pathies which regulate even his most elemental We may take these words and apply them to WILLIAM WATSON. of the past. But, so far as Mr. Harrop's enjoying the family estates and of acquiring information is concerned, the only acknow- other landed property, it was not long before ledgment of the assistance which he has his ungratified ambition impelled him to the received from the writer in the Albemarle strongest opposition to the Whig Minister. Street review is a scanty reference in a foot- There was, says Bolingbroke's latest biogranote. Such a neglect must damage the pher, no ingratitude in such conduct, The general opinion of an historian's labours. It "two-thirds" reversal of the attainder was creates a doubt whether the omission is not only wrung unwillingly from Walpole, and due to his desire to acquire a reputation for the third portion could not be obtained from originality to which he is not legitimately him either by personal adulation or by offers entitled; and such a conclusion is particularly of political support. Some of the brightest undesirable in this instance, as a careful pages of Mr. Harrop's study will be found to examination of Mr. Harrop's volume will lie in his characters of the less prominent furnish conclusive proofs that he has studied men of light and leading at this era. He the politics of Queen Anne's age with laud- takes especial pleasure in setting forth the able zeal. It may not be possible to accept talents of Shrewsbury, and in guessing at the Bolingbroke: a Political Study and Criticism. all his conclusions as articles of faith. We motives by which his conduct was animated By Robert Harrop. (Kegan Paul, Trench, may, for instance, question the correctness of when he depressed the Whigs, or displaced & Co.) his view that "the management of the navy Bolingbroke from power at the death of the THERE is much to attract and there is much was the weak place in Godolphin's Ministry." Queen. He brings out the important part to repel in Mr. Harrop's work. Its main The aim of that Minister and his colleagues which Hanmer played in defeating the aims principles will probably draw forth the un- was to strike home at the French King with of his old friends, which seemed to indicate qualified approbation of the majority of his all their force through his frontiers towards any aversion to the Hanoverian succession. countrymen, but even those who are prepared Flanders; and they cared but little if, whilst But the least-known of all Mr. Harrop's pets to yield their assent cannot but confess their this took place, the baggage of a Secretary of in politics is Arthur Moore, the financier. To regret at the presence of some serious draw-State was carried into Dunkirk. But the Moore he recurs again and again, until at backs. Many of its pages are written with exploits of the navy under Godolphin's Ad- last he bursts out in a special foot-note-these clearness of style and with terseness of ex-ministration presented a happy contrast to notes seem to contain the most recent conpression, and in their perusal no feeling of those of the Ministry which sent out the clusions of Mr. Harrop's study-with the dissatisfaction arises to mar the reader's enjoy- ill-fated expedition to Quebec. We may remark that "a Life of Moore, written with ment. Not unfrequently, however, he finds doubt the propriety, in discussing Walpole's adequate knowledge, would be a most interhimself confronted, to his dismay, with sen- financial measures, of implying that to him is esting contribution to the secret history of tences of portentous length and ambiguous due the consolidation of the State's obliga- the eighteenth century." If this is the conmeaning; and this defect becomes doubly tions into a general three per cent. stock-viction of Mr. Harrop, a feeling of duty to annoying when it follows on the recollection of a measure which he defeated when it was the world should urge him to undertake the many passages-as, for instance, those on the brought forward by Sir John Barnard, and task at once; and we would hope that on its position of the essayist and pamphleteer in the which he left for his successors to carry out. completion we may be able to praise the time of Queen Anne-which are expressed But, when every deduction is made, the fact result without reservation. with clearness and liveliness. If, as will remains established beyond doubt that this probably be the case, Mr. Harrop should volume is not the result of a few hours' perfollow up this study of the brilliant Boling- functory skimming of modern writers. broke with similar essays on other statesmen of the same period, he will increase the number of his readers, and add to their happiness, by reducing his style to greater simplicity. A latitudinarian divine once pointed out to Queen Caroline, the wife of George II., a fault which he wished her to correct. The Queen expressed her thanks for the advice, but intimated her desire to know which was the second fault that she ought to remove; whereupon the courtly minister "smiling put the question by" with the remark that he should be happy to tell her when he found that the first was corrected. With this example before him, Mr. Harrop may plead that one defect is sufficient for a single reviewer to point out, or for a biographer to correct, in writing his second book. But, in spite of this plea, we venture to point out the second defect in his method of work, and that is the insufficient mention which he makes of the labourers who have ploughed in the field of the Augustan era before him. The theory which he examines and amplifies in the opening pages is the theory which Lord Stanhope put forward many years ago; but the name of that courteous historian finds no place in Mr. Harrop's criticism. It needed not the evidence of a letter in a literary journal to tell the world that any student of Bolingbroke's varied career would naturally consult the articles which appeared in the Quarterly Review a few years ago, and that the conclusions of the essayist on the statesman's conduct would influence his estimate Mr. Harrop discusses the measures and principles of Bolingbroke with a keen sympathy for the policy of the Whig statesmen of the period; but with no deep-rooted prejudices against their Tory opponents. The oft-debated Treaty of Utrecht is, as might be expected, analysed with thoroughness and unsparingly condemned in its main provisions; the tortuous methods by which the clandestine negotiations with the French King were carried on, and the inadequacy of the terms obtained, in consequence of these underhand intrigues, by the allies of England have never been laid bare with greater force than in this volume. But even after this exhaustive exposure of a peace of which no one could feel proud, though most Englishmen were wearied unto death of the contest which it ended, Mr. Harrop is sufficiently just to point out that the treaties were not "more directly favourable to the exiled House than the provisions agreed to at Ryswick by William himself. He doubts even if either of the Tory leaders during the Queen's reign was really desirous of securing the restoration of the Pretender; he only suspects that Bolingbroke regarded such a design as one which might be forced upon him at some future period, and for which he must impress the Jacobites with the conviction that his heart was in their cause. This is no isolated instance of candour on Mr. Harrop's part. Bolingbroke, with the sullen acquiescence of Walpole, found himself not only at liberty to return from exile, but with the power of When W. P. COURTNEY. SCHOOL EDITIONS OF GERMAN CLASSICS. Goethe.-Götz von Berlichingen. H. A. Bull. Edited by Heine.-Selections from the Prose Writings. the teachers who have long recognised German as affording . . . the linguistic training of which Latin and Greek have been supposed to hold a monopoly." With the views and aims thus set forth we cordially sympathise. We believe, too, that their realisation must be chiefly the work of Englishmen-men possessed of influence in the schools and universities, and qualified by their English training, and their objective analytic study of the modern languages, to understand and meet the requirements of the English student of the same. Hence we received these volumes, so to speak, with open arms, and entered upon the examination of them with something of sanguine expectation. There is no escaping a frank confession that we have been a good deal disappointed. That they do not lack good points of their own is only what we should have expected from the names of their editors. The experience of the teacher has often added to the practical usefulness of the notes. To Mr. Colbeck, in particular, must be conceded the merit of having grasped his subject as a whole, with the life in it, and of having brought to his task the literary versatility which is certainly one of the necessary qualifications of an editor of Heine. We purpose, however, to confine our attention chiefly to the linguistic notes; and here we too often miss the accuracy of scholarship, and the practical acquaintance with the results of philological research, which we felt justified in expecting from books announced under such auspices. Nay, more, we shall have to show that they contain not a few serious and almost unaccountable errors, such as might well give to the most untrained of Germans teaching their native language in England occasion to triumph over their English rivals, and to throw discredit upon the German scholarship of Englishmen. Let us proceed to look at a representative selection from the lengthy list of notes we have marked for criticism. 66 relation, and the possessive pronoun is as = = hafter Kerl." Nor does he appear to be aware = Haben Sie es schriftlich ?" has no reference to "scriptural authority;" schriftlich, “in writing," "in black and white," is familiarly used to express complete certainty-e.g., "Das geb' ich dir schriftlich!" as a strong assevera tion. The meaning is simply an ironical "Are you quite sure of that?" P. 30, 1. 29, "Bücher worin . . . die Vernunft von ihrer eigenen Vortrefflichkeit renommiert," "supply wird." A finite form of sein or haben as auxiliary may be omitted in a dependent sentence, but not one of werden. Renommiert is indicative present, "reason brags of her own excellence." "Absatz haben" (p. 113, 1. 31), of wares, does not Let us now turn to Mr. Colbeck's larger mean to "run out," but abgehen, to "go and somewhat more fully annotated volume. "sell; off," nor does Absatz here mean Mr. Bull must surely be a despiser of dic- We would again expressly remark that in "pause," "intermission," but "sale," being tionaries. In the note to p. 45, 1. 18, he dwelling upon points where we have a the corresponding substantive to the verb renders "gewachsen wie eine Puppe," "with controversy with him we pass over many absetzen, to " dispose of," ""sell." "Herzog a complexion like." We should say "with a excellent notes, often, indeed, rather meagre, Ernst" (p. 12, 1. 19) is not "the friend of figure (Wuchs, growth, stature) like." Back- but containing useful information tersely put. John Frederick, Elector of Saxony...," but fisch (note to p. 60, 1. 4) does not mean With all Mr. Colbeck's sense of humour, he the hero of the well-known "Volksbuch" of "hoyden," country girl," but is simply a has occasionally missed Heine's jokes in a the same name. We do not think that Mr. playful term for a still growing girl at the way that must amuse himself. He takes, Colbeck would have sought any fartherage when she is supposed to become interest- for instance, entirely en sérieux Heine's fetched explanation of Heine's Kaiseraktionen ing, sweet seventeen" or earlier. On humorous coinage Relegationsräthe. And (p. 131, 1. 18) if the old Haupt- und Staatsp. 73 Lerse says, "Von Jugend auf dien can there be any doubt that by fusstrittdeut- actionen, of which Heine was probably thinkich als Reitersknecht und hab's mit manchem licher (p. 118, 1. 18) Heine meant to indicate ing, had occurred to him. And has Mr. Ritter aufgenommen." Mr. Bull's note is the itching desire of his feet to give the Colbeck any authority for "the verb action"aufgenommen, taken service with."" Is professor a kick? On the other hand, we niren, 'to speculate with shares""? We Mr. Bull really unacquainted with the familiar think Mr. Colbeck will find that his "later can nowhere find a trace of it, and are acphrase "es mit Einem aufnehmen" (es meaning" of wohlbestallt (p. 7, 1. 9), "sleek," quainted only with actioniren, "to bring an die Fehde, den Kampf, or the like; cf. "den "well tended," is a ghost of his own imagina- action against." To sum up briefly a few Handschuh aufnehmen"), to break a lance or tion, apparently conjured up by a mistaken other points upon which we are at issue with measure one's strength with someone, to etymology. On p. 34, 1. 9, dann curiere Mr. Colbeck. Notizen are not "annotations," prove oneself his match, &c.? P. 88, 1. 3, er sich mit nüchternem Speichel" is ren- but memoranda, notes jotted down; and Alle Vortheile gelten" is translated "all dered ". . . with a diet of abstinence." We Heine's Notizenstolz is pride in undigested advantages tell," instead of "are allowed" have here, without doubt, a reference to the fragments of knowledge. Unhaltbarkeit is not or "lawful "—just as in a game one player vulgar superstition which attributes curative "inconsistency," but "untenableness;" Gecries to another, "Das gilt nicht!" P. 2, virtue to the saliva secreted before a man has staltenreichthum is not "wealth of literary 1. 24, ausgerieben is explained as "durch-broken his fast. P. 44, 1. 29, "Und sie (die form," but profusion of figures-i.e., persons, prügelt;" what Mr. Bull means is durchge- Kälber) wandeln stolz gespreizt;" "gespreizt, characters. We do not think any German prügelt. P. 12, 1. 16, "'s ist es ist; South-striding.'" Spreizen never implies forward ever yet said "Mir ist am besten zu Muthe;" German dialect." Just as little as "it isn't movement, but simply the spreading out, or while no one would hesitate to say "Mir ist is South-English dialect. P. 4, 1. 5, "wann holding wide apart-e.g., of the legs or fingers; heute viel wohler." Nor can nach Geburt man sie nit bezahlt, thun sie dir keinen gespreizt is here used with adverbial rather Christi be admitted as correct German Streich;" "ihm and not dir should strictly than verbal force, mit gespreizten Beinen, for nach Christi Geburt. In adverbs like correspond to man." Mr. Bull does not see indicating the awkward straddle of a cow's hordenweis, in which the first element is a that dir is the ethical dative: see his own cor- gait. P. 62, 1. 6, "Kamel, according to the substantive, this alone is in the genitive; rect remark on p. 128, 1. 21. P. 21, 1. 3, great authority, the Burschikoses Wörter-weise is an original accusative. We must "dem Polacken..., dem ich sein. . . gekräu- buch,' is student slang for 'a savage.' Mr. confess ourselves to be quite puzzled as to selt Haar verwischte;' "sein is re- Colbeck seems to have no suspicion of the any connexion, etymological or otherwise, dundant, and we should have expected das." fact that ein Wilder is itself a slang term for between "train-oil" and "in train," the Mr. Bull is here fairly on the grammatical student who is not a member of any Ver- French en train, from Latin trahere. Mr. tread-mill; dem is a dative of interest or bindung, and then generally for a "philister- Colbeck will find his second and better thoughts a = 6 on Eins in Unsereins confirmed, and the whole HENRY JAMES WOLSTENHOLME. Illustrated Guide of the Orient Line of Steamers between England and Australia. Issued by the managers, F. Green & Co., and Anderson, Anderson, & Co. (Maclure & Macdonald.) ALTHOUGH this sumptuous volume is modestly entitled an "Illustrated Guide," it is in reality a series of excellent articles on the route between England and Australia, the whole forming a work of considerable literary merit. It is edited by the Rev. W. J. Loftie, who also contributes chapters on the mother country and on Egypt; and he has been assisted in the work of compilation by Mr. George Baden Powell, Commander T. A. Hull, Mr. H. E. Watts, formerly editor of the Melbourne Argus, Dr. Charles Creighton, and other writers, all of whom are acknowledged authorities on the subjects with which they specially deal. The illustrations are both interesting and artistic; and the maps, diagrams, and astronomical plates give the results of the latest scientific researches. It was a theory of ancient geographers that continents balanced each other, and George Canning alluded to this in the well-known speech in which he summoned "a new world to redress the balance of the old." But he little thought that within half a century from his day the remote island of New Holland, as it was then called, would afford a home to three millions of colonists, almost all of them of British birth or descent. The great Australasian colonies are, indeed, advancing with such gigantic strides that it is daily becoming more and more difficult to keep pace with them; and there is no doubt that the facilities of communication afforded by the enterprise of the managers of the "Orient Line" have encouraged, and will continue to encourage, the growth of a variety of new and important industries by enabling many and heroine finally together when he limb all but total. GEORGE T. TEMPLE. Indian Mutiny broke out, so that we are in 1884 at starting, and the narrative is carried on for more than two years farther. Next, there is the mistake made of so describing the ruins in the parish of Kirby as to point definitely to Fountains Abbey as the place intended, and of drawing a most unflattering portrait of its noble owner, not as an incompetent public servant, put in a post far beyond his abilities, but as a clever, but illconditioned, person. The characters are all conventional lay-figures, especially the hero and heroine, both entirely commonplace, though he is intended to be the model intellectual and active parson, and she a romantic and highly wrought creature, all loveliness and intellect. Another young lady, active, learned, clever, and practical, is set up as a foil to this ethereal being; but we are told that she has the faults of being ever so slightly under-bred and vulgar, which detract from her admirable qualities. This is so; but what the author has failed to observe is that precisely the same fault attaches to all the other ladies in his story, the ideal heroine herself and Lord Kirby's two daughters. The lack of skill in composition is chiefly shown by an intolerably long monologue, in which the heroine discloses her life-secret to the parson and the second young lady, in which she devotes as much space to describing the Paris of the Second Empire and the effect the scenery of Guernsey had on her as to telling who and what she is and what happened to her. So, again, we are told that the Hon. Misses Lawson, though high-bred and graceful, are not pretty; but at the close of the last volume the elder is living in Brighton, the handsomest woman there; and whereas a good deal is made of a second marriage of Lord Kirby, and of the little boy whom the new Lady Kirby thinks to be heir, yet an elder brother is named at the very end as the only son. Still, the book is not by any means unreadable; and its interest lies neither in the characters nor in the plot, but in Mr. Rye's revelations of his own opinions and theories, and the sometimes vigorous language in which he expresses them. Two examples will suffice: "One of the curses of England is the cheap newspaper press. No more fruitful propagator of crime and wickedness of every kind has ever existed. It is not too much to say that modern newspapers do more harm than is counterbalanced by any benefits that the discovery of printing has given to the world." Radical majority is debating a Bill for surrendering Gibraltar, Malta, and Aden, and for dividing the fleet between France, Russia, and the Irish Republic (late the Land League), by flying up to a beam just under the ceiling of the House, waving a small Union Jack, and singing some verses of "The flag that braved," &c. Whereupon the Radicals repent, and walk into the Opposition lobby. There has been nothing like this-we do not say in history, even when Feargus O'Connor's crow spoiled a peroration of Sir Robert Peel's, but in fiction, since, in Anti-Coningsby, Coningsbys at the close of a parliamentary debate, jump, down Ben Sidonia's throat, and disappears for ever. Priest and Man is by an American writer, and even printed with American types, only the title-page being English. The author has got hold of a good subject, and has evidently obvious and modern sources of information been at the pains to read up some of the more touching Abelard, such as Victor Cousin and Charles de Remusat. But he is not at home in the country or the period, and the book Swarms with anachronisms, individually trifling, it may be, but destructive of the local colour expected from the writers of historical novels. Thus he makes the twin towers of Notre Dame visible a century before they were built; he puts a quotation from Isaiah into the mouth of a Gypsy fortune-teller; a presumably Norman-French student applaud an Arabo-Egyptian singer with "Viva la cantatrice!" he supposes that a priest at the beginning of the twelfth century might be known as Père Du Blois, and a middle-class woman as Madame Hildare, and that the Morgue and the juge de he makes London newspaper office, true to the life And there are single passages where the writing rises above its usual high level into something better still. Altogether, a noticeRICHARD F. LITTLEDALE. able book. SOME VOLUMES OF VERSE. ALL of the poems of the Poet Laureate that be cares to reprint-with the exception of his two last dramas-are published in a single volume at about six shillings. The complete works of Mr. Browning, according to a rough calcula tion, can only be bought in twenty-two volumes at the price of about six pounds. For this contrast there are no doubt good reasons, upon which we do not care to dwell. Our present object is to point out that Mr. Browning-or rather Mr. Browning's publisher-has at last been induced to issue at a more reasonable rate not the complete works, but the two series of selections which the poet himself formed some course, will not be content with selections; but ten years ago. The Browning student, of the general public, which contains a vast number of Browning students in posse, has no longer any excuse for saying that Browning is beyoni their means. If anyone must have but one volume only, he will not do wrong in getting the first of the two. Messrs. Smith, Elder, & volume has been reduced from 7s. 6d. to 3s. 6d. Co. are the publishers, and the price of each W. Allingham. Day and Night Songs. New Blackberries picked off Many Bushes. By Edition. (Philip.) Mr. Allingham's new volume might have been called Everybody's Birthday Book, for there must be very nearly three hundred and sixty-five little poems, verses, Whether one agrees with this judgment or not, at any rate it is vigorously put, though it lacks the epigrammatic neatness of Longfellow's apophthegm in "Kavanagh," speaking of the United States-"This country is not priest-ridden, but press-ridden." The other remark is in a different key, and truer to paix (the latter an invention of Napoleon 1.) these wayside reflections of a poet as he facts: Tommy Upmore is the least successful work Mr. Blackmore has yet given to the world. He has, on the one hand, tried to make it a political satire (a class of literature for which his genius is in no way adapted), and, on the other, the conceit upon which the story, such as it is, turns, is a very frigid one-the physical peculiarity of the hero, defined as "meiocatabarysm," or bodily lightness, which enables him to scud before a favourable wind, and even, some three or four times in the book, to mount into the air and fly. That Mr. Blackmore manages to say amusing things in his own quaint, if now mannered, way is doubtless true; and that he does but express the sentiments of many of his contemporaries in his strictures on the measures and policy of the present Government is true also. But his hand is not light enough for satire, and Tommy Upmore actually reads as though it were a clever caricature of its author's least admirable peculiarities, written by someone with more humour than good nature. were familiar institutions at the time. He thinks that Héloise got her name as "God's child," being an orphan, and perhaps imagines a Hebrew root for it; the fact, of course, being that it is the feminine form of the familiar Chlodowig, which takes so many allied shapes, and in all means "holy fame." But some of the episodes in the stormy and there is movement in the subsidiary career of Abelard are described with vigour, story of his imaginary pupil, Felix Radbert, so that, faulty as the book is, it is not with out flashes of interest. My Ducats and My Daughter is a book of much higher quality than the ordinary novel of the season. It is written in clear, flowing, idiomatic English; the plot, without being trite and commonplace, is consistent and probable; there are three or four very well drawn characters in it, especially Mr. Ingleby, the narrow, rigid, conscientious Puritan, supremely convinced that he knows better than anyone else, but as hard on himself as on others. The speculator Arden, and the able Liberal editor Mallory, with his private. creed of Positivism, and his business-like recognition that it would not pay to bring it into the columns of a London daily, are also good portraits, as is, in addition, Camilla Arden, a complex nature, ably drawn. There is some very clever political writing in the The crisis of the story, to which all the pre-book (contrasting forcibly with Tommy Upfatory details about the hero's buoyancy are more), and the humours of a Scottish election meant to lead up, is extravagant without being are skilfully hit off. There is also a vivid amusing. He saves the country, when the description of the interior arrangements of a or verselets here put together, suited to many minds and moods. The title, which sounds at first somewhat fanciful, is not altogether inappropriate, although a fruit of more piquant flavour would best indicate the nature of journeys through life. A less rustic title, too, might have been happier, since in "Blackberries" Mr. Allingham deals more with the world of thought and action than with out-ofThis little book door life and country scenes. is very interesting as a perfectly sincere, outspoken-some may perhaps say, too outspoken is no echo, of one who sees into the heart of things -record of the daily cogitations of a mind which and under a careless guise are to be found for himself. It is, in many senses, a man's book words of counsel, insight, and admonition, utterances of a moralist who would fain see the world wiser and better. Those who cavil at the form of these verses (too short, too long, too plain, too pointed, they are sure to be called by one and another) should dwell on their meaning. A meaning is always there, and often put very happily. Take the following: "You cannot see in the world the work of the Poet's pen, Yet the Poet is master of words and words are masters of men." Here is a delicious epigram of quits other kind: Oh what is gone from us we fancied ours?" Things New and Old. By E. H. Plumptre. (Griffith & Farran.) The sound scholarship, wide humanity, and fluent verse of Dean Plumptre are well known; and in this little book of poems-"the autumn gleanings of a vintage late "-they are all put in evidence. The Dean's muse shows better in longer than in shorter poems; his verse is fluid and equable and well-sustained; but it is little elaborated, and thus it is excellently suited for story, telling. Of the tales in this volume" Adrastos is the best; it is full of the pity and fear that come from watching the shadow of Ate darkening fair lives. "The Emperor and the Pope tells in smooth, rhyming octosyllables the story of Trajan and the importunate widow and of Here is Gregory's intercession for his soul. a fragment from it about the "angli angeli": "He saw and pitied; gems and gold, From out the Church's treasures old, In fullest tale of weight he told, And gave their price, and set them free, Heirs of Christ's blessed liberty. And now they followed, slow and calm, Each bearing branch of drooping palm, Each lifting high a taper's light, And clad in vestments pure and white; And they with voices soft and slow, As streams 'mid whispering reeds that flow, Still sang in mournful melody That sad, unchanging litany, 'O miserere, Domine.'" "Vasádavatta: a Buddhist Idyll," "Chalfont S. Giles," and "Bedford are tales in blank verse, written with taste, but with a want of variety in the pause, and a tendency to recur to well-worn phrases, such as "not for him" at the end of the line (we should not like to reckon up how many times "chance and change" comes in the volume). The sonnets are all interesting. They have one great merit of sonnets, that they are wholes, and run easily; but why do several of them end in an Alexandrine? The best is that called "Drifting," a political sonnet, dated 1867. The pro and con of the Ritual question is argued in two sonnets. The Church Association side rather strays from truth when it speaks of "Prayers in a speech that none can understand" and "Teaching that neither heart nor brain employs." The "In Memoriam poems are numerous, but contain nothing noteworthy. The Hymns run remarkably well. We have also received from the same publishers new editions of two other volumes of Dean Plumptre's poems-Lazarus and Master and Scholar. His Under a Fool's Cap. Songs by Daniel Henry, jun. (Kegan Paul, Trench, & Co.) It takes much wisdom, says the proverb, to make a fool. At least it takes some pathos and some humour and some fancy and a ready gift of rhyming; and these are gifts with which Mr. Daniel Henry is certainly endowed. method is to take a nursery rhyme by way of text-some be quotes, we regret to see, from a revised version-and spin a poem out of it. We have read these poems with a great deal of pleasure. In some cases, we have said the pathos is a little too ready, or the rhythm a little too lame; but in many cases we have been altogether pleased. The poems are not quotable in single verses; indeed, they are hardly quotable at all. The reader must start fair with the text, and then follow on with the application. He must also come to the book with an inclination to be pleased, and then he will be pleased. Here is a passage from an ode cautioning "Burnie Bee" against certain deadly flowers: "He who ventures close to them, Tho' he touch but to the hem Of their garments as they swayTake your wings and fly away. "All things fair will pall on him, All but their lithe stems grow dim, All but their buds pale and gray— Take your wings and fly away. "And his soul-fire-crown'd and shod— Will go sorrowing like a God Fallen from the stars astrayTake your wings and fly away." Ishtar and Izdubar, the Epic of Babylon. Vol. I. By Leonidas Le Cenci Hamilton. been known by his works on Mexico; he now (W. H. Allen.) Mr. Hamilton has hitherto comes forward as an archaeological poet. He has endeavoured to reconstruct the ancient epic of Babylon, adapted, of course, to modern tastes, from the translations given by Assyrian scholars of the fragmentary tablets belonging to it. With these he proves himself to be well acquainted, and to have studied them with laudable zeal. How far he has been successful in throwing them into a poetical dress it is difficult to say. His rhymes are not always perfect; he has an over-great partiality for the word " grand;" and the way in which he introduces Assyrian and Accadian words into his verses is, to say the least, extremely odd. At the same time, the poem possesses both spirit and imagination; and, if it directs the attention of the literary world to the oldest epic of which we know, it will not have been composed in vain. Three Hundred English Sonnets. Edited by David M. Main. (Blackwood.) This little book, which is tastefully got up as to printing and binding, may be called a condensed edition of the same editor's Treasury of English Sonnets. Fresh sonnets are included, and the bulky notes are omitted. The former can hardly be considered a very material addition, except as regards the sonnets of Rossetti. The absence of the with ana. receive a new sonnet by Hartley Coleridge with a good deal of pleasure, and think it vastly more valuable than the two playful poems that Mr. Caine discovered in the Lake country. We are sorry that Lord Hanmer's fine "Pine Woods " has not found a place, and we are yet more disappointed to miss Longfellow's extremely beautiful "Nature." There is reason to think that Longfellow considered this sonnet the best of his shorter poems. We are at a loss to know how an editor generally so discriminating could have printed Sydney Dobell's "No Comfort and omitted his magnificent "Army Surgeon." We think Lord Beaconsfield's " Wellington" is superior to John Forster's "Dickens." We are sorry not to see Poe's "Silence," which, although it has fifteen lines, is as certainly a sonnet as Hood's poem on the same subject. Moreover, Mr. Main knows that the tail is a legitimate addition to the sonnet in Italian--and why not in English? We are disappointed that we cannot find Charles Whitehead's "Even as yon lamp," which is, in our judgment, among the finest sonnets ever penned. Mr. Main properly gives to S. L. Blanchard "Hidden Joys," which Lord Houghton was tempted to attribute to Keats. The selection from Rossetti is excellent, yet it includes the sonnets on "Chatterton " and on "Oliver Brown," both painfully laboured works, and excludes that on the Last Three at Trafalgar," which is, perhaps, as free, as lucid, and as vigorous and impassioned as Milton. Mr. Main alludes to certain emendations by Mr. Hall Caine in Isaac Williams's sonnet not a World' as disastrous; but Mr. Caine's version was, at the time it appeared, the only one that rhymed and scanned, and it remains in all respects equal to Mr. Main's later version. Arthur O'Shaughnessy's Her Beauty" is said to be from the poet's posthumous volume. It was written for Sonnets of Three Centuries, and contains the corrections (from the rough draft which was all the author left behind him) of the editor of that book. Mr. Main gives us another long note on Blanco White's Night." Touching a good deal that has been said by other writers on one "fatally disenchanting line" in that sonnet, we have recently received from Mr. 66 Heed William Davies, author of Songs of a Wayfarer, the following emendation, which he remembers to have seen in early printed copies of the latter does not involve a very sensible loss. The Mr. Main's notes were often valu- sonnet: "Whilst flower and leaf and insect stood revealed." Mr. Main should make a note of this. MR. WADDINGTON'S English Sonnets by Living Writers (Bell) has, we are glad to see, reached a second edition, and the editor has taken the opportunity of adding ten sonnets. these are by Mr. Theodore Watts, three by Mr. W. S. Blunt, and two by Miss Mathilde Blind, who Four of first were all unrepresented in the edition. Mr. Watts's" Wood-hunter's Dream," Mr. Blunt's "To the Bedouin Arabs," and Miss Blind's "The Dead " We observe with some surprise that the reader is still informed by the Preface that the volume contains only 178 sonnets a statement which Mr. Waddington would find it hard to support. It is our misfortune, rather than his fault, that at least two of his writers are no longer are valuable additions. A scheme admitting living writers must have |