30 DECEMBER 1865

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NEWS OF THE WEEK.

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ri American Congress has not been quite as reticent as the 'resident. On the 11th inst., resolutions were introduced into both Houses, affirming that the Emperor Napoleon had...

The return of the cattle plague for the week ending

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23rd inst. shows still a slight increase is the number of attacks, the number being 6,256 against 6,054. No less than 63,593 cattle are now known to have been attacked, of which...

The contest between the advanced Republicans and Con- servatives in

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Congress concerning the treatment of the South has begun, and shows the former to be in an immense majority, though with some followers inclined to...

Mr. Russell Gurney, the Recorder of London, is, as we

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hinted last week, going out on the Jamaica Commission, having obtained leave, not quite without difficulty, from the Lord Mayor, who evidently regards him as adstrictus glebx, a...

Mr. Fergusson, F.R.S., the most eminent of our living surgeons,

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has been made a baronet, one of very few who ever received this honour for their eminence in surgery or medicine. He has marked his well deserved appointment by showing how very...

The Army and Navy Gazette has published an account of

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Colonel Hobbs' campaign in Jamaica which, like the volunteer Captain Forde's account of his campaign, reads so much like irony, that in some passages one can scarcely help...

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Dr. Stanley, Dean of Westminster, preached to a crowded and

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breathlessly attentive audience in Westminster Abbey last Thurs- day on the occasion of the 800th anniversary of the inauguration of the new Abbey, rebuilt by Edward the...

The "guys" have been rioting in Guildford again, having beaten

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a policeman on Boxing night nearly to death. We are informed that these outrages are not committed by " roughs," but by a regular association of workmen and petty tradesmen, who...

Sir R. Murchison has been created a baronet. His claims

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seem to be considerable attainments in geology, great readiness to do the representative work of scientific associations, and a social position unusual with scientific men....

The Qs en of Spain opened the Cortes on the

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27th inst., in a very meaningless speech. Her Majesty states that she will give an account of the progress of the war with Chili, but is " desirous of respecting the...

Somebody has been turning out soldiers to watch Fenians in

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Lanarkshire, who are said to threaten trouble. Surely the pre- caution is a little unnecessary. Nobody can tell what a Fenian will do, but then one is quite sure what a...

The American Fenians, not finding it convenient to invade Ireland,

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are expending their superfluous energies on each other. It appears that there are fools enough among them to purchase " bonds " to the extent of 100,0001., which seemed to Head...

Sir John Lawrence's treaty with Bootan is severely attacked in

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India, and is indeed rather an imbecile arrangement. The Durbar agree to cede the Doars, or valleys leading down into the plain, to surrender the treaty extorted from Mr. Eden,...

An anti-malt-tax meeting was held inIpswich last week, in which

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Sir. Fitzroy Kelly used his usual exaggerated language about the benefit not only to the farmer—which is in some degree real —but to the consumer of beer to be derived from...

Le Nord, and some other Continental journals, publish a story

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of an approaching intervention in Greece. The Government there.is going to pieces, so England, France, and Russia are to intervene, England occupying Nauplia and Syria, and...

The Capital Punishment Commission have issued a very poor report,

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with three useful suggestions, one perhaps that is disputable, no argument, and, we suppose (for this has not yet appeared), a great mass of vague evidence. The Commission was...

We wish judges would remember that their business is to

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do justice, and not only to make respectable life more comfortable. One Peasman, driver of a Victoria omnibus, being slightly drunk, drove too fast, ran his omnibus against...

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M. Fould has issued his financial report, which is a

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sort of cross between a budget, a treatise on finance, and a chapter of one of the minor prophets. We do not profess to comprehend tho- roughly what M. Fould means with his...

The outflow of bullion from the country has had a

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depressing effect on the market for home securities during the week, the result being that prices have fallen three-eighths per cent. On Friday week the closing quotations were...

The Record has invented a new fashion of striking a

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foe after he is dead. In a review of the life of its old enemy, the late Re;r. F. W. Robertson of Brighton, published yesterday fort- night, it touched very gently (as we...

The Provincial Assembly of St. Petersburg, which represents chiefly nobles,

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has drawn up a schedule of its wishes, which the Ber- lin correspondent of the Times calls a "petition of right." It amounts to this—that the Russian squires wish to have in...

Mr. Sothern agreed in September to act Brother Sam for

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seven- teen nights, at the Prince of Wales Theatre, Birmingham, on pay- ment of half the gross receipts. He then became irritated by some slight and also had a sore throat and...

Subjoined are the closing prices of the principal British Rail-

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ways yesterday and on Friday week :- Friday, Caledonian •• Great. Eastern . • .• • • • - Great Northern .. Great Western.. .. Do. West Midland, Oxford ••...

The French Government has, it appears, really resolved to ter-

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minate the extradition treaty with Great Britain. We have offered elsewhere a suggestion as to the motive for this step, but may add here that while France has between 1851 and...

The leading Foreign Securities left off at the following prices

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yesterday and on Friday week:— Greek Do. Coupons Mexican Spanish Passive •• Do. Certificates Turkish 6 per Cents., 1858.. „ 1862.. • . • • • • • . •...

The Bank return is unfavourable, and the Directors have raised

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their minimum rate of discount to 7 per cent. The stock of bullion held by the establishment, notwithstanding the large amount of gold from Australia by the Greta Britain, shoes...

The pantomimes this year do not seem to present much

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origi- nality, though Sadlers' Wells -has made a grand draught on the fishes for new dramatis persona, in itself a clever idea. Aladdin, at Covent Garden, is successful, but not...

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TOPICS OF THE DAY.

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THE " RIGHT HONOURABLE " JOHN BRIGHT. TBE rumour that Mr. Bright is to be admitted. into the Cabinet seems to gather strength, especially among the secret enemies of the...

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THE ANGLICANS' ADVANCES TO THE RUSSIAN CHURCH.

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'TE should be the last to deprecate any genuine movement 1 1 towards a wider catholicity in the rulers of the Church of England, and are glad to see the mere desire for it,...

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IMPERIAL OBSCURANTISM.

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slipping down that fatal TrEg g roove which leads from despotism to darlmess. At the of the French is still very beginning of his rein he felt it necessary to place the press...

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TEE COXENIANDER-IN-CILLEF AT WOOLWICH.

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W E had occasion to refer a few weeks ago to the present condition of Woolwich Academy. Last week the Duke of Cambridge went down to Woolwich, in order to be present at the...

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THE CABINET CRISIS IN ITALY.

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T HOSE, and they are many, who care to understand the immense difficulty of applying Parliamentary institutions to any people not of Teutonic race should watch the contest now...

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THE REFLEX VALUE OF PRESTIGE.

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T HERE is scarcely a problem in politics more di ffi cult than to estimate the precise value of prestige. A few years ago politicians held it to be all in all, the one thing...

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THE DEVIL.

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highest and intensest moral feeling of almost every age L has been, and partly remains, passionately attached to that militant conception of good which seems absolutely to crave...

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New York, December 15, 1865. AN incident noticed in the

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London papers which have just arrived is suggestive of a striking difference of manners (for it is somewhat more than fashion) between the two countries in regard to the...

THE FITZ-GERALDS.

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Our attention has been kindly called to some inaccuracies in our second paper on the Fitz-Geralds, into which we were led by following the common chronology of events. Mr....

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" ECCE HOMO."

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[To THE -EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] Sin,—The perfect candour and cordiality of your review of Ecce Homo emboldens me to ask you to reconsider part of it. From your critical...

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BOOKS.

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LES ETATS-UNIS PENDANT LA GUERRE.• Ir is a curious, to an Englishman an unpleasantly suggestive, fact that the best work ever written on America should have had a Frenchman...

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THE IDEAS OF THE DAY ON POLICY.*

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MR. Bux.rox has worked out a striking idea in rather too few words. He has endeavoured to state, without passion, or pre- judice, or comment, the " formative" ideas entertained...

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MR. HANNAY'S CHARACTERS AND CRITICISMS.* Ws cannot say that in

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our opinion Mr. Hannay has exercised an altogether sound discretion in republishing these essays. Nearly all of them seem to have been contributed as leading articles to the...

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POPULAR ROMANCES OF THE WEST OF ENGLAND.* Tins is not

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a book of fairy stories, such as would interest a child. It is a series of local tales and traditions, too fragmentary and dis- jointed to sustain interest as works of fiction....

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£ UR RENT LITERATURE.

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The Kabbalah ; its Doctrines, Development, and Literature. An Essay, by Christian D. Ginsburg, LL.D. (Longmans.)—We cannot imagine any one wishing to know more about this...

Rates and Taxes. Edited by T. Hood. (Groombridge.)—The gentle- men

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who last year set a Bunch of Keys jingling to the satisfaction of the public, present themselves on the present* occasion in the guise of the collectors of rates and taxes for...

The Lite of Man Symbolized by the Months of the

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Year in a Series of Illustrations. By John Leighton, F.S.A. With Passages selected from Ancient and Modern Writers by Richard Pigot. (Longmans.)— It is almost impossible to...

Hymns on the Holy Communion. By Ada Cambridge. With a

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preface truer, and more ineffable communion with the Father it is a Feast." The tone of the hymns is in harmony with these ideas and similes, and they will be valued by those...

The Supremacy Question. An Essay. By the Rev. G. E.

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Biber, LL.D. (Rivingtons.)—Dr. Biber is the champion of the Apostolical succession, and the episcopal supremacy that he derives from it. In the present essay he reviews the...

The Works of the Ettrick Shepherd. New Edition. With illustra-

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tions. 2 vols. (Blaokie.)—These two handsome volumes containing the one Hogg's prose tales and the other his poetry, originally published in twenty-six shilling parts, are...

The Old Ledger. By G. L. M. Strauss. 3 vols.

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(Tinsley.)—Wading our way very tediously through the first volume, it struck us that the only thing wanting to carry out the illusion suggested by the name and the style was...

The Gothic and Anglo-Saxon Gospels, in Parallel Columns, with the

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Ver- sions of Wycliffe and Tyndale. By Rev. J. Bosworth, D.D., Professor of Anglo-Saxon, Oxford. (J. R. Smith.)—The learned Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford, with the...

The Hebrew Scriptures, Vol. III. Translated by Samuel Sharpe.

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(Whitfield, Green, and Son.)—This is the third and concluding volume of Mr. Sharpe's revised translation of the Old Testament. We observe here, as in the preceding volumes,...

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Draining from Nature. Il lustrated by eighteen coloured and litho- graphic

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plates and more than 100 woodcuts. By George Barnard. (Longman.)—The able Professor of Drawing at Rugby has produced a volume which will be serviceable to pupils and their...

Poems. By Thomas Chatterton. With a Memoir by F. Martin.

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Il- lustrated. (C. Griffin and Co.)—The publisher of this volume seems to have had by him a number of not unpleasing engravings, and to have thought that they might as well be...

By the Loch and the River Side. (Edmonston and Douglas,

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Edin- burgh.)—We have here an amusing collection of pen-and-ink sketches illustrating the troubles that beset an angler, enthusiastic or otherwise, on the banks of or, as is...

The National Melodist, with Symphonies and Acoompaniments for the pianoforte.

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Edited by J. G. Kieser. (Nimmo.) The Scottish Melodist, with, &c., &c. (Nimmo.)—The publishers have collected in the former of these two volumes the most popular English,...

Songs and Sonnets. By W. Shakespeare. Edited by F. T.

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Palgravo. (Macmillan.)—The object of this collection is, in the words of the editor, to bring the lyrical works 'of Shakespeare within a portable volume. Excluding therefore...

Gems of Literature. (Nimmo.)—This is a gift-book of about average

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merit. The selections in prose and poetry are varied, and have been chosen with better taste than we should have expected from the stilted preface with which the book opens. The...

John Gilpin. Illustrated by C. A. Doyle. (Nimmo.)—Our old friend

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is presented here in very bold colouring, which almost reaches vulgarity. There is considerable vigour in the treatment, but we do not altogether approve of this conception of "...