a tolerable joke.

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Mr. R. H. Horne was told by Mr. Lewes that the true hero of his epic was not Orion but Akinetos. Mr. Lewes was in the right; and the true hero of this little novel is not Orlebar but Bishop Frizelle, who is very amusing:

"Would you say grace, my lord?"

"The bishop complied with the request, placing his hands lovingly over the covered dish while he did so, as though he were about to confirm it."

Soon after this John Bunyan came up in the conversation :

"I dare say,' said Orlebar, John Bunyan could mend a saucepan as well as he could write a chapter of Pilgrim's Progress.'

"I venture to differ from you, John. I can't help doubting that,' said the prelate. 'Somehow, I strongly suspect that he must have been but an indifferent tinsmith after all' (he was going to say tinker, but, being a bishop, he was justified in making this change); and I think you underrate Jeremy Taylor.''

The Bishop at one of his charistia, or episcopal dinners and receptions, is really clever; and so is the sketch of the guests at one of them, when they were all mixed up together, helter-skelter :

:

"The Reverend and youthful Decimus Stole, by some fortuitous concurrence found himself seated next to the Reverend Dr. Foxall, his rural Dean; who, on the only visit he had paid (in his official capacity) to Stole's vicarage, had been induced to spend the night there, instead of at the village inn; and, mistaking a holy water stoup at the head of his bed for a watch-pocket, had given his gold repeater a bath which did not serve it. "Parson Hallowes, one of the leaders of the Ultra Low party of his lordship's diocese, got settled down by the side of his sporting brother, Leggett, who on one occasion was reported to have given out the Collect for the last Sunday before the Derby,' and had thereby caused much scandal.

"The Reverend Luke Waters, the total abstainer, got close to old Jex Bibbins, who never even wore clerical costume except on such occasions as this, or on Sundays, and who was said to finish two bottles of port every night, and to go to bed fuddled; after saying his prayers in perfunctory fashion, by staggering up to a corner where he kept the family Bible, placing his hand upon it solemnly, and giving in his adhesion confidentially to the moral sentiments which it contained, by saying as distinctly as circumstances would allow-These-are-my-sheniments.'

All three of the anecdotes introduced into this sketch we have heard or read before; and the author's strokes of humour, though sometimes very good, are now and then of a kind which cannot be called choice: they are too much like the mere horse-play of common talk; the sort of jest you may laugh over at a street corner, but do not care to have in print. Miss Arderne, by-the-bye, would not have written a letter anything like the one which is attributed to her-it is the author's, not hers.

No part of the volume is more deserving of attention than that which takes us into Ireland. There is not much of it, but it is very instructive, and it leaves the reader with the impression that the author is right in suggesting that what the Irish want is to be pretty much let alone by "the Saxon"-because, as Dr. Stokes said, "the Saxon has no power of diagnosis."

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