27 SEPTEMBER 1873, Page 24

The Patriarch and the Tsar. Vol. II. By William Palmer,

M.A. (Triibner.)—Mr. Palmer has hero reprinted in an abridged form, with "corrections and appendices," the translation of "The Travels of the Patriarch Macarius," published for the Oriental Translation Fund in 1836. Macarius, Patriarch of Antioch, visited Russia in the course of the years 1654-6, and a journal of his travels was kept by his son Paul, Archdeacon of Aleppo. Ho came again to Moscow in the year 1670, for the purpose of degrading the Patriarch Nicon, and one of the points on which Mr. Palmer strongly insists is that the journal, though written at the time of the first journey, was touched up on the occasion of the second, opportunity baing taken to introduce unfavourable touches about the arrogance and other bad qualities of Nicon. Mr. Palmer takes, and is probably quite right in taking, the part of Nicon very strongly. Apart from this question, the volume is full of strange and interesting de.eils of the interior of Russian life in the seventeenth century. To Macarius and his followers the Russians seem, or they probably wore, awful barbarians.