uses of the fork. The half-careless, halfcynical humor of it all becomes serious in the last paragraph of the last paper:

"I am sick of court circulars. I loathe haut-ton intelligence. I believe such words as Fashionable, Exclusive, Aristocratic, and the like, to be wicked unchristian epithets that ought to be banished from honest vocabularies. A court system that sends men of genius to the second table, I hold to be a Snobbish System. A society that sets up to be polite, and ignores Art and Letters, I hold to be a Snobbish Society. You who despise your neighbor are a Snob; you who forget your friends, meanly to follow after those of a higher degree, are a Snob; you who are ashamed of your poverty and blush for your calling, are a Snob; as are you who boast of your pedigree or are proud of your wealth.»

Barnaby Rudge was Dickens's fifth

novel, and was published in 1841. The plot is extremely intricate. Barnaby is a poor half-witted lad, living in London toward the close of the eighteenth century, with his mother and his raven Grip. His father had been the steward of a country gentleman named Haredale, who was found murdered in his bed, while both his steward and his gardener had disappeared. The body of the steward, recognizable only by the clothes, is presently found in a pond. Barnaby is born the day after the double murder. Affectionate and usually docile, credulous and full of fantastic imaginings, a simpleton but faithful, he grows up to be liked and trusted. His mother having fled to London to escape a myst rious blackmailer, he becomes involved in the famous "No Popery » riots of Lord George Gordon in 1780, and is within an ace of perishing on the scaffold. The blackmailer, Mr. Haredale the brother and Emma the daughter of the murdered man, Emma's lover Edward Chester, and his father, are the chief figures of the nominal plot; but the real interest is not with them but with the side haracters and the episodes. Some of the most whimsical and amusing of Dickens's character-studies appear in the pages of the novel; while the whole episode of the gathering and march of the mob, and the storming of Newgate (quoted in the LIBRARY), is surpassed in dramatic intensity by no passage in modern fiction, unless it is by Dickens's own treat

ment of the French Revolution in the "Tale of Two Cities. Among the important characters, many of whom are the authors of sayings now proverbial, are Gabriel Varden, the cheerful and incorruptible old locksmith, father of the charming flirt Dolly Varden; Mrs. Varden, a type of the narrow-minded zealot, devoted to the Protestant manual; Miss Miggs, their servant, mean, treacherous, and self-seeking; Sim Tappertit, an apprentice, an admirable portrait of the half-fool, half-knave, so often found in the English servile classes half a century ago; Hugh the hostler and Dennis the hangman; and Grip the raven, who fills an important part in the story, and for whom Di.kens himself named a favorite raven.

Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, Letters

Edited by Frederic G. Kenyon. (2 vols., 1897.) This definitive presentation of Mrs. Browning's character and career is a selection from a very large mass of letters collected by Mr. Browning, and now used with the consent of R. Barrett Browning. It is made a chronicle, and practically a life, by the character of the letters and the addition of connecting links of narrative. The letters give an unusually full and interesting revelation of Mrs. Browning's character, and of the course of her life. The absence of controversy, of personal illfeeling of any kind, and of bitterness except on certain political topics, is noted by the editor as not the result of any excision of passages, but as illustrating Mrs. Browning's sweetness of temperament. The interest of the work as a chapter of life and poetry in the nineteenth century is very great.

Bronte, Charlotte, Life of, by Mrs,

Gaskell, was published in 1857, two years after the death of the author of Jane Eyre. It has taken rank as a classic in biographical literature, though not without inaccuracies. Its charm and enduring quality are the result of its ideal worth. It is a strong, human, intimate record of a unique personality, all the more valuable because biased by friendship. A biography written by the heart as well as the head, it remains for that reason the most vital of all lives of Charlotte Bronté. A mere scrap-book of facts goes very little way toward explaining a genius of such intensity.

Bronte, Charlotte, and her Circle, by

Clement K. Shorter, was published in 1896. It is not a biography, but a new illumination of a rare personality, through an exhaustive collection of letters written by, or relating to, the novelist of Haworth. In the preface the editor writes: "It is claimed for the following book of some five hundred pages that the larger part of it is an addition of entirely new material to the romantic story of the Brontés.» This material was furnished partly by the Rev. Arthur Bell Nicholls, Charlotte's husband, and partly by her lifelong friend Miss Ellen Nussey.

The arrangement of the book is calculated to assist the reader to a clearer understanding of Charlotte Bronté's life. A chapter is given to each person or group of persons in any way closely related to her. Even the curates of Haworth are not overlooked. Yet the editor's discrimination is justified in every instance by letters relating directly to the person or persons under consideration. The entire work is a most interesting and significant contribution to the ever-growing body of Bronté literature.

Personal Recollections of Mary Som

erville, WITH SELECTIONS FROM HER CORRESPONDENCE, by her daughter Martha Somerville.

Never has the simplicity of true greatness been more clearly shown than in the life of Mary Somerville, the life of a woman entirely devoted to family duties and scientific pursuits; whose energy and perseverance overcame almost insuperable obstacles at a time when women were excluded from the higher branches of education by prejudice and tradition; whose bravery led her to enter upon unknown paths, and to make known to others what she acquired by so courageous an undertaking. After a slight introduction concerning her family and birth, which took place December 26th, 1780, the 'Recollections begin in early childhood and continue to the day

Differences'; and leaving behind for the benefit of the new generation annals of a life so wonderful in its completed work, so harmonious in its domestic relations, so unassuming in its acceptance of wordly distinctions, that the mere reading of it elevates and strengthens.

There are charming descriptions of childhood days in the Scottish home of Burntisland; days of youth when she arose after attending a ball to study at five in the morning; a delicate reticence concerning the first short-lived marriage with her cousin Craig, succeeded by the truer union with another cousin, the "Somerville» of whom she speaks with much tenderness; domestic gains and losses, births and deaths; the beginnings, maturings, and successes of her work; trips to London and the Continent; visits to and from the great; the idyllic life in Italy, where she died and is buried; loving records of home work and home pleasures; sorrows bravely met and joys glorified,-all told with the unaffectedness which was the keynote to her amiable character. Little information is given of the immense labor which preceded her famous works. The woman who, as Laplace said, was the only woman who could understand his work, who was honored by nearly every scientific society in the world, whose mind was akin to every famous mind of the age, so withdraws her individuality to give place to others, that the reader is often inclined to forget that the modest writer has other claims to notice than her intimate acquaintance with the great. And as in many social gatherings she was overlooked from her modesty of demeanor; so in these 'Recollections,' pages of eulogy are devoted to the achievements of those whose intellect was to hers as "moonlight is to sunlight," while her own successes are ignored, except in the inserted letters of those who awarded her her due meed of praise, and in the frequent notes of her faithful compiler.

by Edmund Clarence Stedman. The lectures contained in this volume, published in 1892, were delivered by the author during the previous year at Johns Hopkins University, inaugurating the annual lectureship founded by Mrs. Turnbull of Baltimore. Mr. Stedman treats "of the quality and attributes

of poetry itself, of its source and efficacy, and of the enduring laws to which its true examples ever are conformed.» Chapter i. treats of theories of poetry from Aristotle to the present day; Chapter ii. seeks to determine what poetry is; and Chapters iii. and iv. discuss, respectively, creation and self-expression under the title of Melancholia. These two chapters together "afford all the scope permitted in this scheme for a swift glance at the world's masterpieces.» Having effected a synthetic relation between the subjective and the objective in poetry, the way becomes clear for an examination of the pure attributes of this art, which form the themes of the next four chapters. Mr. Stedman avoids much discussion of schools and fashions. "There have been schools in all ages and centres," he says, "but these figure most laboriously at intervals when the creative faculty seems inactive." This book constitutes a fitting complement to Mr. Stedman's two masterly criticisms on the Victorian Poets' and the 'Poets of America. The abundance of finely chosen illustrative extracts, and the pains taken by the author to expound every point in an elementary way, make the volume not only delightful reading for any person of literary tastes, but bring into compact shape a fund of instruction of permanent value. Mr. Stedman cheers the reader by his hopeful view of the poetry of the future. "I believe," he declares, "that the best age of imaginative production is not past; that poetry is to retain, as of old, its literary import, and from time to time prove itself a force in national life; that the Concord optimist and poet was sane in declaring that 'the arts, as we know them, are but initial,' that sooner or later that which is now life shall add a richer strain to the song.>>>

Custom

ustom and Myth, by Andrew Lang. (1886.) This book of fifteen sketches, ranging in subject from the Method of Folk-lore and Star Myths to the Art of Savages, illustrates the author's conception of the inadequacy of the generally accepted methods of comparative mythology. He does not believe that "myths are the result of a disease of language, as the pearl is the result of a disease of the oyster." The notion that proper names in the old myths hold the key to their explanation. as Max Müller, Kuhn, Breal. and

many other eminent philologists maintain, Mr. Lang denies; declaring that the analysis of names, on which the whole edifice of philological "comparative mythology» rests, is a foundation of sifting sand. Stories are usually anonymous at first, he believes, names being added later, and adventures naturally grouping themselves around any famous personage, divine, heroic, or human. Thus what is called a Greek myth or a Hindu legend may be found current among a people who never heard of Greece or India. The story of Jason, for example, is told in Samoa, Finland, North America, Madagascar. Each of the myths presented here is made to serve a controversial purpose in so far as it supports the essayist's theory that explanations of comparative mythology do not explain. He believes that folk-lore contains the survivals of primitive ideas common to many peoples, as similar physical and social conditions tend to breed the same ideas. The hypothesis of a myth common to several races rests on the assumption of a common intellectual condition among them. We may push back a god from Greece to Phoenicia, from Phoenicia to Accadia, but at the end of the end, we reach a legend full of myths like those which Bushmen tell by the camp fire, Eskimo in their dark huts, and Australians in the shade of the "gunweh," - myths cruel, puerile, obscure, like the fancies of the savage myth-makers from which they sprang. The book shows on every page the wide reading, the brilliant faculty of generalization, and the delightful popularity and the unfailing entertainingness of this literary "Universal Provider," who modestly says that these essays are "only flint-like flakes from a neolithic workshop.»

Art

rt of Poetry, The ('L'Art Poétique'), a didactic poem, by Boileau. The work is divided into four cantos. In the first, the author intermingles his precepts with an account of French versification since Villon, now taking up and now dropping the subject, with apparent carelessness but with real art. The second canto treats of the different classes of poetry, beginning with the least important: eclogue, elegy, ode, epigram, sonnet, etc. The third deals with tragedy, comedy, and the epic. In the fourth, Boileau returns to more general questions. He gives, not rules for writing verse, but precepts addressed to the poet;

and points out the limits within which he must move, if he wishes to become perfect in his art. Although his work is recognized as one of the masterpieces of the age of Louis XIV., Boileau has prejudices that have long been out of date. He ridicules the choice of modern or national subjects by a poet, and would have him confine himself exclusively to the history or mythology of Greece and Rome.

are

Analysis of Beauty, The, an essay on certain artistic principles, by William Hogarth, was published in 1753. In 1745 he had painted the famous picture of himself and his pug-dog Trump, now in the National Gallery. In a corner of this picture appeared a palette bearing a serpentine line under which was inscribed: "The Line of Beauty and Grace.» This inscription provoked so much inquiry and comment that Hogarth wrote "The Analysis of Beauty' in explanation of it. In the introduction he says: "I now offer to the public a short essay accompanied with two explanatory prints, in which I shall endeavor to show what the principles are in nature, by which we directed to call the forms of some bodies beautiful, others ugly; some graceful and others the reverse." The first chapters of the book deal with Variety, Uniformity, Simplicity, Intricacy, Quantity, etc. Lines and the composition of lines are then discussed, followed by chapters on Light and Shade, on Proportion, and on Action. The Analysis of Beauty' subjected Hogarth to extravagant praise from his friends and to ridicule from his detractors. Unfortunately he had himself judged his work on the title-page, in the words "written with a view of fixing the fluctuating ideas of taste." This ambition it was not possible for Hogarth to realize. The essay contains, however, much that is pertinent and suggestive.

Απ natomie of Abuses, The, by Philip

Stubbes, was entered upon the Stationers' Register in 1582-83; republished by the New Shakspere Society in 187779 under the editorship of Frederick I. Furnivall.

This most curious work-without the aid of which, in the opinion of the editor. "no one can pretend to know Shakspere's England"-is an exposure of the abuses and corruptions existing in all classes of Elizabethan society. Written from the Puritan standpoint, it is yet not over-prejudiced nor bigoted.

Little is known of Philip Stubbes. Thomas Nash makes a savage attack on the 'Anatomie' and its author, in a tract published in 1589. Stubbes himself throws some light upon his life, in his memorial account of his young wife, whose "right virtuous life and Christian death" are circumstantially set forth. The editor believes him to have been a gentleman"either by birth, profession, or both»; to have written, from 1581 to 1610, pamphlets and books strongly on the Puritan side; before 1583 to have spent "seven winters and more, traveling from place to place, even all the land over indifferently." It is supposed that in 1586 he married a girl of fourteen. Her death occurred four years and a half afterwards, following not many weeks the birth of a "goodly man childe.» Stubbes's own death is supposed to have taken place not long after 1610.

The Anatomie of Abuses was published in two parts. These are in the form of a dialogue between Spudens and Philoponus (Stubbes), concerning the wickedness of the people of Ailgna (England). Part First deals with the abuses of Pride, of Men's and Women's Apparel; of the vices of whoredom, gluttony, drunkenness, covetousness, usury, swearing, Sabbath-breaking, stage-plays; of

the evils of the Lords of Misrule, of May-games, church-ales, wakes, feasts, of "pestiferous dancing," of music, cards, dice-tables, tennis, bowls, bear-baiting; of cock-fighting, hawking, and hunting, on the Sabbath; of markets, fairs, and football playing, also on the Sabbath; and finally of the reading of wicked books: the whole being followed by a chapter on the remedy for these evils.

Part Second deals with corruptions in the Temporalty and the Spiritualty. Under temporal corruptions the author considers abuses in law, in education, in trade, in the manufacture of apparel, in the relief of the poor, in husbandry and farming. He also considers abuses among doctors, chandlers, barbers, apothecaries, astronomers, astrologers, and prognosticators.

Under matters spiritual the author sets forth the Church's sins of omission rather than of commission; but he treats of wrong preferment, of simony, and of the evils of substitution.

The entire work is most valuable, as throwing vivid light upon the manners and customs of the time, especially in