s — -*' 3 ^ 9 = = ^ — THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES 1^ 1"+- -V- B^^^^^B^re?^ EAMBLES IN BOOKS Of the Five Hundred Copies printed this is No. Signed. Rambles in Books BY CHARLES F. BLACKBURN " Otnne solum J>atria" — Ov. LONDON: SAMPSON LOW MARSTON & COMPANY, LP St. Dunstan's House, Fetter Lane Fleet Street, E.C. mdcccxcih B5€>T PEEFACE. " Oil* xcritev excels at a plan or a title page, another ... is a dab at an index." — Goldsmith. What are books ? To some people, of course, they are nothing. To the author, they may be the vehicle of ideas which he desires to convey to his fellow-men. AV"hat are books to their owners ? Many will say, off- hand, " Something to read, to be sure ! " — as if the question were an absurd one. Roughly said, the uses of books are threefold — for reference, instantaneously to answer any question which may arise in the mind ; for reading, as books of narrative ; for mere amusement, as novels. More concisely put — a book is a source of knowledge or of pleasure. If memoirs are provided with indexes, they become books of reference, and thus the three kinds resolve themselves into two. The composer o£ this little volume has gone through the usual throes before settling its title. The " Pleasure of having books, shown from a collection of four hundred volumes " was the first attempt. This, though exactly designating its pui'pose, was too cumbrous. Then came " Journeys among books," modified afterwards to " Journeys in books." The last of these is truer than its predecessor, besides being a little shorter. But the word "journey^' has a flavour of business about it Wherefore " rambles " is better. A man who is on business may not ramble. A professional cataloguer, in the exercise of his calling, makes journeys among books, inasmuch as he works round them like a cooper round a 824 02G vi Rambles in Boohs. ciisk. The owner of a collection, who is merely amusing liimself, may *' ramble in his books/' and record the impressions derived from looking about him inside them. A new terror has been added to the selection, or invention (for it is that) of a title, by the bizarre names ■which are now attached to catalogues of books for sale. Suppose T hit upon the " Love of books " as indicating my object in these pages, I might be confronted by a pamphlet issued by a lover who periodically parades the objects of his affection, with prices attached — in order to get rid of them. The name of lover is often profaned in connection with books, possibly because those v/ho use it are incapable of more than a profane conception of lovers or of books. A lover is one, I imagine, for whom the mere neighbourhood of a beloved object is happiness. Thus far the form of words. For the aspect, a well- proportioned title-page is not unlike a tree in its expan- sion towards the top, and if the author is built like a stick, he or his name stands for the stem. The publish- ing house is the root whence the book springs, the source to which the public must go. A publication which has had immense vogue consists of the opinions of eminent men and women on the hundred books which are best worth reading by other people, ordinary mortals. That is very nice, of course. But how can a man of learned ease, sitting in a luxurious arm-chair, in his turkey-carpeted library, feel for the man who has to work all day ? The rich man lights a cigarette after breakfast, takes a turn in the garden, or a meditative stroll in the conservatory, according to the weather. Then he sits down quickly and writes " Plato " or *' Aristotle " as good for the working man to read by way of diversion from toil. I do not quite catch whether Rambles in Boohs. vii the persons who follow the advice of the various writers (or of merely one) are to read the books indicated for them and then pass on their way with whatever learning they have gained, or whether they are to buy the books so as to be able to read when they are minded. I observe that in one case provision has been made that the public shall be able gradually to obtain the selection at a moderate price. The hundred books which a man should get will cost him twelve pounds, as nearly as I can reckon it. The following pages are an account of a collection possessed by one person, as opposed to lists of books prepared by several persons for the guidance of many other persons. This actual library has grown about its owner during a period of eighteen or twenty years. When a man cannot go straightway and buy a book that he wants, he has to wait until it presents itself at a practicable price. And if he has only a certain amount of room in shelf and cupboard, it often happens that when one book is acquired, another must go. The owner has to determine, multum gemens, which can be spared with the least amount of pain. Then, again, one's taste changes ; a book which is ardently desired one day may be readily spared another day. Altogether, the collection has a certain resemblance to the human body, in which waste or rejection is made up for by continual assimilation. And thus, in a sense, this little library may be termed alive, in contradistinction to fossil collections which undergo no change from year to year. The wise tell us that we must not expect to have everything we like in this world, and some of us have I'onnd that out without assistance. This phase of life is illustrated here. The object, in fine, is to set forth viii Rambles in Boohs. something tliat is, rather than what might be. The ideal, that which is to be desired, has been plentifully dealt with elsewhere. When I hear of a man's possessing a " library," I am tempted to wonder what terras he is on with the books of which it is composed, what they " do for him," or whether they are mere simulacra of intelligent com- panionship. Human beings that we meet may bo acquaintances, friends, or companions. Books which stay in a man's house should not be mere passing acquaintances, they should at least be friends that he can go to when he has need of them. But they may be more — they may be companions that he can sit down with or Avalk about with, indefinitely. I think that every one who possesses books should be able to give an intelligible or intelligent reason for the presence of every book in his collection. This is attempted, here. Now and then, of course, books speak for themselves. About four hundred books is the area which has been rambled through again and again; amusement the one view with which they have been assembled. " How about books of reference ? " may be asked. To read intelligently books of the lighter order you must have heavier metal behind. I am surprised that private persons do not oftener print catalogues of their libraries. It would be a great amusement. " But a type-writer will do all you want," may be interjected. A type-writer will not enliven the titles by contrast of letterpress, as I have endeavoured to do in these pages. Besides the primary object of exhibiting the pleasure to be found in the possession of books, this little volume is an attempt to indicate how a private library catalogue might be printed. For example, everybody who has FamhJes in Boohs. ix attended to the matter knows that titles of books must be arrang-ed by their authors' names, or you will not quickly find them. But, iu ordinary life, in conversation apart from business, books are spoken of without men- tioning the authoi-'s name. We do not say, "Have you read Scott's Bride of Lammermoor, or Byron's Manfred, or Meredith's Vittoria P' but simply, "Have you read the Bride of Lnmrnermoor, or Manfred, or Vittoria ? " To add the author's names would be to suggest that your interlocutor did not know them. This being a catalogue of pleasure and not of business, the problem has been to give the names of books the first prominence while letting the alphabet be governed by the names of their writers. How this has been done will be seen by turning to any page. Printing the writers' nimes in the middle of a line has the great advantage of allowing them to run in the natural order. No one, I suppose, would prefer to set down, e.g. "Kingsley (Henry)" where he was equally free to say "Henry Kingsley." I confess I have rather caught at the chance of avoiding awkwardness or inelegance. One of the few amusing points about cataloguing is that with an unknown author's name you can never be sure whether it is the real name or merely a " purser's name." Here is a case. Ofi'er the following title to any one of ordinary acquaintance with books and request him to write an entry as for a catalogue — Au Dahomey, cortege IriompVial du roi Betanzinc, par Jexs Flinoot. Paris, 18i^2. Of course, he will write " Flingot " first, and " Flingot " becomes one of the glorious army of authors. But, unfortunately, flingot is merely soldiers' slang for a Rambles in Boohs. musket or rifle, what they fling- away in retreating from the enemy, as we read in the Debacle. I once earned my living-, or tried to earn it, by cata- loguing second-hand books for booksellers. To most people this will seem about the least inviting work that can be imagined. I confess to having shuddered at the idea of this "drudgery" day by day. Now, not being obliged to do it, it seems a most delightful occupation. It is within the reach of all. For every man's library (to use a word) is a collection of second-hand books — as he will find if he tries to sell them. To the young man I would say, " Catalogue your books." This is to cultivate their acquaintance. And let him note on paper, as he would say to a friend, why he procured them. If there is any difficulty in stating this, it shows that the volume in question dan make room when something desirable presents itself. You will often hear a man say he does not know what he has got, or whether he has a particular book. In a moment of uncertainty, go to the catalogue, and if that does not satisfy you, pull the books off the shelves or out of the cupboard and catalogue them again. It may be that the arrangement of the catalogue is defective or that the books defy rational inscription. The writer does not preach what he has not practised. Within about ten years he has made four catalogues of his collection. The lirst was merely a large sheet of paper folded into eight and stitched. This gave sixteen pages, which, headed 1, 2, 8, &c., indicated^ in a line for each, books which were piled in a cupboard in sixteen heaps. That was a geographical catalogue, indicating place ; in which heap. Later on, in a printed book, he gave a catalogue rai^oime^ where the books were presented alphabetically under the Rambles in Boolcs. xi most characteristic words of the title. A year or two ago, in a little town* on the Italian slopes of the Alps, the writer pasted down in alphabetical order, after cutting them up, the titles of a second manuscript catalogue. The material had been accumulating on square pieces of paper which contained the names of books as one came to them on the shelves. This catalogue was the germ of that which the reader has before him. Besides these, he once made the experiment of printing a catalogue of his books (there were then 250) on one page about twice the size of this. It was so arranged that, held one way, there seemed to be five shelves, and the varying lengths of the titles imaged the differing heights of the books. The guests at a well-assorted table brighten each other by contact. I have endeavoured that the few books which are here brought together shall do the same in a measure, and to make the entries of them in the catalogue bright by contrast of type. One or two points in the printing may be usefully noted. Parentheses about an author's name signify that, although it is known, it is not printed on the title-page of his book. Parentheses without a name signify that a book is what we call anonymous. If a contemporary author chooses to publish a book without his name, Avhile attaching it to other books, a cataloguer is bound to respect the anonymity. - Before the name of a book means that I do not possess it now. The place of anonymous books in the alphabet is generally determined by the leading word of the title — * The chief trouble was to loam tho Italian word for paste, tliat I might buy some. I had to a>ik thu landlady in Frencli, using the word 7ii/ucila'je, the nearest 1 could evoke. She answered, instantly, Pasta. xii Famhles in Boohs. as Englishman in Paris, Tkalatfa, &c. With foreign books, I have sometimes let the Englisli word which is most likely to be in the mind of a reader determine their position, as with Lij dernier des Napoleons, Trautmann's Oberammergan, and one or two more. The few notes in italics refer to technical points, and may have interest as coming from one who is obliged to consider such questions. Names of publishers are printed much as we hear them spoken. The dark letters show the colloquial names of books. Capital letters are only used where the words demand them. This is what the Germans do. They are scientific in writing and printing, as in other things. The reader will best understand what I mean when he sees an example of the ordinary abuse of capital letters — Martins. His Last Passion, London, 1888. Is there a reader who, not knowing the book, would not declare that to be the title of a religious work ? It is a sensational novel. If the words were printed as I should like to see them — Martins. His last passion. London, 1888. such misconception could scarcely arise. Sizes are not mentioned. They probably convey very little information to the lay reader. And of the experts, booksellei's use one mode of notation and ''scientific" librarians another. Besides, if the shelf on which a book should be found is indicated by a letter in the title in the 'catalogue, there is no real occasion for naming the size. Letters would be necessary where there are several series of shelves. In mj case, by standing at a central point, nearly every book can be reached with one hand or the Rambles in Boohs. xiii other. The frontage of shelves and cupboard is just ten feet by three. Very few books in this collection deserve notice because of their externals. These few I have ventured to describe. A dozen or more volumes are bound, at a cost of about sixpence each, in brown holland, with a blue paper label. This is a reminiscence of the Lake of Como. There, as you approach Bellaggiofrom Menaggio or Cadenabbia, you come on a small promontory which has a drab awning over it. Underneath, at intervals, blue or green vases on the terrace form a pretty contrast of colour. What the traveller sees is the garden of the Hotel Genazzini (?). The large proportion of foreign works is sure to be remarked. One excuse may be urged, that habitual converse with French books is a French exercise which no one need disdain, however old he is. Moreover, it may be asked. Does human interest cease to be human, because the expression of it hails from what we call a " foreign " country ? Some day, perhaps, the word foreign may cease to have a meaning. I like to think of the noble epitaph on General Ludlow in the burying- ground at Lausanne, and have taken as much of it as I dared, as a motto. The republic of letters is, it may be hoped, one great family, not disunited into states. In pursuance of this idea, but without thinking about it, I have given the names of European publishers who have a cosmopolitan reputation without adding their abode. No doubt it will appear to some that a great many *' frivolous " books are enumerated. I fancy that a man^s recreation should be governed somewhat by the nature of his occupation. If his work is making catalogues of reference, which kind friends tell him every now and xiv Rambles in Boohs. then would make them mad to do, a pretty good dose of frivolity is needed to preserve the mind's equipoise, unless the cataloguer is made of putty and can be put* anywhere. That might be, of course, seeing that man- kind is divided into two great sections, those who make impressions and those who take them. The Americans have recognised the distinction, by speaking of grit as a desirable quality. So many short stories are now collected into one volume, that a new duty may be said to be imposed on cataloguers of even private collections — to name each story. It is an appalling look-out, for each entry will need to be supplemented by an index entry. Whether short stories are enumerated or not, the catalogue of every considerable library must be indexed. The question of enumerating the stories in a book is not one to be settled off-hand. Suppose a small volume contains thirty or forty story- ettes, conscientious cataloguing and indexing will give to it thirty or forty times the space and attention accorded to a book of the same size wherein the interest is continuous. " Quousqtif^ tandem, story teWer?" will be the despairing cataloguer's cry. I have evaded the difficulty here, by putting some names of short stories in the index at the end. Thus, if the reader has a mind to know in what volume Gautier's La morte amoureuse is to be found, he can find out in a moment. I had not intended giving this very little work the importance, in look, of an index. But, four pages presented themselves blank at the end, which gave the opportunity of setting forth an attractive bill of fare. * I wish I could give the pronunciation. Ramlles in Boohs. xv Every item has been compelled to come into one line, without maiming words, a point which may be of interest to those who care for regularity of appearance. The words in italics distinguish a title from a subject. In sum, if the reader will be so good as to imagine one whose daily occupation is to do gardening for others in the field of literature, once in a way showing a visitor the advantage or amusement he has derived from cultivating his own plot at home — that is the point of view. The word amusement is exact, for the few minutes snatched before breakfast for this work have yielded the composer almost perfect oblivion of outer things. Rambles in Books. Sir Robert ADAIR. Historical memoir of a mission to the Court of Vienna in loOG, &c. ' Longman, 1^44. Sir Kobert Adair was one of the dinner party at the embassy to-day. He is the individual whom Fox and the Opposition pai ty sent over to St. Petersburg Hfty years ago, to thwart aad undermine hitt's administration witli the Court of Russia. He is eighty years old, and nearlv the only man living who is supposed to have h;id the good graces of the Empress Catherine.— Raikks' Diary, II. 389. Some years ago I wanted Adair's book. I had to wait until it presented itself at a suitable price, ^'ow it is here, I forget what had made it desirable. But the Memoir is worth keeping, for the notices of Gentz, q.v., and his stute papers. Hamilton AIDE. Carr of Carrlyon, a novel, 3 vols. Smith and Elder, 18G2. A picture of the better sort of life in Italy, both of Italians and En^dishnien. It is a story of deep, almost tragic interest, relieved by brij,dit traits of cbaracter. I have read it several times. Taking it up to find an extract, I half read it again, but could not detach a piece. After writing that, I found the following : — "The whole work proves the pospession by the author of abilities and learning equal to anything in fictitious literature." — Daily Nkws. Hamilton A I Dill. Confidences. Cliatto and Windns ( ). This and the next bring us into good company in England. li Rambles in Boohs. Hamilton AIDE. Passages in the life of a lady. Ward and Downey ( ). Hamilton AIDE. Poet and peer. Iiovthchje, 1883. Boiiglit as sure to be worth going to, one day, when " something to read '' is the desideratum. W. Harkison AINS worth. Miser's daughter, with Cmlkshank's plates. Routledge ( ). Commemorates my first vision of a hond-Jide novel. As a boy I Wi)s not allowed to read novels, but a volume of Bentley^s Mkcellanu could be borrowed from the lilirary. One volume contained the first part of the Miser's daiKjhter, and that is all I saw ot it. Tire illustrations serve to show that a sense of beauty was not among Cruikshank's gifts. All that erpands the spirit, yet appals, Gathers around, these summits, as to show How Earth may pierce to Heaven, yet leave vain man helow. Childe Hakold. ALBUM. Olive album. Marion and Co. ( ). This should have contained portraits, I suppose. Instead, I have had fastened in a series of Alpine views. The wind- swept heights, set in the vrmber of the photographs, are well thrown up by the olive tint of the page, Avhich, again, is embellished by coloured flowers in the margin. Albion is a perfidious island with white clitts. Perhaps an album may fitly " hide those hills of snow." The literary interest resides in some photos from Kaulbach's illustrations to Goethe's Faust and Hermann und Dorothea, which are also in the volume. The female heads, in their divine serenity of hair parted a la Madone, may be commended to the notice of editors who limn us commonplace or coloured young persons with untidily arranged hair. " But look at the technique,'^ says an expert. So illustrated pages are a mere arena for the exhibition of meclianical skill — cui himen ademptum. Will beauty never replace deliberate and expensive ugliness? Bamhles in Boolcs. W. L. ALDEN. A lost soul. Chatto and Witidiis, 1892. The name on tlie title made me think this American. But that can scarcely be. Here is part of a conversation. After speaking of English mouths, an interlocutor says : — " Then, by way of contrast, look at the American mouth, especially the American girl's mouth. It is a combination of childishness and viciousness. ... It is a thoroughly false month, and cold as your glacier. The girl who at seventeen thinks that she knows the world through and through, who treats her ' popper ' and her ' mommer ' ^s if they were servants . . . you can read tlie full description of her in her mouth." " What do you say of the French mouth ?" " It is a purely mercantile mouth ; it is strong, but cold. It is, moreover, utterly unsympathetic. The French mouth is always asking what is the market price of kisses." This gives no idea of the deep interest of the story. A ?;eologist, who is also a physician, finds in a glacier a Avoman rozen up. He digs her out, resuscitates her, and finds that She had been dead for centuries. . . . Perhaps she had no soul. . . . I had brought back life to the body, but her soul had wandered too far to be recalled. ( ) "Alia giornata;" or, to the day, in three volumes. Saunders and Otley, 1826. Above the doorway of a marble palace which stands on the banks of ihe Arno, in Pisa, the inscription that gives the story its title is to this day read. — iv. ALLIBOXE. Supplement to Allibone, Critical dictionary of English literature, by J. F. Kii;k. Lippmcotf, 1891. If a man had seen a performance at a theatre overnight, I think that when he opened the morning's paper, he would first turn to tlie account of the piece, to see what was said about it. 1 find the same kind of pleasure in having Allibone's Dictionarij at hand. When I have been interested in a book, I can look the author up and see what has bemi written about his works. There are also biographical particulars of authors. We read that an American novelist was a contributor to the Natiun. B 2 Rambles in Boohs. ALLIBONE {continued). Twenty-six notices of his Avorks are cited from reviews. Of these, seventeen, just sixty-tive per cent., are derived from the Nation. But the laudatory matter from the Nation occupies a hundred and sixty lines. The critiques from all other papers occupy eighty lines — which is an odd way of presenting a conspectus of general opinion. Miss Ella Dietz (Mrs. Clymer), P?-esident of Sorosis, is said to be one of the foremost women of America. To her poems, q.v., "Allibone, Supplement," does not accord one line of extract in praise or blame. I have repaired the omission in loco. H. C. ANDERSEN. Der Improvisator, Roman. Leipzig ( ). This is the first German book (not this copy) I ever saw. I did not then know it was German. It was in the hands of an evil genius. It will be interesting some day to see whether maV occliia is to be found in it. ARABIAN NIGHTS. Mille et Une nuits, traduits par Galland, 3 vols. Ga.rnier ( ). The " real " Arabian nights. The old-fashioned book, whose lovers were discomposed by the innovations or restorations of Lane, q.v., is a translation of this. "0 mes chcrs Mille et un Kuits ! " says Fantasio, and he pjipaks in the name of all them that have lived the life that Gallaud alone made possible.— Heij ley, Views and Eeviews. ARENE ET TOURNIER. Des Alpes aux Pyrenees. Flammarion, 1891. Amounts to a pretty collection of views in what may be called Roman Fiance. A coloured picture of an Arlesienne occupies the cover. It is curious that the name of one of the authors is a translation of arena, the Italian for " amphitheatre." Ranibles in Bools. Sir Edwin ARNOLD. Universal review. October, 1888. Arnoid's lately publislied poems contain an address to a pair of slippers from ancient Egypt. This is considered one of the gems of the collection. It is here illustrated with an amplitude Avliich the large size of the magazine has made possible. C. C. ATCHISON. A Winter cruise in summer seas. Sampson Loiu, 1891. The book narrates a two months' voyage in a steamer to South American ports, while people were shivering in England. The author tells •'^ how he found" health while being carried round. An invalid could not more agreeably spend the sum of £iOO — ubi adtst. HippoLYTE AUDEVAL. Les Amours d'un pianiste. Oalmann Levy, 1880. The story of an English couple resident in Paris, and of their French pianist. One is so little accustomed to French praise of English women that the following contrasted picture may be valued : — Oh! qu'alors je sentis la difference qui separe Cordelia des antres fotumes! Certes, Fanny est bieu belle, miraculeusement belle. MmIs 868 cheveux, qu'elle a snperbes, elle les fait flaniboyer a donner nial aux yeux. Son pied, qu'elle a petit, e le le montre sans cesse. Sa inaia, elle en joue comma un icstrument en avant I'air de dire, " Admiroz-donc ! " Elle met en relief tout ce quelle a de bien, elle dissimule tout ce qui est defectueux; elle se livre a un travail enorme pour a -ceutucr tons les ett'ets de sa beautc, elle fait des fioritures, ehe fait du fr..u-frou, tandis que Cordelia, irreprochable d'eusemble et de details, apparait avec cette simplicite souverame et rayonnante qui caractt'rise les creations parfaites. Et pour rintellii<ence, I'esprit, I'ame, quelle difierence encore ! Loisque Cordelia parle, son langage est profond et plein comme la voix de rOcean.— 231, 232. J. Barbry d'AUREVILLY. Impressions et souvenirs, par Charles Buet. Far/s, 1891. Not merely the history of a literary beau, with specimens of his opinions, but a great collection of other opinions. To use it, I should have to make an index. This is what 1 mean by a l)eau — A la grande joie des paasants, en 1888, il se promenait encoro Votu 6 Ramhles in Boohs. J. Barbey d'AUREVILLY. Impressions et souvenirs {continued). d'un pautalon a baude de satin uoir, raonlant comme un maillot, ayant gilet de velours noir aveo cravate de satin blanc ; jabot et nianchectes de dentelle d'or. Des dianiants pour bontons de chemise, des plants clairs coutures de noir et un chapenu a larges bords, plante de cote. On salt pourtant qne, d'apres Vapereau, Barbey d'Aurevilly etait ne en 1808. — Tissot, Evolutions i>e la critique. J. Barbey d'AUREVILLY. Litterature etr anger e. Lemerre, 1891. Abounds in piquant passages, e.c/. — L'afiFrenx Dr. Johnson, Thippapotame de la lourde critique anglaise, flit CD Anerleterre un de ceux qui ne durent rien comprendre a I'imagiriation de Sterne. Lessing etait le seul qui put se mesurer avec Voltaire et que Voltaire ne faisait pas trembler . . . avec quel ton cavwlier il traite cette vieille idule japonaise qui avait tourne la tete a 1' Europe ! Comme il prend ses pieces et leurs prefaces sophistiqnees, et comme il detache de ces pieces et de ces prefaces tout cet affreux plaque que Voltaire, qui ne travaillait qu'en plaque dans I'art dramatique.ne croit p'^s, mais veut nous donner pour le pur erable {sic) d'cEUvresoriginales et sinceres. A Roman Catholic lady once told me that their name for Ritualists was " best electro-plate." Of Captain Lawrence we read — Je suis convaincu que je tiens la (in the author of Guy Living 'tone) un maitre dans I'ordre du roman, et s'il n'a pas la conscience de cela, il faut que la critique la lui donne. But it would he injustice to cite merely piquant passages. The following is from an article on Byron : — En touchant son sol, comme Antee en touchant la terre, sa mere, la force lui vint. La force de Byron, en efFet, sa grace, son mouve- ment, et je dirais presque la divinite anthromorphite de sa poesie, tout est du plus pur eiecqui ait jamais existe. Jusque-la, tristement Anglais, ce fut dans Chikle Harold qu'il jaillit Grec etqu'il se rapporta Grec a ea patrie. . . . Dans le Don Juan, il le devint tellement dans le chant du chantenr grec, au noces d'Haidee, qu'on aurait pu dire que le mode ionien resuscite avait fondu, sous son haleine de rose, la langue anglaise, le sauvage et naturel idiome da poete I Et il ne I'etait pas uniquement par le theatre de ses poemes, par la tournure et le costume de ses heros. La Grece moderne, qui, malgre ses mal- heurs, ressemble tant a sa mere morte, impnmait sa sublime ressem- blance dans le n.iroir de cette poesie, coloree et pur comme son ciel er pes mers. Sous les brumes du spleen anglais, on retrouvait i'azur lumineux de la Giece e'.prnelle, de la Grece aux immuables horizons, aux lignes sinueuses, aus contours arretes dans leur eplendeur nette. Rambles in Boohs. J. Barbey d'AUREVILLY. Litterature etrangere (continued). en ces vers anglais plus etonnants encore que s'ils avait e'e ecrits dans la langue d'Alcee et de Pindare, et qui, bieii plus sculptes que peints encore, ressemblent a des bas-reliefs de Phidias! That is finely said ! Hear him on Romeo and Juliet — Et ce que constifcue tout entier ce clief-d'reuvre des chefs-d'opuvres de Shaki'speare, ce n'est pas seulement cette merveille de Juliette et de Romeo et les sentiments qu'ils expriment dans la langue la plus enchantee qui ait jamais ere modulee parmi les honimes. Ce n'est pas ce groupe digue de Polycl^s, noye dans la lumiere et les mor- bidesses du Correge, et dout le raonde, tant que le sentiment de I'ideal vivra en lui, retipndra dans sa memoire charnie lea trois immortelles attitudes, les trois inoubliables gestes — le baiser donne par Romeo a Juliette et rendu par Jnliette a Romeo aveo la foiigue naive de I'amour vrai et I'intrepidite de I'innocence ; — I'adieu au balcon dans Pair auroral, empli de joyeux oris de I'alouette qui ne sont ■plus les chants du rossignol ; — et entin I'entrelacement, sur le marbre du raeme mausolee, de ces deux etres si vivants, devenus par la morb deux p^les statues ! Tout ceci, qui suffirait seul a la gloire du plus grand des poetes, n'a pas cependant ete tout pour Shakespeare. . . . C'est la comedie encore plus que la trageilie qui fait le raerite sans pareil du poete anglais dans son drame de Romeo et Juliette. C'est la vie qui y est encore plus belle que la mort — la mort plus belle qua tout, pour- tant, dans les grands poetes, et surtout dans ua poete comme Shakespeare ! — 23, 24. And here is something about Lear — Le Roi Lear, comme Rowco, comme Macbeth, comme Hamlet, comme la plupart des drames de Shakespeare, parait, quand on sort de sa lecture, le chef-d'ccnvre hurs ligne, la master -piece des pieces de Shakespeare ; mais ce n'est peut-etre la que le recommencement d'une impression. On y trouve le pathetique dans les situations, la puis- sance do conception dans les cai-acteres, la beaute ideale dans les sentiments, I'energie ou la grace dans le langage qu'il faut admirer partout daas Shakespeare ; ea d'autre termes, identitc du meme genie, dans des sujets diftcrents. Mais, ip'on me pertuotte de le dire, j'oserais croire (|u'il y a dans Le:ir un arraiigetnent d'art plus profond, des articulations plus formidables,et que jamais Shakespeare li'a campe debout de creation plus forte et qu il ait fait marcher de ce pas-la devant nos esprits oonfondus ! — 49, 50. ^^ I have been tronhled to determine whether the preceding books should be placed under " A " or " B." Aiirevillys biographer does the one and Lorenzs bibliography the other. I have let the matter he settled by the fact that sonu'where in this volume I have referred to these entries as under the name Aure- villy. So the reader will not be misled. 8 Rambles in BooLs. Gboege BAINTON. The Art of authorship, literary rem iniscencea, methods ot work, and advice to youDg- beo-inners, personally contributed by leading- authors ot' the day. James Clarke, 1890. How joyfully leading authors of the day have contributed, let two of them " persona'ly" say: — ■ Mrs. denies havino; given Mr. Sainton leave to print her letter, and considers that its appearance in a collection of letters headed " The art of authorship," and published as a book, is a breach of faith. Mr. ... I hear of the use Mr. Bainton has made of what I wrote with purprise and regret. — The Author. Thus the book has all the atrraction of forbidden fruit. HONGEE DE BALZAC, La Cousine Bette. CaJmami Lpvij ( ). In this story Baron Hulot is enslaved l)y Madame de ]\Iarnetfe, on whom he spends much money, to tlie detriment of his family. This is what she has to say about it: " Do my adorers desert me ? " HONORE DE BALZAC. Etudes philosophiques. Galmann Levy, 1891. A young man of about twenty asked his master in business liow he could best learn conversational French. He said, " Kead Balzac's novels." The youth did not take the advice, and so did not learn that the younsj men in Balzac's novels get on by cultivating married ladies. The upshot was that an opportunity was neglected. A married lady who ought to have been culti- vated had the chance of wrecking his life, in a romantic sense, which she used. HoNORE DE BALZAC. La Vieille fille, &c. Charpentier, 1839. 1 once borrowed some of Balzac's novels from a circulating lil)rary. Tiie print and size of the edition seemed to me ideal. Tliis volume was bought later, a^^ a reminiscence — the same edition, picked up at a stall for about threepence, in half calf. John BARROW. Tour on the Continent, by rail and road, in the summer of 1852. Longman, 1853. Was worth 2d. as an account of travel fifty years ago. Bamhles in Bools. 9 JoH^f BARTLETT. Familiar quotations. Eoufledge ( ). Bound in Japanese silk (so the binder said) with limp sides. The following will sliow the far-reaclnn<:( nature of Mr. Bartlett's book. ]\Iost of us have heard of Providence being on the side of big battalions-: — La fortune est toujours poor les gros bataillons. Lkttres de Sevign^. John BARTLETT. Familiar quotations. Routledge, 1883. A book of gems, set, so to say, in parallel passages from ancients and moderns. As to arrangement, it may be called a perfect book, thus composed — i. an alphabetical list of authors ; ii. the quotations arranged in order of time; iii. an index of extraordinary fulness, extending to 251 pages of two columns each. John BARTLETT. Familiar quotations. Maanillan, 1891. A book of books. 850 pages (rirra) are occupied with the most celebrated passages from English writers from Chaucer downwards, from the ancients, from the Old and New Testa- ments and the Common Prayer, and by a collection of proverbial sayings, English and foreign— all illustrated from the literature of the ancient and modern world. There is a key to tlie contents in an index of nearly 300 pages in double coUunn of small print. The conscientiousness with which the book is produced is shown by the fact that English writers arc allowed to retain their spelling, although the author and the i)rinters are American. One cannot pay a greater trilnite to a book than to house three copies of it in a "library" of about 400 volumes. They are successive editions. (Why not get rid of the two earlier editions, the less complete 1) The first is light and Hat, suitable for the pocket, the second copy is a specimen of wliole- some English printing, famously large considering the matt(!r to be presented. It is in its third binding. I tried a couple of expeiinients in oi;der to get the utmost flexibility of opening. The third copy is not pretty in print or binding. 10 Bamhles in Bools. Marie BASHKIRTSEFF. Journal, 2 vols. Charpeniier, 1890. J'aime le due de H , et je ne puis lui dire que je I'aime, et si je le Ini disais meme, il n'j' ferait pas attention. . . . Anjourd'hui j'ai vu encore le one de H . Personne ne se tient comme lui ; il a I'aii* tout a fait d'un roi quand il est dans sa voiture. This is written when she is twelve years old. Later on we find:— Quand Remy vint me dire, aux courses de Bade, qu'il venait de parier au due de H , mon ccBur eut un secousse. . . . Je cherche ma le<,oa, lorsque la petite Heder ma gonvernante anglaise, me oit : " Savez-vous que le due se marie avec la duchesse M ?" J'ai senti comme un couteau s'enfoncer dans ma poitrine. Heine speaks of Napoleon's eyes, so also does B. K. Ilaydon. Marie notices Napoleon III. : — . . . notre pauvre Empereur, qu'on accuse d'avoir les yetix etranges. Tous ceux qui portent des casques ont les yenx comme I'Empereur-. Je ne sais si cela tient au casque qui tombe sur les yeux, ou a I'imita- tion. Quant a limitation, e'est connu en France, tous les soldats ressemblaient a Napoleon. Some would say that all this had been studied and contrived. The study of head-pieces has not been unknown in England. This girl of tAvelve has thought on marriage, and reflects on paper what she has seen : — Je ne vois pas pourquoi on traitera son marl en animal domestique. et pourquoi, tant qu'on n'est pas mariee, on veut plhire a cet homme ? Pourquoi ne resterat-on pas toujours coquette avec son mari et ne le traiterait-on pas comme un etranger qui vous plait? Est-ce parce qu'on pent s'aimer ouvertement, et parce que ce u'est p^s un crime, et parce que le mariage est beni p^r Dieu ? Est-ce parce que ce qui n'est pas defendu n'est rien ? . . . Je comprends bien autrement tout cela. William BATES. Maclise portrait gallery of illustrious literary characters, with aieuiuirs, biotj-raphical, critical, bibliographical, and anecdotic, illustrative of the literature of the former half of the present century. Ghatto and Windus, 1888. An excellent index makes the MaclLe gallery a work of reference. Rambles in BooJcs. 11 William BATES {continued). Talleyrand is among the portraits. Dante Gabriel Rossetti's description of it is quoted by i\Ir. Bates from his works, q.v. — The picture is more than a satire; it mi»ht be called a diagram of damnation ; a ghastly historical verdict which becomes the image of the man for ever. Contrast Balzac, on Talleyrand. The passage is from one of the books in this collection: — Le prince auquel cbacun lance sa pierre, et qui meprise aussi I'huiDanite pour lui cracher au visage autant de serineuts qu'elle en demande, a em[)eche le partage de la France au cougres de Vienne : on lui doit des couronnes, on lui jete do la boue. — PiiRE GoRioT. Mr. Bates explains how Walt Whitman became a poet — laid a plot to test the gullibility of the public in matters of taste and criticism. He dug up an American poet who had never written a line of ''poetry" in his life, aud who, in all he had written, was bombastic, coarse, conceited and irreverent. He reprinted him in England, wrote an eulogistic preface, aud engaged some friends to aid the scheme by unstinted and indiscriminate laudation. The bait took. Walt Wiiitman was the noblest transatlantic " tone " yet heard. — 99. Turn we to a pleasanter picture, the Quarterly Ilevieiv's editor, extracted from an obituary in the Times — It was characteristic of Lockhart's peculiar individuality that, wherever he was at all known, whether by man or woman, by poet, man of letters, or man of the world, he touched the hidden chord of romance in all. No man less affected the poetical, the mysterious, or the sentimental; no man less affected anything; yet as he stole stiffly away from the knot, which, if he had not enlivened, he had hushed, there was not one who did not confess that a being had passed before them who had stirred all the pulses of the imagination, and realised what is generally only ideal in the portrait of a man. To this im- pression there is no doubt that his {jersonal apjiearanco greatly con- tributed, tliough too entirely the exponent of his mind to be considered a separate cause. Endowed with the very highest order of manly beauty, both of features and expression, he retained the brilliancy of youth aud a stately strength of person comparatively unimpaired in ripened life; aud then, thoui<h sorrow and sickness suddenly brought on a premature old age, which none could witness unmoved, yet the beauty of the head and of the bearing so far gained in loftiness of expression what they lost in animation, that the last phase, whether to the eye of painter or of anxious friend, seemed always the finest. I remember reading this notice at the time, and wondering what a newspaper man could know of Lockliait's " iron s(^lf- control." I now learn that Mr. Elwin or Lady Eastluke may have been the writer. 12 RamhUs in Books. Ernest Quentin BAUCHART. Mes livres, 1864—1874. Paris, 1877. Si j'ai re'ussi a reunir quelques livres qui semblent digne de retenir no moment I'attention des hoiiime>i de goiit, c'est a i'iuimitable artiste qui m'a relie tant de charmantes volumes . . que je le duis. — Fkeface. Mentoris ostentat arfem ! Of the soul iu a book, not one word. Here is a specimen of iliu entries — 98. Histoire de Madame Henrietta d'Angle- terre, suivie des Memoires de la cour de France (1688 — 1689, par ftlme. de La Fayette), Amsterd. 1742, 2 tomes eu 1 vol. in-12, mar. r., til., tr. dor. (ReL anc). Exemplaire aux armes de Mme. Adelaide, fiUe de Lonis XV. Tlie description, being translated, is " original red morocco binding, with bands, gilt edges." To a man whose books are not to be vaunted for their appearHnce, this catalogue of a private library is incomprehen- sible. The number of articles enumerated is 152. At the end we have the numbers again, with a price to each. Whether that is the sum jiaid for each book, or the estimated value, or the money actually obtained for it, is not stated. The gross amount is 154,569 francs = =£6000; say, £40 for each book all round. An expert would probably value the whole collection of books set forth in the volume before the reader at less than £40. I should say, naturally, that it is worth more. If a man spent Qd. a week for eighteen years, that would amount to £22 10->!. Of course more money has been spent, but allowing for what may have been received on parting with a book occasionally, or for the benefit of an exchange, I should say that £22 lOs. is not far from what the cost has been. Heinrich BAUMANN. Londinismen, Slang und Cant . . . &c. Berlin, 1882. A dictionary of English slang with German explanations. It is enriched by numerous quotations of ditties, nurt-ery songs, ;ind the like. The book shows immense research and clever- ness. But, as was inevitable, the author stumbles now and then, e.g. — Damn (verdammt) — tli" thing could we find {Nights at sea), nicht ein gottverdammtes Ding konnten wir finden. This is very droll. The phrase Mr. Baumann cites in illus- Rambles in Boohs. 13 Heinrich BAUMANN {cordinued). tration of the word is nonsense. But his German translation is a perfect reflection of the true Enylish expression, ** Not a damned thing could we find." Adonize putzen, sich putzen. S'aduniser is French for "to adorn oneself." In England we have had an " Adonis of fifty," a phrase wiiich sent Leigh Hunt to prison, but the verb is not. ^Marechal BAZAINE. Armee du Rhin. Henri Plan, 1872. The preface is a military treatise, applied to the condition and needs of the French army. I do not know that I shouhl keep the book but for its beautiful coloured maps. Bazaine was a sinister general. Here is the sinister side of the Rhine: — A partir da jour ou rarmee du Khin et I'armee de la Moselle, battues a Froeschwiller et a F.^rbach, fureiit forcees de se metrre en rerraite, il fut facile de s'apevcevoir combien cette frontiere, df'puis dix aus, avait ete etudiee, battue, minee par l'etat-imj(.r allemaud. l*as una ville, pas une bourgade, pas uu hameau n'etaient ccrauj^ers aux soidats allemands; un grand nombre revenaient occuper en nniformes les contrees qa'ils avait babitees auparavaut comiiie oavriers ou comrae paynans. — Claude, Memoikes. And the French officers had maps of Germany, only ! The eyes of all Avere fixed on their neighbours' vineyard, which was nicely mapped out. J. D. BELTON. Literary manual of foreign quotations. rutitain., 1891. This is what I would call an enUghlened book, if the phrase will pass. The quotations are illustrated not merely fi'om regulation authors, but from magazines, newspapers, and the most modc-rn French writers. The expression Je ne mit< quoi is a good instance. It brings together passages from Chester- field, Kinglake, and Guy de Maupassant. BERTALL. La Comedie de notre temps, -3 vols. Paris, 1874-5. Caricatures of Tarisiaii and sea-side life, exceptionally elegant. 14 Bamhles in Boohs. ( ) Die besten Biicher aller Zeiten und Litteraturen. Ffei 1st ticker, 1889. This is the German analogue to the " Hundred best books," only the number is not restricted. BIBEL. Illustrirte Hausbibel nach der deutschen Ueber- setzuug von Dr. Alartin Luther. Pfeilstiicker, 1888. A family Bible, a very heavy book. But it has about 1000 bright engravings, not fancy pictures, but after photos from objects. Thus the Dead Sea, the Plain of Jezreel, the Garden of Gethsemane, &c., are seen as they are. BIBLE. Holy Bible. Clarendon Press ( ). An ideal book, the size small rather than large octavo, with legible print and references. The paper is thin, but only so as to induce a tender turning over of the leaves. Their edges are red under burnished gold. The boards are of the lightest, just short of being flexible, covered with coarse-grained dark-purple morocco, simply lettered, without gilding ; but the chocolate paper lining has a border of ornamental gold on leather. BIBLE. . Sainte Bible, par Louis Segond. Clarendon Press, 18S0. A neat little example of the Bible in French, so bound in cheap cloth as to open vfith wonderful facility, Biblia Sacra. ParisHs, 1878. I bought this for the sake of the sonorous language. Augustine BIRRELL. Charlotte Bronte. Walter Scott, 1887. BOCCACE. Coxites, illust. par Johannot. Barbier, 1846. When al)out twenty years old I had the opportunity of turning over the leaves of this. I learnt more French from it than from any other book. Hani soit qui mat y peme. I have waited years to get a copy, not too dear, tor old acquaintance sake. B ambles in Bool's. 15 Leon BOUCHER. Histoire de la litterature anglaise. Gamier, 1890. A compact little handbook, interesting as being from the Freuch standpoint. Paul BOURGET. Crime d'amour. Lemerre, 1890. Paul BOURGET. Mensonges, il]ust. de Myrbach. Lemerre, 1890. Some years since, I was on the look-out for psychological romances. Well, here they are, and their motto might be Vanitas vanitaium. H. CouRTHOPE BOWEN. Descriptive Catalogue of historical novels and tales. Stanford, 1882. The stories are " upon " the history of fifteen countries. Hjalmar Hjorth BOYESiEN. Essays on German literature. TJnwin, 1892. It is a question of national temperament whether romanticihm assumes thu form of poetic regret and pissive reti-ospection or of active revolt ajrainpt the hard prose represented by kings and tjovern- ments . . . romantic sm not only means different thiugs in difJereut countries, but it means difTerent thiugs at diiierent times. In Ger- many it was, on the one hand, the utilitarianism of the period and enlightenmeut which drove the school into an idealism, scorning all the servile morality of the Philistine; and, on the other hand, it was the pagan classicism of Goethe and Schiller which impelled it, by tlie impetus of opposition, towards patriotism, mediaeval enthusiasm and Catholicism. — 357. That is from an essay on Romanticism in Germany. This is from the paper on Goethe's relations to women— Though of all the women who figure in Goethn's autobiography, Lili (Schonemann) was, as it appears to me, best qualified to makn him happy, I believe he acted wisely in refusing to become enslaved to a life that whs uncongenial to him ... ho would not have found time to record his inner and outer life so minutely if he had been wedded to Lili. As it is, his is the most coniidetcly rccoided life which history or literature has to show. — IdSi, IGl. English translations of Goethe are among the topics. 16 Rambles in Boohs. ( ) British ballads, old and new, illustrated, selected and edited by George Barnett Smith, 2 vols. Gassell, 1886. This is a book to f^o to for consolation, not the less because of the awful grief of which some of the ballads are th^ vehicle — " Flows Yarrow sweet ? As sweet flows Tweed, As green its grass, its gowan as ypllow, As sweet smells oa its braes the birk, The apple frae the rock as mellow. . . . How love him on the banks of Tweed That slew my love on the braes of Yarrow ? O Yarrow fields ! may never rain ' Nor dew thy tender blossoms cover; For there was basely slain my love — My love, as he had not been a lover." Robert W. BROUGH. Songs of the governing classes. Vizetelh/, 1890. The (late of tlie preface is 1855. The '' Governing classes of Great Britain" is the title of a collection of parliamentary sketches, by Edward Whitty, wiitten in 1853 or earlier. W. C. BROWNELL. French traits, an essay in comparative criticism. David Nutt, 1889. Arriving from London, either at Paris or at the smallest provincial town — Calais itself, say — the absence of individual competition, of personal pre-occnpation, of all the varied inhospitality, the stony, in- accessible self-absorption which depress tiie stranger in London when- ever he is out of hail of an acquaintance, the conspicuous amenity everywhere suffuse with a profoundly grateful warmth the veiy cockles of an American's heart At first it seems as if all the world were really one's friends . . . you feel almost as if you could borrow money of them without security. . . . Nothing is less agreeable to the Anglo. Saxon heart than to discover that it has beaten with unreasonable warmth You understand Thackeray's feeling towards the " distint^uished foreigner" whom he met crossing the Channel, and who " readily admitted the superiority of the Briton on the seas or elsewhere," only to discover himself, the voyage over, in his real character of a hotel-runner, or, as Thackeray puts it, " an impudent, sneaking, swindling French humbug." — 24, 25. " Stony, innccessible self -absorption " is good — because true. This is the best book on France that I know, full of literary reference in illustration of manners. Ramhles in Boohs. 17 Elizabeth Barrett BROWNING. Poems. Warne, 1892. Here are the famous Sonnets from the Portuguese. Oscar BROWNING. Goethe, his life and writings. Sonnenschein, 1892. A useful, business-like review of the life as illustrating the Avorks, which are enumerated. In the text we find mention of the West-ostHche Divan. In the bibliographical list it is the West-OstUchen Divan — three mistakes in thirty-five letters. Whence M-e must presume that German is a difficult language for the English don. In Germany the name is printed West- ustlicher Divan. The portrait of young Goethe, from a bust, is very handsome. Georg BUCHMANN. Gefliigelte Worte, ]4te Auflage. Berlin, 1884. Rightly named Cita/eiischatz des dentscJien Vollies, for it has becomi' almost a classic as a guide to passages in the classics of various countries. Seven languages are represented, and yet the volume looks insigniticant beside a merely English book of (juotations. The s{)ace is farther lessened by the citations being set in the text somewhat like truffles in a Strasburg pie. For all that, the consulter is apt to find what he wants. At the same time, 1 think that an unscientitic index of one alphabet would have made the book usefuller than do the seven indexes, each representing a language. Amusement is hardly to be looked for in a book of reference. However, the author gives, extracted from Lanfrey, a saying of Talleyrand : — L'assassinat est la mode de destitutiou usite en Russie. Which may be translated, " Changes of government in Russia are brought about by assassination." The English Bible named at page 1 4, Bartlett's Quotatio?i«, Cassell's French dirtionarn, Daudet's Tarturin sur les Jlpett, Vloctz' Liftcraitire frnnraise, Stoffel's Rapports, and " Pnich- mann " were experiments in binding. A young booivbinder, who thought he had made a discovery, got me to write something about it. In return, he bound me about half a dozen specimen volumes at a low price. The edges of " Hiichmann " are wholly untrimmeil, the top gilt, the boards, hulf-limp, covered with vellum, delightful to the touch. 18 Bamhles in Books. Antoine BUNAND, Petits lundis, notes de critique. Perrin, 1890. Thirty very nice essays, some of them critiques of critics, Avhich help to an understanding of French literature. John BDNYAN. Pilgrim's Progress. Caasell ( ). When the time was come for them to depnrt, they went to the brink of the river. The lust words of Mr. Despondency were, Fare- well night, welcome day. His daugliter went through the river singing, but none could nuderstand what she said. Js anything printed more affecting than these passings away? Robert BURNS. Love songs, by Sir George Douglas. Gamao TAhrary, 1892. The Editor's aim has been to illustrate the progress and variety of the genius of Burns, the love poet ... no attempt at expurgation has been made. . . . New and interesting details relating to Highland Maiy have been incorporated in the introduction. — ix. The Southj'on, in his ignorance, has to believe the Scotch spelling all right. In the contents he Hnds " XIII. Menies' Bonie Mary ; " in the introduction Burns is quoted as saying, " She was a bonnie, sweet, sonsie lass ; " and in the songs themselves Ave find that Lesley is bonie. Are these Scotch ladies " bony " or " bonny " 1 BUSSY-RABUTIN. Histoire amoureuse des Gaules suivie de la France galante, 2 vols. Paris ( ). . . . il est brillant et comme reluisant. . . . Son style, au bons endroits, a le nitor des anciens. On a, vers ce meme temps, applique le mot et I'eloge d' urhanife ;\ troia ecrivains . . . rurbauiie de Bussy, a son bean moment, etait la seule qui sentit tout-a fait le courtisau aise et homme du motide. " On a mille fois entendu vanter. disait-on de lui en son temps, la politesse de &on esprit, la delicatesse des penseea, un noble enj luemeut, une naivete fiue, un tour toujours nnturel et toujours nouveau. une certaine lanjue qui fait paraitre toute autre lam/ue barhare.^' C'est beaucoup dire, et je dois avertir aussi que c'est d'une harangue d'Academie que je tire ces louiinges. On comprendra pourtaut qu'on les ait pu faire. — Sainte Bedve. The episode called Le perroquet, ou les amours de Made- moiselle, is a beautiful story of ill-starred courtship. Famhles in Bools. 19 Colonel Sjr W. F. BUTLliR. Sir Charles Napier. Macinillan, 1890. There were two famous Sir Charles Napiers. The title-pasre micrht have made it clear that this is Chaik-s Jainos, not the urilor of "Sharpen your cutlasses." "The Twentv-Second gave me three cheers after the fight ( ), and one during it " he writes. "Hf-r Majesty hns uo honour to give that can equal that." What a leader ! What soldiers ! — 135. BYRON. Life, letters, and journals of Lord Byron, complete lu oue volume, with notes. John Murrat/, 1888. One of the few books that one can always go to for solace, and tind it. The advertisements at tke end are an interesting- reflex of literary activity fifty years ago. The printing of them is a model in its way. Those were the days of *' Gur- wood's" Despatches in twelve volumes at a sovereign each. The famous Handbooks " were not." The title of Carenie's Cooker// reads like a joke. It is probably not all mau/re. Byron said somewhere that he hated to see women eat. This was accepted and condoned as a mere eccentricity of the poetic temperament. One day I was in a train in Italy; third class, of course. In the same compartment was a woman apparently out for the day with her children — a A^eritable Madonna as we see in old paintings, whose eyebrows were as an aureole above her eyes, and whose simply-parted hair seemed to overarch a heaven of serenity. Presently she began to eat an apple. The tioubled surface and distorted features brought Byron's words to mind. Here, as at page 69 of this book, we find that the poet was a see-er. BYRON. Works, 4 vols.; Don Juan, 2 vols. Murray, lcS28. Printed on hand-made paper which the binding of half russia, rough edges, has left wavy, and the leaves are not even shaved at the crown. The size is what the slang of the day calls " Elzevir." c 2 20 Bamljles in BooJiS. BYRON. Works, in one volume. Francfort, 1829. Foreign editions often contain matter Avhich is not found in English editions. Here, among " unacknowledged pieces " of Bjron, we tind " The burial of Sir John Moore." The lines, written by the late Rev Charles Wolfe on the burial of Sir John Moore, which, in Medwiu's J lurnal, are incorrectly attri- buted to Lord Byron. . . . On the 16th April, 1817, I received Mr. Wolfe's lines, and on th« 19th of the same month they were published, with the initials of his name (C. W.) annexed, in the Neionj Telegraph, of which I was editor, 'i'hey were written by Wolfe, then a student in Trinity College, Dublin, on readini? the affecting account of Sir Johu Moore's burial in the Edinburgh Annual Register. Nuv. 2, 1824. James Stuart, Editor of the Belfast Newsletter. That is from the Courier of November 9, 1824. Huon CALLAN. Wanderings on wheel and on foot through Europe. Sampson Loiv, ltib7. Remarkable as the production of a young traveller fresh from college. One of the most vivid bits of bicy 'liujf is the account of descending towards Lausanne at racing speed in the dark, without a light. The two extracts which follow are cipital pictures of fiiendly manners in Germany. Freundlicli is a very German word. STRASSBTJRG. "Here in Strassburg* I enjoyed a Sunday's rest, seated on a balcony high above the street where thronged pleasure-seekers and church-goers. The sua shone through the clematis round our bower just enough to make one feel it was summer. There I sat, read and smoked, or listened to the lively talk of the hostess and her dauirhter and a gii'l friend of hers, who had come to see the stranger. They played to me, at first brisk and merry airs; then, when I told them 1 did not like loud rollicking music on Sundays, soothing strains, sweet and low, came floating out to me as 1 sat alone. Now aud then deep sounds would reach my ear, and deepen my reveries as the bells of the cathedral proclaimed the divisions of the passing day. High over the roofs the spire appeared in all its delicate lace- like tracery, itself 400 feet nearer heaven than we below, and by its giddy loneliness, disturbed only by the doves and storks that sweep and circle about its angles, stealing man's soul away for a season from the sordid things of earth." Surely this is beautifully expressed. One may add a week- day scene in Germany : — • strictly German oflBcial spelling. Rambles in BooJcs. 21 Hugh CALL AN (continued). MAiyz. "There I met some real German characters, with less heaviness about their wits than the Prussians display : a master cook, whi'Se wagaishness would have done honour to a Frenchman ; a broken- down, tippling artist, who, if you cared to believe him, had paiuted all the most meritorious works of art in the galleries of Munich ; an officer who was grievously at a loss whether to love me because of my intelligence in military poliries, or to hate me because of the attentions hei^towed by the sweet daughter of the house on the young English stranger. Indeed, they have sweet, winning, happy faces, these damsels of the Rhine. Perhaps there is no other district in Europe where the people in general are so inielligetitly hapjiy and contented as along the Rhine ; and, of course, this trait shows soonest and best in Nature's second thought, the lasses." Mr. Callan is a young gentleman to be envied, so to have apprehended the pleasures and intlueuces of travel. Jane Welsh CARLYLE. Early letters, by David Eitchie. Sonnenscheln, 1889. There came a huge parcel from him (a rejected suitor) containing a letter for mother expressed with a still greater command of absur- dity than the preceding ones, and a quantity, of music for me (poiu* parenthise* I shall send you a sheet of it, having another copy of " Home, sweet home" beside), and in two days more another letter and another supply of music. Hitherto there had been nothing of Impr, rothing more of love or marrying ; but now my gentleman presumed to flatter himself, in the expansion of the folly ot his heart, that / tnight 'possibly change my mind. Ass! I change my mind, indeed! and for him ! Upon my word, to be an imbecile as he is, he has a monstrous stock of modest assurance ! However, I very speedily relieved him of any doubts which he might have upon the matter. I told him ce que j'ai fait Je ferois encore, in so many words as must (I think) have brought him to his senses — if he has any. He has since written to mother, begging of her to deprecate my There the transaction rests, and peace be with us. I have neither heard nor seen anything of Doctor Fieff (FyfFe) — the Lord be praised ! He not only wasted an unreasdnable proportion of my time, but his puj's and explosions were very hurtful to my nervous system. — 2t, 25. She liad previously described the gentleman's attire — . . , vapoured back, in the course of an hour or so, in all the pride of two waistcoats (one of figured velvet, another of sky-blue satin), gossamer silk stockings, and morocco leather slippers. ... I should not like to pay his tailor's bill. — 23. The sprightliiiess of these letters is melancholy in the light of the writer's later history as the wife of a sago. • Thia is Scotch for par purenthete. 22 Rambles in Books. Thomas CARLYLE. Critical and miscellaneous essays, 2 vols. Chapvurit <ind Hull ( ). Old impprial free-town Frankfort is not without its notabilities, tragic or comic, in any case, impreesive and didactic. The young heart is filleil with bodinfj to luok int.) the Judengasse (Jew-gate), where squalid, painful Hebrews are banished to ecour old clothes, and in hate, and greed, aud old Hebrew obstinacy and implacability, work out a wonderful prophetic existence. — -II. 133. Gasse means a narrow street such as Fetter Lane. At Bonn, the Hheingasse leads down to the river. These es?iiys, with their index, 1 regard as a book of reference. Thomas CARLYLE. Sartor Resartus; Heroes; Past and present; Chartism; cue vol. Chapman and ILdl { ). I have bought these because it seems that one should read "K'rlyle." But I have not done so yet. ( ) Celebrities of the century . . . edited by Lloyd C. Sanders. Cas.^cU, J 890. Fourier's ideas are unfolded in these striking words : — He greatly believed in the manipulation of nuiubers, by which he thiiught he conld solve any problem. . . . He could pay off the national debt of England in six months by two billions of hens' eggs, a hnn Jayiug at the rate of two hundred eggs a yiar, and the eggs Huld at fiv^pence per dozen. His economic principle was to divide the world into phalanxes of about 2000 persons, and to subdivide erich phrilanx * into bodies ot ten persons. If the whole were thus airanged, a man between eitchteen aud twenty-ciyht would do as much work as would enable him to live comfortably for the rest of hi.« life. . . . * This explains to me the '' phalanstery" of B;ook Farm. Here are biographies (e.;/. that of Mrs. Browning) written with enthusiasm. Arabi Pasha is biographised from his own materials and from personal knowledge. The literary criticisms make the volume precious. A few lines of what is said about Goethe may be cited as a specimen : — . . . one of the greatest of poets, and perhaps the most impres- sive personality in the whole history of literature. ... If we except the lyrics and, perhaps Fcnist, Werther remains the most complete and perfectly developed work of art that Goethe ever produced. There is much that reminds us of Rousseau in the hero and the landscape, but the picture of German girlhood and German country life in the first half of the story, and the remorseless analysis of the wretched subjection to feeling that in the second half drags the un- happy man step by step down to destruction, are unequalled in romance. Bamhles in Boohs. 23 Celebrities of the century {conilimed). For more about Werlher ^qq "Auievilly" and " Vapereau." Here is part of the estimate of Balzac : — He is probably the only writer who combines in an equal decree idealism of the very bif<h('St kind with what has been somcimes called a fatigains habit of minute observation. It is in thar, from his inferior qualities, that the present crowd of Realistic and Naturalistic novel-writers of Prance may claim to be the descen- dants of Balzac. It sutfioes to read a few pages of any one of them to perceive that had he not written, not one of them could have bt^en ; but not one of them all possesses the merest shadow of his gifts. They are framers of inventories, describers, nothing more; and ho would have blushed at the thought of descending to the low devices and mischievous tricks to which they one and all resort to win the favour of a worn-out, vicious-minded public. . . . To have produced La Recherche de I'absolu and Les parents pauvres, which is the eiroy of poverty and of the political genius it may evoke in a clever woman — to attain to utter truth in two such opposite directions has been given but to one master in French literature. Bali^ac stands alone — the origin from which all other prose writers of fiction proceed, nightly did Balzac entitle his complete wor'kH La co)n4die hu niaive. to which he should only have added the words en France; for it is French humanity he photographs. But it is that humanity whole and entire, without the smallest detail omitted. — Mdlle. Bl-^ze de BCRY. CHAMBERS' Encyclopaedia, 10 vols. Edlnhnrgh, 1888-02. Very refreshing is the outspokenness of the articles when one reflects on the trammels of an encyclopaedia which will be in the libraries of schools and colleges. In the good old day--, Zola's name would have been omitted from a work of such purpose. M. Zola, for good or for ill, was a novelist born. ... In La Di'hiicle the masterly denionstratiou of the faults of the French army is hindered, not helped, by the over-minuteness of the accounts of marches and bivouacs, while in certain other instances, which it irt not necessary to specify, the superfluous matter is not only dull, but utterly disgusting. And now let us hear genius answering genius — Zola has written one of the finest stories ever written by any pen — certainly the finest story of the many which have como from his own pen. It is impossible to convey ihe sense of complete literary Bat'sfaction which this volume iiispirt-s. Yon positivel\ live with its fitfiires in all their adventures; tremble with their cowardice, glow with their courage, weep with their despair, shiver in their liair- breailth escapes, and positively sofiieiimt^s feol almost hungry as you read of their starvation. The glow, the movement, the reality of every picture is complete, and it must be added that the improcsive- neas of the picture is as much created by the reticence and self- 24 Rambles in BooJcs. CHAMBERS {continued). restraint as by the pictaresquoness and power of the writing'. It is true that M. Zola owes something to the teachings of other writers. In many of his scenes I hare been reminded of those magnificent fhapters in " I Promessi Sposi," in which Manzoni has told the story of the plague in Florence. Doubtless Manzoni in his turn learned something from our own Defoe ; and no writer of our time could think of describing war and wholly escape the influence of Tolstoi or of Erckmann.Chatiian. — Sunday Sun. ( ) Character in the face; our looks and what they inoau. CJuqjmaii and Hall, 1893. A sober, sttidiotis, and even scientific book — so far as I can jiidue from a borrowed, uncut copy. It is the lesult of wide i(Mding, evidently. Books of heads and faces are tiresome, in lliat, if you wish to know the effect of a particular trait (say a flat top to a head), it does not seem to be noticed. This book has no index and cannot be used for reference. Mary Charlotte CHAVANNES. A few translations Irom Victor Hugo, &c. Key I in Paul, 1886. Also specimens from Riickeit, Uhland, and French poets. Earl of CHESTERFIELD. Letters of Philip Dormer Stanhope . . . with the Cha- racters, edited by John Bradshaw, 3 vols. Sonnenschein, 1892. These of course had for their object the formation of the character of a perfect gentleman. To define a gi^ntleman has ever been a difficult matter. A letter in the Spectator not many months ago recorded a lady's maid's description of her mistress, " She is a perfect lady, you are always safe with her." Here, viutatis mutandis' is the perfect gentleman, a man of whom you are sure that he will not play you a trick. I have sometimes thought that a gentleman might be described as one who can conduct matters of business with pleasantry. Solemnity is the Ijourgeois characteristic. When Chesterfield was Lord- Lieutenant of Irehmd, they say that an official came to him in great perturbation, " They are rising in Connaught, my lord ! " Chesterfield pulled oat his watch. " It is time they were," he said. We know that jocularity did not prevent his governing well. Rambles in Bools. 25 MoNsiEUE CLAUDE. Memoires de M. Claude, chef de la police do suvete sous la second Empire, 10 vols. Rouj)\ 1881-3. Contains most curious revelations of the court of Napoleon III. at Compieigne and elsewhere. "We read how Miss Howard was disposed of : — La helle Angrlaise qni preta huit millions a Bonaparte . . . fut enlevee pendant nne nuit et. ponduite a la frontiere ; elle fut etouftee, dit-on, dans sou lit. — II., 127, 129. He gives us Pierre Bonaparte's excellent defence when tried at Tours for shooting Victor Noir. Claude thinks English thieves and German assassins characteristic of their countries and the best of their kind. He did escape being murdered in Alsace, but he was robbed by English thieves in Paris. He ■was arrested at Dover and brought to London, while in quest of a malefactor whose papers he had about him. He describes an interview witli Sir Richard Mayne at Scotland Yard. He found that Sir Richard knew all about the mysterious perils of Alsace. M. Claude is literary at times. A well-known lady — . . . devait sa celebrite a un grand poete alors qu'il avait tant a so plaindre de Tillustre bae-bleu pi ur qni il se mourrait ; Alfred de Mneset, chez la Farcy, noyait souvent dans I'absinthe lea chagrins qui lui causaient les nombrenses infidelites de George Sand. — II., 13, Here we have the literary and the musical — Thereaa, par sa voix de sapeur, par sa jeu de banches, faisait I'ad- Diiratiou d'un public idolatre . . . I'c'toile des concerts dutsou talent an hasard en se composant au cafe Moka une voix de porteut;e d'eau, et on chantant en charge uno romance de Lo'Ua t wjct. . . TheitVa ^tait le typo de la chanteuse nprdsboire ; elledevHit devenir I'Eurydice vivante et bonne vivante des Orphees en epaulettes qui, en litterature, ne prisainnt que Rocambole, en musique I'Orphee aux ciiferf:; en fait de cantatricef Schneider et Theresa. Celle-ci devait chanter un jour aux Tnilerie8,elle y chauta ! — II., 211, 215. Claude was once so imprudent as to descend upon a seller of impri)])er photographs. He hears from a higli quarter that he must back out. He parodies "Hell is paved with good intentions " — Bi Je u'agissais pas en cette ciiconstauce delicate, j'ctais destilue. 26 Ramhle.'i in Boohs. Monsieur CLAUDE {continued). Jfi connaispais les rancunes de la cour imperiale, des qu'onne servait pas ses iiiimites, des qu'on ne s'associait tneme pas, pour les pallier, a fees plus mauvaises actions; et la cour imperiale en etait pave ! II., 90. Jt is very natural that a court should be paved. When the war of 1870 broke out, Claude was entrusted with the im/jedimerita — a whole railway-tiain — which Badinguet needed for equipment. It was all but captured by the Germans near Metz, and Claude relates how he got the train back from under hre. M. Zola gives us an idea of the outfit — ... la haine que soulevaifc les gens de I'empereur, s'emparant des villes oil Ton conchait, deballatit leur paniers de vin, tear vaisselle d'argenr, devant les soldats denues de tout. ... Ah ! ce mi^^erable empeieur . . . I'ironie de sa niaison de gala, ses ceut-gardes, ses voitures, ses chevanx . . . son manteau de cour seme dabeilles, balajaut le sang et la boue des grandes routes de la defaite ! La Debacle. Mrs. W. K. CLIFFORD. Last touches, &c., stories. Adam and Charles Black, 1892. " What a beautiful book ! " Such a mental exclamation is not diawn from a jaded novel-reader many times during his life. Thomas is a story to bring tears to the eyes. The following is from An mterlude — When they met there had come over her face an expression of rest- fulness; they seemed to begin their conversation in the middle of one already half finished in their thoughts, or in some dream of which they did not give account. When they parted it was with the knowledge that between them there would be a chapter of life in the future. A chapter of life with her— some hour when the barriers would be broken down, and they misjht stand face to face, not tearing to speak the words that were ali-eady in their hearts. It was maddening joy to think of, but it could never be ; the future was all laid out before him, dull and' commonplace ; there was no shirking it to go seeking after romance and folly and dreams of greater happiness than that which is the lot of ordinary men and women. — 33. These tAvo persons are "engaged," not to each other. After one irradiated day, they go back to the monotony of accus- tomed happiness. Rambles in Boohs. 27 Coalition guide, illustrations of the political history of 1853-4. ''Press'' Office, 1854. A collection of smart Tory political squibs and political pieces, directed ao^ainst the coalition ministry of wliich Abeideeu and Palmerston were the chief members. This is the sort of thing : — THE CABINET CARD PAIITY. (.4 'private apartment at the Furdgn Office. The four ministers who assemhled hastily tn settle the Turkish question are di.-covercd playing at cards, and waitimj for despatches.) Lord Aherdeen. — Shuffle, Clarendon, Lord Cukexdo.v. — You are always makicg me shuffle. (Cards deiilt.) It is Palmei'ston's lead. Lord Palmerston (asidn). — I wish it was. (Plays.) There, my lords, like the princess in the storv, I am always dropping diamonds. (Slyly) By the way, Aberdeen, they are very foud of diamonds in Russia, if you happen to know such a place. Lord Aberheen (sulkilij). — The muckle deil tak Roosha and all her concerns. (Plays.) Lord John Russell. — Don't, don't. That's a very wicked way of talking. (Plays.) I've followed your lead, Palmerston. (Lord Claretidi n plays.) LoRo Palmerston. — And won the trick. It's a way people have who do as I bid them. If somebody I know had trumped Menschi- koS's ultimatum with Dundas' broadside, as I aiivised, we four should not be silting in a back office tiie first week in Septf-mber, instead of shooting partridges. However, wo won't talk of that, or the Premier will get revoking, lo the great damage of Clarendon's peace of mind. LoKD Aberdeen. — I wish ye'd jnst play. Dinua talk so, man. Lord Palsierston. — While I'm talking I'm playing, as has been found out once or twice in the House and elsewhere, my deir Aberdeen. Nobody wastes fewer words than the present Homo Secretary, but holding your tongue is not always the best proof of wisdi^m. Lord Clarendon. — Very good piimd facie evidence of it, though, if you have nothing to say. — pp. 64, 65. And so on, for four pages. I think Mortimer Collins was among the authors. (Henry COLE.) Westminster Abbey, by Felix Summehly. George Bell, 1842. A very early "George Bell," in beantifid preservation. Tiie preface is signed by Henry Cole, who afterwards gave us tha "Broniptou boilers." 28 Famhles in Boohs. Frances COLLINS. Mortimer Collins, Ms letters and friendships, 2 vols. Sampson Low, 1876. He had a beautiful theory that second childhood is a period to be looked forward to, much as we are said to look back upon our earliest days. A friend did not know this at the time of the following colloquy : — F.' — How goes the enemy? M. C. — Why do )0u call time the enemy ? F. — Because he is edax reruni. This biography, composed by Mortimer Collins' second wife, deals with that part of his life and literary activity which was known to her. After the publication of the book, an article appeared in the (Dublin') University Mogazine which gave interesting particulars about Collins' earlier life and newspaper "work. The article, which absolutely ignored Mrs. Mortimer Collins' work, ended with the expression of a hope that some day an adpquate account of Mortimer Collins would be given to the world. Mortimer COLLINS. Selections from the poetical works, made by F. Percy Cotton, Bentley, 1886. Collins had proposed to bring out a new edition of his poems. I Jet him have my copy of Idyls and rhymes on tiie under- standing that he was to give me a copy of the new book, which he did not live to prepare. Mortimer COLLINS. Transmigration. Chatto and Wlndus, 1883. One of Collins' hobbies was deciphering secret writing. The reader will see something of it in this book, which, moreover, is full of his exuberant enjoyment of life. Benjamin CONSTANT. Adolphe. Paris ( ). A very chenp edition, Avhich cannot be vaunted as the publishers' ENTIRE — unless it is all they possess of the article. Bumbles in Boohs. 29 Edward T. COOK. Handbook to the National Gallery. MaemiUan, 1839. Mr. Eiiskin's famous criticisms on the Turner pictures, &c , are preserved for us here. J. W. CEOKER. Correspondence and diaries of the Rt. Hon. J. W. Choker, by Louis Jennings, 3 vols. Murray, 1885. I had tlie good fortune to obtain the Croker Papers lor about 10^. new and uncut. It is, I think, the best book I ever got in that Avay. Lockhart's opinion of Macaulay and his Essays and of the Hidorij of England is here. It occurs in a letter to Croker, asking liim to review the " History " for the Quarterly. Lockhart's opinion is no doubt just, but can we suppose that it would have been needful to attack Macaulay if he had not been a Whig essayist, and the Quarterly not a Tory organ; any more than that Macaulay would have cut up Croker's Boswell if Macaulay had not been an Edinburgh Reviewer and Croker a leading Tory? "A plague o' both your houses ! " Lockliart tells Croker how he composed the Life of Sir Walter Scott, so vehemently assailed wlien it appeared : — Greatly feeling the responsibility imposed on me, in selecting for publication within a few years of his death, I had the whole diary set into type, in order that I might obtain the advice throughout of his most intimate friend Mr. Morritt, and of Milman. Three copies were struck off, and now I liave them all, and I have no doubt that in the course of time some heir of his will sell tbe complete diary lor a larger sum than my book brought for the relief of ... an over- burdened estate. — III., 2^)6. T. Crofton croker. Fairy legends and traditions of the South of Ireland. SoiineuscJtein ( ). " New and complete edition by Thomas Wi-ight, illust. by Maclise ■ and Green "—Title-page. The publication of the legends of the Shefro, the Cluricaune, the Banshee, the Phooka and Thierna na Oge, produced so great a sensa- tion that f'roker began immediately to prepare a second series. With the second he also gave to the world a third. ... 1 knew it was Croker's wish to publish the legends complete in one series. It has been my aim in the present edition to edit them according to the plan he designed. — EiiiTOR's Pueface. This is one of few amusing books I had access to when a boy. The story of the Irishman who paid a visit to the man in tlie moon and was uncivilly received, especially diverted me. 30 Bamhips in Bools. George CUPPLES. Gieen hand, a sea story : (beiug) the adventures of a uaval lieutenant. Routledge ( ). This came out in Blackwood just forty years ago, and boic the simple title *'The green hand, a short yarn," a truly nautical name for a story. ^^ 2'he parenihesrs sJiow the value of the word " being .'' Makquis a. de CUSTINE. Lettres a Yarnhagen d'Ense et a Rahel Varnhagen d'Ense. Bruxdle.s, 1870. Carlyle, in his essays, extracts a beautiful characterisation of IJahel. It is Avritten by Cu<tine, whoso book 1 have been seeking for years, and have found in 1893. DANTE. Divine comedy, translated by Longfellow. Rnutledge, 1867. The notes are a treasury of literary reference. DANTE. Eivine comedy, rendered into English by Frederick Pollock. Chapman and Hull, 1851. The enileavour is to be strictly literal while preserving a metrical form. Schaif's illustrations seem to reflect the terrible sternness of Dante, while Longfellow's literary notes wreathe him as it were with a chaplet of illustration. Alphonse DAUDET. Tartarin sur les Alpes. Collection, GuiUaume, 1886. The illustrations are not merely elegant, but they convey to the untravelled reader the best idea of what visitors to Switzerland hnd there — scenery, people, and manners. Tartarin himself delights me not. The volume is bound in scarlet morocco, demi-limp sides, lined Avith marbled paper through which runs here and there a thread of gold, at the edge of which is a leather border of work in gold. Where the end-papers double is a hinge of leather. The edges of the leaves are gilt, with a finish which is almost French. The exterior of the cover is absolutely plain, lettered' SUK LES ALPES, which makes a perfect title without the help of Tartarin. Rawhles in BooJcs. 31 W. DAVIES. A fine old Euglisli gentleman, exemplified in the life and character of Lord CollingWOOd. Sampson Low, 1875. " Send them to ColHngwood," said Lord Nelson, "and lie will brins^ them to order. . . ." And wlio was Collingwood, tha^. after navy rebels had been im- prisoned and scourged with<mt being brought to order, C'olling>vood could convert them to docility? Who Admiral CoUingwood was . . . history will tell you; nor, in whatever triumphal hnll they may be hanging, will the captured flatrs of Trafalgar fail to rustle at the mention of that name. . . . He whs an officer who held in abhorrence all corporRl punishment; who, thontrh seeing more active strvice than any sea-officer of his time, yer, for years together, governed his men without inflicting the lash. Herman Melville's White Jackft. That is from one who had been a seaman in the U.8. 2^avy, ( ) The Dead leman, and other tales from the French, by Andkew Lang and Paul Sylvester. Sonnensdiein, 1890. I confess to have been caught ])y the pretty name of this book. In the course of his joreface Mr. Lang says : — Some arts have been lost; the art of translation has never been discovered. — xv. The English name the translators have given to Meriirico's ^'■Enlevement de la redoute" is an illustration. Tliey call it " How we took the redoubt." Now, " carrying" is tlie pi'ccise translation of "enlevement," and "carried the recloui)t" is strict military phrase. Why not have let the Englisli be an exact reflection of the French, and said, " The carrying of the redoubt " 1 Under the name " Ploetz," the rea(h',r who is curious enough, will see how the name of this little, though famous, story has fared in German hands. Daniel DEFOE. Hobinson ClUSOe, illustrated by Walter Paget. Ca>^sell. 189L A handsome book published very cheap, no doubt as a present tor buys. Th(! man who buys it is [lunislied l)y an ad r<i]dan'lum covor whereon poor Kubinsuu Crusoe is incrusted with gold leaf. 32 Rambles in Boohs. Fkkdinand DELAUNAY. Campagne de France, 1870-71, vol. I. La&rolx, 1871. Vengeance ! vengeance ! Tel est le cri qui s'echappe de tons las coeurs. L'arnie de la vengeance sera la rehabilitation; I'etude, le travail, la discipline dans les ide'es et dans les mcsars.— -Preface. In reading Zola's Debacle one feels the need of a map. Here is the very complement of that hook, a reflective account of the war, supported by copious citations from de^patcues, articles, pamphlets and books, with maps from official sources. Thomas DE QUINCEY. Uncollected writings, 2 vols. Sonnenschein, 1892. The exquisite finish of his style, with the scholastic vigour of his logic, form a combination which centuries may never reproduce, but which every generation should study as one of the marvels of English literature. — Quakterly Review. A Cambridge man, whom I used constantly to see, was never tired of praising De Quincey's style. Let lis have a specimen, the beginning of a review of Froude's Henri/ VIII. — What two works are those for which at this moment our national intellect (or, more rigorously speaking, our popular intellect) is begin- ning clamorously to call ? They are these : first, a Conversations- Lexicon, obeying (as regards plan and purpose) the general outline of the German work bearing that title, ministering to the same elementary necessities, implying, therefore, a somewhat corresponding stage of progress in our own populace and that of Germany, but otherwise (as regards the executive details in adapting such a work to the special service of an English public) moving under moral restraints sterner by much, and more faithfully upheld, than could rationally be looked for in any great literary enterprise resigned to purely German impulses, for over the atmosphere of thought and feeling in Germany there broods no public conscience, &c., &c. — I. 275. I should call that circuitous ambling instead of straight writing. One of the papers is on the German language, which moves one to note that the "German work" is called Co7iversations-Le.nls.on. " Populace," of course, is a superior translation of populus. Here is something on Anna Boleyn — She had irritated the king by one indication of mental imbecility, rarely understood even amongst medical men — namely, the otlensive habit of laughing profusely without the least sense of anything ludi- I^amhles in Bools, 33 Thomas DE QUINCEY {continued). crous or comic. Oxford, or at least one of tho«e who shot at the Queer, was signally distinguished by this habit. — I. 2S6. On first reading thi.s pas.sage I tlioiight it meant that some Lord or Earl of O.xford had sliot at Queen Anna Boleyn ; but, of cour.se, refe:ence is made to an inuloriouis young man of later date. In the paper called Lud/oig Tieck, De Quincey write.s — ... as Eschylus (s'ci in the Frogs shares his suprenaacy with Sophocles, so would Goethe have invited Tieck to sit beside him on his throne. — II. lo5. What does this mean ? The essay on the Casuist ri/ of duelling, amid much learning, uses the expression " dueU ]mshed I'l Voati-ancey If this is meant for French, it should be a outrance. The volumes contain The household wreck, an interesting story, hut so overlaid with words that I had to skip pages at a time. Paul DEROULEDE. Histoire d'amour, II'"''- ed. Calmann Levy, 1890. A .'^tiiry of fraternal love, very gentiUiomme. I should keep the book, if only because it brings in the Palazzo Alia yioruata at Pisa. Charles DICKENS. Tlie personal history ot David Copperfield. Cliajjiuaa and Hall, 1890. A long time ago, an "art-ful man" advised me to read this. I did not understand him then, but I do now, and keep the book by me, not as a penance, but in remembrance. DICKENS' Dictionary of Paris. Macmillan, 1882. It one might apply a (rerman word to anything about France, I should say that this is singularly anstdndig, worth keeping and consulting, in spile of the dale. 6^^ It icill he ohseroed fJiat the watf in luhicJi, I have gicu the name of tlie author of thin hook lceep.-i it clear of the inu/: of Charles Dickens, the novelist. D 34 Fanihles in Bonis. Ella DIETZ. Triumph of life, mystical poem. E. W. Allen, 1885. AT COMMUNION. Dost Thnn not know ? Thiue fiye can read and see, Thou who hast compassed irnVf npon thH Tree, Sounding the heiyhta and depths of human woe, Can my heart feel a pang Thou dost not know ? Dost Thou not care ? Thy heart can probe and feel, Yea, every smile that fain would tears conceal Reveals my grief to Thee ; no bird of air Can fall unmarked by Thee, dost Thou not care ? TiOrd of the least of these, or gr^at or small, Who numberest hairs, markest the sp-irrow's fall, My wine is drunk, yea, even to the lees. My bark is tossing on tempestuous seas. There is no wine, yet, Master, by Thy will The waters turned ; and, by Thy " P^ace, be still," The tempest slept ; oh, calm this li'e of mine, And give me now to drink Thy draught divine. I cannot imagine a higher reach of devout poetry than that. Ella DIETZ. Triumph of love, in songs, sonnets, and verse. 1877- Herrick has shown that an nlmnst Catulline fancy in the weaving of love poetry is not incompatible with appreciation of a. purer style. His wriiing bridged over the chasm betvveHn the nature-worshipoing of sense and the ideas of the inner man. Miss DietH has well followed in the path which Herr'ck has indicated. — -PubIjIc Opinion. A rare grace and a tender beauty breathe forth in these strange songs. — Literary World. Ella DIETZ. Triumph of time. E. W. Allen, 1884. I will not fear what man can do to me, For am I not Thy daughter, O my King ? Yea., Thou canst bind and Thou canst set me free, silent I wait on Thee or joyful sing; When Thou dost bid me, lo ! my voice I'll raise Hieh to the Heavens in songs of gladdening praise, Or stand in sileiice without questioning. — 9o. Tliese three books are a i)henomenon. As Jacob wrestled •with the angel, and would not let him go, so does the author of the Triuin^ths seem to wrestle with her Ajaker. Rambles in Bnols. 35 • Bek.tamix ])ISRA?]LI. Lettres de Lord Beaconsfield a sa soour, tiaduites; snivies d'un etude sur Lord Beaconstield et le pa'-ty Tory. Ferrin, 1889. The );ist is dated 1852, so "Disraeli " is tlie writer. I value the book for the notes, which exphiiii many an allusion. EoBERT B. DIXON. Fore and aft, a story of actual sea life. Boston, 188o. Three excellent hooks depict a sailor's life bctore tlie mast in all its ro'.iglmess. All three are Americnn ; this one, Cajitain Samuels' From forecastle to cabin, and Dana's Two years be/ore the mast. Yet another American author writes of lorecastlc life, but his ships sail in summer seas — his name is Herman Melville, q.v. G. S. DREW. Scripture lands in connection with their history, recullections of a journey. Smith and Elder, 1860. "Printed by Smith, Elder & Co., Green Arbour Court, Old Bailey." The publisher s catalogue at the end of the volume IS so planned as to look interesting. Mary Frances DREW. Passion play of Ooerammergau. Burns and, Oafes, 1881. Gives us "The complete text for the tirst time translated." Baron A. DU CASSE. Les Dessous du coup d'etat 1851. A. Savine,lQ^\. In tlie Dernier de.^ NapoV'Ons, q.K., the author says: — Ce milieu bavarois (Aug^lxnirg) luurd et compasse, dfteint pnr Ini an point qu'il ne s'en det^agfra j^mai"? eiiti^rement. Ses maniiM-es, pon attitude et ju-(|u'a sa proiiuiii-iation garderont toujoura une certain reflet tudesque. — Pages 30, 31. This is confirmed by i\I. Du Casse, a friendly wiitor : — Son mutisme, cause pent-ctre nn pea a cat epoque par un accent germanique tres prononce, asse/ de.-agreable il des oruilles fiMn(;ai«fH. Tage 25 The Dessous du coup d''<'tat is made useful by a good index of names. In it we find almost fifty notices of Princi' !Napoleon who died recently. St. Arnaud has about as many ref(jreiices. 1. 2 36 Rambles in BooJrs. General DUCROT. Journee de Sedan. Bentu, 1871. Has a coloured military map, AA'liich is interesting to one who walked through the locahty while the turned earth was yet fresh. It was remarked that General Ducrot, taken prisoner at Sedan, had broken his parole. The chief remarked, " If we lay hold again of snch scoundrels, we ought to hang them in their led tmueers, and write upon one leg parjure, and on the other infame. — Busch's Bismarck. General Wimpifen's account is found quoted under " W." Alexander DUMAS. Pictures of travel in the South of France. National Illiistraful Libianj ( ). The proprietors of the Illuhtrafed News for a short time made themselves publishers, and brought out a few pretty books at veiy low ])rice.«. 'J'Jiis is one of them. The date is " conjectured" to be about 1852. Alexandre DUMAS. Une Aventure d'amour. Calmann Tievy, 18P2. Je remarqnai que la deformation de la bouche, si commune chez les vieux Anglais et les vieilles Anglaises, ue s'opeiait qii'a un certain ape, et que tons les Auglais et toutes les Anglaises jeunes, avaient, eu general, des bouches charmantes. Qui pent avoir de'forine la Ijoucbe au point d'en faire un museau chez les uns, une trompe chez les autres ? — C'eetlei/i. The excuse for this extract is its being a complement to "Alden," q.v. Ecclesiastes, by E. H. Plumptre. Camhridge Press, 1888. The notes are a literary repertory and index to reading. Shakespeare, Tennyson, Heine, Schopenhauer, cum miiltissimis aliis, are seen in quotations. Dr. I'Jumptre even cites Heine's profession of faith, Dieii me pardonnera, cent son inttier. Rambles in Bools. 37 Eliezer EDWARDS. Words, facts and phrases, a dictionary of curious, quaint and out-ot-the-way matters. Chacto atul Wivduii, 1884-. Near side and off side. — The left side of a horse is called his " near side." ... A tei-iii derived from ihe times when the driver (?) of the horses in a vehicle walked by their side. Let US turn to the present da3\ Tf a man and woman are goinji; out tor an airinir, the woman steps in first, which brings her to her place, the right liaiid of the man, who follows. That this may naturally come about, the driver brings tlie carriage to a standstill with its left side near the pavement. Tot of spirits.— No derivation of this phrase is ^iven by the die- t'ouary-niakers. A writer in Notes and Queries is respunsildM for the fullowing: — When Haydn the composer was iu En';laiid, he was over- whelmed with visitors, and longed for the quiet of his G rniau evenings nndiHturbed exet^pt by the occasional lifting of hi.s gl.iss. At his most brilliant soirees he was in the habit of stealthily retiring iiiiw and then to moisten his lips. If he met any one who wished to detain him, he would say, " Excuse me, 1 have ntot" (a thought;, tapping his forehead in a signiticaut way. — 577, -78. And SO "tot" became English. At page 107 see more about it. Tiie extracts show how niteresting and useful the book is. Eifel, coloured physical map on linen. Berlin ( ). This has nothing to do with the Eillel Tower. The Eifel is a volcanic district of Germany, between the Rhine and the Moselle — not a French Babel. English Illustrated Magazine. MacmWan, 1892. Some time since 1 .saw in the. spectator a letter which ijuoted an inscription on a sun-dial whicli was not to be found in tlie jirinted collections. Here I tind, not merely the inscription, bnt an image of the sun-dial itself. Tlua'c is an awgidic figure with outspread wings, holding a scroll inscribed L'areunt et imputantur — " They pass and are counted." Let me add two " inedit "-ed words on the lapse of time. A cheap watch I once bought at Verona had on tlu^ back a tidjlct, tahula raxa, inviting inscri[ition. 1 put on it Monstror diffito. Two hands would cover a face To the watch was atlded a 4. .50 guard, dti vrai nirk'-l, bon^^ht in tln^ Italian Alps. Not every one in Loudon can have a monniain chain before him when he will. 38 Rambles in Books. ( ) An Englishman in Paris (notes and recollections) ; 1. Keign ot Louis-Philippe; II. tlie Empire ; 2 vols. Chapman and Hull, 1892. The author's familiarity with things French is deruonstrated hefore you read a line of the book. An ordinary Englishman would write Louis Philippe, without the hyjjhen. The author proves himself to he an Englishman by the way in which Theresa's name is accented. Any one who is inclined to duubt what is here said about the Empire, should read a few passages of M. Claude's Memoires, q.v. In answer to the EnglUliman iji Paris, a courtier wrote in a leading review that Napoleon III. "was the best friend this country ever had." On this theme the historian of 'Tlie cloister life of Charles V. once spoke — We owe the Emperor the Russian war, with its losses in hlood and £80,000,000 added to the national debt. ... In the year of the coup d'etat our naval and military estimates were £13,000.000. Since Louis Napoleon became our firm and faithful ally, they have seldom been much under £26.000,000. There has been the cost of tbe forti- fications, and the co.st, impossible to calculate, of the Volunteers. Sir W. Maxwell Stirling of Keik. Essays from the *' Times." John Murray, 18bl. Collections of reprinted essays were not so common then as lliey are now. These were much talked about, especially that on Lord Kelson and Lady Hamilton. This is the end — An English Ifidy in Calais was in the habit of ordering meat daily for a favourite dog. She was met on one occasion at the buteher'd shop by the English interpreter. " Ah, Madame, Madame." said !M. de Ttbeims, " I know you to be good to the English. There is a lady here tbat would be glad of the worst pi>-ce of meat vou provide for your dog." M. de Rheims received permission to supply the poor vronian with whatever she needed, but he dared not reveal the tuffeter's name, for he had promised fecrecy, and she was too proud to see visitors. Through the chnritable kindness of the English lady (let her name be recorded for the credit of Ler countrywomen ; she resided m Brighton and her name was Hunter), wine and food were supplied to the pauper until she became too ill either to eat or drink. M. de Rheims entreated the poor wretch again and aeain to see the lady who bad been so good to her. Finally she said she would, if the lady irere tint a woman of title. Mrs. Hunter came- — the poor patient thanked and blessed her — and so Lady Hamilton died, " beautiful," says her humane visitor, "even in death." — 32. Rambles in Boohs. 39 ( ) European guides. Orell, F'dsli and Co. { ). An Englisliniaii sees Vod Brienz nach Irderlaken on liis steamboat ticket, and Von Infeilalceii nacli Bern on his railway ticket. He very likely sees Inierlaken printed on the Bahvhof itself, and his! ba<rfi;a2e coming and going will have Intniakea pasted upon it ; and his hotel hill may hear u]ion it the words Hotel des Alpes, Interhiki^n. But he will go home and calmly print an account of his travels in which tlie place is called " Interlachen " — it sounds (or looks) ''so nnicli more German.'' This icas done in the year of universal education. The Briton is not merely a mis-speller of foreign names, but he is the cause of mis-spelling in others who know better. Within a fortnight I have observed two books of foreign extraction whose names appear to have been deliberately mis- spelled in order to conciliate Great British prejud ce. One is a guide to the ISt. Gotthard tunnel, printed in Ziirich, but intended for sale in Kngland. Tlie name of the railway is given as St. Gothard. Being an international affair, two languages prevail on the line, German and Italian. In the one its name is Gottliurd-Balin, in the other, Ferrovia di San Gottardo. The guide to Florence in this series is the other example of deferential mis-spelling In it the famous gallery near the Ponte Vecciiio is called Vffizi, and sometimes UJici. The real name is UfiiziJ = "offices," for the building is <iOvernment jiroperty like Somerset House. In this case anglicising ths names of places is tlie more absurd, that the plates which illustrate the "uidc are inscribed Firenze instead of " Florence.'' o^ Emile FAGUET. Dix-huitieme siecle, etudes litteraires. Lereiu; et Ottdin, 1S90. M. Faguot is sometiraea what English nnivereity elaug calls " cryptic; " there is too much of the nudge and nod and catchword, which are all very well in a circle of the initiiited, bur, not so well in i/enfral lifernry Hociety ... he tias that perhaps rarest quality of the critic which permits hitn to coiifipnin and dislike peccant jiarts without transferrinj; his dislike and condemnation to parts not peccant. — Athen^um. ' 40 Bamhles in BooJrs. CoMTE DE FICQUELMONT. Lord Palmerston, I'Angleterre et le Coutiuent. Bruxelles, 1852, " Wenn der Teiifel hat ein Sohn, So ist er sicher Palmerston." The Count's book is a diplomatic reflection of this sentiment. Only, in reading, you find much abstract disquisition, and very little concrete Palmerston. The original is in German, but this cost less and is easier read. Michael FIELD. Callirrhoe, Fair Rosamund, &c. Bdl ( ). A present from the real publisher, himself a writer of prose, A'erse, and novels. ^^^ The (Author is said to le a lady. I take the name as I Jind it. IT. T. FINCK. Pacific Coast scenic tour. Sampson Low, 1891. Switzeiland and its beauties are here invited to " take a bnck seat." The plates of views are singularly delicate and beautiful. H. T. FINCK. Romantic love and personal beauty, 2 vols. Macmillan, 1887. We should cultivate beauty from within — ■ If the muscles of anger, envy, jealousy, spite, cruelty, &c., are too frequently called into exercise, the result is a face on which the ■word vicious is written as legibly and in as many corners as the numerals X and 10 are printed on a United States banknote. One of the reasons why Fashion encourages the b/ase. nil admirari attitude, and the stolid suppression of emotional expression, is to hide these signs of moral and hygieuic sins. . . . It is with the lips as with Love, of which they are the perch. Neither Zola nor Dante are {sic) the true painters of the romantic passion, but Shakspere, who pays respect to flesh and blood as well as to emotion and intellect. — II. 248, 252. The reader will be amused if he turns to the. entry under " Alden." Here is somethins about the hands — o Another stupidity of fashion is our enforced and cultivated right- handedness. — II., 231. Rambles in Boohs. 41 H. T. FINCK. Homantic love {continued). May not our pair of hands be one of Nature's many symbols, typifyinj,' the relation of man ami woman as helpmeets y Any oiie who does mechanical work which chietly occupies the right liand, will notice how the left hand without conscious volition makes ready and fudges forward the material so as to be most easily laid hold of. When a man cuts your silhouette, the scissors go up and down ; but his left hand moves the paper to the outline of the face. Maurice de FLEURY. Amours de savants. Ckarpentier, 1891. We read how divers men, after a lifetime of devotion to science, show that they are human in very comical ways. Richard FORD. Gatherings from Spain, 2 parrs Home and Colonial Llhranj, 1846. Much new matter has been added to supply the place of portions emitted. . . . (In Spain) the relentless mnrch of human intelleft is crushini; many a native wild flower, which , haviDg no value save colour and sweetnfSf, ma«t be rooted xip before cotton mills are constructed and bread stutfs pubstituted ; many a trait of nationality in manners and costume is already etJaced ; monks are gone, and mantillas aie going, alas! going. - vi. So " that racy cockney " — as the Atlieiunmi once called the aiithor — describes this series of excerpts from his famous hand- book. Hector FRANCE. Amour au pays bleu. Londres, 1885. An exercising ^'round foi' the French army, or a winter resort for English consumptives, is the usual conception ot" Algeria. There are, however, natives, called Arabs, who have their hopes and fears, their loves and their hates, even as white men. This is a most curious story of tlieir ways. Hector FRANCE. L'Armee de John Bull. Charpentier, 1887, The gentleman to whom we owe this book was for six years a spahi in the French service in Algeria. The interest of his remarks on our officers and men may be inferred. 42 Rambles in BoolcPi. Julius FRAUENSTAEDT. Schopenhauer-Lexikon, ein pliilosophisclies Wcirter- biicli. F. A. BrockJiaus, 1871. ^^^ Although Mr. Frauenstaedt is the compiler of this boolc, it might he said that in a catalogue tt should be entered under *■' Schopenhauer." I hace placed it here to avoid the tautology of saying "Arthur Sclwpenhaaer, Schop>enhauer-Lexicon." FREUND. Dictionnaire Latin-franc ais. Firmin-T)idot, 1857, A larj^e and thick octavo, which cost me half-a-crown. The affinity between French and Latin is in favour of a Latin dictionary in French. 8ucli a Avord as the French inMar is a striking example of relationship ; sasurmnent is another. FUN'S Academy skits. Fun Office, ]8Sl-2. Good humour is Fuji's characteristic. Fun does not give portraits of Consi3rvative statesmen holding their hands behind tlieni to receive a bribe from an ugly Russian. This has been done as against Liberals. GAHNERAY. Voyages, aventures, combats, illust. Paris ( ). Most ]ifople have legends of tlieir cliildhood. Among mine was one of an uncle, ca]>tain of an East Indiaman, who was killed in the Bay of T>pngnl wdiile def-nding his vessel against ])irates. Years later I bought in a second-hand shop certain "Voyages et combats." They proved to be Avritten by one of the pirates who assisted in taking the English ship, and con- tained a circumstantial account of the battle between the French and English vessels. Then only I knew that there existed a French account of the transaction. The French piratical vessel wv.s commanded by Surcouf, q.v. Garncray served in the French navy during the Napoleonic wars. It is a change to read of naval encounters in w hich the English did not always " beat the French." Garneray became a mariiie painter and has illitstrated his experiences by drawings of nautical value. Rambles in Boolrs. 43 RicHAKD GAHNETT. • Life of Thomas Carlyle. Waller Scott, 1887. A genial life uf au uiigenial man, Theophile GAUTIER. Nouvelles. Pa/i.s, 1889. Here we have Lamorte amoureuse, Unemiitdc Cleupdtre,&c. Theophile GAUTIER. Romans et contes. Paris, 188G. FllIKDRICH VON GENTZ. Tagebiicher, 2 vols. Vamhagens Nachlass, 1873. Shows wl at very tine com pan}' an untitled man, not adelicj, may frequent on easy terms. But not everybody is in a position to serve .threat people as (jeiitz did : — Jiiillet 21. — .1 ai lu le soir les fenilles infernales de Cobbptt. . . . Xovembre 11. — Sorti ;i 10^. Visite chez le rui de Danemarck, cause line heure avec Ini. Pais nne heure avec Jletternich. . . . Kentre. . . . EiriD urie lettre au prince Schwarzenberg relativement a la conference qui doic avoir lieu ce soir. . . . AlleafH chez Aletternicli. . . . Grande conversation, toujours plus sur la maudite femme que sur les affaires. Ren're ii 8. t ouver- pation avec Laugtnau, a 10.\ chez Xestelrode, causo avec lui jusqu'a, 1 haure. Tliis was at the Congress of Vienna where Gentz was secretary. His holy horror of Cobbett is amusing to the English mind. Tlie 111 audit e feivme Avas the Duchesse de 8agan, as I find in Kaikes' IHarij, q.v. This is an example of the way in wliicli Looks in a small library may act and re-act upon one another. ( ) German popular stories, illustrated by Geokgb (Jruikshans. Chntto and Wmdus ( ). The fine satire which, gleaming through every playful word, renders some of these stoiies as attractive to the old as to the joutig. . . . The illustrations to this volume are of quite sterling and admirable art, in a class precisely parallel in elevation to the character of the tales which they illustrate; and the original etchings, as I have said in my Elements of drruiinij, were unrivalled in masterfulness of touch since liombraudt. — John Ruskin. 44 BamhleR in Boohs. G. R. GLEIG. Waterloo. Mtirray's Home and Colonial Lihrari/, ] 847. Gleicr's " Story of the battle " is probably the best British account in the beaten way of literature. He was in the army ruuier Wellin.s^tou in the Peninsula, of which episode a novel calle<i the SubaUem is an account. As Chai)lain of Chelsea Hospital he had unique opportunities of collecting information. Globe English dictionary. Glasgow ( ). A friend once sent Mortimer Collins a postcard referring to " hy-per-bole " as seen in Anglo-American dictionaries. Out came this skit — ■ An plegantly speaking sonl Is Nuttull of tliH hyjierbole. His words are w\ho. his judgments fair, He li^es at Weston-super-Mare ; He never eats a lo7,en<re, though He oftK'n has a shocking cough ; And thinks qnitiine a useless plague, Even when sutfering from ague ; I ]ik° this Nuttall nnd his I'lique, And vote for him }dc tt ubique. GOETHE. Conversations, recueillies par Eckermann, traduites par E. Delbkot, 2 vols. Charjienfier ( ). Ces Entretiens, tels que M. Delorot nous les leud aujourd hui, eont aussi complets, et meme plus complets, s'il se pent, ipie ce cjui a eie donne en Allemagne ; ils sont surtout plus faciles et plus agre'ables a lire. — Sainte Beuve. Assuredly they are. German, even for one who can speak and write it with tolerable facility, is a painful language to read. Here Eckermann's two publications are made one in chronological order. There are biographical notes and a good inilex. A French writer describes Goethe's Boswell — Eckermann n'e:ait qu'une dom<stique. Aukevxlly. But if the servant serves up faithfully the words of his master, what more do we want ? ^^Ecke7'ma7in vould he called the author of the look, hut as the ivorr/s are Goetlte's, the title is oeat jd^iced. under his name. Whenever there is douJ the greater name precails. Ramhles in Pools. 45 GOETHE. Leiden des juno-en Werthers, lierausgegeben vou L. Geiger, iiiit Zeicbnutigen. Grote, 1883. A sweet, sympathetic edition. One of the Zeichnumjeii , Werther meditating under a starlit sky, is especially pretty. ^^ Here, and elsewhtre, the endeavour has been io contrive that the shortened name, which is indicated by darker letters, shnll read properly. " Werthers Leideyi " is, of covrse, the nsital concise title, hut " Leiden Werthers " is not incorrect German. GOETHE. Sorrows of Werter. Cassell, 18^:0. This is said to be an indifferent translation. Bohn's is not very good. On the first page of it '^if/>7isi7in'g is rendered as " pecul ar." Cassell's has avoided this by not translating the adjective at all. Since writing this I have come upon Professor Boyesen's opinion of English translations of Werthers Leiden — The British barbarian who undertook to put this delicate piece of infiacrinative writing into English for the Bohn Library committed an (ifi'euce compired with which that of Carlyle was venial. For Carlyle (in translating the Wilhelm Meister) produced a coheretiC and interesting book with a definite style, although it was not that of Goethe ; while the mutilator of " Werther " simply bungled along with a heavy hand, unconscious of the beauties which he killed at every stroke of his sacrilegious pen. lie produced a book in which scarcely a trace of the charm of the original is discoverable; and English readers who know the fame of Goethe have been forced to the conclusion that he has been greatly overestimated, and that (Jerman literature must be poor and barren since a work of such trifling merit can have acquired so great a reputation. — 110. GOETHE. Werke, 20 vols., Schillerformat, bound in 10. Grote,187'3. Some one will say — "You possess the Avhole of Goethe's works, which take up more room than any English or French author." Goethe's works were given to me. The illustrations are very nice and sympathetic, especially those to the Italieni,:r.lie Rdse. One of the engravings to the Briefe cms der Schweiz shows an Alpine pass, when mules carried burdens over into Italy. Belore I saw one, I used to wonder what an Alpine pass was like, and when I saw what seemed to he a huge road with gigantic cart ruts in it, winding round a mountain, I had to ask — Was that a glacier '? 46 Rambles in Books. GOETHE. Werther, traluction nouvelle avec notice bioo-raphiqne et Jitteraire par Louis Enault. Hachette, 1872. L'effet qne prodnisit Werther tint beaucnnp anx abominables, niHlsaines et interminables declamations de THeloiSH de Rjussean, qui avait fourbu tons les esprits. — Barbey D'AoBEVinLY. ETiault's preface is an es-:ay on the Soitows of Werter, founded on Kestner'.s Goethf und Werther (Briefe God lies, ni'iist.-ns aus seiner JiVTendzeit, mit erlriuternden Uocunienten). Thus have we Diclitung and Wulirheit confrjiiteil. ^^^ Under "■ Heden''' and " Leires" will he found the riam.'-s of tin ks on Goetlie. I am aivare that the contrari/ i.< done trith Shalcei^pcare. It is a quedi-n, icJnch is thf- best plan. -Golden treasury of the best songs and lyrics in the Eu.oli^h language^ selected and arranged with notes by Francis Turner Palgrave. Macmilhni. 1880. The apparatus or piirade of index is irritating. J want, ^'.7., to find Burns' lines, "To Mary in heaven." I look for that, and don't find it. Then I suppi.se tliat tlic arrangement is by first lines, and look for, " Tiiou lingering star, whose lessening- ray ! '' That is not in the index. But you may not be quite sure whnt is the lirst line of the ])oem. There remains the prosnect of wading through Burns, Robeit Q 759-1 796), cxxv., cxxxii., CXXXIX., CXLIV., CXLVIII., CXLIX., CL., GLF., CLIII., CLV., CLVf. Roman numerals are grand in an inscription, but they give trouble to a man who wants merely guidance. ^g^ This is everywhere known as " Palgrave's Golden Treasury " — indeed, I had placed it in letter '•' t* " — hut as Mr. I'algrave is not the writer of the pieces, thi hook is best in " G." GOTTHAEDBAHN. Karte— Vogelschaukarte. Gcstochen in Winterthw\ 1880. A beautiful coloured map of the district, and a bird's-eye-view map, tinted. From tliese tlie English travelJer leurns the proper spelling of places' names. GRAY. Selected poems, by E. Gosse. Clarendon Press, \QQo. Preserves in amljer, as it were (the onver is ^'v/rir.u'- vellum), the Ode on a didant proi^pect of Eton College and the Eler/y in a country churchyard. Rambles in Boohs. 47 GREVILLE MEMOIRS. Cour de George IV. et de Guillaume IV. . . . extraits par Mdlle. Marie- Anne de Bovei. Flrmin-Bidot, 1888. Tf any micldle-class person would like to know what a racing aristocrat is like— here is one. As a condensation of Greville's bulky book this edition is welcome to a small proprietot. The notes, intended for a French public, are iiseful to those who are not familiar with Hannah More's " Great." W. M. GRISWOLD. Descriptive list of intern atiocal Bovels. This is but a taste. A dictionary wiiich would tell instantly what any novel was about, would often save the trouble of atterai)ting to read it — the novel-reader's punishment. Theie exist several ^ciniillce, but we shall never have the book. The man who made it would have to devote his life to the cause of suffering humanity. And in a Aveek his work would be made incomplete by new novels, for the rate of production in England is three or more a day. Inter-nation-al means Avhich appear to be written in English. ^^^ This is an American pnhlirafii.n. The date and town of issue should have been tjioen here, but I cannot Jind. the book. Archibald Clavering GUNTER. Mr. Barnes of New York. Boutledge, 1891. Not many books have l^-ft on my mind such an imjiression of pleasantness as this. One is drawn towards the author. 'M. GUYAU. L'art an point de vue sociologique. Alrnn, 1880. Eull of literary int'^rest. In one ]»age we find notices of Baizac, Dumas, and Hugo. In anothei' l-Vertlier, Adul/ihe, and Merimce's Carmen are cited; in one more the novels of Georges Sand, Stendhal and Zola are criticised. 48 Rambles in Bools. GYP. Monsieur le Due. J^evy, 1893. It is a testimony to Gyp's power that well-known personages in France are now known by the names that G^p has given to them in her stories. — A■l'HE^^*:uM. Mondeur le Due is the best that I have seen of the lot)'' series of bri^'ht books wliich we owe to Gyp. It is a story told in a series of dramatic scenes. The chaiacters are so many as to foim a species of Vcmify Fair exclusively in le lugh-life. The reader has the privilege of assisting at the intimate con- versation of aristocratic persons, and (oh, bliss !) of learning how they spe^ik slang. The story is interesting as a story, und the diction immensely fine. GYP. Ohe! les psyehologues ! Levy ( ). Such airy, exquisite trifles grow not in our beer-laden atmosphere. Any one who is bitten with "psychology" should read this one aloud to a friend. The hearer, at least, would be amused. • ^§^ Gyp has written so many hooks that it is for the conve- nience of her adniiiers to place them t?i a cataloyue vnder ''"GJ" They cannot go under the lady's 7iame, as shep)refers a pseudonym. ( ) -Handbook for Italy. Murray ( ). To use the famous Handbooks is a liberal education. You find that when you try others. I was once riding between ]^adua and Bologna, as usual without a handbook, the theory being to cram as much as you like beforehand, but once started, to take impressions direct from men and things. All at once, at a small station, a voice called out " Ar-r-qua ! " I confess that I jumped from my seat, not being aware that the railway took any notice of Arqua, and remembering the line — " They laid his bones in Arqua where he died." An American gentleman was sitting opposite with a little red guide in his hand. I asked him to tell me what Avas said about the literary associations of the place. On them the con- scientious Baedeker was dumb. Would Murray have passrcd them by ? Bamhles in Boolcs. 49 ( ) Handbook for Switzerland, 2 vols. Mun-aij, 1879. Some years ago I was meditating how to cross a certain pnrt of the Alps without climbing. I ventured to address the editor of Murray's " ?Iandbooks," sending by way of intro- duction a Continental Tnur. In return came a kind letter, indicating three Avays of doing what I wanted, accompanied by the present of the new edition of Murray's Switzerland Thus I have the aiitograph of the Greater of tlie famous Handbooks. In the history of the house of Murray we learn what travelling was when the materials for the first Handbook were collected :— I began my travels not only before a single railway had been begun, but while North Germany was yet ignorant of Macadam. The high road from Hambarg to Berlin, except the first sixteen miles, which had been engineered and mac:iiiamized by an uncle of mine by way of example to the departrnetits "f Fonts et Chanssees, was a mere wheel-track in the deep sand of Brandenbnrg. The postillion who drove the mis-called Schnellpoat hud to choose for himse'f a devious course amid the multitude of ruts and big boulders of which the sand was fnll. and he consumed two dnvs and a night on the dreary journey. In those days the carriage of that country (the Sruhlwagen) was litt-rally a pliab'e basket on whepls, si^ated acros'', which bent io conformity with the ruts and stones it had to pass over. ( ) Handbook for travellers in Fiance. Murray, 1867. AVilh a new " Bradshaw " for complement, the old " Murray " may still be nsed. Its chief value to nie is for reference at home about places in France which a cyclopiBdia would not give. Jules HANSEN. Coulisses de la diplomatie, (luinze ans a I'etranger. Faris, 1880. I bought this because I had heard, or thought I bad heaid, that it contained ]iiquant revelations. I have mnde several attempts to find them ; and now I forget what I wanted to find. The author is a Danish diplomatist who went up and down Europe (much as Thiers did for France) in order to interest statesmen in Danish jxilit'cs. lie is especially sour against England for minding her own business. 50 Rambles in Boohs. Thomas HARDY. Desperate remedies. Heine mann, 1892. The following story, the first published by the author, was written nineteen years ago, at a time when he was feeling his way to a method. — ^^January, 18s9. This is a story of enchaining interest. I may say that, in taking a conjse of Mr. Haidy's novels, I have endeavoured to cheat them out of a second reading by going tliruugh skip- pingly at first, for the mere story's sake, reserving enjoyment of the writing for another time. Thomas HAEDY. Far from the madding crowd. Sampson Low, 1892, They say that doctors are now so clever that they can light up the inside of you and see what is going on. In Mr. Hardy's novels the moral interior of a rustic is illuminated in a must miraculous fashion. When a writer, besides this, presents us with landscape under varied aspects of time and season, and Avith mental and physical delineation of a very subtle kind as accessories to "absorbing stories which are so told that the writing is exercise for the reader's mind and does it good, wine iuUt pu7ictum — no more can be said. Thomas HARDY. Mayor of Casterbridge. Sampson Low ( ). The following indicates one phase of interest in Mr. Hardy's books: — She had learned the lesson of rennnciation, and was as familiar with the wjeck of each day's wishes as with the diujnal seltiDg of the sun. If her earthly career had taught her few book philosophies, it had at least well piactised her in ihis. Yet her experience had consisted less in a series of pure disappointments than in a series of substitutions. Continually ii had happened that what she had desired had not been granted her, and that what had been granted her she had not desired. So she viewed with an approach to equa- nimity the now cancelled days when Donald had been her undeclared lover, and wondered what unwished-lor thing Heaven might send her in place of him. — 241. There is such a thing as being so acquainted with grief, that a fresh blow comes like an old friend. Fav}hles in Bools. 51 Thomas HARDY. Return of the native. Sampson Low, 1890. Here is part of a piece of delicate portraiture: — She had Pagan eyes, fall of nocturnal mysteries. . . . The mouth seemed formed less to speak than to quiver, less to quiver than to kiss. Some might have added, less to kiss than to curl. Viewed sideways, the closing line of her lips formed, with almost geometric precision, the curve so well known in the arts of design as the cima-recta, or ogee. The sight of such a flexible bend as that on grim Egdon was quite an apparition. It was felt at once that that mouth did not come over from Sleswig with a band of Saxon pirates whose lips met like the two halves of a muffin. One had fancied that such lip-curves were mostly lurking underground in the South as fragments of forgotten marbles. So dno were the Hues of her lips that, though full, each corner of her mouth was as cleatly cut as the point ot a spear. Her presence brought memories of such things as Bourbon roses, rubies, and tropical midnights; her moods recalled lotus-eatei-s, and the march in Athalie ; her motions the ebb aud flow of the sea; iier voice, the viola. In a dim light, and with a slight rearrangement of her hair, her general figure might have stood for that of either of the higher female deities. The new moon behind her bead, an old helmet upon it, a diadem of accidental dewdrops round her brow, would have been adjuncts sufficient to striiie the note of Artemis, Athena, or Hera respectively, with as close an approximation to the antique as that which passes muster on many respected canvases. When I close one of Mr. Hardy's novels it is with a kind of pang, as if one were parting with human beings whose life had been bound up with one's own — to see them no more. Thomas HARDY. -Tess of the d'UrberviHe's. 1892. The secondary title, which jars on the general, is doubtless taken from Hood's Bridge of dglis. I have only read part of the book. I did not buy it, do not possess it, and did nut borrow it. A friend so polite as to think 1 could cut the leaves more neatly than he, offered me the volume to look at. I could not help transcribing a passage which transports us at once to fields of Frencli literature and to Roman camijagiie. One may wonder what the British Philistine, of stone and wood compact, makes of a " marble term." Hard terms in a money tran.saction, probably, are they for him — She thereupon turned and lifted her face to his, and remained like a marble term while he imprinted a kiss upon her cheek. Jl y a toujours I'un qui liaise ct I'autre qui tend lajone ! P.JS. — I have read Ttss. The dairy-farm picture is wonderful. E 2 52 Rambles in Bools. Nathaniel HAWTHORNE. The Marble faun, Avith photogravures, 2 vols. Kcgaii Paul, ^ 889. Probably the best embodiment of the feelint;s of a cultivated person who lives in presence of the antiquities in modern Eome. The principal personage, Donatello, is a nobleman of ancient descent who looks and moves as if he were an ancient statue made to live in modern gai-b. The two women and one other man of the story are pure N^ew England, and exhibit the life of American artists in Eome. Abraham HAYWAED. Selected essays, 2 vols. Longmans, 1878. A selecHoD, carefully revised, of my BioQraphical and critical essays, series I., 11., III. — 8, St. James' Stkeet. The essays, in their original form, are scarce, and cost a great deal of money. The connoisseur objects, of course, to selections. Other people have to be glad of what they can get. Abraham HAYWARD. Goethe. BlacTiwood, 1878. William HAZLITT, Essayist and critic, by William Ireiand. Warne, 1889. A collection of his best essays and descriptive papers. The account of a prize-fight is here, but I do not find the essay on the idea of a nobleman's appearance and the actual aspect of one. Heinbich HEINE. Buch der Lieder. Wien ( ). 8o lettered on the back. The volume contains also Heine's Reisehilder, Italien, Evglische Fragmen'e, Neue Gedichte, ZeitgedicMe, &c. The illustrations reflect the gentle pleasure- loving manners of the city where it is printed. Rambles in Boohs. 53 Heinrch HEINE. Werke, kritisclie Gesatntntauso-abe vou Gcstav Kak- PELBS, Band I., Biich der Lieder. Grote, 1887. A beautifully printed edition, among the many published after the lapse of copyright, I bought this volume for the sake of the binding. It is issued with calf back, marbled paper sides ; cleanly lettered, with a proportion in the letters' size which is very un-Knglish. "Grote" has nothing to do with Grote's Greece ; it is the name of the publisher in Berlin. Eduard voy DER HELLEN. Goetbe's Antheil an Lavater's Physiognomischeu Eraymeuten. Mit Abbildungen, daraater drei bisher nicht beachtete Goethe- Bildniase — Title. One of them, a silhouette of Goethe bj' Lavater himself, is wonderful in its intellectual energy. And Klopstock is silhim(!tted by Goethe. A pretty little vignette depicts Cupid with his feathered arrow turned into a plume behind his ear. (Arthpr helps.) Companions of my solitude, by the author of •• Fiiouds in Council.'^ Smith and Elder, 1874. Accjuired for the sake of a beautiful and romantic story. ^^^ This is a case in which you hardly know what to do about the place of the title in the alphabet. One book has the author's tiame, one has not. Arthur HELPS. Friends in Council, first series. Cassell, 1891. These essays used to be quite " fashionable " reading. W. E. HENLEY. Views and reviews, essays in appreciation. David Nutt, 1890. These literary papers are a treasury of pi(iuant epithet, e.g.: — ..." nor a (rermaaized Jeremy like Carlyle " — ' he was not mar- moreally emphatic as Landor"— " He neither dallied with aotitheHis like Macaulay nor rioted in verbal vule^arisius with Dickens " — " Who grub as for truffles, for meanings in Bjowning." 54 Bamhles in Books. JoHANN Gottfried v. HERDER. Stimmen der Volker in Liedern. Cotta, 1861. Volkerstimmen (the colloquial name for the book) are ballads of various nations, English, &c., rendered into German. W. L. HERTSLET. Schopenhauer-Register. . . . aller Stellen, Ge^en- stiinde, Personen, &c. F. A. BrocJchaus, 1890. Refers to passages in authors which interested Schopenhauer. 1 bought the Schopenhauer- Le.cikon by Frauenstiidt, q.v., Avhich is a much larger volume, thinking to find the passages in full. Instead of that, the book is composed of Schopen- hauer's words merely. Dr. Birkbeck HILL. Writers and readers. Unwin, 1892. The foolish woi-shippers of Browning in their wild extravagance place him above Milton ; but I will not do them the injustice to believe that they have read Paradue Lost. This is a useful extract. The volume consists of lectures at New College, Oxford. Though they have the air of mere causenes, an index of nearly 200 topics or authors makes them a sli'dit handbook of literature. o George Stillman HILLARD. Six months in Italy, 2 vols. Murray, 1853. I have an idea that this is the best book on Italy. You cannot read a Handbook, but this you can read, travelling in the best manner that is possible away from Italy. A shilling, I think, bought the two volumes, a 16s. book. John Oliver HOBBES. Some emotions and a moral. Unwin, 1891. The third lady . . . had a nose which somehow suggested low comedy, and a plaintive-looking mouth . . . her eyes were large, clear, and emotionless — singularly like glass marbles. — 13. Here is something in another vein — (An Interlocutor) — I think that there is much to take hold of in the Greek notion — that man is happiest to whom from day to day no evil happens. — 7. Rambles in BonJcs. 55 John Oliver HOBBES. The Sinner's comedy. Uinvin, 189'2. Would the reader know a Ji?i de siecle novel 1 Ecco ! — (Lord Middlehurst) just before he died kissed his wife's hand with singular tenderness and called h^r " Elizabeth." She had been chris- tened Augusta Fiederica; but then, as the doctors explained, dying men often make these mistakes. — 2. Matrimony is not blessed by the author — I suppose he's married. He"s got a patient, bearing-up look. — 88. Here is a cliaracteristic bit. Whereupon exeunt omnes 1 — Bishop Gaunt confided his brief love story to a friend. " But why," said the friend, " since the husband had forfeited every right to be considered, why didn't you punch his head and bear the woman off in triamph \ " "To tell the truth," said Sacheverell, "I was tempted to some such decisive measut-e." "If you had succumbed," said the friend, drily, " she would have recovered." " Don't say so," said Sacheverell, " I think I know it." The friend, who was a psychologist, went home with moi-e material for his great work on linpu,i6e and Reason. — 146. John Oliver HOBBES. A Study in temptations. Umoln, 1893. Immensely smart, of course. The smartness of the pre- ceding books has a tendency, no doubt, to make the reader expect a great deal. Aksene HOUSSAYE. Tragique aveninre de bal masque. JDentu{ ). When I bought this, it had a portrait at the beginning — not of the heroine, but, as I believe — of the Princesse Elisabeth Ib'lcne de France. It was elegant enough to have framed. Wiiy it should be stitched up here is a mystery. J. D. HOWELLS. Venetian life, 2 vols. Longmans, 1891. To hiive read this book is the next best thing to having lived in Venice. The illustrations are coloured plates in imitation of water-colour drawings made for this edition. Didet ever see a gondola ? . . . It glides :ilong thf water looking blackly, JuH^ like a coffin olapt. in a canoe;, Where none can make out what you say or do. i^)6 Bamhles in Boohs. J. D. HOWELLS {continued). XX. And up and down the long canals they go, And under the Rialto shoot along, By night and day, all paces, swift or slow, And round the theatres, a sable throng. They wait in their dusk livery of woe. But not to them do wofiil things belong, For sometimes they contain a deal of fun, Like mourning coaches when the funeral's done. \ Beppo. By way of describing the stillness of Venice, Byron said that Englishmen could not sleep there, because there was no noise of carriages. I found this stillness emphasised in 1866. The evening gun from the French man-of-war which was in ctiarge, came with such a bang that one seemed to hear the crockery jingle in cupboards. It was not a still time, neitlicr, for bombs were going off here and there, apparently by way of salute to the departing Austrians. Italian soldiers were to be seen sitting on doorsteps, waiting. Plenty of nonsense has been written about the desecration of Venice by steamers. The truth is that they are scarcely seen, or heard, or smelt — as steamers. They look like a good-sized cutter overspread by an awning which hides all but a few inches of the funnel. You may be reclining in a gondola on the Grand Canal when one of these omnibuses goes by. All that you perceive, if you notice anything, is a rustle like that of a lady's dress, for they slip over the water instead of stirring it up. The gain is immense when you want to catch a train. And they take you quickly to the Lido and back for id. Victor HUGO. Histoire d'un crime. Calmann Levy, 1877. Le temps et rhomme etant crepusculaires. — I., 106. That is a beautiful touch. The criminal is Napoleon III. Compare the extracts under " Da Casse," p. 35. Alexander von HUMBOLDT. Letters between 1827 and 1858, Avith extracts from Varnhagen's diaries, and letters to Hnmboldt. Trilhier, 1860. Bamhles in Bool's. 57 Ella HUNTER. Santo, Lucia and Co. in Austria. Blachvoods, 1883. Lncia, I may explain, is a bright bay pony. . . . Last and least comes Co., an elderly uuiippropriated blessing'. — -¥111. Can this be a quiet slap at some "mute ingloriovis " 1 Ralph IRON. Story of an African farm. Chapman and Hall, 1890. Waldo muttered : — '■ The thing J Icvt^d onoe was a woman proud and TOiintr; it had a mother once, who, dviut;, kissed hor little ba'iy, and prayed God she might see it again. If ic had lived, the loved thing wouid iiseif have had a son, who, when he closed the weary eyes and smoothed the wrinkled forehead of his mother, would have prayed God to see that old face smile again in tne Hereafter. To the son heaven will be no heaven if the sweet worn face is not in one of the choirs; he will look for it through the phalanx of God's glorified angels; and the youth will look for the maid, and the raoiher for the baby. 'And whose then shall she be in the resurrection of the dead? " — 283. — whicli reads like a conundrum on a solemn subject. 1^^ The lady who wrote this book is hvoivn, hut we are not at liberty to print her name, as she does not. ( ) ^ Ixora, a mystery. Kegan Paid, 1888. A Jewish tale in alternate prose and verse. It is connected •with Bristol, where a manuscript wiiich tells of buccaneers, ancient mariners, sunny islands, and ghostly visions at sea, mysteriously comes to the writer. He is acquainted with the West Indies and its legends, and with the language of the sea. Jewish though the book is made to be, towards the end we see a crvptogratn in which a ship is accompanied by Christian emblems. Her seams fresh caulked, her yards across,' Heady again for sea. . . , Five days we waited — on the sixth Up- anchor and away. . . . We crossed^ the Line, and then days nine We circled^ in our flight. . . . An island hove in sight. . , . A league offshore in fathoms ten We let the anchor go"" — ^ Fuiled sails, Hquared yards, and made all trim And taut aloft, alow. \For reftrencet tee next paye. 58 Rambles in BooJcs. Ixora {coiUinued). (1) Before sail is made on a vessel, some of the yards have to he sent up from, deck ami " crossed," i.e. slung crosswise whence to hang the sails. (2) The word of command is, "All hands up anchor ! " {S) " Crosshig the line" is strict nautical for crossing the Equator. It is a favourite joke at sea to say to a green hand, " We are this side of the Line now, Sir,'' (4) When there is no wind, as in the doldrums, a vessel may go round and round on her axis. (5) The command is, " Let ifo the anchor ! " Virginia W. JOHNSON. The Lily of the ArnO ; (or) Florence, past and pre- sent. Gay and Bird ( ). This hook is the best exponent of the pleasure of living in the beautiful city that 1 have met with. The mere headings of the twenty chapters suggest as much. Here are five : — r. The street of the ivatermelim : IT. A Florevce windnir ; III. The shrine of the five lamps ; IV. Church towers ; V. Country hells. I once stayed in Florence before I had the sense or training to understand the privilege. The sky, the stars, the lilac flush of the hills, the towers, the bells, and even the flowers were too little heeded. But I did not miss Machiavelli's epitaph in Santa Croce — Tanto nomini nullum par elouium ! ^^^I have put parentheses about the word " or " in the entry of the name of the booh, with a vierv of showing how well it can be spared. The name of the booh is a good example of what is called the alternative title ; the first title is so conceived that a second is required to explain it. Everybody, of course, is not bound to hnoiu that Arno is the name of the river which traverses Florence, or that the Lily is Fiorenza, the city of flowers. The moral is that this or any booJc (■% a subject may be lost sight of in a catalogue arranged by stibjccts. Two entries of one booh should be enough in any catalogue, thus — Johnson (Virginia W.), Lily of the Arno. . . . Lily of the Aruo, Johnson (Virginia W.). . . . When a seeker for boohs on Florence goes to such a catalogue he may miss the book we are sppakitig of I do 7iot see that tlie cataloguer ought to write the name a third time as a premium on a fantastic title. Rambles in Bool's. 59 JOURNEY-MAN. A Continental tour of eight days for forty-four shillings. Sampson Loiu, 1878. Tlie pleasure of travel is chiefly in the retrospect, I suppose. But if any one would taste of disillusion, let him, after an interval of a dozen years, try to live over asain the experiences of a journey which has given pleasure. Landlords are dead, picturesque buildings razed, railway stations removed, diligences done away, oltl-world alberr/os turned into caffes, romantic signs supplanted by electric lamps, &c. John KEATS. Poetical works, with a memoir by Lord Houghton. Edward Moxon, 1 866. The Greek mind of Keats has here an accompaniment of designs from the sculpture of Hellas. For years I sought to know why Isabella chose a pot of basil. Folkard"s Plant lore gives the explanation. It seems that in Italy they believe the perfume of basil engenders sympathy, from which comes its familiar name Bacianicola — "Kiss me, Nicolas ! " H. G. KEENE. Verses, translated and original. W. H. Allen, ] 888. Love and travel are the theme. Rowje gagne and Ptrvi- (lilium Veneris are indications of this ; while the mind may be said to travel, for the collection includes a paraphrase of the Song of Solomon and translations from Hugo, Gautier, Heine, itc. Keepsake, edited by Frederic Mansel Eeynolds. Longmnn, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman, mdcccxxxix. A faded beauty, in battered silk and gold. I confess to an indescribable tenderness for this volume. After an austere childhood spent in the presence of bookcases filled with Simpson's Fluxions, Prideaux' Connection of tlie Old and New Tetifommt, &c. on the one hand, and Law's Serious call, AVilberforce's Practical view, &c., on the other, — I stayed for a few weeks in a house wliere there was free access to Black- mood's containing the Diary of a late ]jhi/,ncian, and to various annuals. The copy of the Kee.pxahe. is just like the one I then revelled in. If I could, 1 would always possess a book enjoyed long ago, in the exact edition and similar binding. 60 , Ramhies in Books. Akthdr KEYSER. Cut by the mess. Chatto ami Windus, 1889. Lathom and West sprang up the side . . . standing before the officer of the watch, they touched their caps and said, " Come on board, sir."— 91, 92. " On 1)oard " may be commended to writers who print "aboard " as if it were nautical. " Aboard " is slang or care- lessness of speech. Officers, iov example, say "on board." Describing the midshipmen's berth the author writes — The roof of this narrow room was covered with racks in which were stowed hats, boot^, gun-caaes, walking-sticks and umbrellas. — 21. This is a contribution to naval history. In the old days, sailors knew not umbrellas. Bat this is the story of a smoke- jack's cruise. A. W. KINGLAKE. Eothen. Blachwoods, 1877. . . . the book is quite superficial in its character. I have endeavoured to discard from it ail valuable matter derived Prom the works oi others, and it appears to me that my efforts in this direction have been attended wiih gre.-it success. I believe I mai^ truly acknowledge, that from all details of geographical discovery or aiitiquariau research, from all display of " sound learning and religious knowledi^e," from all historical and scientiric illustrations, froui all useful stntistics, from all political disquisitions, and from all good moral reflections, the volume is thoroughly fiee. — Pkeface. Eothen was a present to the author of a Continental tour of eif/ht days, whose name, even, Mr. Kinglake did not know. The book was accompanied by a very pretty letter. Charles KINGSLEY. Alton Locke. MacmUlan, 18S0. One of the characters is a " second-hand " bookseller. Charles KINGSLEY. Two years ago. MacmUlan, 1890. This story of aristocratic and modern life attracts me more than novels of Alexandria or centuries ago. Moreover, Two years ago has a mystic heroine with a counterpoise in a doctor who is a materialist. F ambles in Bnol's. 61 Henry KINGSLEY. The Hillyars and the Burtons. B. Tauchnitz, 1865. In this story, an uneducated girl, who mitjht, I fancy, after a year and a half at "a boarding-Pchool, have developed into a very noble lady, is arraigned before the reader. — Pheface. A novel of mystical beauty. The Hillyars are swells^ and rich ; the liurtons, blacksmiths, and poor. Young Erne Hillyar courts Emma Burton, who turus him away because she believes that her duty is to a lame brother. But she suffers. Towards the close of the story Emma relents. The end of all is, that she is drowned in coming by a steamer from the south to marry her lover — "Yea, Emma was drowned, whelmed in the depths of the pitiless gea— her last work over, her finnl ministration pur-ued while the vessel ceased to leap and began to settle down." — 333. Rddyard KIPLING. Badalia Herodsfoot. Detroit Free Press ( ). EUDYARD KIPLING. Barrack-room ballads and other verses. Met/men, 1892. M Ay DAL A 7. By the old Moulmein Pagoda, lookin' eastward to the sea, There's a Burma girl a-settin', and I know she thinks o' me ; Fur the wiud is in the pnlm-trees, and the temple-bells they say : " Come you back, you British soldier ; come you back to Mandalay ! " Come you back to Mandalny, Where the old Flotilla hiy : Can't you hear th ir paddles chunkin' from Rangoon to Mandalay ? On the road to Mandalay, Where the flvin'-Kshes play, An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay ! . . . A Erench writer .said, not many years ago, that if anything i^hould put an end to English rule in India, it would be one of the greatest disasters the world has seen. In tlie meanwhile Mr. Kipling's books show us the machine at work. 62 Rambles in Boohs. RUDTAED KIPLING. Departmental ditties. Thacker, Calcutta^ 1891. So long as 'neath the Kalka hilla, The tonga horn shall ring, So long as down the Solon dip The hard-held ponies swing, So long as Tara Devi sees The lights of Simla town, So long as pleasure calls us up And duty drives us down, If iyoM love me an I love yoii. What pair so happy as we two 1 So long as aces take the king. Or backers take the bet. So long as debt leads men to wed, Or marriage leads to debt. So long as little luncheons, Love, And scandal hold their vogue, While there is sport in Annandale Or whiskey in Jutogh, 1/ you love me ax I love you, What knife can cut our love in two f So long as down the rooking floor The raving of the polka spins, So long as kitchen lancers spur The maddened violins. So long as through the whirling smoke We hear the oft-told tale — ''Twelve hundred in the lotteries And What'semame for sale P " If you love me as I love you, We'll play the game and win it too. . . . By all that lights our daily life Or works our lifelong woe, From Boileaugunge to Simla Downs And those grim glades below, Where heedless of the flying hoof And clamour overhead, Sleep, with the grey langur for guard, Our very scornful dead. If you love me as I love you, All earth is servant to us two. — Pages 75-77. At the end is a glossary of native words used by the English in India, which, because of the many dialects, may help even those who are familiar Avith what is called Hindustani. It is worth while to add that, to get the right sounds, the vowels B ambles in Boohs. 63 RlDYARD KIPLTXG. Departmental ditties {continued). must be pronounced in the Continental waj'. Thus, '^ bandar" properly said, seems to English ears spelt " bundah." In Dejtart mental ditties there is a poem to or about a bandar. Turning to the glossary, T find it means "monkey." Once, on a passage home from Imlia, some English children were on deck. They saw a man up aloft in the rigging. They, not being able to speak English, called out " Bundah, bundah !" as it seemed to me. I knew perfectly well what they meant, but did not know that the word was ^' bandar." This comes of not learning a language by book. RUDYARD KIPLTNG. Life's handicap, being stories of mine own people. Macmillan, 1891. RUDYAED KIPLTNG. Many inventions. Macmillan, 1893. Tlie power of these is almost terrible. In one, a gentleman private, all but dead, is being borne down from the front in a doolie. At the door of a house in Peshawur he sees the woman who might have been the light of his life. He is on his feet in a moment and goes towards her. She folds him in her arms. " ' I'm dyin', Aigypt — dyin',' he sez. Ay, those were his words, for I rsQiimber the name he called her." He is taken with the death rattle. She shoots herself, RuDYARD KIPLING. Phantom 'rickshaw and other eerie tales. Allahabad ( ), Through all the Anglo-Indian cynicism, which is a matter of course, there comes to us the mystery of the East. Mysterious, too, are the mottos to the chapters, which come we know not whence. Let me give an instance of Anglo-Indian cj'nicism. I was once sitting at dinner ne.xt a young man. I asked after his brother, whom I hatl met the year before. Meanwhile I had been to England, "He is rotting in burying-ground/' \sas the answer. 64 Rambles in Books. I closed and drew for my Lovers sake. That now isfulse to me, And I sJcio the Eievcr of Tarrant Moss, And set Damenii free. And ever t)iey ijive me praise and gold. And ever I moan my loss ; For I struck the blow for iny fnlse T.ove's sake. And not for the men of the Moss .'—Tarrant Moss. RUDYAED KIPLING. Plain tales from the Hills. Macmillan, 1890. RUDYARD KIPLING. Soldiers three. Sampson Low, 1893. ( ) Knapsack handbook. London, 1883. I preserve this because of the elaborate preparation and expense which it suiigests. List I. counsels the purchase of artich'S amounting to £7 5s. 6'/. List II., of the knapsack and its cnutents, shows the way to spend £9 (js. more, nearly seventeen ])Ounds in all. Among the articles reconinienifed for the walking gentleman are plaisters for the feet, medicines for the stomach, and a pillow-case to be tilled with hay. ]\fy experience is that feet wliich are tender are healed by w;dking, that walking is the medicine for body and mind, and that one's jack is A ready-made pillow. 'J'he Coniinental tour named at page 59 caused not a farthing of expense in the way of kit. Tl>e true traveller is always ready to start, and to go in his ordinary costume. And if he will use the conveyances and accommodation which are vised by the inhabitants of tlje sanje station in life, it will no longer 1 e a ridille how living and sleejiing are contrived for four shillings a day. It can be done all over Europe at the same rate. The expedition to Venice named at page 130 cost, out and home, £11. Visiting Italy was a mere afterthought. The intention had been to repose at an alhergo among the moun- tains. It was full, so a few days were devoted to brushing up reoollections of the Frato della Valle at Padua, Bologna's leaning towers, &c.. till there was room. Deduct d£8 for travelling twice 1000 miles at \d. a mile, d£3 represents fifteen days' expenditure of 46-. a day. — Q.E.D. Joseph KNIGHT. Life of Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Walter Scott, 1887. Very pretty in its sympathetic criticism of the poems. Bamhles in Boohs. 6-5 (Lac de Thun ; Adieux !) Uue passion, roman par Paria Kokigax. Paul Ollendorf, 1886. The words within parentheses are a fancy title whiclx I have liad lettered on the back of the book becaus-e of associations. This gives cccasion for sa3'ing that if for any reason a book has a letterin2f which does not accord with the title one would write from the title-page, the two nnist, io cataloguing, be made to accord hj beginning Avith the words on the back of the book, or else you may not be able to find it when you look for it — which, one may presume, is one end of the catalogue. Two stories, out of eight which compose the volume, narrate ill-starred inclinations of young women for young men whom they have met in a train or on board a steamboat. They are very finely done, and leave on the reader the impression that the heroines are perfect ladies, although they go in pursuit of their heroes. They find complete disillusion in the end. Une Passion is, moreover, a beautiful picture of a Jewish home of the richer sort, where charity, in the highest t^ense, prevails. LANDSCAPE ANNUAL. Switzerland and Italy, by P rout. Jennings, \^^Q. This book, the publisher's name, and the binding of myrtle- green morocco, recall the old days of bookselling, when, they say, hundreds of such volumes Avould be sold by one city man at Christmas for 21>>-. and 31s. Qd. apiece. The ])ictures present what now must be called an ideal Italy. Then the cities had their ancient walls with their towers ; the streets of Bergamo, Verona, and Bologna were not made hideous by the din of tramways di Verona, &c ; and you couhl walk in Milan without being deafened by the combined uproar of traracars, crashing carts, hotel omnibuses, and other veliicles. Walls are now razed, ancient landmarks removed, and Italy generally is on the move — even to the United St;ites. The Croker Papers give an idea of travelling between this and Italy in 1834. Sir Robert Peel was summoned to form a ministry ... it took a special messenger eight days to reach him in Rome. . . . He set out for England November 20 and arrived December 9 . . . " travelling over precipices F 66 Rambles in Booh^. LANDSCAPE ANNUAL [continued). and snow eight nights out of twelve." Mr. Croker writes to him : — "What a journey ! You are noar a fortuight sooner than I expected — not only because I fancied you would have been at Naples, but Irom the wonderful rapidity of your journey." And this Avas a traveller to Avhom money was no ohject. About 1860, a Queen's messenger told me that five days were required to get to Kome. With our guides, handbooks, rail- Avays and telegraphs, it is not easy to imagine Avhat travelling used to be. In Mrs. W. K. Clill'ord's Lad touches, 1892, q.v., one of the personages says, " I shall be in Rome the day after to-morrow." So that the transit is reduced to two days aud nights. Edward William LANE. Lane's Arabian nights (designation on the cover). The thousand aud one nights, a new traDslatioii from the Ai'abic . . . new edition, from a copy annotated by tlie translator, 3 vols. Chdtto, 1889. The learned notes are in such profusion as to overshadow somewhat a book of pleasure. The spelling of familiar names is no doubt correct, but it jars on the unlearned. When I was a boy, many an hour was whiled away by th ■ original edition of " Lane," simply because I had to take what I cuuld get. In remembrance of those days I would gladly possess the original edition, but it is among the precious books — pretiosus. Messrs. Chatto iind Windus' reprint, at a third of the price, is an excellent makeshift and really a pleasanter book to handle. The odd mannerisms of Harvey's engravings which form [)art of the association, are before tlie eye exactly. Edwakd William LANE. The Thousand and one nights. Charles Knight, 1839. Here is, after all, the original edition. It presented itself advantageously, and I was enabled to get it in the way of exchange without spending money. Famhies iv Bools. 67 P. LANFREY. Histoire de Napoleon I. Cliarpentler, 1880. II imporCe de dire ici, pour eclairer le fantasmagorie des recits inilitaires, que ]e bulletin de Bonaparte sur cette afl'aire d' Aboukir, dirter-^ en plnsieurs points trod-iuiportants de celui de Berthier, sou chef d'etat-mijor. — I., 411. Laiifrey dares to say that Napoleon cooked the accounts. Ati'l, after all, what is a lie ? 'Tis hut The truth in inasqueiade. — Don Juan. Andrew LANG. Letters on literature. Longmans, 1892. It is pleasant, in this critical age, to find a writer so eminently " modern " speak thus of Longfellow — His qualities are so mixed with what the reader brings, with so many kindliest associations of memory, that one cnuuot easily criticise him in cold blood. ... Of Lont;tellow's life there is nothing to know but good, and his poetry testifies to it — his poetry, the voice of the kindest an i gentlest heart thac pnet ever bore. — 42, 40. It is seldom that a })ublisher offers criticism viva-voce. I liave heard two such utterances, the interval between thfMU being many years. In both cases the " Psalm of life" was the subject. Tiie speakers had probably never exchanged a word in their lives. Andrew LANG. Letters to dead authors. Longmans, 1802. Here are the beginning anil the; end of a letter to the author of Don Juan, written in his own (or Pulci's) metre — My Lord, Do you le member how Leigh Hunt Kuraged you once by writing My dear Byron ? Books have their fates, as mortals have who punt, And yours have entered on an age of iron. *«#«■* Farewell, thou Titan fairer than the Gods ! Farewell, faiewell, thou swift and lovely spirit. Thou Sfilendid wairior with the world at odds, UnpraiseH, anpr<iisable, be von d thy merit; Clia:»ed, like Orestes, by the Furies' rods, Like him, at length, thy peace thou dost inherit ! Beholding whom, men think how fairer far Than all the stediasi stai s the wandering star ! F 2 68 Rambles in Boohs. P. LAROUSSE. Dictionnaire complet de la langne francaise ; . . - quatre dictionnaires en un seul. Aug. Boijer, ]879. With small diagrams of objects. The back of the binding is qna>>i-\\\oxocco, continued over the sides by morocco-grained cloth of the same hue, so artfully welded where they meet tlijit you might fancy you h;id a morocco-bonnd volume. This is French morocco in excelsis. (Whether Morocco will become more French is jvist now a question burning as the sands.) A valuable part of Larousse is the Dictionnaire firti.<tique et litteraire, explaining allusions. We frequently read that a person was on the cltemin de DanuAs (on the road to Damascus), i.e. on the way to be enlightened. St. Paul, ou the road to Damascus, was much enlightened, hence the allusion. LAVATER ET GALL. Physiogncmie et phrenologie. Parts- ( ). The commentary to one of the diagrams is simply prophetic. The Leader. Thornton Leigh Hunt, 1850-54. Among its outside coutribntors were Mazzini,* Miss Martineau, Landor, Charles Kintcsley and Mr. Fronde. . . . One of the contrihn- turs of verse was Gerald Massey. In "Open coancil " was published a series of remarkuble papers on the Droit au travail, by W. E. Forster, then unknown to fame. — Bookman, Dec, 1892. A newspaper whose dramatic criticisms were Avritten by George Henry Lewes, is something to possess. The literary articles are also believed to be his. Those were the days of Thackeray's novels in yellow covers, of the first appearance of Kuskin's books ; Currer Bell and her sisters were astonishing literary London, and Edward Whilty, reeling almost with exuberance of fancy, was dejiicting and criticising the governing classes in the Leader. To turn over the leaves of this old newspaper is a debauch of intellect. Which recalls Lewes' argument against early rising — " It is all very well, nrnv and then, but to do so habitually is to make a debauch of it." Another of his sayings was, "The tears are very near the surface." * Mazzini and Harriet Miirtineau both Lave their requiem in the Timet Obiiuiiry,q.c. Bamhles in Boohs. 69 " Come, com', mi/ lord, untie your folded fhought* And let them datitjle like <i hrid"^}t lo'>ti' hit r.^* { \ " Dlchkss of M.vlft. Leaves from the diary of a dreamer, fonud am >iicr liis papers, , William Fickerhui, I800, A book with a publisher's name, which was never pul)hslied. I iafer this from the fact that the British Museum does not possess a copj% which must have been the case, had the ordinary processes been gone through. In this copy I find an MS, memorandum: " Written hij Henry Theo'lore T/ickerman, of New York, a friend of Wdf^liingfon Iroing.^' The book raiglit be called the " Saunterings of a sentimentalist in ltah\" On the way home, he writes — • As I leaned over the bridge at Geneva, and saw the indigo blue of the lake nnd the pecaliar shoodnpf play of the waves, the tneaninpr of cue line in Childe Harold was cmiplftely realised. I understood, as never before, the significance of the phrase which, setting absohite sense at defiance, gives the exact idea of the spectator : — ■ " The blue ruahhig of the iirroiri/ Bhone." I do not know anything about " absolute sense." The simple fact is that the Rhone issues deep blue, from a lake which is pale blue like the butterflies which flit about it — and not always that. At Geneva the Rhone is crossed by a wooden bridge whose jjiles divide the water at intervals. Cross the bridge, and walk a few steps down the road on the bank. You will see the blue water which has been separated by the wooden balks, coming together again. As it does this, the rapidity of tlie current forms a succession of arrow-heads which glisten in the sun. This torrent, rolling forty feet deep of trans|)arent blue, is a sight to see. Our sentimentalist has not noticed one peculiarity of Grenc va. There the chimneys are made to symbolise the horrible Calvinistic ideas of a future state. The tubes which carry oil' the smoke stand in all sorts of contorted attitudes, almost literally writhing over a fire. J. Sheridan LEFANU. A Lost name, -3 vols. Bentley, 1868. Hfic is a picture of the heroine and evil genius of the story : — In fairy lore we read of wondrou.s trar.smutations and disguises. How evil spirits have come in the fairest and saddest forms ; how fell and shrewd-eyed witches have waited in forest glades by night, in shapes of the loveliest nymphs. So, for a droam-lii<e moment one might see under the wondrous beauty of tlio girl ... a face that was apathetic and wicked, — 1. 41. 70 Bamhles in Bools. HuGiTES LE ROUX. Les Mondains. Ccdmann Levy, 1883. In one of these stories is a chanson of fifty-five lines, of Avhich thirty-five are — La dicrue digue digue La brigue dondaine. La digue digue dun ! Ah ! mais non! printed the requisite number of times. This is French poetry. Philibert Joseph LEROUX. Dictionaire COmique, satyrique, critique, burlesque, &c. Lion, MDCCxxxv. A very jolly book, full of passages from Moliere, Scaron (sic), Corneille, Racine, Kegnier, Despreaux, Sairazin, Lafontaine, Lesage, Rabelais, St. Evreniond, Quevedo, &c. R. C. LESLIE. -Old sea wings. Cluipman and Hall, 1890. The illustrations depict wooden vessels, and preserve for us figure-heatls. A most interesting book might be made of the fast disappearing figure-heads, if the artist would let them be beautiful, not antique, with so much of the accessories as is needed to show them off. A ship at anchor, what object is more suggestive of rest] The water idly laps about her bends. The figure-head, which lor months, through day and night, has been whirled over countless billows, now peacefully looks down on its own image in the mirror below. The flag of its country waves, maybe drooi)s, over the after* rail. And yet what scenes of violence, mutiny, and murder may be going on within the impassive bulk ! What is more gently beautiful than the unfolding, one by one, of a vessel's sails as she falls away before the breeze, and steps out on her course 1 We, at a distance, do not hear the wonderful creaking of the gear, the shouting of the men, nor the almost terrible clank of the chain which fills the decks with uproar. Who that sees the white ghost which scarcely seems to glide across a disk of troul)led grey, thinks of the great hull which is tearing through surges Avhich break in thunder about her bows 'i * I fancy thflt the word "taffrail" would be a puzzle for the etymologist. I fin<i tuiit, without, thinking al)Out it, I have given the derivation, t(hei »f(ter) rail. If any one doubts, let him consider " bosun," the nautical for " boatswain." Rambles in Bool's. 71 ( ) Letters from headquarters, or the realities of the AVar in the Crimea, by an officer on the staiT, 2 vols. Mnvray, 1856. Here in a few words is a picture of the horrors of war. At Balaklava, — Captain Nolan galloped some way in front of his brigade . . . was the first mari killed ; souie grape-shot hit him in the chest ; his horse tnrued and carried him to the rear through our advauciiig squailroriH. His screams were heard Jar above the din of battle, and he fell dead from bis saddle near the spot where the order had been given for the charge.— I.-, 316. ^^^ By the Hon. Somerset Calthorjpe, hut as the author's name is not printed, it is more regular to place the title her-^. George Henry LEWES. Life of Goethe, copyright edition, 2 vols. F. A. Brocl-hans, 1882. (This) travelled from one commercial patron of literature to another, nn^il Mr. David Nult took pity on it, and gave it to tiie reading world. — John Francis and thk Athen^um. The original English edition was published in two vohniios for thirty shilling.s. It is now out of print and scarce. I believe tliat the current edition is abridged. The copy here quoted cost nie three shillings in Germany. George Henry LEWES. Ranthorpe. Bernard Tauchnitz, 1847. TO HER who has lightened the burden of an anxious life this work is inscribed by HER HUSBA.N'D is the dedication. In 1853 Marian Evans became the wife of George Henry Lewes. He had married at an early ago a woman possessed <if many cLurius of person. They went to live in a large house at Kensington, with five other yountr couples, keeping house on a co-operative plan. One result was the desertion of her home by Mrs. Lewes with one of the men. . . . She soon repented, and Lewes foryavo her, receiving her back. A second time, however, she left him. — Cooke's George Eliot. EamhUs in Books. Geouge Henry LEWES. Ranthorpe {continued). Rantliorpe in the English edition is scarce. This was Louglit in Germany for about ninepence. We know, most of us, that Tauchnitz editions of English authors are taboo here, because their sale would spoil the market for legitimate issue. But if the copyright edition is sold out, and there is no intention of reprinting, does the restriction hold good *? Ranthorpe is a case in point. Nobody supposes that it will be published in England again. 'I'he author probably only sent it out as a kite to see which way the wind blew, or used the story to air ideas whicdi he ^vould not have put forth later in life. The book is all the more a curiosity for that reason, if it be one. The dite, in conjunction with the dedication, is a landmark of biography. Those who do not care for George Eliot's novels may be amused to hear that a newspaper, now no more, a few years ago made the statement that they ovved their vogue to the iact tliat Lewes held the ju-ess of London in bondage. These are not the exact words, but what was said was to that effect. George Henry LEWES. Rose, Blanche, and Violet, 3 vols. 1848. They say that Carlyle called Lewes " the ape." He was not handsome, it is true, which gave occasion for a hon mot on his alliance with George Eliot — " One cannot be angry with them, they are both so ugly." Literary world. Office (1882-1893). The back volumes are a repertory of valuable critiques and extracts from lately published books. Liberality of view is a chief characteristic of the notices. John Gibson LOCKHART. Ancient Spanish ballads, translated, with notes. Blackwood and Murray, 1842. The name "■ W. Blackwood and Sons," in association with "John Murray,'' commemorates Lockhart's old association with " Ebony." The ballads are historical and romantic. A few Avhich could not be definitely assigned to either class are styled INIoorish. The partition between them is a quasi-liilii of exceeding richness. The decorator is Owen Jones. BamhJes in Boolcs. 73 John Gibson LOCKHART [continued). This luxurious book, produceil at a period when luxuries books were not so common, deserves a word or two of descrip- tion. The real title is preceded by an arabesque title-page in colour and gold. The title-page proper is printed in black and rod with a worked border in colours about it. On the hack of this is a design fanciful in colour and gold, in the middle of which seems to blaze the printer's name on the golden side of a knightly shield — jn'elude to a book of chivalry. The contents are .set in colours and close with an emblem of chivalry. The letterpress itself is surrounded by borders ; at one time a simple black line, at another time a coloured single line. These are exceptions. Generally, these ballads have arabesque borders in colour, which diifer with each ballad. Arabesque initial letters in colour are many ; and tail- pieces to correspond come in where the Averse does not fill the page. Wood engravings are strewn about the "print," accompanying it — bounding, surrounding, or ending, as the case may be. In token that these are lays of love as well as of chivalry, after Finis, two cupids extend the ensign of the printers, Vizetelly Biothers, Fleet Street. The publisher's catalogue is a delicate piece of work in tint and colour. Somelxxly's defacing fingers have cut out the name of one of the books. Mine is a shabby copy, bought for old acquaintance' sake, H. LOETSCHER. Health resorts of Switzerland. Zurich, 1890. A mere handbook to the various " Kurorte.^' I preserve it because it has a hundred of the finest views, from photos. The heights of mountains are given in figures with an "m " after them (Finsteraarhorn, 4:^75 m., &c.), which makes them seem a third of their height. All English readers glancing into a handbook will not instantly discern that " m " means metres. Here is need of a little " cure." Tn this translation of a work written in German for Swiss u.se, care is taken not to wound British susceptibility by too great accuracy of spelling. Thus, the name Interlaken is altered to Interlachen in the letterpress. This is proved by the fact that an illustration of which the Avord "Interlaken" forms a part remains intact. When the word "Interlaken" is rightly spelled, it denotes the situation of the town, inter lactia, the Lake of Thun and the Lake of Brienz. 74 Bamhles in Bools. " Denn AUen wan enfxti'ht 1st werth, dass es zu. Grunde geht," LOKI. The New Werther. Kegan Paul, 1880. Fin (le siede love-letters. The hero, or sufferer, "introdooced hi-^ dona to a pal." The end is — Riphael, Ethel, I forgive you — yoa were but human. Ethel — beloved — I die! LONGFELLOW. Poetical works. Routledge, 8oho Square, 1851. Bound in russia by Eiviere, the edges red under dull gold. LONGFELLOW. Poetical works. Cassell ( ). Not merely beautiful large print, but beautifully illustrated. I was chiefly caught by a view of Cadenabbia, that earthly ]iaradise opposite Bellaggio, where rich English lounge away the day in the off-season. Bathing-places are cunningly contrived nnder the road which skirts the lake, and from the drawing- room visitors steji out under a splendid avenue of trees which are free to even the cheap traveller who goes by on foot. Charles LOWE. Prince Bismarck. Helnemnnn, 1892. This book is interesting as a novel. I nearly got through it at a sitting. It showed me, as I had not seen them before, the causes which led up to the Danish struggle, to the Prusso- Austrian contest, and to the Franco-German war. James Eltssell LOWELL. Essays on the English poets. Camelot Series, 1888. Spenser, Shakc-^peare, Milton, Keats, Lessing, and Rousseau. Bamhles in Boohs. Henrv W. LUCY. Diary of two Parliaments, 2 vols. Ca^sell, 1885-6. A Conservative statesman is depicted — Nature has gifted the Attorney-General with a voice the tone of which would, oi' itself, raise him above mediocrity. I think the most exact siinilirud6 might be conveyed to those who are familiar with the creaking (jf the cordage ia a (<hip's rigging while the vessel lies at anchor in a pitchy sea. O^er and above tne possession of this unique voice, Holker has a deliberate way of saying nothing, which ia exceedingly irrititing on a sultry summer night when the nerves are unstrung. — DistcAKLi Parliament. LUTHER. Table talk. Cax^ell ( ). Aci;urdnig to Luther, heaven has two surpri?es for those who attain it. Une is, the persons whom they tiud there; the other, those vvliom they do nor, tind. Arthur LYNCH. Modern authors, a review and a forecast. Ward and JJowney, 189L Some of them get short shrift. They are quickly strung up, e.f/.— Who is more objective than PanI de Keck, with his fripperies, his popular, spirituel st'^ries of the Paris of to-day ? — 153 Paul de Kock delineates the Paris of to-day, just as Marryat, whom lie lesembles in his coarseness (allowing for latitude) and in his good nature — depicts the British navy of to-day. The hooks of both have value as pictures of a day that is past. Dickens, as also Balzac, seems to hold towards the ideal n- velist some such relation as Thomas Brown, "facile princeps of botanists," held to Darwin. — 91. I helieve that Robert Brown, a botanist contemporary with ^Martins. VVallich, and Ijentham, was by Martius called botani- corum facile princeps. Justin McCARTHY. History of our own time, 2 vols. Chnfto, 1887. Lord .Stratford de Redclille's diplomatic career extended over tliirty years of the present reign. His name is once given in tlie index to Mr. McCarthy's book. Eleven lines of the index, (»r twenty-two references to pages, an; accorded to Sir Walter Scott, who died befon; tlu! rei^n commenced. The index is a key to the book. Here is a key to the index : — ^Q) Ramhles in Boohs. Justin McCARTHY {continued). A reader of Mr. Kinglake's history is apt io be nauseated by the absurd pompousnes^ with which the historian overlays his descrip- tioDS of the great Eltclii. ... A devoted inipf^rial historiau woul i have made himself ridictilous by writing of the great Napoleon at the height of his power in language of such inflated mysticism. — Ch. XXV. Let me add something which shows why any one may be g;]ad to possess the History of our oini time. It is about a twentieth of a passage on Mr. Ghidstone at tlie time of the Budget speech : — The greatest speech, the greatest poem, give the author the hitjhest place, though the effort were but single. Shakespeare would rank beyond Massinger just as he does now had he written only the Teifipcst. We cannot say how many novels, each as good as Gil Bla,.<, would make Le Sage the eciual of Cervantes. On this point fame is inexorable. We are not, therefore, inclined to call Mr. Gladstone the greatest Enirlish oratoi' of our time when we remember some of the fiuest speeches of Mr. Bright ; but did we regard parlinmentary speaking as a mere instrument of business and debate, then uuqui-s- tionabiy Mr. Gladstone is not only the greatest, but by far the greatest English orator of our time ; for he had a richer combination of gifts than any other man we can remember, and he could use them oftenest with effect. Eene MAIZEROY. Les Deux femmes de mademoiselle. Ilavard, 1880. Mademoiselle is a young officer of girlish beauty. These barrack-room stories are a veritable treasure in the way of distraction. One of them gives the experiences of — AN OFFICER'S LADY. Des la prime aube, c'est un tapage de gros souliers ferrcs qni piotinent les marches des escaliers, de grosses voix qui parleut service, de grosses figures rouge ludes, niaisement epanouies, qui baillent dans le corridor. Mon mari est un ofBcier d'avenir, disent ses camarades. . . . " Oflicier d'avenir,"' cela represente des dejeuners electriqut^s, pendunt lesquels monsieur lit nn journal militaire dejilie centre sou verre, signe des papiers et depouille sa correspondance. Nous sonmies a deux bouts de la table, silencit-u^, mangeant, buraiit, baillant. Baptiste est campe derriere nous, en umforme, sa serviette sous le bras. Les chiens se rouleiit sur le tapis et me ]ettent des re'gards gourmands. Un vague adiea du bout des levres, au dessi'rt, et je peux reciter toute la journee, comme autrefois au Sacre-Cojur : " Calypso ne ■pouvait se consoler du depart cVVlysse." —Pages 218-9. 0^P^ Maizeroy is known to be a pseiido7iym. Btd I take as I find. FamhTes in Bools. 11 W. H. MALLOCK. Human document, a novel. Chapman and Hall, 1892. — " What :i pity that ri woman like Alarie Bashkirtcheff, with such resolute frankness, and such power of self-observation, should have died before her experieLCes were better worth obseiving." " Tell me," said the countess, " how deep in the mud must a woman walk before a man considers her progress interesting? . . . the manuscript is an imaginary continuation of Mar)e Bashkir tclietf's Journal, in which she is represented as undergoing the exact fate you were wishing for hf-r." The Imaginary Journal, as Countess Z. had called it, was not entirely a journal, and was not entirely imMginary. Some single thread of narrative, in a feminine handwriting, ran through the whole Volume; but this was broken by pages after pages of letters, by scraps of poetry, and various other documents, all in the hand- writing of a man, and all — as it seemed — originals. — 3, 4. If this is not enough to pique curiosity, 1 do not know ■what is. W. H. MALLOCK. A Romance of the nineteenth century. Cliatto, 1892. There are some books -which you read and put down, again, reading a little, to lay it down once more, tor fear of having nothing more to read. This is such a one. Eakl of MALMESBURY. Memoires d'un ancien ministre, 1807-69, traduits du lungluis avec rautonsatiou de I'autear par M. A. B., ;iine edition. Paid Ollendorff, 1885. I extract from the English original a trait of calm heroism on the part of Lady Malmesbury, whicli might be called noliles.^e a'Air/e in action : — "One morning (at Geneva) we took a sailing-boat and went on the lake. The halyard slipped out <f the block, and my brother's swarming up the mast capsized the boat. Lady Fitzharris iafter- wards Countet^s of Malmesbury) turned to me, both of us being in the ■water, saying, ' Don't be afraid; I won't lay hold of yuu, but tell mo what to (lo.' My brother, who hid got entanirled under the sail, came up, and by putting her hands on our shoulders wo kept her up for a i|uarter of an hour, till a watchmaker, who was rowing Ins wife, took her in, whilst we hung to the stern till we reached the shore, which was a quarter of a mile oft." Tlie French version costs about half the price of the English cheap edition. 78 BamV.es in Boohs. Baeon MARBOT. Memoirs, translated by Arthur J. Butler. Longman?!, 1893, A French general was killed in the wars with Germany. His friends wished him to be buried in Paris. His body was headed up in a cask filled with rum. When the cask was opened on arrival, it was found that the general's moustache had grown down to his knees. This is one of Marbot's stories. Of course there are sceptics, but they do not deserve to be told a good story. If this one is a fable^ the moral is — Use rum for thin hair. Christopher MARLOWE. Works, by Colonel Cunningham. CJiatfo and Wiudus ( ). Includes the translations. The edition most in vogue has not half the matter here given. (Captain MARRY AT.) Jacob Faithful, by the author of " Peter Simple/' the "King's Own," &c. Riclianl BentJey, I808. STANDARD NOVELS, No. LXIII., in the old shiny cloth, plum colour, with a black label^ lettered in gold. Profepsor Maurice was in early life the author of a novel called FAixtace Conway. Mr. Maurice so'.d the novel to Mr. Bentley. The villain of the novel was called Captain Marryat ; aj d Mr. Maurice, who first learned of the publication of his book from a review in our columns, had soon the pleasure of receiving a challenge from the celebrated Captain Marryat. Great was the latrer's astonishment on learning that the anonymous anthi r of Euxtace Conuxii/ had never heard of the biographer of Peter S-impJe and. being in Holy Orders, was obliged to decline a duel.— Newspaper Extract. 1^^ Captain MarryaVs name is not on the title-page, hvt it would he ridiculous to treat the book as if one did not know the author. Captain MARRYAT. Percival Keene. Baudnfs Library, 1842. Better printed than any current English edition. The stationer's shop at Chatham where Percival's mother and her sister entertain the officers with their brightness has always seemed to me one of the prettiest pictures in fiction — notwithstanding the marine who is in the shade. Rambles in Boohs. 79 Captain MAKRYAT. Poor Jack, illustrated by Clarkson Stanfield, Ronfledge, 1883. As a boy T used to see the ori<^inal edition in the hauvls of some friends. This cheap edition is a remiaiscence. Benjamin Ellis MARTIN. Old Chelsea, a summer day's stroll, illustrated by JosKFH Pennell. U'lnvin, 1889. Mr. Peiuieirs sketches invest commonplace objects with artistic glamour ; the very barges on the river are glorified. Be it noted to the honour of the writer's literary sympathii'S, that six out of the lumdred and eiyhty pages of wliich the book consists, are devoted to Henry Kingsley, a novelist whose chivalric and mystic qualities are too little recognised. Harriet MARTINEAU. Biographical sketches, 1852-68. Macmillan, 1869. I have collected all the meiiioirs I hfive, vi' ritten tor tho Daily Ncvs, tmva my tiist cuiiuection with the paper, in 1852. — H. M., Ambleside, 1868. I. Royal ; 11. politicians ; III. professional; IV. scientific ; Y. social ; YI. literary. There are between forty and fifty of these. It is wonderful how this lady calmly judged and appreciated men and women of tlic day, written as the notices were in a secluded momitain home. Here are a few lines from tlie notice of Lockhart : — The goodwill which lie did not seek in his happy days, was won for him by the deep and iiiauiluld sorrows of his latter years. . . . He was now opulent . . . but what were opulence and leisure to him now ? Thi.se who saw him in his daily walk in London, liis liutid- some countenance — always with a lowerin^^ and sardonic expresision — now darkened with sadness, and the thin lips compre-sed more than ever, as by pain of mind, forgave, in respectful comi.;ission for one so visited, all causes of tpifirrel, howove- just . . . and carefully award him his due, as a writer who has atforded much pleasure in his day, and left a precious bequest to posterity in his Life of the great novelist, pufijed, as wo hope ic will bo, of wha ever is untrue aud unkind, and rendered as safe as it is beautiful. See, under " Croker," Lockhart's own words about the Li/e. 80 Rambles in Books. Gut de MAUPASSANT. Bel ami, 62me edition. Havard, 1890. The story vividly depicts the working of a Paris newspaper. Guy de MAUPASSANT. Fort comme la mort. Ollendorff, 1889. Foi love is strong as death. — Ecclesiasies. Guy de MAUPASSANT. Mademoiselle Fifi. Raoard, 1890. A collection of garrison stories. In one of them a tragic incident of the German occupation near Koueii is given with extraordinary vividness. A Frenchwoman after stabbing a Prussian officer who has insulted her, escapes almost barefoot in a snowy night, and hides for days in the village clock-tower till pursuit is over. Jules MAUREL. Duke of "Wellington, with a preface by the Earl op Ellesmere. Murray, 1853. I am mucli inistaken ... if it do not rank now and hereafter among the most accurate, felicitous, and discriminatinir trihutes which have emanated from any country in any language. — PRtFACE. G. PoNET MAURY. G. A. Burger et les origines anglaises de la ballade litteraire en Allemagne. Jiaclutte, 1889. Which returned to us through the medium of Scott's trans- lation of Lenore. Augustus MAYHEW. Faces for fortunes, 3 vols. TinsUij Brothers, 1865. THE LAUGHTER OF WOMEN IS THE MOST BEAUTIKUL SOUND IN THE WORLD. IN THE HOPE OF HEARING IT, THIS BOOK IS WRIl'TiiN. The author does not say how he is to hear the laughter of his fair readers. The audience of a writer is generally out of earshot. A man can scarcely distribute his newly-printed story to those who are immediately about him, and then sit down and wait for the explosions which he has been laying ti-ains for. Ramhles in Bool'S. 81 ( ) Mehalah, a story of the salt marshes, 2 vols. Smith and Elder, 1880. A rival of the heroine describes her to a gentleman who hesitates, lie had said : — " She is more bnaty than ynu are." " I know — strides abuut like a man, smokes and swears, and chews tobacco. I have often wondered, George, what attracted you to Mehalah. To be sure, it will be a very couvenient thinv' to have a wife wh(j can swab, and tar the boat and caulk her. But then I should have fancied a man would have liked somi-thing different from a -sort of man-woman — a jack-tar or Ben Brace in petticoats. . . . She has the temper of a tom-cat, I'm told. She blazes up like gun- powder. . . . Then she is half a gipsy. She'll keep with you aa lont^ as she likes, and then up with her pack, and on with her wadiug- boota. Yo, heave hoy ! and away she goes." An ex-fishing-boat-proprietress conducts a wedding — She thrust her way to the pulpit, ascended the stair, and installed herself therein. " Oh, my eye ! " whispered the boys in the gallery. " The old lady is busted all down her back ! " "What is that?" a.sked Mrs. De Witt in dismay. She put her hands behind her. The observation of the boys was just. Her ertbrta to clear a way had been attended with rum to the fastenings of hnr dress, and had brougiit back her arms to their normal positiou at the expense f)f hooks and eyes. " It can't be helped," said .Mrs. De Witt, " so here goes." And she dre.v on her military coat to liide the wreck. " Now, then, part-on, cast off! " ^^^ The autlwr is one of the best known writers of the day. His name is printed on many a book. But as it is not given here, we are bound to respect the incognito. Lord MELBOURNE. Papers, edited by Lloyd C. Sanders. Longman, 1890. The poco curante manner, the apparently light tone in which he often treated serious suujects, concealed a strenuous application to business, and a deep and genuine anxiety to do his duty to the best of his ability ... I remember noticing how easily the tears came into his eyes, not so much, as I have heard it said, at anything tender or aflFecting, as at the expression of a noble or g-^neroua sentiment. Kakl Cowpkk's Pkkkack. If ordinary men are concerned to know what it is to he a Prime Minister, tliey will get an idea of the worries of the positifjn from this hook. ]\luch of the anxiety in Melbourne's ca.se was theological. The outcry which followed Dr. Hampden's appointment to the Regius Professorship of Divinity at Oxford will long be remembered. Euitob's Noi K. G 82 RambUs in Books. Herman MELVILLE. -Narrative of a four months' residence among- the nntives of a valley of the Marquesas Islands. 1846. This book is commonly called Tijpee, I believe. Herman MELVILLE. -OmOO, a narrative of adventures in the South Seas. Murrains Home and Colonial Library, 184-7. This and the preceding book are in the ori<;iiial dun-colourod covers, almost as fresh-looking as wlieii published. In this dull land, amid drudgery which embrutcs us while " passing the time," we, some of us. sigh for brighter skies and a climate less rude. Herman Melville gives an Englishman the best ubstitutc. s Herman MELVILLE. Moby Dick. Putnam, 1893. Mob// Did- is the name of a new edition of a Avonderful story of South Sea whaling called The ivJtale. It appears that American Avhalers hunt the sperm Avhale, an animal which atfoids some sport, regarding the Greenland whale as a tame beast, only tit to be chased by Englishmen. One sperm whale appears to have been a specially ugly customer, who would not be taken. He broke the leg of one captain wdio went after him. Kesolved not to be beaten, the captain, with a wooden leg, sails again in chase of " Moby Dick," the whale, so familiar as to be known by sight. The book is the story of that cruise and of the encounter. I know no novel which more com- pletely takes one out of the monotony of home life, and it amounts to a monograph on the sperm whale, its habils, iniernal economy, &c. Herman MELVILLE. White Jacket. Putnam, 1893. Amid the crowd of naval novels, this distinguishes itself by depicting life on board an American warship. ]? ambles in Bools. 83 ( ) Men of the reign. BoutJedge, 18P5. Biographies of men ami women, chiefly English, wlio liiive died since 1838. Observe the neatness with Avhich literary cliaracteristics are hit off' — JAMES, G. P. R. . . . To the present generation he is almost unknown, and quite unreadable ; but the public of forty years ago honestly admired his long-di-awn stories, his iuterminable conversa- tions, his convention-il sentiment, and bis questionable history. People liked to c dl him " George Prince Regent." Certainly, with his huttoned-up frock, black stock, and no shirt collar visible, he had quite the air of the ''Ancient Regime " \\-hich he delighted to chronicle. Geouge MEREDITH. Beauchamp's career. Chapman and Hall, 1889. If 1 were to say that Mr. Meredith's novels are works of instruction, I should be called a romancer. Nevertheless, the faultless manner in which foreign names are given in them — it seems almost an impertinence to speak or such a thing — is full of instruction for many a writer. Let me give an instance of the need of learning. Not ten years ago one of our expensive newspapers gave a view of Innsbruck, with letter- press which was "special" — if not taken from ordinary works of reference. The name of the town under the view Avas Inns- briick, and all through the article was lunsbriick, Innsbriick — u^que o/l nau!<eain. Here is another case to show the astounding inaccuracy which passes muster. An expensive edition of Byron has a plate which I first saw quite lately (February, 1893), with the inscription, The Wcn{/e?i Alps. Any one wotdd suppose tliis to mean several mountains. The plate actually depicts a grassy ] latform, 6000 or 7000 feet high, whence, across a great abyss, you look on the snow-clad JwtKjfrau. This spectacle is said to have inspired the sublinuties of Manfred. The plilform is the Wenr/ern-Alp — not "Wengen" ("Alp" in Swiss parlance is merely a higii pasture). "You may go up there and see nothing but a curtain of mist, from behind which, every few minutes, comes a roar as of tliunder. These are avalanches. Presently tiiere is a rift near one corner, and you see something .shiniiig. Before you have time to think, a pyraund, as it were of frosted .silver, 13,000 feet higli, is disclosed, glittering in tlus sun. The charitable explanation of mis-spellings is that foreign G 2 84 Rambles in Books. Geoijge MEREDITH. Beauchamp's career {confinned). names have to be doctored for the English market, like foreign wines at Cette. Our patriotic feelings would be hurt by aecniracy. It is notorious that in En<ilish company a man Avho attempts correct pronunciation of foreign words is looked on with compassion. George MEREDITH. Diana of the Cross ways. Chapman and Hall, 1890. George MEREDirH. Egoist. Chapman and Hall, 1889. " Caviare to the general." George MEREDITH. Khoda Fleming. Chapman and Hall, 1889. No such pavage and scathing attack upon the superstitions of respectability has been written as Rhoda Fleming. — Henley, Views AND KeVIEWS. It is the critic's business to show the reader what is in a book, in doing which he sometimes makes a revelation to the author. George MEREDITH. Sandra Belloni. Chapman a.nd Hall, 1889. This book with the beautiful name, an endearing diminutive of the more splendid EmiHa Alessandra Belloni, is a prelude to the novel enumerated next. Under the name of Vittoria the girl was, from the boards of the Scala, to call Italy to arms. George MEREDITH. Vittoria. Chapman and Hall, 1889. This magnifioent romance is the story of a voice. In it the actions, conversation, and even the looks of both Austrians and Italians— nay, the very aspect and phases of city, hill and plain — are so brought before the reader that he seems to have lived Avith the white-coated officers and Italian consi)irators. Take, e.r/ , the picture of General Pierson, Weisspriess, &c., chatting in the shadow of the arpna at Verona, or the account of Barto Rizzo, the insurgent shoemaker, who fights tooth and nail for the liberation of his cara Italia, while enslaving his wife at home and making her an instrument of freedom. Within late years two or three books^ and essays innumer- Rainhles in Bools. 85 George MEREDITH. Vittoria {continued}. able, on Mr. Meredith have appeared. All fight shy of Vittoria, so I venture to append a specimen or two. Behold some amiable oppi-essors — A group of officers, of the cavalry, with a few infantry uniforms skirting them, were sitting in the pleasant doling evening air, fanned by the fresh springing breeze, outside one of the Piazza lira* cafles, close upon the shadow of the great Verona amphitheatre. They were smoking their attenuated long straw cigars, sipping iced lemonade or coffee, and talking the common talk of garrison officers, with perhaps that additional savour of a robust immorality which a Viennese social education may give. The rounded ball of the brilliant September moon hung still aloft, lighting a fathomless sky as well as the lair earih. It threw solid blackness from the old savage walls almost to a junction with their indolent outstretched feet. Itinerant street music twittered along the Piazza; officers walked arm-in-arm ; now in moonlight bright as day, now in shiidow black as night : distant figures twinkled with the alternation. The light lay like a blade's sharp edge around the massive circle. Of Italians of a superior rank, Verona f^ent none to this resort. Even the melon-seller stopped beneath the arch ending the Stradone Porta Nnova, as if he had reached a marked limit of his popular customers. Here is part of a portrait of Mazzini as seen by his followers assemVjled on the Motterone, a great green wedge, 4000 feet high, which divides the Lake of Orta from the Lago Maggiore — espcciallj' curious in the light of an incident narrated at pages 91, 92:— The side view of his face was an expression of classic beauty rarely now to be beheld, either in classic lands or elsewhere. It was severe ; the tender serenity of the full bow of the eyes relieved it. In proKle they showed little of their intellectual quality, but what sotno might have thought a playful luminousness, and some a quick pulse of feeling. The chin was firm ; on it, and on the upper lip, there was a clipped growth of black hair. The whole visage widened upward from the chin, though not very markedly before it reached the broad-lying brows The temples were strongly indented by the swelling of the forehead above them : and on both sides of tiie head there ran a pregnant ridgo, such as will sometimes lift men a deplorable half-inch above the earth we tread. If this man was a jiroblem to others, he was none to himself; and when others eallid him an idealist, he accepted the title, reading himself, notwitbstand- in>r, as one who was less flighty than many philosophers and professedly practical teachers of his generation. He saw far, and iiH grasped ends beyond obstacles : he was nourished by sovertjitrn principles; he despised material present interests; and, as I have * I liclicve the riBmc in clian'.'cd now. Then; is a vrtriieii witli seiits, wnero pavement was, aucl a very bellicoBe equesiriau siatue ol' Vittorio lojmauuole 1. 86 Famhles in Boohs. George MEEEDITH. Vittoria {continued). said, he was less supple than a soldier. If the title of idealist belonged to him, we will not immediately decide that it was oppro- brious. The idealised conception of stern truths played 8bout his head certainly for those who knew and who loved it. Such a man, perceiving a devout end to be reached mi^ht prove less scrupulous in his course, possibly, and less remorseful, than revolutionary Generals. His smile was quite unclouded, and came sof lyasa curve in water. It seemed ti) H.w with, and to pass in and out of, his thoughts, — to be a part of his emotion and his meaning when it shone transiently full. For as he had an orbed niind, so had he an orbed nature. The passions were absolutely in harmony with the intelligence. He had the English mannt r ; a remarkah'e simplicity contrasting with the demonstrative outcries and gesticulations of his friends when they joined him on the height. A famous Austrian swordsman has been wounded almost to death in a duel with Angelo Guidascarpi armed with a dagger. Vittoria is near. 'Tis a t-uperbly martial bit — A vision of leaping tumbrils, and long marching columns about to deplov, passed before his eyelids: he thought he had fallen on the battlefield, and heard a drum beat furiously in the back of his head ; and on streamed the cavalry, wonderfully caught away to such a distance that the figures were all diminutive, and the regimental colours swam in smoke, and the enemy danced a plume here and there out of the sea, while his mother and a foruotten Viennese girl gazed at him with exactly the same unfamiliar countenance, and refused to hear that they were unintelligible in the roaring of guns and floods and hurrahs, and the thumping of the tremendous big drum behind his head— " somewhere in the middle of the earth:" he tried to explain the locality of that terrible drumming noise to them, and Vittoria conceived him to be delirious; but he knew that he was sensible: he knew her and Angelo and the mountain pass, and that he had a cigar-case in his pocket worked in embroidery of crimson, blue, and gold by the hands of Counte.9s Anna. He s-aid distinctly that he desired the cigar-case to be delivered to Countess Anna at the Castle of Sounenberg. and rejoiced on being assured that his wish was comprehended and should be fulfilled ; but the marvel was, that his mother should still refuse to give him wine, and suppose him to be a boy : and when he was so thirsty and dry-lipped that though Mina was bending over him, just fresh from Mariazell, he had not the heart to kiss her or lift an arm to her ! — His horse was off with him — whither ?— He was going down with a company of infantry in the Gulf of Venice : cards were in his hand, visible, though he could not feel them, and as the vessel settled for the black plunge, the cards flashed all honours, and his mother shook her head at him : he sank, and heard Mina sighing all the length of the water to the bottom, which grated and gave him two horrid shocks of pain : and he ciied for a doctor, and admitted that his horse had managed Rambles in Books. 87 George MEREDITH. Vittoria iconti)i.iied). to throw him ; but wiue was the cure, brandy was the cure, or water, water ! Not often do we see a portrait so l^eautif ul and so sad as this — Countess Ammiani was a Venetian lady of a famous House, the name of which is as a trumpet sounding; from the inner pages of the Republic, ller face was like a leaf torn from au antiiiue volume; the hereiitary features told the story of her days. The face was sallow and tireless; life had faded like a painted cloth upon the imperishable moulding. She had neither tire in her eyes nor colour on her skin. The thin close multitudinous* wrinkles ran up accurately ruled from the chin to the forehead's centre, and touched faintly once or twice beyond, as you observe the ocean ripples run in threads confused to smoothness within a space of the grey horizon sky. But the chiu was tirm, the month and nose were firm, the forehead sit calmly above these shows of decay. It was a niost noble face ; a fortress f lice ; stroni; and massive, and honouiable in ruin, though stripped of every flower. This lady in her girlhood had been the one lamb of the family dedicated to heaven. Paolo, the General, her lover, had wrenched her from that fate to share with him a life of turbulent sorrows till she should behold the blood upon his grave. She, like Laura Piaveni, had bent her head above a slaughtered husband, but, unlike Laura, Marcellina Ammiani had uot buried hur heart wir-h him. Her heart and all her energies had been his while he lived ; from the visage of death it turned to her son. She had accepted tlie passion for Italy from Paolo; she shared it with Carlo. Italian girls of that period had as lirtle passion of their own as flowers kept out of sunlight have hues. She had given her son to her country with that intensely apprehensive foresiL'ht of a mother's love which runs quick as EMstern light from the fervour of the devotion to the remote realisation of the hour of the sacrifice, seeing both in one. Other forms of b)ve, devotion in other bosoms, may be deluded, but hers will not be. She sees the sunset in the breast of the springing dawn. Often her son Carlo stood a ghnst in her sight. With this haunting prophetic vision, it was only a mother, who was at the same time a supremely noblewoman, that could feel all human to him notwithstandiug. . . . Tliese four ])ictures, all lovin<4ly traced, sliow tli'i ^rand inipartiality of a writer whom the Frencli designate magistral. Owen MEREDITH. Lucile, illustrated. Keijan raid, 1882. A story, in he.xameters, of modern chivalry. OwKN MEREDITH. Wanderer; Clytemnestra, &c. B. TauchnUz, 18()i). I'ulitcsl of polite literature ; high life poetised. 88 Rambles in Boohs. Prosper MERIMEIE. An author's love, being the unpublished letters of Merimee's Inconnue, 2 vols. Macmillan, 1889. Merimec's Lettres d une iiiconnue are famous as the love- letters of a great literary man. This book profes-^es to be the lady's letters to him. It is, however, a mystification by a clever ^Vmerican who has betrayed herself by making the Inconnue write about " owning up to " — something. Here is a specimen from the letters — . . . Did you ever hear that story sung as a sacred anthem ? The oil ran down his beard, ran down — -Aaron — the oil — it ran — • liis beard ran down — down — down — Aaron — down — -the oil, the oil, the oil, down Aaron — down — down — the oil his beard ran down— ran — God knows where it finally did or did not run or whether it was the oil, or Aaron, or the beard which eventually ran down — down — down— I , 89. A plain-sailing man has also described an anthem — "If I was to say to you, ^'Ere, Bill, give, me that handspike,' that wouldn't be a hanthem ; but if I was to say to you, 'Bill, Bill, Bill, give, gice, gioe me, give me, that, that, that, handspike, spiike, spike, spike,' why, that would be a hanthem." — Cornhill Magazine. 1^^ / have had to put this anonymous book under Merimee's name, as all its interest is derived from Mm. Prosper MERIMEE. Letters to Panizzi, 2 vols. Ro.mington, 1881. The interest is chiefly political. Thus, May 10, 1859 — The Emperor left to-day. He was escorted to the railway-station by an immense crowd which cheered him lustily. That was en route for Magenta, Solferino, &c. Thiers said — Louis Napoleon has planned this war for years ; for years he has forced Austria to keep up establishments beyond her means ; that b' e is bleeding to death ; tliac the Cougress was a trick; that as soon BS he was prepared, and she exhausted, ho would spring upon her; and because she would not wait for his spring, he calls her an aggressor. — Nassau Senior. The return was not triumphant — II avait solemnellement proclame a I'univers qu'il allait'delivrer I'ltalie " des Alpes a I'Adriatique," et il I'abandonnait a mi-chemin. Le vainqueur do Solteriuo eat ob'ige de se sauver nuitamment, au milieu des huees, des ens de mepris, de mort et de malediction de ce Ramhles in BooJrs. 89 Prospeii MERIMEE. Letters to Panizzi {continued). b<in peuple qu'il venait de delivrer. A Turin, I'animosite populaire prit tie telles proportions que Victor-Emmanuel, craii);uant pour la vie de Napoleon III., le prit au milieu de la nuit et le conduisit hors de la ville. — Dernieu des Kapol^ons. Prosper MERIMfiR. Lettres a une inconnue. Michel Lev;/ ( ). The name of the Inconnue was long a secret, but Miss O'Meara's account of Madame Mohl's Salon half reveals it. Charles MEROUVEL. La Filleule de la duchesse. Dentu, 1880. The story of an ambitious and clever French girl whose mind rebels against the prospect in life which her father's chemist's shop in Paris offers her. The Ducliess gets her the appoint- ment of governess in a lordly Scotch castle. There she makes havoc in the hearts of the men who come to kill game in the autumn. The end is, that a rajah who is among the guests, in the most ceremonious terms, oilers to "buy" her, if &lie will consent to be taken to India. He explains that so alliances in his country are made. J. MERY. Marthe la blanchisseuse ; La Venus d' Aries. Cahnann Levi/, 1884. Constantin et Gallu8, deux empereurs artistes, ont meuble Aries ; lis Ini ont donne des monuments miignifiques et des promcnoira peoples de belles statues. Alors est arrive pour Aries le phenomene remaique a Athencs, a Rome et a Syracuse. Ces musees en plein air ont frappes I'imagination des feiiimes en pou voir de Lncine, et les traits divins de tatit de statues de deesses se sont refletes sur les visages desjeunes filles. ... La boaute des femmes s'est perpetuee apres la mine des musees. — Venus d'Arles. A German student to complete his curriculum travels in France and visits the Koman antiquities of Nismes and the neighbourhood. One day, strolling about in Aries, he sees iu the embrasure of a window a living statue reclining in the attitude of a sphinx. He is petrified and chained to the spot. We learn how he courts a Venus of Aries, and what his mother says when she hears of it, the family being what is called adeliy in Germany. 90 Ramhlcs in Boolcs. ( ) Metaphysicians, a memoir of Frauz Cai-vel, brusli- maker, &c. Longman, Broion, Green, Longmans, and Bohert.-^, 1857. Originall}" about twelve shilling*, this came to me, or I to it, for ten pence. But I had waited more years than Jacob did for RacheL According to Lockhart's Life of Sir Walter Scott, a partner of Longmans' liouse while on a visit to Archibald Constable perceived five swans, as he thought, on a pond. "8vvans, man !" exclaimed Constable, "they are geese, and tlieir names are . . ." Lockhart adds that this skit cost the " Crafty " a good bargain. MEYEE. Hand-Lexicon, 2 vols. BihUogra'plnsches TnstUuf,]88b. A working encyclopfedia with coloured ma])S and elaborate plates of machinery, ships, &c., and much statistics, wilhin the compass of two thick crown octavo volumes. Edouai^d de MORSIER. Romanciers allemands contemporains. Perrin, 1890. Frieclrich (German ppelliag) Spielhagen, Pan! Heyse, Gustave (P'rench spelliug) aud Wilhelm (German spelling) Raabe.— 403, 4Ut. M. de Morsier's book is especially interesting as being from the hand of a Frenchman. There are such copious extracts that one becomes acquainted with the best German novelists at a very easy rate tliioofih the medium of translation. An introduction of 112 pages, " De I'Allemagne, de sa littcrature, de sa langue, et de son genie," is a very pretty ]iendant to Madame de Stael's won.serful book. Her ]\liS. was completed in lolO, as she says in her preface. E. C. G RENVILLE MURRAY. Side lights on English society. Vizetelhj, 1885. A species of Vanity Fair in detached sketches. The illus- trations to this book, from their smartness and elegance^ must be French. Hamhlefi in Boohf^. 91 Alfred de MUSSET. (Euvres, ornees de dessins de JNI, Bida, graves en faille douce, &c. Cliarj^)eutler, 18G7. The plates are of exceeding delicacy and beauty. The back is very prettily gilt on leather. The sides are of grained cloth, the same colour, so cuiiiiingiy "let in" to the t>7erlapping of the back, tliat a superficial observer Tuight well take the binding to" be whole leather. The gilt edges look Lke the shiny part of a brass candlestick. NAPOLEON III. Le Dernier des Napoleons. Lacrolx, 1875. Injimus Napoleonidum ! — no English word will translate the two-edged dernier. The author, who dedicates his 400 pages to the niaues of Maximilian, with savage delight, shows up the Napoleonic regime. Cavour is regarded as the proto- type of Bismarck, who, with ohl William, is beautifully sketched. It is a political pamphlet of extraordinary piquancy. Here are two pictures in little : — GAYOVR. Cavour etait le politique le plus foncierement et le plus froidement pervers de son temps. M. de Bismark, son copiste servi'e, son disciple et son adrairateur fanatique, restera toujonrs et quand niome au dessous de son umdMe de toute la distance qui sepaz-e le genie du talent, I'oiiginal de la traduction. Cavour avait scrute, dechiffre et jugc Napoleon III. avec un inexorable sagacite. . . . II vit avec bonheur, niais avec stupefaction, que cet homnie n'entrevoyait meme pas, ee que I'independance et I'unite d'ltalio allaient ciewr de perils pour la France. EMPEliOli WILLIAM. Le roi Guillaume est le personnification du caractero, de I'esprit et de la politiijue ))russi(]ue8 (■ic) dans co qu'ils ont de plus excessif, de plus audacieux, de plus itnnioral. J^a fourbtrie et, Thypocrisie sont Ic foiids meme du caractere national de la Prusse, Cost le souffle vital et perpetuel c|u'inspire et atiime toutcs les phases de sa politique, tons l< s mysteres de sa vie hi8torique et in'ime. C'est tout le geiiie de Frederic lo Grand, qu'on appelait de son temps " le g' and Jourbe." And here is an " English gentleman " — Un jour Sir .Tames Hudson rletnanda. h M. de Cavonr une audience pour nn f^entilhon-iiie anLilais. Cavour, qui etait fort matinal, donna fees audioucee a ciu(i heurea da matin. Le protege do S. Exc. I'ambas- 92 Rambles in Boohs. NAPOLEON III. Le dernier des Napoleons {continued). sadenr fut exact. Manieres raidpp, tenne irreprochable, la barbe coapee a I'ane'aise, c'etait le type ideal du " (jenfleman traveller.''' L'Anglais deroula an ministre italien un plan formidable et complet de renovation italienne. Cavour, qui se connaissait dans la matiere, fut eponvante de la hardiesse, de la Incidite. de la profondeur, et surtont de la perspi- cacite de son interlocuteur ; mais, ne saiais^sant qn'imparfaitement la phrase anslaise. il lui en temoigna le regret et lui demanda si par bonheur il parlait le fran^ais. Le gentlem^iv, avec un flegme parfait, Srt mit a resumer la conversation et ses idees dans le dialecte italien le plus pur et le pins elegant. Cavour, fascine, buvait la derniere parole, quand I'etranger se leva pour prendre conge. — Monsieur, lui dit le ministre, vons parlez politique comme Machiavel et italipn comme Manzoni. Si j'avHis un conipatriote tel que vons. je lui cederais aujourd'hni meme la presidence du C'lnseil ! Maintenant, en quoi pourrais-je a mon tour vous erre agreable ! — Si vons aviez un compatrioie tel que moi, repondit le gentle »an, vous le feriez condamner a mort ! Vous me demandez commeut vous pourriez reconnaitre les bons avis que je vous ai dounes? . . . En les executant et eu delivrant I'ltalie. Jusque-la, la protection ds Sir Hudson me snfBra. Et I'inconnu se retira en tendant sa carte au ministre; Cavour fit un soubresaut, il avait lu sur la carte de visite : MAZZINI. Contrast that witli the gentiJliomme anglais in Fleet Street — The biographer remembers being; desired to look towards the left, on doiug which he perceived a man of very dark complexion, in a shabby black coat, with a silk kerchief wound round and round his neck, without collar, wnistcoat buttoned high, and with downcast eyes, standing by the side of one of the small archwavs of Temple Bar. Panizzi observed, '• That is Mazzini." No sign of recognition passed between them. — Fagan's Life of Panizzi. NAPOLEON IlL Letters of *' an Englishman" on Louis Napoleon, the Empire and the Coup d'etat, reprinted, with largfe additions, from the Times. Henry G. Bohn, 1852. ADVERTISEMENT. " I PUBLISH these letters for these reasons. They are calculated, I believe — they are meant, I know — to elevate the tone of public life, to fortify the sense of public honour; to brand a paltry and a huckstering statecraft ; to blow up political quackery and shams. . . . To denounce tyranny; strip the tinsel from success; tear the mask Rambles in Bool's. 93 NAPOLEON III. Letters of "an Englishman" (continued). from the leproas visage of hypocrisy; aroynt (sic) the juggling fiend," &c., &c. This is very fine, of course, but it makes one feel that 1852 is a long while a,i,'0. The rhetoric of these letters produces the sauie sort of effect on the mind as reading now Samuel Warren's Diarij of a late pity siciun, with its " INIy God!" et id ijt'nus omne. The stilted style — the " Good God, sir!" style — is certainly gone out.— Whitty's Political portraits, 1854. { ) The New Antigone, a romance. Macmillan, 1888. This might be called the romance of a picture^ an ancestral portrait, which the hero of the story, a celebrated painter, has been asked to see if he can restore. He sets to work, and this is the result — The countenance (nominally a Madonna) that had heen lost was vii-ible once more, drawing all eyes to it, in calm unconscious beauty, not looking down towards e.irth, but already enlitrhtened, as it seemed, with the glory that fnlla from the Great White Throne. It was not a likeness of any hninan face; if it resembled Lady May, the expression transcended all that had ever shone ou her features.— 156. Tl'c heroine of the story, Hippolyta, is a young lady of aristocratic descent who had been brought up away from society. When at length she enters it, the women seem to her hard-Mioutlied. If 1 weie called upon to cite a specially aristocratic trait, it would be simplicity of speech — " yea, yesi " and " naj^, nay." And there are faces which seem of unalterable sweetness. Hknry NORMAN. The real Japan; studies of contemporary manners, morals, almiiiistration and pcjlitics, illustrated Ir- in photographs by the author. Unwiv, 1892. My statements are based upon months of special investigation at the capital, supplemented by visits to JSi'eria. Korea, and Peking. At Tokyo every opportunity for study of all the departments of Government was miif.t courteously atforded me; a Japanese gentle- man from the Civil Service was placed at my disposal as translator and interpreter, and my inquiries into matters outside official control were made easy by oUicial and private assistauce. — Prkfack. 94 Rambles in Books. Oberammergau und sein Passionsspiel, vou Kaul Tkautmann ; Zeiclmungen vou Peter Hai.m. Bamherg, 1890. Has sketchy illustrations showing the ordinary life of Oherammergauers, a view of the dome of Ettal, &c., and a very pretty cover. ^g^ r/r/.s should, stricthf, have been fut in letter " T"." Bat }v)th it and the entries ^^ Napoleon III." are mod easily found, as theij are. T. P. O'CONNOR. Lord Beaconsfield, a biography. MuUan, 1879. Mr. O'Connor writes from a hostile point of view ; but what makes his hook so damaging is the array of facts which he marshals along the line of his narrative. — Spectator. This history of the genius of glitter, a veritable ignis fatuus — which Latin words translate "light and leading" — is a valuable political record; bearing witness in Primrose days. Jeatireson's Novels and Novelists, N. P. Willis' PencillijKjs, Madden's Life of Lady Blessingtoji, and contemporary news- papers are, irder alia, drawn upon for illustrative extracts. Laurence OLIPHANT. Fashionable philosophy, sketches, &c. Blachwoods, 1887. It is not often that a purely English book is printed in the Tauchnitz-Format ; colour, paper covers and all. This is an example. Richard O'MONROY. La grande fete. Calmann-Levy, 1890. Exceptionally smart Parisian stories. In one of them, a baroni/e wants a new carriage. Her husband says she wants exercise — L'exercice vous est excellent, surtout I'exercice a pied — ce que les ladies anglaises appellent dn footing. Voulez-vous un lion conseii ? Eh bien ! faites du footing, nia chere amie, faites du f.oting. — Kh bien ! alors, mon cher, puisque vous le voulez, jo vaisdevenir a footing -lady , One wonders whether, to French eyes, a French phrase in an English book looks as bad as that. Here is a story of British maltreatment of French — A case was being tried before Lord Campbell in which both parties and all the witnesses were French. The counsel on either side, Sir Rambles in Boohs. 95 EiCHARD O'MONEOY {continued). Al'^xander Cockbnrn and Sir Frederick ThesiKPr, wpre excellent French scholars, Rud the .jury profe?se(l themselves well acquainted with the lingo. Everything went smoothlv until the judge uttert-d some sounds which were certfiinly not English, and as certainly nun FrAiich. Sir Alexander Cookbnru muttered in an angry tone to his opponent, "What ails the old fool to mnrder the language like that?'' "Oh," said Thesiger, "Jock's not killing it, he's only Scotching it." — Nevvsp^pek Leader. ^§° One cannot s/ippose that " Richard, o mm roV u a real name, but a cataloguer ha-' to accept what the author (jicei^ him. OVIDE. Amours, Heroides, &c. ; avec etude par Jules Janin. BibliotlLeqne Latine-francaise ( ). Janin's essay is the temptation to keep this, which I boni^lit ill the expectcstion of finding all the Heroids. Not having intended to possess the Amours, it is consolatory to read in Finck, q.v. — ... to be regretted — the undervaluation of Ovid's genius. . . . For Ovid was un<ine8tionHb y the tirsc poet who had a conception of the higher po.<sibilities uf love ; in fact he was the greatest, and the only great love-poet before Dante. His rHre genius enabled him to anticipate and depict the modern imaginative side of love. . . . Ovid was a profound observer and psychologist . . . the Elegies and Heroides are full of pretty modern touches and flashes of insiijht. Romantic Love. OVIDE. Heroides, &c. BihliotJihpiG Latine-francaise ( ). When 1 was sent to school at about the age of ten, the tirst Latin exercise was to translate, day after day, these epistles of deserted ladies. I have always carried about with me a sense of their beauty and fitness ot language. Take these specimens of gentle plaint, sneer, and savage upbraiding — Phyllis Demnphoonti. Hospita, Deino[)hoon, tua te Khodopeia Phyllis Ultra proniissum temijus abesbe qiieror. (Ennne Paridi. Perlcgis ? An conjux prohibet nova ? Ariadne Tlieseo. Mitius inveni, quam te, genus omne ferarum ! 96 Rambles in BooJrs. W. OWEN. Sketches of Lago Maggiore and Fallanza. Bickers, 1879. The praises of the Hotel Pallanza are said or sung without stint, by the resident clergyman, wlio takes pupils, as per advertisement. Let it be added, that every one who visits the Lago Maggiore will be less likely to miss something that is worth seeing if he has this very portable little book with him. H. N. OXENHAM. EecoUections of Oberammergau in 1871. Ji'ivinytons, 1880. A good example of the English attitude towards foreign worshippers. ( ) Paternoster Row, a journey of many a day, by a Journey-man. Mauuscnpt ( ). Joseph and Elizabeth Robins PENJSFELL. Play in Provence, (being) a series of sketches written and drawn. Umvin, 1892. The designs are exquisite. On the cover the word "play" is illustrated by a picture of a bull facing his tormentors in the arena. In the letterpress the Englishman is illustrated — "A bull-fight! Ah, let, us go away before the horrid thing com- mences. Do you know when it begins ? Ah! ten minutes; we have ample time to see the arena. Come, George." And they skipped rapidly round the huge circle, clamboriug over the broken stats, and when the band eniertd they ditappeared. It is like ihis tliat the average tourist sees the character of a country. And ihey were the only foreigners, save the Publisher, in Aries.— 70, 71. And where was the "Writer, that he should describe 1 ^^ I have jMt pareniheses about the u-orcl " feewy " to show how icell it can he t^partd. Itamhles in Tioolifi. 97 ( ) Penny Magazine, two volumes. 1838, 1843. Although the older series was published more than fifty years ago, there is nothing better amid the hosts of periodicals, if one merely desires a book to turn over. The woodcuts are singularly bold and bright. 184.3 belongs to the newer series. A trifling circumstance will show how a book may be chronological. When I was a boy, two ladies, dressed in deep mourning, called at my father's house. Their visit had no sort of importance, but it seemed ill memory to be associated with an article on needle-making whii'h commenced with the words, " Why are needles made at Hedditch?" So, observing a volume of the Pennij Ma'jazine of about the probable date of the visit, lying on a bookstall, I thought 1 would see if the article on needles was in it. It was. Bishop PERCY. Reliques of ancient English poetry. TFa/-«e, 1880. Wlien I was a young fellow a copy of " Percy " was not to be had under \Qs. second-liand. New it was double the price. So I went without it. Xow, two shillings or less buys the book. PLOETZ. Manuel de la litterature francaise. Berlin, ISM. A colled ion of specimens of French authors which are valuable for their fulness. Tlius, Merimee's famous Prise d'uae redoute is given entire, I think. The author called it L' enlevemtnt d'uue reduute. Edgar Allan POE. Histoires extraordinaires, traduction de Charles Jjuudelaire, 2 vols. Culiuaim Lcvij, 1887-8. (Aarevilly says) '' L'Arii(''ricain etrangle le poete, et les besoins de realitc. aucres si piot'uudi'uiont dans les lioinraes de sa race, dotruipent reffoi faiitustiijue qu'il arait d'aboid obtenu. Le merveilleax explivjUL' u'est plus du uierveilleax. The name of the translator was the temptation to get these. But reading them as French stories sets one's teeth on edge in a curious way. 98 Rambles in Boolcs. Edgar Allan POE. Tales of mystery, imagination, and humour; and poems J illustx'ated with twenty-six engravings on wood. Readable Books, 1851. " Henry Vizetelly, printer and engraver, Gough Square, Fleet Street." Mr. Vizetelly was also the publisher, and one may presume, the projector of the series. Forty years ago the publishers of pretty illustrated books at a low price were few indeed. Jules POIRET. Horace, etude psychologique et litteraire. Paris, 1891. This being the day of psychology, temporarily obscured by theosophy, it is very " nice " to have Horace so treated. Stanley Lane POOLE. Life of Lord Stratford de Redcliflfe. Longmans, 1890. This is the authoritative life of the " Great Eltchi." It is not much reduced from the two volumes octavo in which it tirst appeared. W. Mackwoeth PRAED. Selections, by Sir G. Young. Ward and Loch ( ). I first made the acquai^itance of Praed in a little magazine published by Charles Knight about 1846 — as a writer of elaborate riddles in verse called by a peculiar name. It is not for such riddles that I value any collection of his poems. Now, I wonder that Praed should have been so represented. ( ) Publisher's playground. Kegan Paul, 1888. At first I thought the publisher had been playing on his own ground. But it is not so. This very little book has a peculi- arity which is new to me. The notes at the foot of each page are printed in the usual manner, looking like prose ; but they appear to be rhymed verse made prose by the printer's art. Rainhhs in Books. 99 L. QUICHERAT. Thesaurus poeticus liugute latiuas. Hachette, ]890. Suppose the words impar congressus come into one's mind, and one would like to know the complete phrase, this book gives it. Or is it gutta carat lajndem ? here is the whole thought and the source of it — Gutta cavat lapidem, consumitiir annulus nsn. — Ovid. For years I have been passively seeking a Latin phrase on the tedium of life, of wliich one of the words is tcedet. In Quicherat I find it. Dido* sighs — Taedet coeli conyexa tneri. — Yikg. An Englisliman may tire of perpetual blue in sea and sky, and long for neutrals, which are more like home. Quite lately, I have been wanting a classical dictioriary, to tell me " who " Demophoon, Phyllis, &c., are, for cyclopaedias disdain them. Heie I have the information in the best form, with the poetical passages which relate to them. Felix RABBE. Les Maitresses authentiques de Lord Byron, par Felix Rabbe. Albert Savine^ J89U. He means actually (or we should say) the ladies whose names are associated with Byron's history, for Miss Chaworth is one of them. The book gives particulars about Allegra's mother, &c., which Moore, for fear of offending aristocratic friends, withheld from his Life of Byron. Ernest RADFORD. Measured steps. Unwin, 1884. In " measured steps " the rushing j^ace of a locomotive finds poetic expression. • There is another account of Dido's grief— When Dido found .Eneas would not Cf me, She wepi in silence umi was Lii, do, dam, u 2 100 Uamhlps in BooJcs. Thomas RAIKES. Raikes' Diary. A portion of the journal from 1881 to 1847, reminiscences of social and political life in London and Paris, 2 vols. Longmans, 1858. T do not think it is generally known that Raikes' Diary Avas edited by Greville, whose own journal became so famous later on. This would suggest an intimacy between the two men, hut Raikes is not mentioned in the Greville Memoirs. No doubt Greville revised Raikes' book for aristociatic reasons. Raikes was originally a city man or of city extraction. Gronow tells us that at the clubs they called him "Apollo," because he rose in the East and set in the West. His diary is well wiitten, a reflection of the best talk of the day, and a fund of information. In it we find an excellent account of the careers of Beau Brummell and of Count Pozzo di Borgo. The b.'St ])i,rt of Georges Sand's estimate of Talleyrand is printed in French. Raikes was a close friend of Lord Alvanley, and corresponded with the Duke of Wellington. Here is an example of the interest of tlie book : — FROM THE "HORNING POST." Talleyrand was born lame, and his linibs are fastened to his trunk by an iron apparatus, on which he strikes eveiy now and then his gigantic cane, to the great dismay of those who see him for the first time — an awe not diminished by the look of his piercing grey eyes, peering through his shagsiy eyebrows, his unearthly face, marked with deep stains, c >vered partly by his shook of extraordinary hair, partly by his enormous cravat, which supports a large protruding lip drawn over his upper lip, with a cynical expression no painting could render; add to t'lis apparatus of terror, his dead silence, broken occa- sionally by the most sepulchral guttural monosyllal)les. Talleyrand's pulse, which rolls a stream ot enormous volume, intermits and pauses at every sixth beat. This he constantly points out triumphantly as a J est of nature, giving him at once a sujieriority over other men. Thus, he says, all the missing pulsations are added to the sum total of th..se of his whole life, and liis longevity and strength appear to support this extraordinary theory. — Raikes. For more about Talleyrand see "Bates," page 11. The extract from Raikes' journal given under "Adair" is a good instance of the value of the Diary as a work of reference. If any one has a mind to know in what year the steamer Preside7it was lost, the index to "Raikes " leads to the infor- niiition. If this seem nothing, let the reader try and find out some other way. Tlamhles in Bool-s. 101 C. T. RAMAGE. Beautiful thoughts fi'om French and Italian authors. 1884. There are not so many quotations as one might hope from the bulk of the vohuue. jS"o doubt there are beautiful thoughts, but rnany of the citations are what we call " good things," as — Qiiand on n'a ce qu'on aime, II fiiut aimer ce qu'on a. It is comforting to find that this comes from a very high quarter. I had used it as a motto to a book without know ng tlie source. The words are from a letter of Bussy-Rabutin, Madame de St'vigne's cousin and correspondent. !See under " Bussy " what; Sainte-Beuve says of this great '■ swell." ( ) Ravenscliffe. Galignani ( ). Lord Fermanagh missed marrying a lady he was in love with because she preferred some one else. After twenty years or more, at a solitary pass on the coast of Ireland he meets the lady's son by his rival : — The colour of his (the younp man's) face was heightened by his walk, aud the fresh wind blew tlie fair hair round liis countenance aa he lifted lii;^ hat. It was sini^ular, but it was thus, wheo animated by the fiesh air, and hid own naturjilly sweet and cheerful expression, that he most resembled his mother. . . . They got into conversation — As it proceeded, the stranger (Lord Fermanagh) would start, change colour, Jind a strange passion would flit over his f.ice. At a Certain point on the clitt' he signed for Edwin to ascend; then, turning abruptly away, he hurried for concealment under the rociiS, and gave a few minutes to au outburst of uncontrollable emotion. — 171-3. I remember, when reading this a long time ago, thinking, " what a romantic circumstance ! " as if such agitation were to be envied. The author is Mrs. Marsli, hut it seems bed to fuJInn' the book. r 102 BamhJes in Boolcs. Charles RBADE. Foul play, by Charles Reade and Dion Boucicault, illustrated by Du Maurier. Cliatto, 1 888. I may say that this is the only novel I ever read serially. It was published in Once a Week. It is an astounding book, giving the idea of omniscience on the part of its authors. Of course it has been mercilessly ridiculed ; inter alia, by a mock storv called Chikkin Hazard. Charles READE. Griffith Gaunt, or jealousy, illustrated. Chatto, 1887. Griffith Gaunt, a squire, is a stout Protestant. He has married a Eoman Catholic. The frontispiece shows her^ a supremely fine lady, in Academic converse with her confessor, a too beautiful priest. The husband glares at them, behind some foliage. After beating the priest he leaves home, and presently marries a sweet plebeian, ]\Iary Vint. She, in prison, captivates a baronet. It is very pretty to hear her, not his lover, call him George. Charles READE. A terrible temptation, a story of the day. Chatto ( ). Charles READE. A woman-hater. Chatto, 1887. The heroine sings : — After a recitative that rivalled the silver trumpet, she flung herself with immediate and electrifying effect into the melody. The orches- tra, taken by surprise, fought feebly for the old ripple, but the Klosking, resolute by natiire,was now mighty as Neptune, and would have her big waves. The momentary struggle, in which she was loyally seconded by the conductor, evoked her grand powers. Cat- gut had to yield to brain, and the whole orchestra, composed, after all, of good musicians, soon caught the divine afflatus, and the little theatre seemed on fire with music. The air, sung with a lar<>fe rhythm, swelled and rose, and thrilled every breast with amazement and delight ; the house hung breathless ; by-and-bye there were pale cheeks, panting bosoms, and wet eyes, the true, rare triumphs of the sovereigns of song ; and, when the last note had pealed and ceased to vibrate, the pent-up feelings burst forth in a roar of applause, which shook the dome, followed by a clapping of hands like a salvo, that never stopped till lua Klosking, who had retired, oame forward again. — 35. RamMes in Boolcs. 103 Adolphe EICAED. L'amour, les femmes et le mariage, historiettes, peusees et reflexions glauees a travel's champs. Dentu, 1857. This might be called a dictionary of wisdom. Extracts from authors of various countries are grouped under words — JALOUSIE. Un jaloux trouve toujours plus qu'il ne cherche. Mdlle. de Scudkby. VISAGE. Le visage est le miroir de I'ame. — Sai.vt Jkrome. Les femmes se cacheat dans le sein de Dieu, lorsqu'elles out honte de montrer un yieus visage auquel les jeunes gens ne rienfc plus. ROCHEBRUNE. The book is a famous index to reading. One learns the names of authors one has not heard of (I speak for myself), and discovers that many a seemingly uninteresting — because unread — author has written interesting things. Among the writers quoted are Aristotle, Cicero, Erasmus, Hesiod, Joubert, Milton, Montesquieu, Pascal, &c., &c. J. EI CARD. La Course a ramoiir. Paris, 1888. French-fashion, this book contains a story, Simplette, not named on the cover. Here is a specimen of it — ■ Le beau marquis. . . . En 1865, son enorme fortune devoree jusqu' au dernier louis, il s'etait marie. On lui avait deconvert une petite consine trea riche, laide et intelligente ; il I'avait epousee comme on Ee noie. J. EICAED. Moumoute, Calmann Levy, 1892. Elle aimait, done elle croyaifc. . . . Ce qui etait en elle, elle le mit en lui. C'est assez gencralement ce qui so passe dans le cas d'araour et c'est ainsi que naissent les stupeurs qui saisissent, lorsqu'on voit I'etre si facticeraent crt'e agir selon sa veritable nature et non dans le sens de celle dont on I'avait mentalement doue. — loO, 151. Folie etrange de nos ames chercheuses d'impossible ! Le plus clair de noB joies est fait de souffrance. Quand notre vie a coule et quo, au bord du grand Uoute oil nous allons tomber, nous regardous en arri("'re, nous ne trouvons de souvenir et de reconnaissance quo pour CO qui nouH a fait pleurer et saigner. — 311. 104 B ambles in Bools. W. E. RICHARDSON. From London Biidge to Lombardy by a mac- adamised route. Sampsuii Low, 1869. The good-humoured English traveller is here s-een at his best, turning all things to pleasantness. The clever sketches reflect this happy mood, while they convey good notions of the ohjects depicted, even in burlesijuing them. LrciEN RIGAUD. Dictionnaire d 'argot. Paris, 1888. I have h'.'en seeking high and low for a rational explanation of the word " impressionist." Chambers' Encydiqwdia gives it not. Of course ic may he said that " impressionist " is mere slang. If so, account for its admission into one of the French dictionaries. Perhaps it is admitted under protest, and pays toll by remaining unex])lained. However, looking for some- thing else in ^I. Rigaud's book, I find — Impressioniste.— Feintre ultra-realiste. f-es impressionists>< ru im- piesfcionalisti'S ne peignent que limpiession. lis jette"t quelqnea toiK sur la toile sans s'occuper ni de rharraonie des cuuleurs, ni dn <Jessin, ni du re^te. L«nrs ctuvres repseml)lent a des esquisses informes. C'est I'iudicatioo, ce n'est pas le tableau. Here is a definition which shows the smartness with which Avords are trt-ated — Quartier.— Quartier Latin, qiiartier des ecoles. . ._ . Femme dn •luaffier, femuie qui habite le qnartier Latin pour y etudier, sur le vif, I'eiudiant. The book abounds in bright citations from the " modernest " authors. LuciEN RIGAUD. Lieux communs de la conversation. Paris, 1887. Bought in the hope of its being a*^ interesting as the Avf/ot, which it is not One gets tired of examples of hanaJite in diction, which the author may have had painfully to evolve. ( ) / Rockingham, or the younger brother. Galignaiii, 1849. I find in the sadness of this story an exceeding charm. Edward Whitty calls younger brothers "detrimentals" — because they are no good to anybody. Rambles in Bonks. 105 Edouard rod. Henri Beyle. Hachetfe, 1891. Balzac ranije Beyle parmi les rnattrcs les plus disfiiignes de la lit- foraiuie rles ideeH, a l^quelle appartienntrit Meiiinee, Alus-^or,, Leon Gozian, Beranyer, DeliviirnM, G. Plancho, Madame de Girardin, Aiphonse Karr et Charles Nodier. 'riie portrait was a surprise to me. A burly, bull-necked man, with mutton-chop whiskers and no m mstache, is scarcely the ideal of an ultru-line analyser of sentiment'^, who, born at Grenoble, thought it worth while to be epitaphed Milanese. Under •' Stendhal," books written by him are noted. Dante Gabriel ROSSETTI. Collected works, with preface and notes by Wjtjjam M. KostJETTi, 2 vols. Ellis and Elvpy, 189U. I. Poems, prose-tales and literary papers. II. Trauslations, fine arc notices, &c. E. ROUBAUD. French dictionary, 14Gtli thousand. Cassell, 1882. I believe that this is the best cheap French dictionary. And it is well ]n'inted. But some of the definitions are luLiicrously bad or insufficient : — angelus anpelus angiosperme ... augiospermoua angine angiua ansiospermie .. augiosperm angineux... attended with angina angiotomie ... angiotomy angicgi'd-phie... angiography aperitif ... apeiitive, opening angiologie ... angiulogy echassier, n.m., (omi) grallio I have nothing with these answers. Jn;/elus means, I thiidv, a church bell sounded at a particular hour. I believe that ap''ritif oiten means something taken before a meal to ])roniote appetite. The so-called Engli.sh looks as if demand created supply. Je.^n Jacques ROUSSEAU. La NoTlvelle Heloise, on lottres de deux Amans, Jlalntans d'une petite Ville au pied des Alpes, 4 vols. Geneve, mdccclxxx. An.undefinable attraction is about the place and date. 106 Ramhles in BooJcs. Rousseau juge par les Francais d'aujourd'hui, par J. Gkand-Cakteket, Fernn, 18U0. A very curious collection of essays on a man who was not French, but who fascinated Frenchmen — and others. For a French opinion by one who was not fascinated see " Goethe." The binding of the book is French. I sent it and a dozen other vohnnes to Paris to be bound like Heine, q.v., which I had bought partly for the sake of its cover. That being German, I was informed that the binders were not accustomed to the clafes of work. So I had to request that the books might be bound according to French taste. "Which was done, well and cheaply. ^^^/ have hesitated as to irhere this should he 2^lci<'ed in the aljyhahft. After all, under Rousseau is tlie diiectest way. It is justified hij the fact that the hook is actually the icurk of many men, edited by M. Grand-Carteret, W. Clark RUSSELL. Book of authors. Warm ( ). " A collection of criticisms, ana, mots, personal descriptions, &c., wholly referring to English men of letters in every age of English literature." This little book is a monument of study, on the assumption that the extracts are the resvilt of reading the authors' works. One may speculate as to what influence this has had in the formation of Mr. Russell's style. At all events, there is the fact that a writer so imaginative and poetical began his literary career as a compiler of other men's dicta. W. Clark RUSSELL. Book of table talk. Routledge, 1874. Selections from the conversations of poets, philosophers, statesmen, divines, &c. Most such collections are confined to the opinions of one person. This book gives us sayings of Luther, Selden, Walpole, Byron, Wellington, &c. Although there is an index, there is no " contents," not even a list of the men whose talk we get. The whole book has to be turned over to arrive at that knowledge. Ramhles in Bools. 107 W. Clark EUSSELL. Sailor's language. Sampson Low, 1883. Here are one or two addenda derived from '^ oral tradition." They have not been explained in print before, I believe. Behind the door. — A man who is unlucky says he is behind the door when anything is served out. , Billet. — A post or situation, from the hillet which entitles a soldier to quarters in a house. Bloodsucker. — A man who does as little work as he can. Bread. — -The biscuits given to the crew of a ship, the same as dog- biscuit ashore, are called ship's bread. The tin they are handed about in is the bread barge. The word biscuit is not used. Our word captain's biscuit points to the difference of quality. Cholera. — An overhand knot in the stomach. Darkie. — -Native of India, neither white nor black. Fanam bag. — The pouch in a monkey's mouth for a reserve of food. Fiddler's Green. — An intermediate place of residence in a future state, reserved for sailors and sirens. Glory hole. — A very untidy place. Grog.^Rum, undiluted, poured into the men's pannikins from a tot which is the measure. The ofBcer who serves it out is respon- sible for the quantity. Some are said to protect themselves by letting their thumb go into the measure each time. A hole in the bottom of the tot is another way. The leakage is not perceived as the vessel comes up dripping. Thus a nice little peculium accrues to the officer against wanting a nip during a night watch. Growl and go. — -Salt phrase for doing your duty while grumbling. Litany.—" From Hell, Hull and Halifax,* good Lord, deliver us ! " I was once some months in a northern town. I thought I had died without noticing it, and was in hell. Maxim. — Obey orders and break owners. Medusa. — On land the name of the French frigate Mcdttse is asso- ciated with one of the most dreadful shipwrecks on record. At sea, the tradition is she made the fastest passage to India ever known. Mere shakings.— A trifle, equivalent to Disraeli's description of the national debt as a mere flea-bite. Monkeys.— Ages ago, sailors said, "Monkeys can speak, but they won't, fur fear of being made to work." Now, a book is wanted on the subject — or a book wants a subject. Is the monkeys' holiday over ? Nail in your coffin. — A glass of rum neat. Night glass. — Officially a telescope, but often a glass of grog. Outside. — -At sea, as opposod to in a river or in port. Pitchforks point downwards. — A tropical shower. Pun.—" First and furem'st, cut away the mainm'st." Sailor. — A word little heard at sea. A ship is a good or a bad Bailer ; a man is a seaman, able or ordinary. Stepney.— i'eople born at sea belong to the parish of Stepney. There used to bo a gibljut, at Halifax. 108 Ramhles in BooJcs. W. Clark RUSSELL. In the middle watch. CJmtto and Windus, 1890. Twenty-six yarns are here. Figure- heads, ships' name's, slaving, &c., and the interesting article on other writers' sea novels. W. Clark RUSSELL. My shipmate Louise. Chatto and Wiiulus, 1892. W. Clark RUSSELL. The Mystery of the Ocean Star. Chatto and Windus, 1S91. Twenty-three yarns, double twisted. This and its prede- cessors are in famous large [irint, ideal foi- a railway journey, and the cloth binding is semi-limp, which accommudates it to the pocket. W. Clark RUSSELL. Wreck of the Grosvenor. Sampson Low, 1891. When this first appeared, I copied out whole passages in sheer admiration. SAINT E-BEUVE. Portraits of men. Stott, 1891. An interesting little book, made amusing by the translator. Goethe's aged parent, " Goethe's Lady Counsellor," as she was called. — 4. Goethe's father was a Eath, that is. Councillor, which made his mother the " Councillors lady." On arriving at the Mein, we found Goethe skating. — 6. We say Frankfort on the Maine, for Frankfurt am Main, AVhy not, then, write Maine instead of Mein? Very likely Sainte-Beuve wrote Mein, but I suppose it is not too much to demand English of a translator. Here is some Italian — . . . the tale of Francesa de Rimini (for Francesca da Rimini). And now a little French, injudiciously transplanted — (Musset) wrote proverbs of an exquisite delicacy. — 30. He wrote proverbes, which are dramatic pieces founded on a proverb, as On ne hadine pas avec Vamour. Ramhles in Boohs. 109 Philippe SAINT-HILAIRE. Colette. Pseudonym Library, 1802. Everybody who has read one of this exceptionally smart series of books will turn Avith interest to any oth"-r that he may chance to meet with. This one has the peculiarity that I seem to have read it before — before 1892. There is, I believe, a story called the NeUraiiie de CoJetfe, in which the heroine, who has lived in great seclusion, tends a man who has met with an accident near the house she lives in. There is a veuvaine in the Colette here chronicled, there is a wounded man, and the heroine tends him. The story is carried on in letters written by the lady and gentleman to friends. I have since found that Colette is a translation of the book I had already seen. Lloyd C. SANDERS. Life of Viscount Palmerston. W. H. Allen, 1888. ( ) Saturday Magazine, volume the eighth, published under the direction of the Committee of general literature and education appointed by the (Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. Joliii William Parker^ West Strand, 1836. Intended to counteract or counterpoise the irreligious Fenny Ma(jiizine of the Society for the Ditrusion of Useful Know- led>'e, the Saturday Mayazine offered extracts from devt)ut books and many an interesting piece that was less serious. From its pages I got my hist hint of the existence of Grimm's Kutdei'- und Ilausmurchen, and of Zschokke's works. One of tlie nariaiives is of Klizabeth \V'o;jdcock, who was rescued alive after Vjeiug three weeks under the snow. Her only notion of the lapse of time was from iiearing the bells go for church on a Sunday. Imagine the intervals ! One of the best pieces is from Inglis' travels, lie li;id been, tempted by the clearness and shallowness of tlie water to wade to an island in tlie Adige near liovign. There he went to sleep and was woke by the roar of waters. It was the river 110 Rambles in Boohs. Saturday Magazine (continued). in qxde. He had to get up a tree. The paper is called " A night of extreme peril." The Saturday Review was issued at first from jNIessrs. J. "\V. Parker and Son's house. It may be noted, for those who are curious in such matters, that the size of the page was the same as that of the Saturday Magaziiie, and that the type, and it may be the paper, had a physiognomical resemblance. ( ) -Schalk, Blatter fiir deutschen Humor. Berlin, 1880(?) A few years ago I observed an advertisement in which Schalk, a German comic paper of the better class, and of some standing, was offered for sale as a property. The particulars of income and expenditure may have their interest for those who care for the mechanism of literary matters : — Receipts. Subscribers yield £1350 Sale of back vols 40 Advertisements ... ... 400 Electros of woodcuts ... 100 £1890 Expenses. Setting and printing £400 Paper 250 Designs for Illustrations . 160 Zincotypes 180 Literary contributions ... 210 Editor 150 Clerks 120 " Sending out " expenses . 50 Carriage (postage ?) 60 Taxes 20 Bent and miscellaneous ... 50 _£16o0 What would the editor of Punch say to £150 a year ? August Wilhelm SCHLEGEL. Lectures on dramatic art and literature. Bohn's Standard Library, 1846. This series has been undertaken with the view of presenting to the educated public, works of a deservedly established character, accu- rately printed in an elegant lorm, without abridgment. — Peospkcxus. The size is ideal for a book. This volume cost a shilling. Schlegel's translator is Black of the Morning Chronicle. Bamhles in Boohs. Ill Max SCHLESINGER. Saunterings in and about London, the Englisli editiou by Otto vox Wenckstekn. Naihanitl Cooke, Milford House, Strand, 1853. Amusing and genial* observations of a Hungarian gentleman ^vllO visited England during the Great Exhibition of 1851. He describes the London dwelling-house as surrounded by a dry ditch, Avhich you cross by a bridge. The pages devoted to an evening at Vauxhall Gardens have historic interest. The Duke of Wellingtou in Rotten Row, and Holborn's steep hill are among the notahilia. The illustrations are by M'Connell, a now- forgotten artist who appears to have been a disciple of " Phiz." The volume is one of a series brought out by the proprietors of the Illustrated London Neivs at half-a-crow'n apiece. SCHMIDT- WEISSENFELS. Friedrich Gentz, eine Biographie. P>'Cig, 1859. Gentz strikes me as possessing more energy than any man I have ever seen. His head seems to be organised in a very superior manner, and his conversation btars the stamp of real genius. He is one of those who seem to impart a portion of their own endowment, for yoa feel your mind elevated while in his society. — Mks. Trench's Remains. I had long been on the look-out for a portrait of Gentz, when I hit upon this. Now I possess two, one in eacli volume of *' Schmidt." Gentz Avas handsomely subsidised by the Allied Powers to fight their battles against Napoleon, on paper. He is best known in England as having been secretary to the Congress of Vienna. Arthur SCHOPENHAUER. Art of literature, a series of essays, selected and translated by T. B. Saunders. Sonnenschein, 1891. One of the best half-crown's worths ever offered to the Endish reader — and author. A UTHORS. There are two kinds of authors : those who write for the subject's sake, and those who write for writing's sake. While the one liave had thoughts or experiences which seemed to them worth communi- cating, the others want money, and so they write — for money. Tiiey may be recognised ... by the aversion they generally show to • Heine's notee on England are amusinjj, but not remarkably genial. 112 Famhlfs in Boohs. Akthur SCHOPENHAUER. Art of literature {continued). saying anything straight out, so that they may seem otlier than they are. . . . As soon as the reader perceives this, let him throw the book away, for time is precious. VVhen an author beg ns to write fi>r the sake of covering puper, he is cheating the reader, becaus^e he ■writes under the pretest that he has something tu say. A great many bad writers make their whole living by that foolish mania of the public for reading what has just been priuiel — jour- nalists, I mean. Truly, a most appropriate name. In plain language it is journeymen, day labourers! — Pages 3, 4. It may be worth while to recollect that jomwalier is French for what we call a labourer, A BOOK can never be anythingf more than the impress of its author's thoughts, and the value of these will lie either in the matter about wliich he lias thought, or in the form which his thoughts take, in other words, what it is that he has thought about it. — Page 9. THE TITLE should be to a book what the address is to a letter. ... It should, therefore, be expressive; and since, by its naiui'e. it must be §hort, it should be concise, laconic, pretjnant, and, if possible, give the contents in one word. A prolix litlo is bad; and so is one that says nothing, or is obscure and ambiguous, or even, it luay be, false and mislejiding. This last may possibly involve the book in the same fate as overtakes a wrongly -addressed letter. The worst tiilts of all are those which have been stolen, those, I mean, which have already been bone by other books; for they are in the first place a plagiar- ism, and, secondly, the most convincing proof of a total lack of originality in the author. I have many a time wondered what " style " is ; whether it is the mere mechanical arrangement of woids, or the attitude of the mind. Then again, one may wonder whether it is to be acquired or whether it is inborn. STYLE is the physio 'nomy of the mind, and a safer index to character than the face. To imiiate another man's style is like wearing a mask, which, be it nevei- so fine, is not long in arousing disgust and al'hor- rence, because it is lifeless; so that even the ugliest living face is better. . . . Every mediocre writer tries to mask his own natural style . . . these everyday Writers are absolutely unable to resolve upon writing just as they think, because they have a notion that, were they to do so, f^eir work mi^ht look very cliildish and simple. . . . An intelligent author really speaks to us when he writer, and that is why he is able to rouse our interest Hnd commune with us. He puts individual words together with a full consciousness of their meaning, and chooses them with a deliberate design. Consequently, BamMcs in Bools. 113 AuTHUB SCHOPENHAUER. Art of literature [contmned). his discourse stands to that of the writer described above much as n picture that has been really painted to one that has been produced by stencil. In the one case, every word, every touch of the bruph, has a special desi<?n; in the other, all is done mechanically. Just as Lichteuberg says that Garrick's soul seemed to be in every muscle in his body, so it is the omnipresence of intellect that always and every- where characterizes the work of genius. " Commune with ns," " omnipresence of intellect," — there you have the soul of the matter. If I were suddenly required to say anythint^ ahont style, the discourse AA'ould consist of four words— Let every shot tell. "When a man has something to say, and is clear in his own mind, he cannot go far wrong if he does not overlay his matter with words. Loid Chesterheld has provided for the opposite case — ■ '• When you have nothing to say, say it." The body assimilates only that which ia like it; and bo a man retains in his mind only that which iuterests him. . . . Few people take an objective interest in anything, and so their reading does them no good ; they retain nothing. . . . KeiJetitio est mater studiorum. Any book that is at all important ought to be at once read through twice,* partly because on a second reading the connectioD of the different parts of the book will be better under- stood, and the beginning comprehended only wheu the end is known, and partly because we are not in the same temper and disposition on both readings. On the second perusal we get a new view of every passage and a different impression of the whole book, which then appears in another light. It would be a good thing to buy books if one could also buy the time in which to read them ; but generally the purchase of a book is mistaken for the acquisition of its contents. — Page 83. If a man puts forth ideas in a book, how many readers lay hold of them as he would have them'? And of the few readers that do so, how many follow them as far as he would have them ? We find in dramatic performances an illustration of the effect produced by a book. I have lead in some French work that the object of a spectacle is to move us to laughter or to tears. .Some French author has also said tliat the madness of Ophelia is the most pathetic scene ever i)ut on the stage. Yet, out of a thousand spectators of its representation at any given humik nl, ♦ I give as I find.— C. F. B. 114 Bamhies in Boohs. Arthur SCHOPENHAUER. Art of literature [continued). how many men, or women, are moved to tears? Perhaps there is one, and he is looked upon as a fool by his immediate neighbours. But if the author of the piece could see his audience, which would be to him the more sensible part of it, the moved or the unmoved ? And does it not suggest to our- selves that between those who can sit like images and hear the most beautiful words, and see without emotion the most touching scenes presented, and those who are stirred by them, there must be a great gulf, fixed — and that things in real life may affect, or not aftect, the two classes of persons in some similar manner ? BOOKS. A man's -works are the quintessence of his mind, and even thonpjh he may possess very great capacity, they will always be incomparably more valuable than his convtrsaiion. . . . The writings even of a man of model ate genius may be edifying, worth reading and instructive, because they are his quintessence — the result and fruit of all his thought and study; while conversation with him maybe unsatis- factory. So it is that we can read books by men in whose company we find nothing to please, and that a iiigh degree of culture leads us to seek entertainmeut almost wholly from books and not from men. Well hammered out ! But I am sure that men purposely withhold their good things from conversation because they are afraid of impoverishing themselves as writers. One may go on, ad infinitum, quoting from Schopenhauer, when he is on books. One more extract may be given : — THE CLASSICS. If a man knows no Latin, he belongs to the vulgar, even though he be a great virtuoso on the electrical machine and have the base of hydrofluoric acid in his crucible. There is no better recreation for the mind than the study of the ancient classics. Take any one of them into your hand, be it ouly for half an hour, nnd yon vill feel yourself refreshed, relieved, purified, ennobled, strengthened; just as if you had quenched your thirst at some pure ppring. Is this the efl'ect of the old language and its perfect expression, or is it the greatness of the minds whose works remain unharmed and unweakeried by the lapse of a thousand years ? Perhaps both together. But this I know. If the threatened calamity should ever come, and the ancient languages cease to be taught, a new literature will arise, of such barbarous, shallow aud worthless stuff as never was seen before.— Page 4fi. After all, proof of a book is in the leading— jjJacetne, Lector ? Bair.hles in Boohs. 115 Arthur SCHOPENHAUER. Pensees et fragments. BaUJiere, 1891. Tlie cheapest way to get an idea of Schopenhauer's Parenja und Paralij)omena. Sir Walter SCOTT. Life of Swift. Robert Cadell, 1849. The humanest life of one who lies ubi steva indii/nafio cor lacerare Jiequif. It is a volume of Scott's works published in half-crown volumes printed in the type which is associated Avith the famous press of James Ballantyne, whom Scott brought from Kelso to Edinburgh. It was a youthful fancy of mine to bind up with this Lady Duff Gordon's translation of De Wailly's Stella and Vanessa. Stella said of Swift, " The Dean can write beautifidly about a broomstick." Could " Mind v. Matter " be better stated 1 Sir Walter SCOTT. Poetical works, with a critical memoir by W. M. KussETTi. Collins ( ). The publisher does his best to make the work immortal by omittiu" all reference to time. ( ) Sea-pie, illustrated by Alfred Crowqutll. 1841-2, A very salt book of most ancient and fishlike aspect. The cover looks as if it had been afloat under the chests in a cabin. ( ) -Seespuk. Breslau, 1888. The superstitions, traditions, and legends of the sea, such as the sea-serpent, &c. There is a picture of the Flijing Butch- man under all canvas, with a boat whose head is in the opposite direction calmly boarding her at the bows! The only excuse is, that the ship is so Dutch-built that her flying is incon- ceivable. 1 2 116 Rambles in Boohs. SHAKESPEARE. Dramatische Werke, iibersetzt von August W. ScHLEGKL nnd L. Tieck, 8 vols. Grate, 1874. A. W. Schlegel a fait nne traduction de Shakspeare, qui, veunissaut I'exactitude a I'inspiration, eat tout a fait nationale en Allemagne. De Stael, Allemagne. SHAKESPEAEE. Hamlet, with notes by Thomas Page and John Patge. Moffatt, 1891. A school book, with unusually varied apparatus. SHAKESPEAEE. Hamlet— Othello— Romeo and Juliet. National Lilirary, 1886-9. Separate volumes, little books for the pocket, with good piint. Seated in the Piazza San Marco over coffee and cigar, one reflects how Venice has more than one Shakespearean interest ; how the Kialto, now a bridge, was in our dramatist's day a hank of the Grand Canal, the riva alto. But a yet greater interest attaches' to the circumstance wbichled him wrong, yet right, in bis not knowing that there were two Othello families, one of which was distinguished as II Moro, the Mulberry, because they held estates in the Morea. And this was Shakespeare's Moor ! — Dr. Hake. , AVhy not say, at once, Mr. Moor of Venice, embrowned by travel ? SHAKESPEARE. (Euvres completes, traduction Laroche. Cliarpentier, 1864. The translation is so nervous as to be good reading for an Englishman. I have merely the volumes which contain Hamlet and Othello, i.e. six or eight plays. SHAKESPEAEE. Works, with life, glossary, &c. Warne, 1888. Simply a cheap edition^ with the best print possible in one volume. A great criminal was once executed in China after torture which he bore with extiaordinary fortitude. After his death the gall bladder was found to be unusually large. Here is one more instance of Shakespeare's omniscience — I lack gall to make oppression bitter. — Hamlet. Bamhles in Bools. 117 SHAKESPEARE. Concordance, by W. D. Adams. Routledge, 1891. A veritable treasure. It gives the sentences where Avords occur. The conimoncenient of lines is indicated b}' a capital letter to the first word. ^loreover, the price is three and sixpence. A Shakespeare Concordance used to cost more than a soverei;^'n. There are glossarial notes. One explains that " cock" means hoat, which is light for one passage. 15ut, divided only by a semicolon is another passage, where "cock" evidently means weathercock — Yond tall anchoring bark diminished to her cock =they have got so far away from a vessel which is at anchor, that only her masthead (nautice truck) is visible. SHAKESPEARE. Die Menschen in Shakespeare's Dramen vom Stuudpuukte dervergleicheudeuLiteraturiJ'escliichte. Worms, 1890. A book the reading of which is to be looked forward to. Reading German is tiresome compared with speaking or writiiitf it. o SHAKESPEARE. Payne Collier's Emendations, &c. Berlin, 1853. Erganzangsband zu alien enj^lischen Ausgahen und zur Schlegel- Tieckschen Uebersetzuag ron Shakespeare's draniacischen Werken, enthaltetid die in einem altea Ex. der Folio-AuSijabo voa lf!32 auf- gefundenen iind herausgeaebeneri liandschriftlichen Bemerkiu)g''ii nnd Textandernngen iu iibersichtlich verKlHichonder Znsamnien- ecellung bearbeitet und iibersetzt von Dr. Julius Frese— Title. The Eiif,dish edition of the Emend af ions, was published at fifteen shillings ur so. Here we have the English book and a German version opposite, bound in a volume which cost a shilling in Germany. The German title is a good array of words. ^^^ This and the three preceding entries are not worked into the alpliahet of Shakespeai^e's ivorks bacause tJtey are onlij xuppleinenfari/ to them. The entry which /(Alowi i>' thrown out of i/x plwe litj tlie xpeUing " Shakxpeare," nhich, in a practical ra/aloguf, rcould haoe to be ignored. 118 Uamhles in Boohs. SHAKSPEARE. Poems, edited by Robert Bell. C. Griffin ( ). Id est not the dramas. It would have been very nice to possess them also in such excellent print. The spelling "Shakspeare" is chronological — speaks of the time, tells the tale when Bell's book was originally printed. SHENSTONE. Poetical works, witb a description of the Leasowes. G. Cooke ( ). "Embellished with superb engravings." In Avalking through the Exhibition of 18G2 I saw a monu- ment inscribed — Eeu quanta minus est cum reliquis versari quam tiii meminisse ! I afterwards learnt that Shenstone was the author. Hence the possession of this little book, which cost about ninepence on the Continent. James SIME. Life of Jobann Wolfgang Goethe. Walter Scott, 1888. A good summary of what average people should know. ( ) Six months in the ranks, or the gentleman private. Smith and Elder, 1882. Life in barracks (that is, how soldiers spend nine-tenths of their time) was never presented in so life-like a manner. After reading and admiring the book, I hear casually that it is all made up — a work of fiction. ^g^ The author's name is known, hut I cannot give it. H. Percy SMITH. Glossary of terms and phrases. Kegan Paul, 1889. This used to be a fourteen-shilling book. Now it is to be had for a quarter of that. It is singularly useful. Thus — Angelas bell. — The bell rung at the time appointed for the recita- tion of the Ave Maria. Coryee.— The obligation of the inhabitants of a district to repair roads, &c., for the sovereign or the feudal lord. Which shows the force of the expression quelle corvee ! Rambles in Bools. 119 H. Percy SMITH {continued). Eurasian. — A half-breed between a Ewrupean and an Asiatia parent. Philistine. — A word used to describe the supposed lack of sweet- ness aTid light in inferiors by those who think themselves superior. Umber. — An olive-biown earth from Umhria, &c Umber, as a colour, is the tint of a shadow, umhra, omhre. William SMITH. . Thorndale, or the coufiict of opinions. Blaclnvoods, 1857. Professing to be the papers of a consumptive who died at Posilipo, it is a collection of conversations and narratives as the medium for philosophical ideas. I have reason to remember this book. One Christmas Eve I slipped quite quietly on the slanting pavement which borders an entrance to a goods station. The stones were slimy with half -dry mud. I came down on the risrht hand which held an umbrella and seemed to sprain it. The other held aloft T/iorndale to keep it clean. After an hour and a half's dodging about to pass the time till I could see the doctor whom I used to con.sult, I learnt that the right wrist was broken. Just after the doctor had arrived, I could hear his dinner coming to table. So I begged leave to take a walk, feeling sure that he would malce a better job later on. He restored my hand, and charged £1 Is. 6d. for six mouths' attendance. Peace to his as^hes. He is no more. Admiral W. H. SMYTH. Sailor's word book, revised by Vice-Admiral Sir E. Belcukk. Blackie, 1867. Science, professional knowledge, and pleasantry are here combined. Poltroon. — Not known in the navy. Portuguese man-of-war. — A beautiful floating acephalan of th© trojjical st'as, the FlnjsalLi pelajica. Slant of wind.— An air of which advantage may be taken. " Portuguese man-of-war " is the sea-name for what we call a nautilus. " Slant of wind" is seamen's slang for any chance in ordinary life. At sea there is a figure of speech for nearly everything. Thus, in a certain vessel, there was a raaintopman, a smart man enough, but pale. He was dubbed " the painter and glazier." 120 llambles in Books. Society in London, by a foreign resident. Chatto, 1886. Contrast with Lord Coleridge another English judge . . . Sir Henry- Hawkins. They designate him a hanging judge because it is not his habit to treat crime as merely the abnormal development of virtue. . . . Facts are to him what ideas are to the Lord Chief Justice. The latter has the spirit of a law-reformer ... is perpetually engaged iu the attempt to construct a new lei^al code, which shall have prece- dence over any code in existence, out of his own subjective notions of right and wrong. . . . Sir id. H. is entirely free from any of these judicial sentimentalisms. The object of the lnw, as he understands it, is to put down crime, to be a terror to evil-doers. — 67, 68, A newspaper extract " follows on the same side" — — Should the witness be surprised to hear that . . . Mr. Justice Hawkins did not like that form of question. Whether the witness "would be surprised to hear" was of no consequence whatever. regretted using that form of question, but really thought he was following the example of a very high personage indeed. Standakd, 1893. Soldiers, sailors, statesmen, writers, &c., have their turn in Society in London. The author calls us the "most imaginative people on earth." This would not occur to everybody, but the dictum is as it were proved in another foreign quarter. The French laugh at an English mob for being easily dispersed by a few policemen, Avho are but men, like themselves. But the police.nian wears a uniform, which is the symbol of "force." This, Ave nmy presume, is what influences a crowd. ( ) Songs of a lost world, by a New Hand. W.lf. Allen., 1883. Poetic pieces, with an attractive title. I do not think they cost me any money. A friend, who suspected my taste, gave them to me. ( ) Songs of the dramatists, with memoirs and notes by Robert Bell. C. Griffin ( ). These, as well as " Shakspeare's " Poems, were actually I)ublished by J. W. Parker, Strand. The print, except the title-page, has the physiognomy of books published by that house, which ceased to exist in ISG-t. JRamhJes in Boohs. 121 Madame de STAEL. AUemagne. Paris, 1858. Twice in two minutes have I found Jean Jacques quoted — " Les langues du Midi etaient fiUes de la joie, et les langues du Nord, da besoiu." And this from Heloise to her lover — " S'il y a un mot plus vrai, plas teodre, pins profond encore pour exprimer ce que j'eprouve, o'est celui-la que je veux choisir." It may be worth recollecting that the two writers were jfays. Madame de STAEL. Corinne. Gamier ( ). The reader of Corinne . . . will recollect that, upon the first visit of Oswald and Corinne to St. Peter'e, he pauses to contemplate and admire the grace of her attitude as she holds back the curtain lor him to pass in. This iucident always seemed to me hardly worthy of the sensibility and geuius of Madame de Stael. No deop-lieart"d woman would value the love of a man wlio, at sucli a moment, and in such a place, could be arrested by the grace of a female form. Hillard's Italy. But what of imagining a noble lover who not merely precedes his idol into church, but lets her hold the curtain for him to pass 1 Madame de STAEL. Dix annees d'exil. Charpentier, 1861. Half of tiie Ijook is occupied by a most interesting account of her life and writings by Madame Necker de Saussure. STENDHAL. Vie de Henri Brulard. Charpentier, 1890. II n'y avait, qu'un ctre au monde : Mdlle. Kably, qu'un evenement : devait elle jouer ce soir ? . . . Quel transport de joie . . . quand je lisais son nom sur raffiche ! Je la vois encore, cet affiche, sa forme, son papier, ces caracteres. J'allais successivement lire ce uom cheri a trois ou quatre des endroits auxquels on attichait : les earac- teres nn peu ases du mauvais imprimeur devinrent chers et aimes pour moi . . . h Paris la beaute des caracttires me chO(|ua : ce n'etaient plus cenx qui avaient imprime le nom de Kably. — 197. The book De I'amour has nothing to compare with this. 122 Ramlles in Boohs. STENDHAL. Journal de Henri Beyle, 1801-18, 2 vols. Charpentier, 1888. A most curious record of emotiolis and of timidity in tlie presence of happiness. There is a story in Sandford and Merton, I think, of a monkey who tired the charge in a gun and ran to the muzzle to observe the etiect. He was just in time to he blown to pieces. Stendhal, energetic and resource- ful as a soldier in time of war, was so constituted as to recede from an immediate prospect of happiness, in order to contem- plate it, with the effect tluit the happiness was blown to the winds. STENDHAL. Lamiel, roman inedit, publie par Casimir Stryenski. Quantin, 1889. An unfinished psychological romance rescued and deciphered for the press by an enthusiast. STENDHAL. Souvenirs d'egotisme, autobiographie et lettres inedites. Charpentier, 1893. I find this much more interesting than the Journal. The preface is entitled, Stendhal et les salons de la Restauration. The Autohiofjrajjliie is full of good things, including counsel ou books to be read. The covers of the early copies of the book bore the name " Stendahl." Some years ago a life of Beyle was published in London. In it the name was " Stendahl," right through. Colonel STOFFEL. Rapports militaires. Paris, 1871 . Tout le monde connait les rapports adresses par M. lo colonel Stoffel a I'empereur Napoleon III. avant la guerre de 1870, mais ce qn'on sait moins geueralement, c'est que cet officier superienr fut le principal collaborateur de Napoleon III. dans les travaax relatifs a Vllistoire de la vie de Cesar.— Le Temps, 1892. In the preface, Stoffel comments on the astounding neglect of his information, which descends to microscopic examiuation of powder, with diagrams. Hear a native of India on this theme — A mere pretext for war was found and taken advantage of with an impertinence and a levity of which France alone was capable, and with an inexcusable ignorance of the actual strength of Prussia. . . . Napoleon III., as dancing-master to the nation, was doubtless to blame, but his office made it obligatory to keep up the dance the nation wanted. — Chunder Dutt. Bamhles in Bools. 123 ( ) Stokers and pokers; or the London and North- western Railway, the electric telegraph, and the railway cleariug-house, Ly the author of " Bubbles from the Brunnen of Nassau/' John Murray, 1849. A signalman is here pictured in a tall hat. H. W. STOLL. Gotter und. Heroen des klassischen Alterthums. B. G. Teuhner, 1879. Fiir das gebildete Publikam. — iv. I got this for the sake of the numerous tasteful delineations of statues of the antique gods, &c. Harriet Beecher STOWE. Uncle Tom's Cabin, or life among the lowly. K G. Bohn, 1852. The most agreeahle edition for reading, hecause of the print. The size is that of Bohn's Libraries. My mother " thought I had a bad cold " when I read the book on its publication. This is the copy, with many passages noted. E. R. SUFFLING. Jethou, Crusoe life. Jarrold, 1892. I wonder this has not attracted more notice. A young man undertook to live on a desert island for a year, to feed himself, to sptak to no one, and to let nobody land — and did it. SURCOUF. Robert Surcouf, eorsaire malouin. Plon, 1890. Robert Surcouf, the pirate, killed my great-uncle Kobert. Surcouf, the author, dedicates his book to his aunt. HlI'POLYTE TAIXE. Histoire de la litterature anglaise, 5 vols. HacheUe, 1885. Htppolyte TAINE. Notes sur I'Angleterre. llachette, 1874. Mais ces mots si precieux, stabilite, repos, richesses, ]e uom d'Angleterre les rappelle encore. Les vents mugieseut antdur d'elle ; les floes souleves des revolations battent en grondant sos rivages. L'Angleterre est commo le Ne[)tuiio de Virgile: — Alto protpicienii, lumma 2)lacidum cujxit ujctulit untln, Chaules de Remusat. 124 Jlamhle^ in BooJcs. Tares. Kegan Paul, 1884. A title of five letters, which form also the word " tears." Reuret and longing (after, not prospectively) are the burden of the few pieces. Here is pait of one ot theni^ — - NIRVANA. Sleep will he give his beloved ? Not di earns, but the precious firuerdon of deepest rest ? Ay, surely ! Look on the grave-closed eyes, And cold hnnds folded on trai qnil breast. Will not ihe All-Great be just, and forgive ? For He knows (though we make no prayer or cry) How our lone souls a<'hed when our pale star waned, How we watch the proiniseles^s sky. Life hereafter ? Ah, no! we have lived enough. Life eternal ? Pray God it may not be so. Have we not suffered and striven, luved and endured. Run ttirough the whole wide gamut of passion and woe ? Give U'? darkness for anguished eyes, stillness for weary feet. Silence and sleep ; l)ut no heaven of glittering, load unrest. No mure the lilelong labour of smoothing the stone-strewu way; No more the shuddering outlook athwart the sterile plain, Where every step we take, every word we say. Each warm living hand that we cling to, is but a fence against pain. Isaac TAYLOR. Little Library Ship, with sixteen engravings on steel. John Harris, 1830. This was one of the few delights of my childhood. In memory whereof this secoiid-liaiid copy Avas bought. The print is beautiful, and the plates very prettj'. I have a picture, a common wood-engraving, of two vessels, the one a steamer, the other a sailing ship (an auxiliary screw, to be very exact), both rocking on the waves of the Atlantic. The steamer, feminine by comparison in her delicacy ot build, (one might say) also in the contour of her paddle-boxes, halts with head averted from her more s-turdj' companion, and yet her hull inclines that way. The man-of-war, squarely set as to the yards (jn which the sails are furled, stands almost like a rock in comparison with the weaker vessel, scarce touched by the commotion of the waves. The picture is a delineation of the American frigate San Jacinto stopping our mail-steamer, the Trent. Those were the days of the grandest rig for war- vessels, even when provided with steam. The way this one, all atuunto, towers into the clouds, is a sight. Bamhles in Boohs. 125 (Isaac TAYLOR.) Physical theory of another life, by the author of the " Natural history oi euthusiasin." W. Pickering, 1839. Alfred TENNYSON. Works. Macmillan, 188G. W. M. THACKERAY. Vanity Fair, price one shilling. Smith and Elder, 1890. The puppets stand outside on the yellow cover, just as they did in the original issue in 1848. ( ) Thalatta ! or the great commoner, a political romance. Parker, Son, and Bourn, 18G2. I once advertised for Catarina in Venice, thinking it to he a hook. It turns out to be part of this book, whose title is attraction enough for one Avho was horn by the sea. Tlie author's name is loell known, hut he gives it not. Andre THEURIET. Peche mortel, 17me ed. Lemerrc, 1885. Tlie shop windows have made us familiar with VAngehis of Millet. More than twenty years ago I read in a l)ook on Western France, tliat the Angelusyvixs sounding as the opposing French and English forces met — at Agincourt? I have sought high and low to find what time of day the bell denoted. English books do not tell, take " Smith/' q.v. Here we have precise information. I. do not care for the hook beyond this: — La tombee da crepnsculo et les premii>ro3 sontieries des Angehcs lea Burprirent encore attables aupres do la source. — G3. A few weeks later I read in another book — Le sol montait lentement. Un Angelas tinta. — Ccirassier Blanc. And after that I find that Barbey dAurevilly wrote— Dana la l'ri<;re du 8oir, ou rhommo ot la fomrrie, lasses d'aroir laboure tout le jour, disont leur Angtlui au jour qui mourt. . . . 126 Ramhles in Boolcs. George TICKNOR. Life, letters, and journals. Sampson Low, 187G. " Ticknor " is an aniazindy interesting repertory of memo- randa about celebrated European personages, to wbicli a good index is the guide. Thus — " Lockhart ... is the same man he always was and always will be, with the coldest and most disagreeable manners I have ever seen." II., 120. " Cavour . . . his conversation is such as yon might expect from his appearance, lively and agreeable ; his views of everything on which he talked strikingly broad, but not, I think, always exactly defined. . . . His eye is very quick; it reminded me of Lord Mel- bourne's, which was the most vigilant I ever saw." — II., 288. See "Napoleon III.'^ for something more of Cavour; and •' Bates " for something more about Lockhart. Ernest TISSOT. Evolutions de la critique francaise. Ferrin, 1890. ( ) Tomahawk, vol. II., and various Nos. Office, 1868. Some of our best painters have graduated in scene-painting. Here is a cartoonist wlio brings painted scenes on to the printed page with tragic power. * Charles TOMLINSON. Sonnets. James Cornisli, 1881. An essay. The author has written sonnets, and expounded Dante's object in writing the Divina Commedia. Tourist's guide to the Continent. Great Eastern Railway, 1891. It weighs about half a pound, and is published at sixpence. I do not know any book which more intelligently and agreeably sets forth the attractions of travel in Belgium, Holland, Germany, and Switzerland. Any one who has not been on tlic Continent Avill benefit by reading it ; and the illustrations very prettily set the scenes before him. Bamltles in Boohs. 127 H. D. TRAILL. Sterne. MacmiUan, 1882. " Xon s'est dit Sterne, je ne voyagerai comme ces singuliers tonristes qui, avant de s'embarquer, semblent deposer leur coeur dans lenr maison, arreter jusqu'a lear retour la circulation de leur sang, pour qui le voyage equivaut a une suspension des facultes de la vie, et que les pays etrangers voient transformes en automates con- templatifs, Non, pendant que le bateau, la diligence, ou la chaise de poste m'emporteront, mon pouls continuera de battre, mon ccear malwde de soupirer et de desirer, mun ame de rever." That is some Frenchman's description of the Sentimental journey. The room Sterne used to occupy in the hotel at Montreuil is still reverently shown. ( ) Two old men's tales ; the Deformed and the Admirals daughter, 2 vols. Saunders and Otley, 1884. One, at least, of the later editions was chastened, somewhat. ( ) Types of womanhood, in four stories. lSa,mpson Lovi, 1858. I. Our wish; II. The four sisters; III. Bertha's love; IV. The ordeal. I have carried this book about with me for nearly thirty years. My attention was first attracted by reading *' liertha's love " in Fraser's Magazine. There is an air of sacrifice, suffering?, and resignation about the stories of that period. Now, people gallantly take the good things which a kind Providence has provided for their enjoy- ment, without wanting to be wiser than their Creator. VAPEREAU. Dictionnaire des litteratures. Eadiette, 1876, Imagine a large octavo book composed of 2096 pages in double column, each column containing seventy or eighty lines of small print closely packed, giving an account and perliaps a criticism of every considerable work of every age and every land in the manner of the following extiacts. And if you would know what a catalogue, or an epigram, or a Minnesinger is ; -what are the characteristics of English, French, or Latin, 128 Rambles in Boohs. VAPEREAU (continued). &c., literature, you have only to look them up. One of the most valuable points about the book is the jn-ecis which M. Vapereau gives of every great work of classical antiquity — the Anii(jorce of Sophocles, tlie Iphigenia AuUca and Taurka of Euripides, &c., &c. WERT HER. Dans Leu souffrances du jeune We i ther, V eirtistp s'ps^t peint Ini-tneme plutotqiie la societe de eon temps; tnais il a excite nn tel inter^t pour souheroa qu'une generation toite enti^re s'est modelee sur son imatre et est arrived k e'y reconnaitre. Jamais ceuvre litteraire n'a plus profondement renuie les ames ; les peusees, las sentiments, les sonf- frances plus ou moiiis chitneri(|Ues d'lin heros de ro'nan sont devenus I'objet d'nne imitation epidemique, jusqu'au suicide inclusivement. On a dit que jamais aucaue passion reelle n'avait cause autant de morts volontaires que la contagion de cette passi:)n imaginaire. Les " souffrances " du jeune Werther ne sont pas seulement celles d'un amour reprime par les devoirs sociaux, ce sont surtout celles d'ua reveur revolte centre les necessiles de la vie, d'un artiste iiue des aspirations folles vers I'ideal livrent sans force et sans courage aux deceptions et aux froissement de la realite. Werther est un ue ces homraes que ravage la contemplation d'eux-memes et qui se font un mal extreme avec leurs propres pensees. Goethe a inooule a ees compatriotes cette sensibilite maladive, cette molancolie romanesqne que JNladame de Stael et Chateaubriand devaient developper che« nous, et Lord Byron chez les Anglais. Pour lui, il sVn guerissait en la decrivant, et trois ans plus tard il faisait la parodie de son ceuvre et la satire de ses imitateurs. On snit que le roman de Wf-rther se rapporte k deux faits reels: le suicide du fils d'un celebre predicateur nommc Jerusalem, et une tendre affection de Goethe lui-meme pour une jeune femme mariee ; mais 1' ceuvre litteraire est tout dans les analyses psychologiquea, le developpement du caracere, le progres constant d'une passion unique, la simplicite des circonstunces ou elle se produit. le charme infini des scenes qui jettent quelque variete dans une situation monotone. L'ecnotion produite par Werther dans toute I'Enrope repondit au succ^a du livre en Allemagne. II fut traduit dans toutes les langues et plusiears fois. La premiere traduc- tion fran9aise est de 1776. II fut en outre commente, imite, refait, contrefait, parodie sous toutes les formes; il passa an theatre dans tons les pays. II y avait longtemps que I'auteur s'ett'or9ait de I'oublier, apres en avoir combattu I'inflnence, qu'on le lisait et qu'on le discutait avec la meme passion. Le general Bonaparte I'emportait avec lui dans la campagne d'Egypte. WINCKELMANN Est considere avec raison corame createur de la critique de I'art, et !e premier pour I'application de I'esthetique, sinon le fondateur meme de cette science. II avait au plus haut point le sentiment du beau et des conditions de sa realisation par les nrts. II connaissait de I'antiquite tout ce que les monuments conserves nous en ont revele il devinait le reste. 11 avait etadie les classiques, non pas en erudit, Rambles in BooJifn. 129 VAPEREAU {continued). maia en se faisant Thomme de leur temps, de toutes lenr pensees. II s'etait fiiit, pour ainsi dire, paYen. suivant I'expression de Madame de Stael, pour mieux penetrer I'antiquite, et Ton sent dans ses eciits le culte nieme de cette beaute dont les Grecs avait fait rapotheose. Maie, loin de s'arreter ii la beaute physique, il excellait a saisir le rapport entre les traits exterieura d'une osu^re d'art et les qualites morales dont elle est le symbole. Vaenhagen von ENSE. Rahel, Life and letters, by Mrs. Vaughan Jennings. Keg an Paul, 1883. Eahel was a woman quite as remarkable as Madame de Staei, in her intellectual faculties, in her fertility of thought, her clearness of soul, her goodness of heart ; ia eloquence she far surpassed the author of Corinne, but she wrote nothing. — Custine. Was greatly influenced wlien a girl by the writings of W. von Hum- boldt and Schlegel, and especially by Goethe, whom she called her god ; and she, in her turn, recognised and encouraged the genius of Jean Paul, Tieck. Fouque, Gentz, Fiohte, Hegel, Heine, Thiers, Benjamin Constant. &c., b it especially the writers of the Komaatic school. — Chambers' E.vcyclop.ei'IA. The "Life" is of singular interest to those who care for German literature. " Kahel," a 7s. 6d. book, with leaves uncut, co^t me about ninepence. ^^T/ns should, I suppose, have hcen registered under the authors name. In a list planued without an index one is often liable to doubt as to the most useful position. The greater name has prevailed here. Varnhagen von ENSE. Sketches of German life, and scenes from the War ot Liberation in Germany, sclec^ted and translated by {Sir Alexandkr Ddff Gokdon. Murray's Home and Colonial Library, 1852. Soldier and literary man, Varnhagen was the fortunate husband of Kahel, Gerraany'.s greatest literary woman, altliough she never wrote a book. His account of the French iix Berlin as enemies is curious in the light of a promenade which was projected later. K 130 Bamhles in Boohs. ( ) To Venice in a simple way, by a Joueney-man. Manuscript, 1891. " Gentle and simple " is a very old distinction. Nowafiays the gentle ride in sleeping cars and need not change carriages after they reach the other side of the Channel. The simple way is to travel as do foreigners who have to earn their living. Venice was reached thus — I. Rail to Harwich, steamer to Antwerp. II. Rail to Aix-la- Chapelle, changing at Hasselt. First and second class passengers are not required to get out. III. Third class rail to Cologne. IV. Third to Bonn, in order to catch the Rhine steamer, which second and first class passengers are in time for. V. Third class steamer to Coblenz, thence to Mannheim. VI. Third express to Basel, thence third class rail to Lucerne. VII. Second class by steamer to PUielen. VIII. Third class rail to Amsteg. IX. Next day, third rail to Faido, thence later on to Belliuzona. X. In the morning third class rail to Lugano. XI. By steamer to Porlezza, thence over the mountain in tramcars to Menaggio ; later by steamer * to Como. XII. Como to Milan, third class rail. XIII. At Milan a circular second class ticket was obtained for about 35s., which enabled the traveller to visit Verona, Venice, Padua, and Bologna by quick train?. If a third class traveller takes a ticket, e.g., from Bergamo to Verona, he is made to get out at Rovato and wait several hours while the train he has come by is bowling away to Verona and Venice. Thus are poor travellers made to feel the difference between gentle and simple. " Prof. De. " Cesaire VILLATTE. Parisismen. Langenscheidt, 1888. Simply a French slang dictionary with German explanations. When I acquived it bond fide French slang dictionaries were scarce. ( ) Violet, or the danseuse; a portraiture of human passions and character. Brussels, 183<3. An English hook, not easily to he procured in England. It was first published about fifty years ago in two volumes, and later, circa 1857, as a railway novel in pictorial boards. There has been great controversy as to tlie author of it. Many successive numbers of Notes and Queries have been occupii d by specnbitions from various correspondents — in vain. But I believe it is perfectly well known, in what are called aristo- * The intention had been to go from 'Menag'gio via the Lake of Lecco to Bergamo, and thence to Verona. But mis-sing the steamer through walking to Cadennabbia, the traveller taok the next boat, rather than wait. Ramhles in Boohs, 131 Violet, or the danseuse {continued). cratic circles, who wrote the hook. Its manner shows it to belong to a bygone era. One little oddity of diction may be wrortli noting. When one of the chai-acters wants to say "contempt" he uses the word "despisal " — if that be a word. < ) Visitors' book. Sampson Low, 1892. Again and again within a few weeks have I come back to this little book of ninety-six pages, a collection of nine stories. The Head master is amazingly smart ; John and Charles is a line show-up of almost unconscious snobbishness ; the Success- ful author is terrible in its sallness ; the Secret of the ice river is a story both sad and beautiful. Here is an indication — TEE ICE-RIVER'S SECRET. They were, quite obviously, husband and wife and lover. . . • Takinjr no notice of the polite purtier^ who, gold-laced cap in hand, opened the carriage door, the husband walked straight into the hotel in that broad-shouldered, arrogant fashion which proclaims the Briton abroad . . . obviously a person of wealth and position. The selfish- ness and ill-temper which were indicated by his mouth marred tha appearance of a hearty English sportsman or country squire. The wife came next, calm, composed, handsome, and stately. Yet her composure did not deceive mo. For I saw in her beautiful eyes, as she turned them for a moment to the man who stood at her shoulder, that look of ineffable yearning, of longing and sorrow, that never yet was seen save in the eyes of those who love but do not hope. I have seen ti at look before, and I have reason to know it. I have seen it mirrored — well, well! It is a dreadful look to thos^* who realise its full significance. It was in this womau's eyes beyond a doubt ; and it haunted me. . . . At dinner . . . the lover was rather out of it ; and, feeling this, I addressed some trivial remark to him about his journey. In a moment her eyes were upon me, taking my measure in one swift glance that was over instantly. ... He talked well, this man ; and she loved to hear him talk. His manner to me was perfect; and she entirely appreciated the nicety of it. It conveyed to me very delicately, "You are a handsome woman still, and siill entitled to your prerogatives. You were a very pretty girl once, and young men like myself used to chafi' you a little, just as I am doing now, and were ready to run on your errands and e.\ecuto your orders, just as I am ready to do at this moment. Though its bloom be past, the perfume of your beauty han»8 about you still. I recognise the atmosphere and acknowledge it." Appreciative homage, so subtly conveyed, is as dear to a woman's heart as it is becoming on the part of a man; it pleased me, and it K 2 132 Rambles in Boohs. Visitors' book {continued). pleased her too. I began to understand the fascination which he exercised over her. He was a refined-looking man, with a heavy moustache, a clear-cut strong chin, dark hair and dark eyes that had a dantrerous sparkle in them when he was roused to animation, and at times had a steady look that spoke of firm self-command. Not a man to be trifled with either in love or hate. Looking at these three people, I could see all the elements of a tragedy before me. The liusband and the lover go out climbing most days. At leugtli the husband falls down a crevasse, out of which, with inlinite labour and risk, lie is dragged by the lover. However, the husband dies of some internal bruise sustained in the fall. Four or five years later, the lovers are married — I watched the fair face of his beautiful wife, when he turned to greet her on her approach, and saw the look, no longer of sorrowful longing and despair, but of warm and happy devotion that shone forth for him from her tranquil eyes. I wish I could put into language the beauty of this little story as I feel it ; and if I could, the reader would have the pleasure of laugliing at me. William S. WALSH. Handy-book of literary curiosities. William W. Gibbings, 1893. Here is a volume of 1104 very closely printed pages, a dictionary of curious matter such as we find in Azotes and Qu"ries. It would be an almost indispensable handbook if there had been an efficient index. A couple of extracts will demonstrate this, while showing the nature of the contents — Lord Lytton (Owen Meredith) was seated on« day at dinner next a lady whose name was Birch. Said she to his Excellency, " Do you know any of the Birches ?" " Oh, yes, I knew some of them most intimately while at Eton ; indeed, more intimately than I cared to." " Sir, you forget that the Birches are relatives of mine." " And yet they cut me ; but" (smiling his wonted smile) " I have never felt more inclined to kiss the rod than now." Mrs. Birch, sad to say, according to the gossips, told her husband that his Excellency had insulted her. When I wanted to find this for extract, I had to recollect as well as I could at about what thickness of the edges I had opened the book before. The 4ndex did not help. The second piece I cannot find. It relates that when the Spanish Armada was put to flight, our admiral sent one word to Rambles in Boohs. 133 William S. WALSH {continued). Queen Elizabeth, " Cantliarides" (the Spanish fly). This little story of two or three lines requires in the index the entries — Admiral's name, Cantharides, Spanish Armada, and perhaps " Queen Elizabeth '' — that is, four entries for about as many lines. Mr. Walsh's Handy-book has fifty-five lines to every page. I suppose, considering the number of good things crammed in the book, that ten index entries per page are likely to be required that we may find what we Avant. The extent of the index is about 1000 entries, less than the number of pages. Duke of WELLIXGTON. Despatches, Selection by Gurwood. Miirraij, 1851. ^ly father was writing in the library at the Hoo, in the presence of Lord Dacre and Earl Grey, when the latter nobleman, who had long been absorbed in the perusal of a large octavo volume, suddenly closed it emphatically, and with a warmth of manner unusual to him, said to his host, " Well, Brand (calling him by his family name), I have at last finished Wellington's Despatches, and what conclusion do you think I have arrived at ? Why, that when I regard him, first, as a general, and think of his promptitude, prudence, and presence of mind in unforeseen difficalties; his powers of organisation, his thought for his soldiers, his attention to the commissariat; then, secondly, as a minister, the lofty sense of duty by which he was always actuated, his readiness to lay aside his own prejudices when he thought the public welfare was at stakw ; and tliirdly, as a man, his truthfulness, simplicity, and absence of conceit under such an accumulation of honours as never yet fell to the lot of a subject, and would have turned the heads of most men — I pronounce him the greatest man, ancient or modern, that ever lived." Rev. Julian C. Young's Journal. On the point of invading France to defend its people, the Duke had to ''call oat " its would-be ruler who was at ease in the perfidious isle. He wrote to the Comte de Chambord — I can only tell you that, if I were a prince of the House of Bourbon, nothing should prevent me from now coming forward, not in a good house in London, but in the field in France. From St. Jean de Luz, 1813. French writers were not insensible in this matter — (Barbey d'Aurevilly) reprochora au comte de Chambord son inaction; il le surnommera le grand expectant de I'histoire et il osera ecriro ces paroL-s impies pour un royaliste : " Assurement, il est plus don>c d'etre le radieux ainphitryon do tout un j)arti qui vous traiie de roi, dans ces diners par lesquels on ginverne partout les hommes, que d'etre rase, comme Carloman, et jete aux oubliettes d'un monastere. Tissor, Cbitiqub. 134 Bamhles in Bools. ( ) Wheat and tares, a tale. When a rational man ])uvs a book, it is generally for the sake of what it contains. This book was bought for the sake of something not in it. I thought to have fciind the story of a Jew Avho was very fond of i^oast pork, for which he used to go into the country to an inn once a week. One day a violent tliunderstorm came on, just as he was enjoying himself. Our Jew went on like a man, taking as little notice as he could, but at last he had to throw down his knife and fork, exclaiming, " Vat a fuss to make about a leetle piece of pork ! " After housing the book several years, I hnd that it is not Wheat and fares. A wrapper bearing that name was on a book called Miss Gmjnne of Woodford. The title, being at the top of every left-hand page, had escaped notice. E. M. WHITTY. Friends of Bohemia, or phases of London life, 2 vols. Smith and Elder, 1857. Friends of Bohemia is a novel which even critics looked forward to reading. Whitty's sketches of Parliament had ]irepared them for a sensation. Here are specimens of the book : — ARISTOCRACY. There is the Duke of Beadleland. He lives in No. 1, Decencies Terrace. An upright, admirable man, who always wins the cattle club prizes. He has been raising his rents lately, in consequence of the extravagant conduct of the Marquis of Bumble, his eldest son, and many a hearth on his broad estates has been made sad this year. But evidently now he has had a most satisfactory interview with Mr. Coutts, and the Duchess is bringing out two daughters, the fair Ladies Laces, this next season. See, he gives that beggar a copper, and rubs the fingers of his glove together, shaking away the momen- tary touch of the mendicant. MAN OF BUSINESS. Here's a man. That's Shylock, the theatrical man, who is a blessing to Loudon. They tay he is worth £100,000, and yet when I went, ten years ago, to see a friend in Cursiror Street, Shylock was a bailiff. I dare not give you an idea of what Shylock has gone through. Aspasia says she used to know him as an "agent." He kept night bouses. . . . He says that if the bishops would put it into his hands, he'd make religion "the popular go" and till the churches. So he would. RamhJes in Boohs. 135 E. M. WHITTY. Friends of Bohemia (continued). NORTHUMBERLAND HOUSE. Who is that over-dressed old woman in that shining brougham ? Mrs. Carey, who deals iu chickens. She has a grand mansion in Pimlico, which the Eail of Harridan bought for her. She is rich ; those jewels about her are real. Like the Times, she has correspon- dents in all parts of the world, to provide her with fresh canarcls, fit for a jaded market of old marquises. Watch her pass Northumberland House. There is a recess there in the wall, made by the bricking-up of a door, and there is an old woman in rags, standing there, having crept within the bar, and selling apples to unappeased little boys. Doesn't that wretched figure look a dismal supporter at the side of the poich of the Percies ? Does it not signify a good deal of the veritable supporters of Ducal houses ? Well, there is a legend that that old woman is the sister of Mrs. Carey. They began life together as beauties in the same trade; but, yoti see, talents are divided in families. Mrs. Carey gives the apple — old symbol of love! — decked out on strawberry leaves to the most beautiful ; her sister, Bet, sells apples to flat-n. sed, frank little boys, and they very often take advantage of her barred condition to run away without paying. Edward M. WHITTY. Political portraits. Govenung Classes of Great Brifain, 1859. The preface is dated 1854. The sketches belong to preceding years. ^g^ In this and the preceding entry I give the name of the author us I find it. ( ) "Who hreaks — pays, by the author of Cousin StAla, •1 vols. Smith and Elder, 18G1. The heroine, through fear of a tyrannical uncle, marries the ■wrong man, from whom, while only twenty years old, she has become separated. At Genoa she meets accidentally the right man, who is off to the wars, to fight lor Italy against the Austriaus. One must have heard the sweet voice that had been heavenly mnsio to one's ears, changed to a hard, cracked, toneless sound, to under- 136 Rambles in Boohs Who breaks — pays (continued). stand the heartache with which Giuliani listened to Lill. Hitherto, she had avoided looking at him; now her eyes slowly wandered over his face as he s>it silent, striving to coller^t his thoughts, so as to find the right words to speak to her. . . . Giuliani had sought Lill's presence, believing his heart-wunds healed over; painful throbs told him now the contrary. His tongue was at fault ; he had avowedly come there to advise and influence her to be reconciled to her husband ; but he felt that if he opened liis lips just then, it would be to speak words he was as bound not to utter as she not to hear. Meagre, worn, sad, she had as great an attraction for him as in all the brightness of her beauty. Envied, triumphant, surrounded by homage, or neglected, alone and faded, she was equally dear to him, not more so in other days, not less so now. He sat on, wordless, feeling that his soul was like a ship between Soylla and Chai-ybdis. Lill could not bear the silence. "How are your Paris friends, Mr. Giuliani ? " . . . How the assumption of that gay manner jarred with the dejection stamped on Lill's face and figure. She was no longer poised, erect, giving the idea of a bird ready to take wing; on the contrary, her head was bent forward like one accustomed to bear a heavy burden. . . . For an instant the muscles round her mouth quivered, then they resumed their rigidity, and she said quietly, " I cannot believe in anything, Mr. Giuliani." " So you refuse even my friendship ! " He tried to speak cheer- fully, bet his real sadness showed through the attempted disguise. " How good you are to me! " she exclaimed, and laid a hand over her eyes. He saw first one tear, then another, fall on her black silk dress. His heart quaked, he rose and hurried to the window. The sim was already low in the cloudless west; a long tremulous line of fiery gold lay on the small dancing waves. Oh ! blessed nature, that never refuses encouragement, if men would only open their eyes to see, their ears to hear. . . . She told him her tale with entire trust, but with cruel naivete. She did not remark his frightful pallor, as her words, revealing such treasures of tenderness for another man, met his ear. His feelings were stirred almost beyond his control. He suffered at one and the same moment for her and by her. — II., 261-266. All is not sadness in the book. Here is a trait of the cruel uncle — Sir Mark, who always wrote agreeably, as if to make sure that no line of his should ever hang him, surpassed himself on the present occasion. — II., 144. Who breaks — pays is a shabby library copy bought for old acquaintance sake in order to possess the book in the shape in which it was first read ; my idea of collecting. Biwihles in BooJcs. 137 Philip H. WICKSTEED. Four lectures on Hendrik Ibsen. Sonnenschein, 1892- I do not wish to make any oue read Ibsen who does not like hini ; but I shall be glad if I cau help candid readers, who have not bet-n drawn to hira, at least in part, to what there is in him that attiacis othnrs. — Prkface. The little volume is chiefly occupied with the metrical works. At the end is an account of the DoWs house and other social plays. The lectures are illustrated by translated extracts. John WILLIAMS. English dictionary. Cassell, 1803. ^Scholarly, even interesting, I keej) this always near. N. Parker WILLIS. Life, here and there ; (or) sketches of society and adventure at far- apart times and places. Henry G. Bohn, 1850. One finds here a title-page which is punctuated, and may speculate as to whether it is due to a literary publisher or to a fastidious author. "Presence of mind'' is the phrase which has come to me in reading Life, here and there, &c. The sentimental part of these slight stories was in harmony with the mood of a particular period of life, in rememhranco of which I cherish what many persons would call " trifling " books. Patriots will not be displeased to read Willis' remark in reference to members of the nobility he met in Europe, that the only ones who looked it were the English. ^^ The imrentheses about the word " or " in the title show its use. K Parker WILLIS. People I have met. Henry G. Bohn, 1850. Pictures of society and people of mark, drawn under a thin veil of fiction. — Title. Some people complained that the veil also was drawn — aside, a good deal more than should have been by one who had received hospitality in great houses. To this accusation a recent life of N. P. Willis furnishes the answer, supported by letters from members of the Englisli aristocracy. The sketches are singularly bright reading ior an ordinary mortal's leisure. 138 Rambles in Boohs. Sir Robert WILSON. Private diary of travels, personal services, and public events, 2 V9IS. Murray, 1861. At Lutzeu (it is really Liitzen) he was struck by a piece of bursting shell — " It was just as I was leading the Russian and Prussian battalions to resist the French attack that I was hit." The ordinary English traveller in Germany has tronbl.e enough to lead himself, if he be without a bear leader. What qualities, then, must an Englishman have had who could lead Kussian and Prussian troops into battle 1 The Diary is not common. So I thought myself lucky to get a 26s. book not cut open for about six shillings. Sir Robert Wilson's Life is common enough. General de WIMPFFEN. Bataille de Sedan, les veritables coupables. Ollendorff, 1887. Histoire politique et militaire d'apres des materiaux ine'dits, elaborea et co-ordonnes par Emile Corra. — Title- Page. " Haring been unable to die at the head of my troops, and having laid my sword at the feet of your Majesty," the ex-emperor was trotting oflf towards Belgium in his smart green carriage, with green and gold liveries, followed hy more carriages and more green and gold, amazing the war-worn German soldiers by the spick-and-span neatness of their equipments. So exit the saviour of society. SiE W. Maxwell Stirling. At page 26 we have a French view of Imperial campaigning. Frances Williams WYNN. Diaries of a lady of quality, 1797 to 1844, edited by A. Hayward. Longman, 1864. A book of the best society talk. Miss Wynn carefully noted memoranda about Napoleon on board the Nortliumberlancl, the Duke (surprised V) at Waterloo, &c. ; observed great actors ; knew Mr. Greatheed (here called Greathead) of Guy's Clitfe ; talked with Lord Braybrooke about Junius, ho.., &c. " Rambles in Boohs. 139 Yes and no. James Hogg ( ). Passages of courtship extracted from tlieVorks of oi;r best novelists. The editor has not been ashamed to call his collection '' XXXV. ways of popping the question" — which delineates him. He has labelled each scene with a title for tlie circulating library. The best thing in the book is the summaries which show the reader what leads up to the scene in each case. Arthur YOUNG. Nautical dictionary. Longman, 1863. An eighteen-sliilling volume, with the leaves not cut open, bouglit for half-a-crown. I prize this book for the bold wood-cuts of the minor parts of ships. Its publication fell at an interest- ing time, when steam had not extinguished sailing in the navy; so that apparatus of rigging are shown, besides the appliances of steam vessels. The index, with its French equivalents, works as an English-French vocabulary, though it is too ^meagre to be of much use. Julian Charles YOUNG. Memoir of Charles Mayne Young, tragedian, with extracts from his son^s joui-nal, 2 vols. Macmillan, 1871. See the entry " Wellington " for a specimen of this book. Edgar ZEVORT. Thiers. Classigues j)opulaires, 1892. iJaiiM la nuit du 14 au 15 jnillet, la guerre fut brusqunment duoidee au Tuileries, par I'influence du paiti du cour, o'est k dire de riiiipe'ra- trice Eutrenie et des bopapartistos pur sang. La voille I'empereur avait dit aux anibassadeurs de deux grandes puisparices — " C'est la paix, je le regrette, car I'occasion etait bonne; mais, k tout prondre, la paix est nne partie pliia sur. Vous pouvez regarder I'inoidout conime termiue.' — 212. Thiers protested with all his might, but it was of no use. 140 Ramhies in Bool's. Emile ZOLA. La Debacle. Charpentier, 1892. A shadow of coining events, after Worth — Des heures durent se passer, tout le camp noir, immobile, spmblait s'aueantir sous roppression de la vaste nuit manvaise, oil peSB.it ce quelque chose d'effioyable, sans nom encore. Des sursauts venaic d'un lac d'ombre, nn rale subit eortait d'une tente invisible. Ensuite, c'etaient des bruits qu'on ne reconnaissait pas . . . toutes los ordinaires rumeurs qui prenaient des retentissements de menace. — 21. A sweet Sunday morning ensues nevertheless. Who does not feel himself in France, as he reads this? — Vers huit heures, le soleil dissipa les nuees lourdes et un ardent et pur diraanche d'aout resplendit sur Mulhouse, au milieu de la vaste plaine fertile. Du camp, maintenant eveille, bourdonnant de vie, on enteudait les cloches de toutes les paroisses carillonner k la voice dans I'air limpide. Ce beau dimanehe d'effroyable desastre avait sa gaiete, son ciel eclatant des joars de fete. — 2-i. An oasis in the desert of misery, the morrow of a wetting : — Presque aussitot le soleil reparut, un soleil triomphal, dans la chande matine'e d'aout. Et la gaiete revint, les homrues fumaient comme une lessive, e'tendne au grand air: tres vite ils tnrent sees, pareils a des chiens crottes, retires d'une mare, plaifantant des sonnettes de fange durcie qn'ils emportaient a leurs pantalons rouges. . . . Tout au bout d'un faubourg de Reims, il y eut une derniere halts devant un debit de boissons qui ne desemplist^ait pas. — 76. Was campaigning ever more vividly depicted? DEBIT DE BOISSONS places the reader on the road in France in a moment. INDEX. Aberdeeit, Clarendon, Palmerston, 27. Acddcmy sfci'fs, Kuii's, 42. Adi^'e in flood, narrow escape, 109. Admiral's daughter, tale of intrigue, 127. Adolphe, Benjamin Constant, 28. Algeria, novel of Arab life, 41. AlUiiiagne, Madame de Stael, 90, 121. Aljpes anjc Pyrenees, Arena, 4. Alpine pass, 45. views, 2, 73. AUon Locke, Charles Kingsley, 60. .4 IV inierludc, Mrs. W. K. Clifford, 26. Augelus, hour it denotes. 105, 118, 125. Annuals, one of the old, 59, 65. Anoiher life, physical theory, Taylor, 125. Anthem, an, described, 88. AraJnan hights. Lane's translation, 66. Aristocracy, English, 93, 134, 137. Aries, arena, English visitors, 98. statues, a source of beauty, 89. Ariiiee dii lihin, Bazaine, 13. Arqna, in the travellers' guides, 48. Art I'uts technique before beauty, 2. sociologically treated, 47. Assassination, way to change rulers, 17. Austria, Santo, Lucia and Co., Himter, 57. Authors criticise authorp, lOtS. Schopenhauer on. 111. Authorship, great authors upon, 8. Sadalia Uerodffoot, R. Kipling, 61. Bol masque, Tragique avcnture, 55. Ballads, collected by Percy, 97. Knglish, kc. in German, 54. Scottith, terrible sadness, 16. Balzac as a guide to young men, 8. criticised, 23. Barrack-room hallads, R. Kipling, 61. Barracks, a soldier's experiences, 118. an othcer's lady's life, 76. Basil, why Isabella chose that plant, 59. Baudelaire, translation of Foe, 97. Beau, literary, depicted, 5. Beauty, Urcek, and Wincfcelmann, 129. Berlin literary society, 129. Bicycle tour round Europe, 20. Birches, acquaintance, Lord Lytton,132. Bisinarch. Prince, Charles Lowe, 74. Bookbinder the coLector's mentor, 12. Books, authors cay how they write, 8. best. German li»t, 14. Schopenhauer on, 112, Books, titles, fantastic, deprecated, 58. Buch der Liedcr, Heine, 52. kritische Ausgabe, 53. Burial of Sir John Moore, C. Wolfe, 20. Burma girl and British soldier, 61. Byron, a splendid euloginm, 6. Mr. Lang, letter in ottava rima, 67. relations with women, 99. Cabinet card party, 27. Cadenabbia, an earthly paradise, 74. CaUirrhoi;, Michael Field, 40. Caricature, elegant French, 13. Carlyle described, 53. Life, by Garnett, 43. Carr of CarrJyon, Ai(i6, 1. Catarina in Venice, part of Thalatta, 125. Catherine of Russia, 1. Cavour, «1, 126. Chambord, Comte, gets a challenge, 133. Chelsea, illustrated by Pennell, 79. ClHssical dictionary, in French, 99. Classics, the, Schopenhauer im, 114. Clubs, West End, their " Apollo," 100. Collier E/m'fi(i<if 10 )is. German edition,! 7. Colluigwood. Admiral, character, 31. Comedie de notre temps, Bertall, 13. Companions of my solitude, 53. Ccmjidenees, Aid^, 1. Continent, Tour in 1852, Barrow, 8. Toiin'.sCs guide. Great Eastern, IK. Courtship, scenes f rorn novelists, 133. Cousinc Bette, Balzac, 8. Crimean War, 71. its cost, 38. Criticism in France, Ernest Tissot, 126. interest for a reader, 3. Cruikshank, George, 2, 43. Dante andhis circle, Rossetti, Works, I'^S. David Copperfield, Dicke'is, 33. Departmental ditties, R. Kipling, 62. Desjycr<tte remedies. Hardy, 5i>. Diciionnaii^ comiqne, 8atyri(iue, Ac, 70. IHplomatie, Coulisses de la, 49. Dramntic nrt. Lectures. Schlegel, 110. Early rising, George Hy. Lewes on, 68, East Iridiaman taken by pirates, 42. Eckerrnann. Aurevdlyon, 44. Ssaiiite Beuve on, 44. Ellesraore, Earl of, on Maurel, 80. El()i)ernent, suggested, 55. Emotion at sight of an unknown face, 101 142 Rambles in Boohs. Emotional expression, kept down, 40. England, Charles de Remusat on, 123. Taine, Angleterre, 123. Englische Fragmente, Heine, 52. English area,dry ditch witli a bridge, 111 ■^— army, French soldier on, -11, —^ diction, an oddity of, IHl. — general in action, in Germany, I'^S. literature, dictionary, Allibone, 3. handbook, French, 15. Hi.stoire, Taine, 123. — slang, German dictionary, 12. the, an imaginative people, 120. woman, a French picture, 6.- woi'ds in a French book, 91. EnUvemcnt dc la redoute, Merimee, 31. Bothen, a present from the author, 60. Etymologies. Terms and phrases, 119. European personagres described, 126. Face, chavacter in the, 24. • how it becomes ugly, 40. Far from the ynadding crou-d. Hardy, 50. Florence. Johnson, Lily of the Arno, f8. Flying Dutchman, in German hand8,115. Foreign names, our misspelling, 39, 83. Foul play, C. Rgade and Boucicault, 102. Fourier, would benefit mankind, 22. Fox and the policy of Pitt, 1. France, Handbook, Murray, 49. — Roman, Arena, 4. South, Dumas' Travels, 36. Sunday morning, 140. Franco-German war, 26, 32. declaration, 139. French sufferings, 140. Frankfort and the Judengasae, 22. French " as she ia wrote " heie, 33. dictionary, 68, 70, 105. in Germany, Varnhagen Bnse, 129. —— language maltreated here, 94, 95. literature, French criticisms, 18. • index to reading, lu3. specimens, 97. ■ morocoo binding, 68, 91. newspaper slang, banalit^s, 104. — — quotations, 101. slang, French dictionary, 104. German dictionary, 130. traits, Brownell, 16. Friends in council. Helps, 53. Future state, physical theory, 125. Garrick.his soul was in every mupcle,113 Garrison stories, Maupassant, 80. GefiHgelte Worte, Biichmann, 17. Geneva, chimneys are in contortions, 69. " the arrowy Rhone," 69. Gentleman, what constitutes a, 24. Gentz, 1,111. Georse IV., Greville's, in French, 47. George Kliot's novels, why praised, 72. German ballad, English origin, 80. characters, some real, 21. literature, essays, Boyesen, 15. novelihtf, Morsier, 90. roads fift.v Tears aso 49. words, English misspelling, 17, 39. Germany, ext'nct volcanos in, 37. week-day cceae, 21. Glacier, what it looks like, 45. (iladstone, Mr., Budget speech, 76. Gods of anticjuity, from statues, 123. Goethe, Abraham Hayward, 52. translations criticised, 45. Life, George Henry Lewes, 71. ■ — James Sime, 118. relations to women, 15. Governing classes, songs of the, 16. Green hand, George Cupples, 30. Grey, Earl, on Duke of Wellington, 133. Grief, its ravages, Wlio breaks — pays, 135. Oriffith Gaunt, Cba les Reade, 102. Half caste, now called Eurasian, 119. Hamilton, Lad.v, beautiful in death, 3'', dies poor in Calais, 38. Happiness, Greek notion, 54. Heaven, a saying of Luiher, 75. HMise, Nouvelle, Rousseau, 46, 105. Hcroides, Ovide, Latin and French, 9fi. Hillyars and B u rtoiis, Henry Kingsley ,61 . Histoire d'nn crime, Victor Hugo, 56. Howard, Miss, aud her fate, 25. Hugo, translations from, 24. Human documetit, W. H. Mallock, 77. Husband, how he should be treated, 10. Ibsen, fashionable philosopher, 137. Ice river's secret, a story, 131. Idyls and rhymes, Mortimer Collins, 28, Illusions, how they are dispelled, 103. Impressionist, what it means, 101. Im.provisator, Andersen, in German, 4. Inconnue, Prosper Merim^e's, 88, 89. Index, a tiresome one, 46. India, French mot on British rule, 61. Ireland, T. C. Croker's Fairy legends, 29. Italian lady, an ideal portrait, 87. lake districr, 96. War and Napoleon III., 88, 89. Italien, Heine, 52. Italy as it used to be, 65. on the road thither, 104. Six uionths in, Hillard, 54. travelling from in 1834, 65. Jacob Faithful, Marryat, 7S. James, G. P. R., his novels criticised, 83. Japan, the real, Norman, 93. Jethou, Crusoe life, Suffling, 123. Jew, a, likes roast pork, a story, 1.''4. Jewish tale of Bristol and the sea, 57. Johannot illustrates Boccaccio, 14. Johnson, his idea of Sterne, 6, Judges, English, a foreign view, 120. Jungfrau seen from the Wengernalp, 83. Kaulbach, female heads m photo, 2. Kestner, iSoethe und Werther, 46. Kinglake's Crimea, an opinion of, 76. Kingsley, Henry, an account of, 79 Klopstock silhouetted by Goethe, 53. Ladies, deserted, their epistles, 95. Lago Magtjiore and Pallanza, 96. Lang, Mr. Andrew, on translation, 3'. La.-t touches, Mrs. W. K. Clifford, -^6. Latin dici ionary, Preund. in French, 42. — — Vfrse ((uotations, Quicberat, 99. Lavarer, Goethe's share in his work, 3. Left hand the helpmeet of the right, 41. Lessmg crumples up Voltaire, 6. Ramhles in BooVs. 143 Letters to dead autlxors. And. Lang, 67. Lettres a RaUel, Custine, 30. Lewes, George Hy., and the Leader, 68. Library. Mcs livres. Bauchart, 12. Life's handicap, Rudyard Kiplino;, 63. Liii Schonemann no mate for Goethe,15. Lily of the Arno, Johnson, 68. literary curiosities, W. 8. AValah, 132. Literature, Art of, Schopenhauer, 111. eighteenth century, 39. letters on, Andrew Lang, 67. LittSratures, Iiictionnaire, Vapereaa, 127. Lockhart, a loving; delineation, 11. as he appeared to G. Ticknor, 126. judged hy Harriet Martineau, TO. on his Life of Sir Trailer Scott, 2a. London, Sauntcrings, Schlesmger, 111. and N.-Western Railway in 1849,123 Longfellow, criticism by A. Lang, 67. translation of Dante, 30. Lost name, J. Sheridan Lefanu, 60. soul, Alden, 3. Love, romantic, and beauty, 40. Lover, the author of I'e i'ainoiirasa, 121, Liicile, Owen Meredith, 87. MacUse gallery of caricatures, 10. Madonna of San Lncar, 93. Man of business depicted, 134. Mandnlay, a sunny picture. 61. Many inrentions, Rudyard Kipling, 63. • Marble faun, Nathaniel Hawthorne, 52. Marriage may be like suicide, 103. Married man's patient look, 55. Maurice, F. D., Marryat challenges, 78. Mayor of Cagterhridge, Hardy, 50, Mazzini, 85, 91, 92. Melbourne, Lord, 81, 126. Memory assisted by a book, 97. Metternich and Gentz, 43. 3XiUe et une nuits, Galland, the real, 4. Mind, triumph over matter, 115. Miser's daughter, Ainsworth, 2. Jtfondains, Huguea Le Roux, 70. Monkey, how said in Hindustani, 63. Monkeys can speak, but will not, 107. Monsieur le Due, Gyp, 48. Morte amoureuse, Gautier, Nouvelles, 43, Mother Carey and her chickens, 136. Mouths, American, English, French, 3. ■ English, 36. Mr. Barnes of Nev: York, Gunter, 47. MuBset, Alfred de, and George Sand, 25. Napoleon I., Hisfoirc, Lanfrey, 67. Napoleon HI., by Victor Hugo, 56. coup d'lJtat, 35. German accent, 35. Indian native opinion, 122. look affected by the cap, 10. war equipage, 26. 138. National debt, could be paid off, 22. Gallery handbook, 29. Navy, sticks A umbrellas now known, 60 Near side and offside, with horses, 37. Nirvana: darkness, silence, sleep, 124. A'ol.lt'KNC o'/'i/c, an anecdote, 77. Northumtierlaiid House, 8upporter,135. Houvelle Hcloise, J. .J. Rouiseau, 105. Novels, historical, descriptive list, 15. Novels, international, descriptive li8t,47. sociologically considered, 47. Nuit de Cleopd'Te, Gauticr, 43. Uberammergan, English view, 00. Passion-play, the text, 35. Oblivion, the one thing pra.\ ed for, 121. Ohe ! les yisychologues ! G> p, 48. Pacidc Coast scenic tour, Finck, 40. Pagan lady, part of a portrait, 51. Painter and glazier, a nickname, 119. Palnierston, Lord, 27, 40, 109. Paralipomena, Jf-c, Schopenhauer, 115. Paris, Dickens Dictionary, 33. Knglishman in, 38. Parliaments, Didryofttro, H.W. Lncy,75. Parole, breakers of, Bismarck on, 36, Pas aux dames, .Swiss translation, 121. Passages in the life of a lady. Aide, 2. Pcroii'u! Keene, Mnrryat, 78. PercKnt et iiiipiitantur, on sun-dial, 37. Pessimism, a German couplet, 74. P/i(Uifom 'rickshaw, R. Kipling, 63. Phi istine, what the word means, 119. Physioffnomy, Lavater, in French, 68. Pihirim's Pogress. Jofin Bimyan, 18. Pirate of St. Malo, Surcouf, 42, 123. Pisa, Alia giornata palace, 3. Piaui tales from the hills, R. Kipling, 61. Poet and peer. Aide, 2. Poetry, devotional, 34. Police imder the Second Empire, 26. Politene-s to ladies, De Stacl's idea, 121. PoliUcal portraits, Whitty, 135. Pollock's translation of Daute, 30. Poor Jack, Marryat, 79. Pork, roast, a feabt interfered with, 134. Private library catalogue, in print, 12. Proposals, specimens from novels, 139. Prussian strength for war, Bapjjorts, 122. Ps.A chological novels, 15, 122. Psychology caricatured, 48. in Horace, Poiret, 98. Quarterly Review on Do Quincey, 32. — — and Lockhart, 29. Quartier Latin, theatre of study, 104. why so called, 104. Quotations, familiar, Bartlett, fer, 9. foreign, 13. • in a setting of comment, 17. in several languages, 17. Rahel Varnhagen von Ense, life, 3'^, 129. Railway locomotive, the poetry of, 99. Noi-th-We.-tern.bir F. Head, 123. ifant/iorpe, George Henry Lewes, 71, 72. Reading, Schopenhauer on, 113. Recognition hereafter, 57. Reisehilder, Heine, 52. Return of the native. Hardy, 51. Rhine campaign, Bazaine's book, 13. Rhone at Geneva, 69. Right-handedness due to fashion, 40. Ritualists, the best electro-plaie, 0. Robinson Crusoe, illustrated edition, 31, Boniandc love, Ike, Finck, 40. Romanticism, German and other, 15. Rome, antiiiuitiet set before us, 52. five days' journey, now twu dnyb' 66. Rosamund (liosa mundi) the Fair, 10. 144 Rambles in BooJcs. Jiose, Blanche, and Violet, Lewes, 72. Eossetti, D. G., life, by J. KniKht, 61. Bousseau, quoted liy De Stael, 121. Bum fouud to make the hair grow, 78. Ruskin on German stories, 43. on the National Gallery, 29. Sapran, Daohesse de, 43. !- ailing vessels, 70, 139. Sailor's language, W. C. Russell, 107. word book, Admiral Smytb, 119. Sand, George, and De Musset, 25. Scene-painting in print, 126. Schwrf s illuHtrations to Dante, 30. Schlegel, translation of Shakespeare.llG Scho'penhauer-Lexilcon, Frauenstaedt, 42. ■ Register, Hertslet. 54. Scientific men comically human, 41. Scotch spelling hard to understand, 18. Scott, Sir W., Lockhart on the Life, 29. Soi/ifi"'' landf. Drew, 35. Sea, legends, 115. flang, from recollection, 107. ■ terms, illustrated dictionary, 139. Sedan, BataiUe de, Wimpffen, 138. . Journee de, Ducrot, 36. Sentimental stories treasured, 137. Shakespeare, a criticism, 116. • Fienoh ciiticism of Lent, 7. French crit. of Romeo and Juliet, 7. Shl}\ Little Lihrary, Isaac Taylor, 121. parts and apparatus pictured, 139. Simla, life at, 62. Slang, London, German view, 12. Slippers from old Egypt, apostrophe, 5. Society memoranda. Miss Wyim, 138. Soldier life. gentleman private, 118. Scldier's life at home in barracks, 118. Soldiem three, Rudyard Kipling, 64. Home emotions and a moral, Hobhes, 5-t. Song from Faust, singing described, 102. Sonnets, 17, 34, 126. Sorrows of Werter, Goethe, 45. Spain, costumes and manners gone, 41. . Gatherings, Richard Ford, 41. Spanish Armada, concise de8patch,133. biiUfids. Lockhart, 72, 73. Statues depicted, Gutter und Heroen, 123. Steamer, paddle, feniinine aspect, 124. Stella and Vanestna, De Wailly, 115. Stendhal, Balzac's opinion, 105. ■ Kdouard Rod, Henri Beyle, 105. ■ his portrait a surprise, 105. name difficult to spell, 122. Sterne said to himself.we read what,127. Stratford de RedcliEfe, Lord, 76, 98. Study ill temiitations, Hobhes, 55. Stylo, D 1 Qaincey's, examples of, 32. ■ four words about, 113. ■ Schopenhauer on, 112, 113. Snhaltern, G. R. Gleig, 44. Summer seas. Winter crui e, Atchison,5. Sunday scene at Strassburg, 2u. fcSuu-dial inscription, Pereuiit, Ac, 37. Swift, Sir Walter Scott's Life, 115. Switzerland, Handbook, Murray's, 49. how visitors find it, 30. mountain views, 73. Switzerland, plates after Prout, 65. Visitors' hook, 131. Table talk. Book of, W. C. Russell, 106. T(pdiam vita;, Dido's lament, 89. Talleyrand, 17, 100. Balzac's opinion, 11. Rossetti on his portrait, 11. Tartarin sur les Alpes, Daudet, 30. Technique put belore beauty, in art, 2. Tiss of the D'Urbervilles, Hardy, 51, Tht5ret-a, voice and singing, 25. Thief-taker taken for a thief, 25. Times, essays reprinted from, 38. Title of a book, Schopenhauer, 112. want of clearnets,58,112. Tot of spirits, explained, 3?. Translation, art, Mr. A. Lang on, 31. Tr«Msi/ti(;r«(/o7i., Mortimer Coding, 28. Travel, Sterne's idea, told in French, 127 Travelling, Ante- .Murray period, 49. elaborately, 64. Trench, Mrs. Richard, on Gentz, HI. Tuckprman, Henry Theodore. 69. Tico years ago, Charles Kingsley, 60. Typee, Herman Melville, 82. Uffizij Gallery, from uiBzio ufBzi;, 39. Vnde Tom's Cabin, Mrs. Stowe. 123. Utiepnssir.n, Paria Korigan,65. V'anitv Fair, puppets stand outside, 125. Varnhagen von Ei se & A. Humboldt,50. Venetian life, J. D. Howells, 55. Venice, goi dola, B.vron describes. 55, 56. its stillness, Byron's account, 66. steamers do not spoil, 56. To, in a simple vay, 130. Venus d' Aries, J. Mery, 89. Vieille file, Balzac, 8. Vienna, court, 1. Fitfoi-ia, George Meredith, 84, 85, 86, 87. Vulhe^-stimmen, Herder, 54. Voltaire a worker in electro-plate, 6. Vox et prietcrea nihil, 75. IFaiidcrer, Owen Meredith, 87. War, example of its horrors, 71. Waterloo, story of the battle, 44. Wedding in the salt marshes, 81. Wellington, Mau'el, by Ellesmere, 80. Weltschmerz,W> rther an expression, 128. Werther, Goethe, 22, 128. Goethe, Fiench criticism, 128. in French bv Enault, 46. Westminster Abbey, Cole, 27. Whale nicknamed Moby Dick, 82. Whitman became a poet, how, 11. Whitiy, Edward, and the Leader, 68. Wil- elm Meister, Carlyle's, 45. William I., of Germany. 91. William IV., Greville's, in French, 47. Winckolmann, De Stael on, 129. ■ Vapereau on, 128. Wreck of the Grosvenor,W. C. Russell. 1( 8. Woman frozen in a glacier, revived, 3. Women eat, Byron hated to see, 19. Women's laughter, beautiful sound, f^O. Writers and readers, Birkbeck Hill, 5i. Zola criticised, 23. 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