23 JUNE 1894, Page 26

English Writers. By Henry Morley, LL.D. VoL X. (Cassell and

Co.)—Professor Morley devotes this volume to the earlier portion of "Shakespeare's Life and Works," and to the writers contemporary with that period. The limit which he imposes upon himself is the end of Elizabeth's reign. The first chapter is given to the birth, parentage, and education of Shakespeare ; the second brings him to London, and describes some of the dramatic material which he found waiting, so to speak, for his touch there. Chapters IL!. and IV. are given to the Elizabethan dramatists, Lodge, Peele, and Greene, and Marlowe. Then we have Richard III. and John treated in a chapter, and The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Comedy of Errors, and Love's Labour's Lost, in another. Such is Professor Morley'a plan throughout the volume. He puts what he has to say about the writers of the times alongside his strictly Shakespearian chapters; no previous volume has shown so well his complete mastery of his subject. One hardly realises the prolific variety of Elizabethan literature till one sees this multi- tude of authors marshalled in this fashion.—We may take this opportunity of mentioning the second volume of the History of English Literature, by Bernhard Ten Brink, translated from the German by W. Clarke Robinson, Ph.D. (Bell and Sons.)—

" Wyclif, Chaucer, Earliest Drama, Renaissance," are the subjects indicated by the sub-title. Chaucer occupies the greater part of the volume, 170 pages out of 339. The fifth book is devoted to Oceleve and to Lydgate ; to an account, which will be found more than usually complete, of the Religions Drama, Miracle and Morality Plays, &c.; to the influence of the revival of letters in England, and other kindred topics.