CURRENT LITERAT U RE.
GIFT-BOOKS.
Lords of the World : a Story of the Fall of Carthage and Corinth. By the Rev. Alfred J. Church. (Blackie and Son.)—There is no kind of romance more difficult to write than that in which the endeavour is made to give a charm and interest to scenes occurring before the Christian era. A careful student who also understands the art of story-telling may achieve, as Mr. Church has done, a large measure of success ; but the dread of anachronisms and of losing credit as a scholar must always hinder him from giving full scope to the imagination. Mr. Church's mastery of his subject and his literary skill are, how- ever, sufficiently complete to carry his adult readers with him, and as a boy's book the Lords of the World deserves a hearty welcome. Some of the scenes are highly picturesque, and the tale is brought to its close without any of the superfluous and languid passages which the schoolboy impolitely desig- nates as "rot." There is also many an exciting adventure that sustains the reader's curiosity in the fortunes of the hero Cleauor, and if his chivalry reminds us of King Arthur's worthiest knight, it is not perhaps the less lifelike on that account. Cleaner witnesses the final destruction of Carthage, and is an unwilling spectator at the sacrifice of children to Baal Hammon ; he travels with Polybius, the historian, to Alexandria, and reaches Corinth at the moment when that city falls into the hands of Rome ; he has, moreover, many private adventures of his own, a love affair being one of them ; and comes triumphantly, as a hero is expected to do, out of many difficulties and perils. Scipio's character is finely drawn ; but in denouncing the Agrigentines for enduring the horrible cruelty of Phalaris, and contrasting it with the clemency of his countrymen, the great Roman forgot the brutality that butchered men "to make a Roman holiday."
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