to the literal accuracy on which scholiasts lay stress, just as he was careless of grammatical exactness. Mr. Ormsby is a little too severe on the stories inserted in the First Part. Nor is he, we think, right in asserting that Cervantes put them in because he was doubtful whether he could safely rely on the adventures of the knight and his squire to amuse his readers; he probably did not consider this, but simply followed the fashion of the time, which demanded such interpolations. Still they are undoubtedly excrescences, and Mr. Ormsby has done rightly in printing them in smaller type than the rest of the book.

Mr. Ormsby discusses and rejects the proposal more than once made of a revised edition of Shelton's translation. We are not able to agree with him in this matter. Shelton accomplished his task in a hurry, and especially in the Second Part (if the Second Part be really his) he made many blunders ; but these could be corrected, and, as Mr. Ormsby says, he "had the inestimable advantage of belonging to the same generation as Cervantes; it cost him no dramatic effort to see things as Cervantes saw them"; while the translator of the present day must either produce an obviously modern version or an artificial imitation of the English of Shelton's time. On the whole, therefore, we are inclined to believe that an amended version of Shelton would be found the best solution of the problem of making 'Don Quixote' intelligible to English readers.

Mr. Ormsby's own translation is workmanlike. He is an excellent Spanish scholar, and, as his introduction shows, he has plenty of common sense, and is not led away by whims and crotchets. If his translation has a fault, it is that it is wanting in vigour. Mr. Ormsby is a little too apt to content himself with rather tame equivalents of Cervantes's phrases. For example, there is surely no reason for not translating literally "Riose Camila del A. B. C. de su doncella," and diluting it into "Camilla laughed at her maid's alphabet." A more important instance is furnished by the words used by Cervantes to express the bewilderment of the judge when (Part I. c. xlii.) he encounters Don Quixote at the door of the inn, "á quien se puso á mirar muy de proposito." This Mr. Ormsby renders by the formal phrase, "whom he scrutinized very carefully." Taken individually, translations of this sort may seem adequate enough, and it may appear to be hypercritical to quarrel with them; but the effect of a large number of such paraphrases is considerable, and the translation as a whole lacks vivacity and character. Mr. Ormsby has gone to the opposite extreme from his immediate predecessor. In fact, if Mr. Ormsby did not tell us that he had avoided looking into Mr.

We have not left ourselves much space to speak of Mr. Gibson's translation. The Numantia is a far finer work than El Trato de Argel,' and is interesting as a specimen of the Spanish drama before Lope. It is a striking poem, but it is not possible to rank it high as a play, and it will always remain more or less of a curiosity, read by few except professed students. Mr. Gibson has done his best to make it popular, and his spirited version r. v be perused with pleasure by those ac inted with Spanish

and those who are not.

NOVELS OF THE WEEK. Grass Country. In a By Mrs. Lovett Cameron. 3 vols. (White & Co.) In a London Suburb. By W. Hartley. 3 vols. (Same publishers.)

For Lilias.

concluded in accordance with the demands of poetic justice, but that he is far too fond of dwelling on unpleasant details, physical infirmities and the like, and devotes a quite inordinate amount of space to chronicling the malignant manoeuvring and rancorous gossip of acid spinsters, fullblown widows, and amorous clergymen He is thoroughly at home in his sketches of Bohemia, but he is unable to divest them of a sordid vulgarity, which the iterateness of his writing does much to en hance. His dialogue is often witty, but it is with the wit of the cabman or the music hall; and when the region of caricature is exchanged for that of romance the diction becomes stilted and the sentiment strained. By far the best chapter in the book is that which records Scarlett's parting from Laura Deakin, a girl with the instincts and habita of an actress, who has been forced for & while by circumstances to conform her manners to the code of suburban propriety, This situation is developed with some humour, and Laura is altogether a more attractive personage than her antecedents warrant. Novelists may be excused for occasional lapses of memory; but to change the name of a character from Gow to Snow on the same page, as Mr. Hartley has done (vol. ii. p. 84), is rather an unjustifiable proceeding. The alteration of a Christian name from Nancy to Laura (iii. 86) is a more venial error, especially in speaking of a member of the dramatic profession. There are quite an unusual number of misspelt words in these volumes as well as some absolute novelties, such as "reluded" and "abtruse"; and the author's French is of an atrocity that quite surpasses the vagaries of the average novelist.

By Rosa Nouchette Carey. 3 vols. (Bentley & Son.) MRS. CAMERON's descriptive power is higher than her moral teaching. She is quite at home in the stable and the kennel, and the strange hunting establishment set up by her sporting family, the three Latimer brothers and their pretty sister Eve, is amusingly described. But the reader will feel little sympathy with Dick Gaskell, who seduces a poor girl and deserts her, and, being more or less engaged to his cousin Constance Harlowe, manages at the same time to win the affections of honest Eve Latimer. That young lady dissuades her lover from marrying the ignorant peasant girl he has ruined, but his "self-respect "must be of a very conventional sort if he considers he has maintained it by adopting her advice. Fortunately, Avice turns out to be an heiress, and the vulgar country lawyer who consoles her seems likely to make her more happy than she would have 'For Lilias' is a thoroughly wholesome and been with her gentlemanly seducer. Our charming story, in which types of gracefu author introduces us to some high society, womanhood predominate, though the write but the fatuous Lord Harlowe and his very has given us one finished male portrai ordinary wife are not very lifelike. Such in Capel Frere, whose whimsical fancie rustic dignitaries have not been sharply reconcile the reader to that absence o contrasted with persons of the same status hearty humour noticeable in most book: in town since railways were invented. by women. The plot is effective in that it Since the same period, too, the scandalous affords the writer full scope for the delinea world is much the same in town and country, tion of domestic life, in which she excels and the author's moralizing on the narrow- and for the development of the character o ness of social spite in the provinces is quite the heroine, who is no paragon, but never beside the mark. Lady Dalrymple descant-theless a striking and attractive figure b ing in public on what the footman told her maid is one of many indications that our author knows but little of this part of her subject. She is at her best when she writes without a moral; and the healthy country doings in the shires, the pretty opening scene of poor Avice Colston's love, and, above all, the relations between Eve and her brother, little Tom, until the premature obscuring of that bright young piece of manhood, make the reader willing to con

reason of her very faults. Miss Carey method is none the less successful becaus it is a little old-fashioned; the dialogue i easy and natural, but singularly free fro all approach to slang; and her latest wo will maintain, if it does not advance, he reputation as a genial and refined writer.

PHILOLOGICAL BOOKS.

translation had suffered from an effort to avoid the faults of that work. Mr. Duffield abounds in archaisms, and in his anxiety to be vigorous becomes occasionally grotesque; Mr. Ormsby eschews archaisms ("grouting," vol. iii. p. 49, is one of the few exceptions), and in his desire to be simple be is apt to be tame. This is the sole fault of his version. It is decidedly more accurate than those which have preceded it, and shows a firm grasp of the niceties of the Spanish language.

in the book.

Introduction to our Early English Literature & Co.)-This volume consists principally It is far easier to register the defects than extracts from nearly all the extant Angi to indicate the merits of Mr. (?) Hartley's part in prose) and brief introductory remar Saxon poems, with translations (for the mos book, though the latter are by no means slight. When he chooses to be serious he torily carried out the book would have been The idea is good, and if it had been satisfac proves himself to be an intelligent and acute great service to self-teaching students who boerver. This makes it all the more to be having obtained an elementary knowledge at regretted that he should have unduly inAnglo-Saxon language and had some practic dulged his talent for caricature and dis- study of the poetical literature. f exercis in reading, are about to begin the systemati figured his pages with constant breaches of good taste. It is not that the author is students it would be a most useful exercis to read a number of selected passages with th a thoroughgoing realist, for his story is aid of good translations (not slavishly litera

versions like those of Thorpe, but versions combining faithfulness with idiomatic freedom) in order to form the habit of observing the finer shades of meaning, which learners are apt to overlook when toiling through the texts with a dictionary. Unfortunately the execution of Dr. Robinson's work is not equal to its plan. We have no fault to find with the selection of passages, and the book is certainly the completest collection of specimens of Anglo-Saxon verse which we have seen, no poem of any importance having been overlooked. The translations also are spirited and appreciative, and the explanatory observations are attractively written. But Dr. Robinson's scholarship is evidently of the most superficial character, and the volume is so full of inaccuracies that we fear it will be of little

practical use. The introduction, on the history of the Teutonie tribes, contains some amazing tatements. The Teutons are said to have rought the runic alphabet "from their earliest Asian home." The author apparently thinks that the names of the days of the week, as well as the runes, are a native Teutonic invention, for he adduces the names Sunday and Monday as evidence that our ancestors worshipped the sun and moon, and he actually suggests that Monday may perhaps be derived from the name of the god Mannus. In the preface Prof. Wülcker is quoted as the authority for the identification of the poet Cynewulf with the tenth bishop of Lindisfarne, the fact being that this identification is a hypothesis which Prof. Wülcker has energetically opposed. The volume includes a sketch of Anglo-Saxon grammar, which is needless for those students to whom the plan of the book is suitable, while for beginners it is too incomplete to be of much use. A glossary would have been desirable, but it has not been supplied. The title-page contains no indication that the scope of the volume is restricted to the poetical part of the literature. Apparently this limitation was an afterthought, for in appending to the volume a list (which is very inaccurate) of Anglo-Saxon prose writings, the author makes the odd remark that this list will help to justify the title of the present book." It would have been easy to amend the title so that it should not need justification; but the fact that the discrepancy between the title and the actual contents has been allowed to remain is curiously characteristic of the careless way in which the book has been put together. As Dr. Robinson appeals to his readers to furnish him with corrections we presume he looks forward to issuing a second edition. If he should do so, he should Cancel the introduction and the grammar, add glossary, and get some competent scholar to correct his translations. So revised the volume would supply a real want. In its present shape We cannot recommend it.

Ix Assam, that cradle of numerous rude tongues, a remarkable revival of linguistical search is taking place, mainly due, we believe, to the enlightened zeal of Mr. E. Stack, of the Shillong Secretariat, and likely to be particularly gratifying to Mr. B. H. Hodgson, the great i neer of scientific research concerning the aboriginal languages on the borders of India. It was only some few months ago that we received from those parts an 'Outline Grammar of the Kachári Language,' by the Rev. S. Endle. That publication has just been cceeded by A Short Account of the Kachcha Naga Tribe, with an Outline Grammar, Vocabulary, and Illustrative Sentences, by Mr. C. A. Soppitt, a young officer who has the administrative charge of the North Kachar Hills. Kachcha Nagas live west of the Angami Nagas, between these and the Khasis; their language has affinities with Mikir and Kachári. The same gentleman is now engaged upon a Kuki grammar, while Mr. Needham's Abor Grammar' is in type, and Mr. MacCabe's 'Angami Naga Gram

The

mar' ready for the press. The last-named lan

tongue. Mr. Stack himself is working up his materials towards a grammatical account of the Bhutia Changlo dialect, and is likewise preparing from his rich collectanea a grammar and phrasebook of Mikir. Shall we ever have a similar report from British Burma?

By order of the Assam Secretariat another valuable book by the above-mentioned Mr. Soppitt has recently been printed, viz., A Historical and Descriptive Account of the Kachari Tribes in the North Cachar Hills, with Specimens of Tales and Folk-lore. The history of the Kacharis, who number upwards of 400,000 souls, cannot be traced further back than the beginning of the fourteenth century. After the scanty notices under this head, more ample details are furnished concerning the habits, customs, amusements, and manufactures of the tribe, its crude religious notions, and its legends as to the origin of thunder and lightning, of earthquakes, sun, moon, and stars, and of various animals. The rest of the volume contains folk-lore tales and chapters on superstitions and on kindred tribes. We welcome all the more gratefully any contribution to our knowledge of the rude tribes of that remote frontier province (the latest general conspectus of whom we find in Mr. C. J. Lyall's able Census Report for Assam) as the moisture with which the air in those parts is saturated, and which is apt to sap the strongest European constitution, must be held responsible for many delays and interruptions of literary work.

To

those causes it must also be attributed that we shall have to wait yet a while for the publication missionaries at Tura have been engaged, and of of the Garo dictionary on which the American Major Macgregor's Notes on the Singphos and their Language.'

PROF. JULIUS EUTING publishes in the last number of the Sitzungsberichte of the Academy of Berlin ninety-eight inscriptions (facsimiled and transcribed with short explanations) collected by him during his travels in Syria and Arabia in the years 1883-4, with the title of Epigraphische Miscellen. Amongst them are two Phoenician inscriptions, two Egypto-Aramaic on papyrus, one Old Aramaic, forty Palmyrene,

one

Old Hebrew, twenty-two Hebrew and Græco-Hebrew, and twenty-eight Greek inscriptions. Some of them have already been published by M. Clermont-Ganneau and by others. The Græco-Hebrew inscriptions are of importance for the history of early Christianity. Here occurs the epithet peoẞevrys. They will be favourably compared with those found at Hypæpa, and published lately by M. S. Reinach in the Revue des Études Juives, vol. x. p. 74 seq., where the epithet peoẞúrepos occurs. The title 17, so much discussed find here in Greek transcription lately, we as : 54, Σαμου | ήλ Γάλ | λου Βηρ | εβί Disu. We find in No. 57 the Jew Benjamin with the epithet Kevτηvápios TŶs Tapeμßoλîs.

LIST OF NEW BOOKS. ENGLISH. Theology.

Alexander's (Rev. W. L.) Zechariah, his Visions and Warnings, cr. 8vo. 6/ cl.

Bersier's (E.) Sermons, Second Series, cr. 8vo. 4/ cl. Cross's (Rev. J. A.) Bible Readings, selected from the Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua, cr. 8vo. 2/6 cl. Gregg's (J.) Sermons preached in Trinity Church, Dublin, Second Series, cr. 8vo. 6/ cl. Handy-Volume Edition of Bishop Ellicott's Old Testament Commentary: Vol. 2, Exodus, by Rev. Canon Rawlinson, 3/ cl.; Vol. 5 Deuteronomy, by Rev. C. H. Waller, 2/6 cl. Immortality, a Clerical Symposium, by Canon Knox Little and others, cr. 8vo. 6/ cl.

Maclaren's (A.) Pictures and Emblems, being Illustrations from his Sermons, cr. 8vo. 5/ cl.

Newton's (R.) Bible Promises, a Book of Sermons for Children, cr, 8vo. 2/ el.

Watts's (R.) The Rule of Faith and the Doctrine of Inspiration, cr. 8vo. 6/ cl. (Carey Lectures for 1884.)

Law.

1571, illustrated, 4to. 10/6 cl.

Philosophy.

Lotze's (H.) Microcosmus, an Essay concerning Man and his
Relation to the World, 2 vols cr. 8vo. 36/ cl.
History and Biography.

Adams's (W. H. D.) The Merry Monarch, or England under
Charles II., its Arts, Literature, and Society, 2 vols. 21/
Grant (U. S.), Personal Memoirs of, 2 vols. 8vo. 28/ el.
Legge's (A. O) The Unpopular King, the Life and Times of
Richard III., 2 vols. 8vo. 30 cl.

Secret Memoirs of Madame la Marquise de Pompadour,
collected by Beaupoint, 8vo. 10/6 cl.
Taylor's (S. T) Reminiscences of Berlin during the Franco-
German War of 1870-71, 8vo. 7/6 cl.

and Cure, 12mo 2/6 swd.

Fothergill's (J. M.) The Will Power, its Range in Action, 3/6
Traill's (Mrs. C. P.) Studies of Plant Life in Canada, 15/ el.
Von Arlt's (Dr. F. R.) Clinical Studies on Diseases of the
Eve, 8vo. 12/6 el.
Williams's (W.) Manual of Telegraphy, illustrated, 8vo. 10/6
General Literature.

Allen's (G.) Babylon, 3 vols er. 8vo. 31/6 el.
Blanche's (A.) Master of his Fate, a Swedish Tale, trans. by
Rev. M. R. Barnard, illustrated, cr. 8vo. 6/ el.
Cameron's (Mrs. H. L.) A Dead Past, a Novel, cr. 8vo, 3/6 cl.
Child Pictures from Dickens, 3/6 bds.

Cotterill's (C. C) Suggested Reforms in Public Schools, 3/6 cl.
Electoral Boundaries of the United Kingdom, 8vo. 2/6 swd.
Fenn's (G. M.) Sweet Mace. popular edition, 12mo. 2/ bds.
Fenn's (G. M.) The Vicar's People, popular edition, 12mo. 2/
Hardy's (R. F) Katie, an Edinburgh Lassie, cr. 8vo. 2/ cl.
Holmes's (E.) Through a Refiner's Fire, cr 8vo. 3/5 cl.
Hough's (L.) For Fortune and Glory, cr. 8vo. 5/ el.
Howells's (W. D.) The Rise of Silas Lapham, cr. 8vo. 7/6 cl.
Hugo's (V.) The Outlaw of Iceland, er. 8vo. 2/ bds
Hunting, by the Duke of Beaufort and M. Morris, illustrated,
er. 8vo. 10/6 cl. (Badminton Library.)
Hutcheson's (J. C.) On Board the Esmeralda, or Martin
Leigh's Log, cr. 8vo. 3/6 cl.

In the Depths of the Sea, by Old Boomerang, cr. 8vo. 5/ cl.
Knight's (A.) The Cruise of the Theseus, a Yarn for Boys, 5/
Last Days and Fall of Palmyra, Letters of L. M. Piso to his
Friend M. Curtius, cr. 8vo 2/ cl

Loader's (J.) The Candidate's and Election Agent's Guide for
Parliamentary and Municipal Elections, 12mo. 7/6 el.
Lowndes's (C. 8) Lena Graham, illustrated, 12mo. 2/ cl.
Lowndes's (C. S.) New Honours, illustrated, 12mo. 2/ cl.
Martin's (Mrs. J.) Ministers' Wives, er. 8vo. 3/6 cl.
Norris's (C. M.) Hugh's Sacrifice, illustrated, er. 8vo. 2/6 cl.
O'Donoghue's (N. P.) Unfairly Won, a Novel, 12mo. 2/ bds.
Paull's (Mrs. H. B.) The Owners of Broadlands, illus., 5/ cl.
Reader's (E. E.) Fairy Prince Follow-my-Lead, illus., 5 cl.
Stone's (E.) Grace Murray, a Story, cr. 8vo. 3/5 cl.
FOREIGN.
Fine Art.

Lachner (C.): Geschichte der Holzbaukunst in Deutschland,
Part 1, 10m.
History.

Jäger (A.): Geschichte der Lan ständischen Verfassung

Tirols, Vol. 2, Part 2, 12m. Werunsky (E.): Excerpta ex Registris Clementis VI. et Innocentii VI., 4m.

Philology.

Landgraf (G.): Die Vita Alexandra Magni d. Archipresbyters Leo, 3m.

Mousterberg-Münckenau (S. v.): Der Infinitiv in den Epen Hartmanns v. Aue, 5m.

IN Principal John Campbell Shairp Oxford and St. Andrews have to mourn a remarkable man. His friends will long lament a man of warm heart and lofty character, not one who dulled his palm by entertainment of any casual acquaintance, but who could grapple to his "soul with hoops of steel" those of “ adoption tried." Those nearer yet will need some time ere they can draw consolation from any such secondary reflections as the high impression made by the nature of him they mourn on those who had the good fortune to know him well. Yet they may rest assured that to many a young scholar and junior colleague afternoons and evenings spent in the genial and refined society of Principal Shairp and of his family are among the most pleasant and profitable recollections of life.

Those to whom his oddities, and what some might think his weaknesses, were dear-his occasional engrossment in some lilt of Scottish song, which was puzzling till it broke forth articulately and gave a turn to the conversation, his fondness for "to-names," and, it must be owned, a frequent taste for gossip-know that in his more serious vein there was never a more suggestive talker, and that they must have been but narrow judges of human nature who, "hærentes in cortice," did not respect the heart and head which intercourse with Shairp revealed to them. As an author his poetic works hardly supported the estimate those who knew him were inclined to form of his powers. His critical essays have been more esteemed; yet, paradoxical as it may seem, it was his poetic side which was his strongest intellectual charm, the ideal view of life's objects, the animating sympathy with which he regarded nature. The author of 'Kilmahoe' was as clear-souled and pure as his Highland ladies and his Highland streams.

Mr. Shairp, like several of the Scottish professors, was a man of birth. He combined in his descent both the Celtic and Lowland elements. Son of a laird of the ancient family of Houstoun in Linlithgowshire, he had a Campbell mother from Argyll shire, while his father's mother was a daughter of Macleod of Macleod. It is small wonder that with such antecedents he should have readily assimilated the legendary lore of the Highlands, or qualified his natural bent to a Cavalier Toryism by a warm sympathy with the crofters and fishers of his maternal land.

On far fields of fame when the red ranks were reeling
Who pressed to the van like the men from the shealing?
Ye were fain in your need Highland broadswords to berrow:
Where, where are they now, should the foe come to-morrow?

Indeed, like many a Conservative of the old type, bred in the old ways of old (and not wealthy) families, he was no stickler for rank. He could not have been a democrat; but the simplicity which was equally characteristic of him was averse to mere conventional distinctions. Like the lady in Kintyre,—

To him none worthier seemed for being great,
Nor any less because their place was low;
True to that simple pure heart-estimate
Which doth not earth's rank know.

In fact, like the originals of the portraits he has drawn in his principal poem, he was that rare character a gentleman.

After the usual schooling in his native land, Shairp went as a Snell Exhibitioner to Balliol. At Oxford he enjoyed, besides a good classical reputation, that of being one of the best riders of his day. He evidently entered thoroughly into the spirit of the place, and no doubt imbibed much of its tone, yet he was, I venture to think, as little Oxonianized at the core-if I may use the expression in the sense of being exclusively imbued with its current philosophy or modes of thought as a true son of Oxford could well be. He was far too sympathetic not to feel its influences, but his vein of feeling, his nature at his best and deepest, had already got its bias, Scottish in its inception and to the last. Southern critics would hardly acknowledge this; but they know only the Scotticism of Burns. Shairp's genius was drawn from Highland sources, and the types are different.

From Oxford he went to Rugby. The task of grounding very small boys must have been somewhat irksome; but the writer can bear witness that it was conscientiously done, though the occasional rhyming deliverances of their master were as often above the comprehension of the ordinary schoolboys as to struggle into the "big school" on the stroke of the clock, under the protection of his tall form and flying robe, was exactly to their taste. Alas for those days! They were happy to us, though our preceptor, perhaps, even then had a longing for a different field. This he found in his appointment to the professorship of Humanity at St. Andrews, a post of little emolument, and that, I believe,

|

|

largely payable in "kain-hens," but in those days (1858–68) endowed with a good deal of leisure. Here he evolved the little volume of poems above alluded to, which suffered a good deal at the hands of many who had no particular sympathy for the local colouring and resented occasional roughnesses of metre, which were better suited to a Scotch than an English pronunciation. Yet few can have read the descriptions of the "glen," of the "garden," or of the "sacramental Sabbath' without being touched by the manner as well as the matter of the singer. The lesser pieces are of varying merit, the best being those in a Celtic minor key. Probably in some respects the book would have been more successful had it not been before its time. It will be re-read with interest in these days of crofter agitation. In 1870 appeared Culture and Religion,' an argument addressed to several schools of agnostics, two years after his succession to Principal Forbes in the headship of St. Salvator and St. Leonard's. This was followed by various Studies in Poetry and Philosophy,' which have been highly estimated by the critics; and in 1879 he contributed an essay on Burns for the "Men of Letters series, perhaps the least successful of his works. That sturdy sensuous genius, whose song had as little to do with morality as that of a bird who sings each season for a different mate, had nothing in common with his critic, except those touches of nature which are proverbial. Shairp's lectures from the chair of Poetry at Oxford, which he filled from the year 1877, appear not to have taken hold on the undergraduate audience. The academic youths were probably ἦθος νεαροί, and dissertations on Marlowe or Mr. Swinburne would have been more to their taste than Wordsworth; wherein they were possibly right. For the rest, the works of the late Principal will always be read with pleasure by an educated few; while, whatever be our opinions on the religious questions which were nearest to his heart, 61 one thing we feel must be right; to live as he lived, to be of the spirit he was of." C.

THE LIBRARY ASSOCIATION.

THE Conversazione on Tuesday night, September 15th, in the news room of the Plymouth Free Library, was gay and very well attended.

gave an

The afternoon of Wednesday, the 16th, was well spent, mainly in the discussion of a paper On the Extension of the Free Library System to Kural Districts,' by Mr. Silvanus Trevail. Mr. Trevail urged that good books might be disseminated among the rural population by means of the School Board system, the schoolmasters and schoolmistresses acting as librarians in the several parishes. Canon Moor account of the libraries of the city of Truro, viz., the County Library, the Diocesan Library, and the library of the Royal Institution of Cornwall. The canon is honorary librarian of the Diocesan Library, and he gave a particular account of a valuable bequest of theological works made by a country clergyman, who lived almost penuriously that he might buy fine copies of the Fathers, the Councils, and other works, all which he bequeathed to the Diocesan Library of Truro.

It con

In the course of the day the Mayor opened an exhibition in the old building of the South Devon and East Cornwall Hospital. sisted of rare books, rare bindings, and various specimens of leather used in binding. There shelves that revolve and steps that fold up and were library appliances of all kinds, including are very light to carry. Some of the most sumptuous bindings came from the library of Lord Crawford and Balcarres, others from the collection of Mr. R. M. Holburn, of Highbury. Several Caxtons were lent by Mr. Blades. The Japanese book-backs of highly polished shark skin attracted attention. So did an edition of Gertrude of Wyoming,' on the edges of which, underneath the gold, was painted a beautiful

landscape. Pigskin bindings were shown by Mr. Zaehndorf, which encourage the hope of obtaining a very durable and hand-ome covering for books. Embroidered velvet bindings of the time of Queen Elizabeth were exhibited, which lead to the expectation that this style of book decoration may be revived. Among the exhibits were specimens of the destructive work of the bookworm on a copy of the Koran. The little creature had attacked the binding, but, with what was called a true Mohammedan instinct, it had spared the text of the sacred book. An edition of the sacred books of the Sikhs, said to be the property of Lord Dufferin, was exhibited as the smallest book in the world, being about half the size of a postage stamp One room was devoted to illustrations exhibited by Messrs. Cassell & Co. and by the proprietors of the Graphic. Another room contained the publications of the Religious Tract Society and the innumerable translations of the Scriptures issued by the British and Foreign Bible Society. The building in which these various objects are displayed had, by the energy of Mr. Wright, librarian to the corporation and local secretary to the Associa tion, been completely renovated in the course of a few days; and it was impossible not to feel that the acquisition of its large and commodious rooms for the use of the Free Library, which is somewhat cribbed and cabined in the edifice it now occupies-"an architectural curiosity" it was called-would be the best reward that s man of Mr. Wright's public spirit could receive for his honourable exertions. A visit to Saltram Park was made very agreeable by the courtesy of the owner, the Earl of Morley, and by the beautiful weather. Unfortunately many of the fine Sir Joshuas are in the earl's house in London. Scarcely had the members of the Association reached their hotels when they were summoned to the exhibition building and received a hearty welcome from the local committee.

The first business of Thursday morning was the election of 132 honorary members of the Association, a further proof of the energy and perseverance of the local secretary. Then followed three papers on classification, the first being by Mr. W. Archer, librarian of th National Library of Ireland, who contended tha the dictionary form of catalogue was better that any other, that author and subject should be included in one alphabet and not form separate divisions of the catalogue, and that all doubts and ambiguities should be made clear by the multiplication of cross references. The second paper, On Classification for Scientific and Medical Libraries,' by Mr. J. B. Bailey, librarian to the Medical and Chirurgical Society o London, pointed out the special kind of classi fication needed for libraries of that kind, which cannot properly be arranged on the system usually adopted in the ordinary collections o general literature. The third paper, by Mr. John Brownhill, 'On Science and Art,' pro pounded a scheme of classification that could have but a limited application. It was announce that the report of the committee on classification was not ready for presentation to the meeting.

In the afternoon Prof. F. Pollock read

paper On the Library of the Alpine Club, which pleased the audience as much by it literary finish as by the grave humour which characterized the document and its delivery Mr. Tedder, librarian of the Athenæum Club followed with a paper, 'Proposals for a Biblio graphy of National History The scheme thought, for a single writer. necessarily a large one-too large, it might be fore elicited loud cheers when he announced that he was not satisfied with merely throwing out a suggestion, but that he meant to do the work himself. The paper by Mr. W. Roberts of Penzance, 'On Publishers' Subterfuges in the Eighteenth Century,' was so indistinctly de livered in a room acoustically bad that few coul

Mr. Tedder there

hear it, and the audience gradually melted away. The temptation to get into the sunshine

Life and Letters of Henry W. Longfellow,' by his brother the Rev. S. Longfellow, Sea Life Sixty Years Ago,' by Capt. George Bayly, -A Facsimile of General Gordon's Last Journal,' reproduced by photo lithography, 'Last Days of Marie Antoinette,' an historical sketch by Lord Ronald Gower, and Biographical Lectures,' by the late Mr. George Dawson. Amongst historical books they promise the fourth volume of Prof. Mahaffy's edition of Duruy's History of Rome and the Roman People,'-the second volume of Profs. Woltmann and Woerman's History of Painting,'| The History of Catholic Emancipation,' by the Rev. W. J. Amherst, S.J., and Mr. T. P. O'Connor's account of 'The Parnell Movement.' Besides these they announce a collection of antiquarian lore by the late J. W. Warter, entitled 'An Old Shropshire Oak,' and 'Sylvan Winter,' by Mr. F. G. Heath.

The additions to the "Parchment Library' will be Mr. Stanley Lane-Poole's edition of 'Swift's Journals and Letters,' and 'Milton's Poetical Works' in two volumes. In the larger series Mr. George Saintsbury will give 'Specimens of English Prose Style,' with an introductory essay. The next additions to the "International Scientific Series" will be Prof. Hartmann's work on 'Anthropoid Apes'; Prof. Oscar Schmidt on 'The Mammalia in their Relation to Primeval Time'; Prof. Milne on Earthquakes and other Earth Movements '; and Dr. H. Macaulay Posnett on 'Comparative Literature.' In theology the announcements of the same publishers include the completed volume of Early Christian Symbolism,' by the late William Palmer, with numerous compositions from fresco paintings and sculptured sarcophagi, a fourth volume of 'Thirty Thousand Thoughts,' sermons by the Bishop of Derry and by the late Lord O'Neill, also a volume of 'Lectures and Addresses' by the latter author; whilst the "Pulpit Commentary will be increased by a volume on 2 Corinthians and Galatians,' and one on 'Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians.' The miscellaneous announcements of the house include 'New India; or, India in Transition,' by Mr. H. J. S. Cotton, and Ideas about India,' by Mr. Wilfrid Blunt ; also Scientific Meliorism and the Evolution of Happiness,' by Miss J. H. Clapperton,-The Social Problem,' by Mr. William Graham, author of 'The Creed of Science,'-'Springs of Conduct an Essay in Evolution,' by Mr. C. Lloyd Morgan, Circulating Capital: an Inquiry into the Fundamental Laws of Money,' by an East India Merchant, 'Some Thoughts on Moderation,' by Mr. Gustafson,-and 'The Life of a Prig,' by One.

Several volumes of poetry are announced by Messrs. Kegan Paul & Co., including Mr. Austin Dobson's At the Sign_of_the__Lyre,’—Mr. Edmund Gosse's 'Firdausi in Exile,'-' The Romance of Dennell,' by Mr. J. R. Mozley,- A Modern Ideal,' by Mr. S. R. Lysaght,-' Bertha, and other Poems,' by Mr. C. Sayle, "The Poet in May,' by Mr. Evelyn Pyne, Antonius: a Dramatic Poem,' by Mr. J. C. Heywood,'Uriel Acosta,' from the German of Gutzkow by Mr. Henry Spicer, and a revised edition of Viscount Sherbrooke's 'Poems of a Life.'

6

|

Georgiana Mundy,- The Highlands of Canta- caut,' with 225 original illustrations, bor bria,' by Mars Ross and H. Stonehewer Cooper, and twelve page etchings by Maurice L - 'Protestants from France in their English 'Lalla Rookh,' with 143 illustrations by W Home,' by S. W. Kershaw, 'Izaak Walton: Closson, E. H. Garrett, H. Sandham, his Wallet Booke,' being the songs in The other artists; King John and the Ab Compleat Angler' newly set forth and Canterbury,' with original designs by illustrated by Joseph Crawhall, The Life Hinscliff, reproduced in photo-lithography; and Speeches of Mr. Joseph Cowen, M.P.,' Sir Joshua Reynolds edition of Boswell's by Major Jones,- The British Colonies and of Johnson,' in 5 vols.; and an editin their Resources,' by James Bonwick, F. R. G.S.,- Bacon's Essays.' The same firm will p Forty Thousand Miles over Land and Water,' Miss Kate Greenaway's new Christmas by Mrs. Howard Vincent, Miscellanies : Marigold Garden,' Miss Greenaway's 'A Prose and Verse,' by William Maginn, edited bet,' and her Almanac for 1886,-two new by R. W. Montagu,- Fifty Years of Conces- books by Mr. Caldecott, entitled Mrs. sions to Ireland, 1831–1881,' by Mr. R. Barry Blaize' and 'The Great Panjandrum Hims O'Brien, - 'The Purple Land that England as well as his eight latest toy-books in a volu Lost: Travels and Adventures in the Banda called Randolph Caldecott's Second Collect Oriental, South America,' by W. H. Hudson,― of Pictures and Song'; and new toy-books City Ballads,' by Will Carleton,- Indigenous Mr. Harry Furniss, called 'Romps in the Hou Flowers of the Hawaiian Islands,' forty-four and Romps at the Seaside,'-'Men of plates painted in water colours, and described Reign,' a biographical dictionary of eminent c by Mrs. Frances Sinclair, jun.,- Floating Flies racters of both sexes who have died during and How to Dress Them,' by Mr. F. M. Hal- reign of Queen Victoria, edited by Mr. Hu ford,- New Theories of Matter and Force,' by Ward,-Mr. Davenport Adams's 'Concord Mr. W. Barlow, A Primer of Orthographic to the Plays of Shakespeare,'-the Caxton Projection,' by Major G. T. Plunkett, R.E.,- tion of Lord Lytton's novels, in twenty vela Algebra for the Use of Colleges and Schools,' -a new uniform edition of Victor H by W. Thompson, M.A.,—‘Eight Months on novels, the third volume of Canon D the Gran Chaco of the Argentine Republic,' 'History of the Church of England,'-'New Zealand Rulers and Statesmen,' by large-type edition of Byron's poems, in W. Gisborne,-New Guinea: an Account volumes,-'Escaped from Siberia,' trans of the Establishment of the British Protec- from the French by Mr. H. Frith,-'I torate,' by Mr. Charles Lyne, The Panama Brave Days of Old, the Story of the Crus Canal,' by Mr. J. C Rodrigues,-Studies in The Essayes of Montaigne,' edited by Shakespeare,' by the late Richard Grant White,— 'The Science of Dress in Theory and Practice,' by Miss Ada S. Ballin,- The Life and Letters of John Brown, Liberator of Kansas and Martyr of Virginia,' edited by F. B. Sanborn,- Utopian Dreams and Lotos Leaves,' by Mr. G. W. Warder, The Last Days of the Consulate,' from the French of M Fauriel, edited, with introduction, by M. L. Lalanne, The Wooing of Ethra,' by Mr. J. Moyr Smith,'Dedham Park,' by Mr. J. Bradshaw, John Haile a Story of Successful Failure,' by the author of Sleepy Sketches; or, How we Live and How we do not Live, Margaret Grantley,' by Miss L. Higgin,-A Strange Voyage,' by Mr. W. Clark Russell,- Miss Montizambart,' by Miss Hoppus,- By the Cornish Sea,' by the Rev. John Isabell, Don Luis; or, the Church Militant,' by Mr. John Lomas,-and the following Christmas books: two new stories by Jules Verne, entitled 'The Vanished Diamond' and The Archipelago on Fire'; Elric and Ethel a Fairy Tale,' by Mr. Francis Francis; The Key-Hole Country,' by Gertrude Jerdon; "The Master of Ralston,' by Maud Jeanne Franc, author of 'Marian'; The King of the Tigers, by Louis Rousselet; 'The Voyage of the Aurora,' by Mr. H. Collingwood; The Adventures of Jimmy Brown,' written by Himself, and edited by W. L. Alden; and 'Delightful Thames,' by E. F. Manning.

6

·

Lord Beaconsfield,' by Mr. T. E. Kebbel,Longitude by Lunar Distances,' by Major H. Wilberforce Clarke, R. E.,- Reform and Progress in India,' by an Optimist, Reminiscences of Sport in India,' by General F. F. Burton,and A Dictionary of Islam,' by Thomas Patrick Hughes, B.D., M. R. A S.

Messrs. George Routledge & Sons will pub

lish the following gift-books for the Christ

mas season: Editions de luxe of Manon Les

Morley, a new and revised edition of Archibald Forbes's Life of Chinese Gord 'The Vee Boers,' by Capt Mayne Reid Sea Change,' by Flora L Shaw,- Holly Grange,' by G. M. Fenn, and a collecti Christmas boxes of books for children.

Messrs. S. W. Partridge & Co.'s anno ments include 'Nan's Story; or, the Life Work of a City Arab,' by L. Sharp,Lionel, that Tiresome Child,' by E. M. V worth, Wait till it Blooms, by Jennie pell,-Pretty Pictures for Tiny Pets, Stories and Verses,' The Young Folk's ture-Book, with Descriptive Stories, by Weston,-'Issy: a Story of Trust and Tri by Laura McL. Backler-Christ and the by Prof. Stanley Leathes, D.D.,- Her S Blessing: a Tale,' by Jennie Chappell,- K McAlpine: a Tale of Mountain, Moorland Sea,' by Dr. Gordon Stables, The For of Riverside,' by S. Hocking,- Running Home,' by M. A. Paull,-and 'Alice We Blessings,' by Ruth Lamb.

The announcements of Messrs. Skeffing Son are as follows: Please tell me a Tale original stories for children from four to te of age, by Miss Yonge, Miss Coleridge, Heathcote, Rev. S. Baring Gould, &,Parish Church,' by the Rev. S. Baring a volume of sermons to children,—'The of Jesus,' by the Rev. S. Baring Gould. discourses for Advent, Christmas, and Epr -Village Tales for Boys and Girls,' b Massey, a volume of tales intended for class or night school,-'A Golden Thr very Young Children; or, Great Truths in Words,' by Miss Edith Pitcairn, Watchwords,' by the Rev. C. G. H. Bas twenty-eight short readings for Ad 'Pastoral Comforts,' by the Rev. J. D. K -"The Preacher's Book, Advent to Whits by Three Clergymen of the Church of E

6

Fifteen Sermons on Charity,' by Rev. J. B. Wilkinson, --Stories and trations on the Litany,' by the Rev. Dr. man, 'The Light of the Judgment, Rev. T. L. O. Davies, Sermons preach Village Church,' by the Rev. F. J. Midi

and 'The Life of Duty,' in 2 vols., by t

H. J. Wilmot Buxton.

Messrs Masters & Co. will publish dur

coming season a new tale by Lady Du entitled Letty's Mission,' illustrated,