CURRENT LITERATURE.
The British Quarterly Review. April. "(Hodder and Stoughton.) —The first article in this number is one of considerable value—" The Alexandrian Type of Christianity." Few things in the history of theology are more interesting than the way in which thinkers like Origen and Clement anticipated the tendencies of modern thought. The other strictly theological article is also worthy of notice. The importance of that remarkable relic of primitive Christianity, "The Teaching of the Apostles," can hardly fail to make itself felt as time goes on, though, of course, ecclesiastical systems which exist in the face of the New Testament will not go down before the Teaching. Of essays dealing with practical topics we have "The Sunday Closing Bill for England," a most temperate and well-reasoned article, which cannot fail to advance the profitable discussion of a most difficult subject. "Religion in London" contains some valuable information; but is it not time to give-up the use of this misleading information about "seats" provided by various religious bodies? (We have always found, by the way, wherever we have been able personally to test these statistics, that they are incorrect.) The writer of the article himself seems to admit that the figures do not represent the evangelising work done by the various communities. And indeed, no one, to take a single instance, could suppose that the figures, " Established Church, 5,900; Free Churches, 6,451 ;" for St. George's-in-the-East, represent at all truly the Christian work done in that parish. What can the " Free Churches " show to compare with the sixteen men (we take the number from the Clergy List of 1884 ; it is, we believe, really larger) who give their whole time and strength to pastoral work in this one parish ? It is hateful to make these comparisons; but non nostra culpa. There is one literary article, " George Eliot," and three dealing with politics, Continental and English, "Count Cavour's Letters," "Toryism in the Last HalfCentury" (a review of " Croker's Recollections"), and a "Political Review of the Quarter."
Tree Gossip. By Francis George Heath. (Field and Tuer.)--Ifr. Heath here puts together in alphabetical order (a convenient arrangement, which, however, somewhat mars the literary aspect of the volume) a number of interesting and nseful facts about trees and shrubs. We may note, as specimens, a recommendation of the eucalyptus as improving the sanitary state of malarious districts, facts about the longevity of trees,—the yew holds the primacy in this respect, living as much as 3,200 years (query the contemporary evidence),—a curious account of the "mill trees" (the juice of the masserabunda contains fatty matter, sugar, caseine, and phosphates in larger proportions than in equal quantities of the milk of the cow), &c. This is a very readable little book, and of a pleasant appearance.
Driftwood from Scandinavia. By Lady Wilde. (Bentley and Son.) —This is a pleasant volume ; containing, indeed, nothing new, but giving pictures of Denmark and Sweden that have a certain charm about them—the clihrm that is never absent from the work of a kindly and intelligent observer. The author's observations about other matters than those which meet the eye are not always trustworthy. It may be true, for instance, that the Danes "are little given to politics," and that the members of the present Royal Family are very popular ; but it is certainly true that there is what may be called .a standing political crisis in Denmark, and that Copenhagen is about as "red" in its Republicanism as any capital in Europe. There are some curious ethical speculations here and there, as, for instance, on pp. 96-98, one from which Lady Wilde deduces the moral, "Let all genius remain unwed,"—hard upon genius, and hard upon the world, which would be impoverished by the withdrawal from its line of succession of its best sons.
Matt : a Story of a Caravan. By Robert Buchanan. (Chatto and Window.)—Mr. Bachanaa's dramatis personae and plot are in part, at least, of an old-fashioned kind. Mr. Monk, of Monkshurst, the wicked usurping cousin, is quite the familiar villain of melodrama, and William Jones, the miserly and unscrupulous wrecker, is almost equally well known to us. Then we have the foundling washed on shore after a shipwreck, of coarse close to the ancestral home of which she is rightful heiress ; nor do we miss the comic Irishman. The hero has more novelty about him. He is a light-hearted, insouciant, young Englishman, who goes about the country sketching in a caravan, and who comes across Matt, the heroine, the aforesaid foundling and heiress, in the course of his wanderings. It will be, of course, guessed by our readers that the love-story between these two is the main subject of " Matt ;" and it is, on the whole, told in a pleasing way. We must take exception, however, to at least one touch in the description of the heroine's affection. That she should be artless and frank enough to let it be seen, and even to press it upon the man she loves, is natural, and quite unobjectionable ; but we can hardly say as much when we find her "ardent" kiss described as "precocious." Is Mr. Buchanan quite correct in his language when he makes his hero say,—" I felt all my conversation had been categorical to monotony," meaning that he had been doing little but ask questions P Artistic Anatomy. By Mathias Duval. Translated by Frederic R. E. Fenton. (Cassell and Co.)—This book will be welcome to artstudents. The standard English work on the subject—Professor Marshall's—will, of course, retain its position ; but this volume will be found a very convenient text-book, made accessible to all by its low price. It may, perhaps, be regretted that the translator has not substituted the terms used in English anatomy for the French nomenclature ; but he can hardly be blamed for following his original. The illustrations taken from Professor Sappey's treatise on osteology are admirable. We may direct especial attention to both text and illustrations of the twenty-fifth chapter, " Muscles of the Face." We may, perhaps, suggest a doubt whether " Figure 76" does not rather express grief than "discontent or centempt."
The "Runnymede Letters." With an Introduction and Notes. By Francis Hitchman. (Bentley and Son.) —Mr. Hitchman, who describes himself on the title-page as author of " The Public Life of the Earl of Beaconsfield," must have strange notions of taste and propriety when he republishes these letters, apparently under the impression that they will increase the credit of his hero. There is not a syllable in the Introduction so much as hinting at anything like a fault in these productions (which, as may be seen, Lord Beaconsfield never disavowed because he could not). On the contrary, we are told that the republication of these comments of the "great lost leader of the Tory party" will be "good for the present distress," in times when, among other dreadfal things, "a Minister clings to office by the help of the votes of disaffected Irishmen " (a pretty cool assertion after the shameless bid by which a few weeks ago the Conservatives secured the votes of the Parnellites). The letters themselves are in the worst possible style. Turgid, bombastic, hill of the falsest taste, they are beneath contempt from a literary point of view. The violence and injustice of their language exceeds what one would have thought possible. Lord William Bentinok, almost the first name among the rulers of India, is nothing but a " drivelling Nabob." It marks, however, some progress in political education that Mr. Hitchman has the grace, if not to be ashamed of this ebullition of spite and folly, to avow that the object of it "left a magnificent reputation in India." It would be tedious and useless to examine the letters in detail. If some literary hireling, wanting a few pounds, had dug them out of their grave in forgotten newspaper files, careless of what damage he might do to a great reputation, we should but say that he was acting after his kind. It is far more serious that a respectable partisan should fancy that he is doing good service to his friends by republishing this mass of scurrilous vulgarity.
The True Story of Mazeppa, ,Sec. By Viscount E. Melchior de Vega& Translated from the French by James Millington. (Field and Tner.)—Byron's story is derived from Voltaire. Another legend has been told by Poi:Lenin, relating this time to the Cossack chief's old age. Both have a certain foundation in fact. Mazeppa was lashed to his own horse and carried as far as his own door. This happened to him in his youth ; and in his old age he eloped with his god-daughter Matrina, child of a wealthy Cossack, Basil Kotchouberg. The story of his treason, his alliance with Charles XII. of Sweden, and his flight to Turkey after " Pultawa's fatal day," is historical. The second of the Viscount de Vogues papers tells the dismal tragedy of Alexis, the son of Peter the Great. The third is entitled, "A Change of Reign, the Death of Catherine IL, and the Accession of Paul I." Of all the dynasties of the modern world, none have had a more tragical history than that of the Romanoffs ; and the present volume, drawn as it is from authentic sources, deepens the impression.
Fresh Fields. By John Burroughs. (D. Douglas, Edinburgh.)— Mr. Burroughs is well-known as one of those literary visitors from the other side of the Atlantic who describe our scenery with so appreciative an enthusiasm. Some, at least, of these eleven essays were familiar to us as having already appeared in the Century. "A Hunt for the Nightingale," of which we have before spoken in praise in these columns, is a particularly pleasing specimen of Mr. Burroughs' manner. He is hardly so happy, we think, when he essays literary and philosophical criticism, as in " A Sunday in Cheyne Row." But the two articles, " In Carlyle's Country " and "In Wordsworth's Country," in which criticism is, of course, subordinated to description, are more attractive.
We would draw this littention of our readers to an admirable lecture by Professor S. Wiliciens—The Rise of Latin Literature. (J. E. Cornish, Manchester). The lectiitewas.,a_elivered as an introductory address at the opening of the 1884-85 Session of Owens College, Manchester. It commences with some valuable remarks on the specialisation of study, and proceeds to state,—and to state, we think, with both force and oandour,—the claims of classical language and literature. In these we have a most instructive summary of the earlier developments of Latin literature, " earlier " being taken to comprehend anthers who were born while the Republic was still an actual entity, and not moribund, as it was when Ovid was born at Sulmo.
Not Every Day : a Love Octave. By Constance MacEwen. (Ward and Downey.)—This story is hard reading, so hard that, we must frankly confess, it proves too much for us. Not many pages from the beginning of the first volume we came, in the course of a description of a boarding-house, upon the statement that a novel-writer, named Mr. Windemere, "was living en pension for an object—that object being a malignant one, namely, the vivisection of the specie." This was an inexpressibly funny assertion, and we thought the book might after all be enjoyable in its own way. But it proved nothing of the kind. There is a dreamy maundering widovi, of AmericanScotch origin apparently, but bearing the Austrian name of Esterhazy ; and there is a wonderful colonel, who might likewise be pure Scotch or English, but whose name is Vau Straubeuzee. Many minor shadows also flit across its pages ; but never a one of them, try as we might, left a definite impression on the mind. The history of haw the hybrid widow lost her money did not move us any more than its extremely odd recovery ; and the terrible smash-up of the City of Glasgow Bank, we suppose, was of no interest. The truth is that Miss MacE wen has taken no pains whatever with her task. It is, therefore, merely a series of ink-splashes, overloaded with sentimentalism, gush, and sham philosophisings. Yet there are traces of talent in the book ; here and there we come upon a vivid touch, a crude etching that might have been made a finished picture. But, as the book is written, they occur by accident ; and until Miss MacEwen has learned to write soberly and with care, until she submits to take pains, in short, the talent she has will be wasted. Vanessa Esterhazy, languishing and gyrating on the miserable poverty of £700 a year, and making love spasmodically ; her dear friend Cordelia, who writes to her jerky nonsense by the yard ; the colonel, the old maids, and all, are as uninteresting as a bundle of marionettes.
SCHOOL BOOKS.-A Greek Grammar for Schools and Colleges. By James Hadley. Revised and in part re-written by Frederic de Forest Allen. (Macmillan.)—This grammar, first published in 1860, was originally founded on the " Griechischo Schulgrammatik " of Professor Curtius. The changes introduced by the present editor are mainly in the directions indicated by recent advance in philology as applied to the inflexion in the accidence, and of new philosophical and systematic views as applied to syntax. A minor point litho excision of some forms traditional to Greek grammars which have no Attic authority. The book, it must be understood, is for advanced students; to whom, though we cannot pretend to estimate its value at all precisely without a much more careful examination, it is likely to be useful.--Sallust's Catilina and Jugurtha. Edited by the late
George Long, M.A. ; revised by J. G. Frazer, M.A. (Whittaker, Bell, and Son.) Mr. Frazer has unquestionably added considerably to the value of the edition which he has revised. We are especially glad to see that he has included the letters and speeches which survive from the lost "Histories" of Sallust, besides giving an interesting frag ment from the third book, relating to the war against Spartacns.
With regard to the text of Sallust especially some valuable work has been done. We cannot forbear to give what the editor justly calls a certain emendation by Professor Postgate in Jugurtha, 53. The manuscripts have "Romani quanquam itinere atque opera castrorum fessi laetique erant." For the words in italics, Professor Postgate
has most elegantly conjectured " laoti quierant," giving the maximum
of improvement with the minimum of change.—ln the series of Elementary Classics (Macmillan), we have Thucydides : Rise of the Athenian Empire, by F. H. Colson, M.A. This is said to be "edited for the use of beginners." Mr. Colson has done his best ; but we are not persuaded that beginners ever ought to be set to work on Thucydidea. It is true that the choice of easy Attic writers is but small ; still, it is large enough. And then there is Herodotus, whom it is easy to Atticise. However, as we have said, Mr. Colson has done his best with notes full and clear, and a useful vocabulary.— Casar's Invasion of Britain has been "adapted for the use of beginners" by Messrs. W. Welsh, M.A., and C. G. Duffield, M.A. This adaptation means a good deal of alteration of the text, which has " been simplified as much as possible." To this we see no kind of objection. Ccesar, unless being so modified, is certainly beyond the reach of beginners. Notes and a vocabulary have been added.—Another book for the same class of learners is Fab the Faciles, by F. Ritchie, M.A. (Rivington). We cannot say that Mr. Ritchie's Latin always faultless (for these exercises are, we suppose, of his own composition), and the correcting of the press has been carelessly done. We have examined a few of the series, in which the story of Ulysses is told, and find various things to criticise. We doubt whether " secundissime vento" is allowable. The adjective, as applied to a wind, hardly admits the superlative. Why "indignation exarsit sociosque objurgabat"P Is there any reason for the change of tense ? In the next lesson we find " cog,noverat enim frumentam, quern in nave haberent, lam deficere." Quam is, of course, a misprint ; but why the subjunctive haberent The mood is doubtful again in " qui nuper in patriam Cyclopum egressi essent," as a definite number of individuals is spoken of. Why "ad januam pulsarent " ? We have a little further, "omnes nniversi." We can find no authority for the two words in this order, and only Plautus and Apnleius for universi omnes. This was probably a colloquial expression.—The Metamorphoses of Ovid. Book XIII. With Introduction and Notes. By Charles Haines Keene. (Bell and Sone.)—Some of Mr. Keene's notes are useful. His illustrations particularly, quoted and not given in reference (a quite useless practice), are valuable. But some notes we cannot commend,—e.g., " velaturque aliturque avibus, is dependent on birds for both his dress and food.' " The rendering is extremely prosaic, and should not have been given at all. The reader might have been reminded that the verbs are middle, and, perhaps, supplied with an equivalent for the first, " clothes himself."—Easy Latin and Greek Papers. Prepared by H. R. Heatley, M.A. (Rivingtons.)—These papers are divided into five classes : " Latin (General)," " Latin (Special)," " Greek," " Greek (Special)," and "Greek and Latin (Mixed)." They will save a great deal of time to the teacher now spent in the multiplying of copies for use. Each boy in a class will be supplied with one of these books, and may be set to answer on paper or vied race, as occasion may suggest.—Clavis ; or, Exercises in Latin Elegiac Verse, Part I., compiled by A. C. Ainger (Rivingtons), appears in a new edition, as does also Part II. of the same work, the latter and more advanced volume supplying the young scholar with " Ideas and Versions."---. A Second Latin Exercise-Book, by John Barrow Allen, M.A. (The Clarendon Press), has certainly the merit of giving an abundance of exercises and examples. It is intended to be used as an intermediary between elementary exercises and the most advanced stage of Latin prose composition, and, therefore, very properly contains materials for a good deal of work. The excellent practice of setting "unprepared " passages for translation is happily extended to other languages besides Latin and Greek. Indeed, the University of London, in its examinations in the modern languages, gives no other. We have to meet this want.—The Eton French Translator ; French Extracts for Translation, selected by H. Tarver (E. Stanford), giving a choice of a hundred and twenty-two passages ; and French Passages for Unseen Translation, selected and arranged by C. H. Parry, M.A. (Rivingtons.) Here we have a greater number of extracts, mostly shorter (there are 153), and a few notes giving difficult expressions or out-of-the-way words.—Yet another book of the same kind, but beginning at an earlier stage of the learner's career, is The Oxford and Cambridge French Reader, by Frederic Hunt (Jakeman and Carver, Hereford). The graduation from the easy to the unusually difficult passages seems well and carefully done, and the help judicious. The theory of the book is one for which a good deal may be said that a pupil may advantageously be made to read before be is set to learn the grammar. Of editions of French Classica we have Lamartine's Tailleur de Pierres de SaintPont, w7..1 Etymological and Grammatical Notes, by J. Bolelle, B.A. (Bell and Sons), a well-selected example of a great writer ; and Corneille's Cinna, Edipeil, with Introduction and Notes, by Leon Delbos
Norky, e).—We have also to acknowledge the New Method ojaierench Conversation, by Professor Charles M. Marchand (Griffith, Ferran, and Co.), which has reached a fourth edition ; An Introduction to French Conversation, by Antoine Oberlin (Hachette) ; A Manual of French Prosody, by Arthur Gosset (Bell and Sons), intended "for the use of English students," and likely to be useful as explaining and illustrating a somewhat obscure subject ; French at Home and at School, by F. Julien (Sampson Low and Co.) ; and the Teachers' Companion to Macmillan's Progressive French Course, Second Year, by G. Eugbne Fasnacht (Macmillan).
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