The Women Martyrs of the Reformation. By Walter Walsh. (R.T.S.
2s. 6d.)—This is a book which has, and cannot but have, much that is painful in it. It is not, indeed, one to be put indiscriminately into the hands of young readers. Nevertheless, it has a useful, we may say a necessary, function to perform. It makes us realise what the persecutions in England, France, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands really were. Apologists tell us that they were severe repressions of political movements. There is no book which can show more clearly than this how absolutely futile is this plea. Some of these women had very indiscreet tongues, but that any one of them was a danger to the State it is im- possible to believe.
Stories from Greek History. Retold from Herodotus by H. L. Havell, B.A. (George G. Harrap and Co. 2s. 6d. net.)—Mr Havell has gone to the unfailing mine of Herodotean legend and story, and made excellent use of the material that he finds there ; not without an occasional change when such was needed to make it better suited to modern manners. He begins with what may be called the barbarian element—Lydia, Egypt, and Persia—and then comes to Greece. One of his divisions is " Tales of Sparta," and another "Tales of Athens." "The Revolt of Ionia " and " Marathon " form separate sections (our author wisely keeps to the more veracious narrative of the heroism of Cynegeirus), and then we have, in seven divisions, "The Invasion of Xerxes." Sir William Jones's noble poem, What Constitutes a State ? " can hardly be said to bo " From Alcaeus."
The Sunday at Home. (R.T.S. 7s. 6d.)—There is no mistake about the character of this magazine. It answers to its title, and shows with no little success that it may at the same time be very readable. Mr. Silas Hocking contributes a serial story dealing with Monmouth's Rebellion. It opens with a highly picturesque scene at Whitehall in the latter days of Charles II., and ends dramatically with the arrest of Jeffreys. But our readers know how well Mr. Silas Hocking can treat such a theme. There are biographical papers relating to the past and present. John Knox is, of course, among the subjects. (There are some striking letters of his printed.) The story of Beza, a personage about whom many readers know little besides the name, is told. In it is given a facsimile of the Codex Bezae. (Would not this, with its remarkable variations from the Received text, be an interesting subject?) There is a particularly kindly notice of H. P. Liddon. "The earthen 'vessels of our controversies are no sufficient measure of a true man." That is well said, even though Liddon himself used the " earthen vessels " pretty constantly. We must mention a fine ballad by the Rev. Frederick Langbridge, "The Bishops' Candle," dealing with the story of the death of Ridley and Latimer. Another from the same pen relates the martyrdom of William Huntin, one of the Marian victims. The miscellaneous papers are of no common value. This is a carefully edited and valuable volume.
St. Nicholas. Vol. XXXII. (Macmillan and Co. Gs.)—The tale that runs through this volume is "Queen Ixi of Ix," a curiously fanciful bit of work ; but as this instalment begins with chap. 15, it is not easy to judge of it. The other serial, " Pinkey Perkins : Just a Boy," is also a fragment; but the chapters are mostly independent, and they are distinctly amusing. Naturally they have a tinge of American colour, but this will not make them less acceptable. The same colour is to be seen in the " Corner Cupboard," a most entertaining story of some amateur merchants ; the parodies are particularly good. But it is needless to praise St. Nicholas, so long has it held its place of honour among children's magazines. The title-page bears upon it the familiar words, " Conducted by Mary Mapes Dodge " ; but Mrs. Dodge did not live to see the completion of the volume, passing away on August 21st. She was in her seventy-fourth year. She had presided over the magazine with unfailing tact for more than thirty-one years. Mr. William Fayal Clarke has contributed an excellent narrative and apprecia- tion of her work. It will suffice to quote one sentence, for it reveals the secret of her success : " Every copy of St. Nicholas made _Famous Sisters of Great Men. By Marianne Kirlew. (T. Nelson and Sons. 2s. 6d.)—Miss Kirlew tells, and we are well content to hear again, the stories of Henriette Ronan, Caroline Herschell, Mary Lamb, Dorothy Wordsworth, and Fanny Mendelssohn. We have no complaint to make about the inclusion of Mary Lamb, though it may be said that the weight of obligation in this case was quite differently placed from what we see in the other stories. Miss Kirlew recognises this, and one is quite sure that the brother would have desired nothing more than that her share in his work should be fully recognised.
The Christ of the Children. By the Rev. J. G. Stevenson. (J. Clarke and Co. 2s. 6d. net.)—This is a carefully put together Life of Christ, with an especial regard to the children. Hence the narrative of the early days is filled in with various details. Mr. Stevenson has very properly rejected the marvels of the Apocryphal Gospels, though the mention of sparrows made out of clay shows that he had one of them in his mind. (It is a happy idea that if Christ had not done His carpentering well, it would have been cast in His teeth when He visited Nazareth.) There are illustrations after Millais, Holman Hunt, and others. One only of them, the theatrical picture by Benjamin West, we could wish away.—The Life of Christ, Told Chiefly in Words of One Syllable. By A. Pitt-Kethley. (G. Routledge and Sons. ls. 6d.) —The word " chiefly " gives the writer an escape from the difficulties which a rigorous observance of the rule would pro- duce. We have found tales told strictly in one-syllable words sometimes obscure ; but there is no obscurity here. There are twenty good illustrations.
The Bravest Deed I Ever Saw. Edited by Alfred H. Miles. (Hutchinson and Co. 5s.)—These stories of heroic acts have been gathered from various sources ; some are of the present, and for some the editor goes back to history. But they certainly make a very striking collection. The first, for instance, well deserves its place. Lord Roberts tells how Makawab Khan helped to take the Sekandarbagh, which Sir Colin Campbell had to possess himself of on the road to Lucknow. The gates of the fort were being rolled together when this man thrust his arm into the aperture with a shield on it. While it was there the bolt could not be shot; and he prolonged the situation by thrust- ing in the other arm. The fort was taken. Then there is the tale of the stewardess of the Stella,' brought back to one's memory now by the loss of the ' Hilda' in much the same place. After this come rescues of drowning men,—that effected by Lieutenant Heyland, for instance, told on pp. 200-1; and that by a little boy of three, who saved an elder brother by his extraordinary presence of mind. We might multiply examples ; but perhaps one told by "General" Booth may worthily end the list. It is, as will be seen, of a wholly different kind. A high-born girl joined the Salvation Army,—a thing that does not often happen, we are told, and can easily believe. She was summoned to the death- bed of her father. She went and came back. Six months after- wards it became known that her father had by his will given her six months to choose between her work and his money, which was to go elsewhere if she remained with the Army; and this was her choice, made "in a spirit of calm and perfect content."
The Adventures of Harry Rochester. By Herbert Strang. (Blackie and Son. 6s.)—This " Story of the Days of Marlborough and Eugene" is a well-constructed bit of work. The young heroes who go through the manifold adventures of historical tales cannot but be very much alike, and the adventures themselves cannot but bear a family resemblance. Still, it is quite possible to give something characteristic both to the one and the other. Harry Rochester's defence of Madame de Vaudrey's house and of the ruined castle are especially good, lucidly described, and not hard to realise, and his ride with the reprieve reminds us of Browning's famous poem. But perhaps the best things in the book are the characteristic touches which Mr. Strang has given to the portraits of Marlborough and Eugene. The story is, of course, for the most part outside the main currents of affairs, but when it is concerned with them, as, for instance, in the battle of Blenheim, Mr. Strang rises to the occasion. There is a love story, but it is kept with sufficient discretion in the background, and is generally well managed.
The Lost Earldom. By Cyril Grey. (R.T.S. 3s. 6d.)—This is a story of the troubles of the Covenanters. The interest culminates, of course, in the victory of Drumclog and the defeat of Bothwell Bridge, but there is an underplot, so to speak, treating of the private fortunes of the hero. The author is surely a little hard on his countrymen of to-day when he describes them as "an ungrateful and degenerate posterity." How, one is inclined to ask, has this same posterity "surrendered the fruits In Northern Seas. By E. Everett-Green. (T. Nelson and Sons. 3s. 6d.)—As in many a former story, our author knows well how to bring back the atmosphere of other days, and in this pleasant tale of a Venetian adventure into the Northern Seas we have an instance of her ability to throw the garb of imagination over her characters. The two Zenos leave Venice, and all that it means to a family occupying a good position in the State, on a voyage of discovery; they are wrecked, fortunately on the lands of one Sinclair, Earl of Orkney, and begin by helping him to govern his new subjects. But the day comes when the spirit drives them forth on the deep again, much to the good Earl's sorrow, and they sail to Greenland. Whether Miss Everett-Green can bestow on these wanderings on the billows the same colour, wealth of fancy, and magniloquence of diction that we associate' with her attempts to vitalise mediaeval life in England we may doubt; but she never loses her feeling for the picturesque, for happy touches of landscape, and now and again gives us some really striking situations. Nothing could be better than her opening chapter : young Dracone strolling to the Rialto and the Piazza of St. Mark, and the brilliant scene, the kaleidoscope of colour we know Venice must have been at that date,-1390. Again, the quiet impressiveness of the silent approach of Earl Sinclair's men through the sea-caverns to Malesi Sperre's torture-chamber is not to be denied. If our authoress is not so much at home as she would have been on terra firma in England, she nevertheless shows her versatility, and has written a very pretty story, with plenty of adventure and well-arranged backgrounds ; and these are the books that teach us history and humanity.
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