THE MAGAZINES.

THE Magazines this month are by no means sirikingly good. "Salem Chapel," in Blackwood, has ended, and the story which replaces it, " Our New Doctor," strikes us as a very dull, over-

drawn piece of satire. The story is based on the resemblance between two twin brothers, who represent one individual, and give rise to all kinds of suspicions among the quidnuncs of a country village. The idea has been often worked out, and there is little in the present use made of it to justify its reproduction. The number has a most ably savage article on Lady Morgan, whose memoirs seem to have aroused the ire of half the critics in the kingdom, and the conclusion of the very important paper on "Progress in China." The account of the Taepings, whom the writer detests, contains little novelty, but he adds some further facts on " Captain Osborne's Expedition," and a remarkably clever defence of the new policy it involves :—

" If the Governments of Europe were to agree to withhold the Service of their troops, this would not prevent the employment of private indi- viduals from Europe or America, and we have seen only recently how easy it is to evade the jurisdiction of the foreign consul by the simple process of hailing for a Chinaman, or from any State not represented on the spot. The Chinese Government can command foreign aid if so dis- posed, but irresponsible enlistment of foreigners is on all grounds ob- jectionable and dangerous. It has been tried, and the results have been what might have been anticipated—waste, peculation, and danger to the State. What, indeed, is the experience of those European Powers who have at different times independently raised foreign legions ?"

It was with this view that Captain Osborne was permitted to select Captain Hugh Burgoyne, V.C., as second in command; Commander C. S. Forbes ; Lieutenants Arthur Salwey, Noel, Osborn, F. C. Vincent, H. M. Ommanney, Allen Young, and G.

Mmice ; Mr. Henry Collins, in charge of the Paymasters' and Storekeepers' Departments ; and Doctors John Elliot, F. Piercey, Fegan, and others, of the hospital arrangements, and to pur- chase the Mohawk, Africa, and Jasper, from Her Majesty's Government. Three more are building in private yards, and the whole force will consist of six vessels, carrying 40 guns, and 400 first-class British seamen. These vessels will give the Imperial Government complete control of its own waters, and enable it at any time to isolate a local rebellion. Their pivot, it would seem, is to be the island of Hainan, by far the most important place in China, and the writer talks exultingly of the information which the captains of the flotilla will bring to Europe concerning the far interior of an empire of which white men have scarcely seen the fringe. There is an excellent sketch of Henri Lacordaire, the priest who dreamed that be might be a Catholic and yet free, and a vigorous Tory partizan article, very much manlier in tone than the recent onslaught on the Whigs in the Quarterly. The writer affirms that the Tories can, " when united," come in when they please—a qualification much needed ; and believes that Mr. Gladstone intends to remodel the Bank of England, which we do not. Mr. Gladstone likes experiments, but reductions will this year occupy most of his superfluous energy.

The best paper in Fraser by far is Miss Cobbe's account of her visit to the Dead Sea. She arrived on its shore on a bright April day, and found, apparently to her disgust, nothing of the gloom and desolation other travellers have described. The lake lay shining under a Mediterranean sky, with the bright yellow chrysanthemums creeping along its shore, and looked as little. " accursed " as possible. The only "weird" accessory was the- forest composed of " the skeletons of the trees once washed down from the woody banks of Jordan by the floods into the lake, and then at last cast up again by the south wind on the shore and gradually half buried in the sands. They stood up almost like a blasted grove, with their bare withered boughs in all fanastic shapes, whitened and charred as if they had passed through the fire." The water, however, in which Miss Cobbe bathed was in- tensely acrid and bitter, tasting like salts and quinine, and' exacerbated the skin for hours after the dip. All fruit, too, is really blighted, the saline character of the soil eating out the heart of the few specimens which attempt to grow at all. The worst paper is the defence of slavery by " A White Republican," who not only believes in the inferiority of the black, but declares that "after visiting nearly all the Southern States, he bad never seen a blow struck upon the body of a slave, nor witnessed a single instance of physical suffering caused by cruelty of treatment on the part of the master. On the cotton, as well as on the rice plantation, be found the negro well fed, sufficiently clad, lightly tasked, and generally looking comfortable and contented." The negro, indeed, is one of the happiest beings in the woad ; negro

deuces, for example, not being stimulated by liquor, but by an exuberance of physical health—and, may we not add ? of happi- ness—which puts such " life and mettle in their heels." A slave market in New Orleans is a large comfortable hall, filled with well-dressed boys and girls, who all beg to be sold, and from whom it is difficult to escape without making a purchase ! The

answer to all that is the existence of the Slave Code.

If nogroes are so happy, and so greatly enjoy their status as chattels, why keep up such terrible laws to retain them in

their beatitude? Or are they, perchance, being a " peculiar and "inferior" race, so enamoured of misery that they need to be whipped to induce them to remain in their happy Eden ? It is however, unnecessary to argue, for the very Rune writer, on the very next leaf, speaking of Mr. Lincoln's proclamation, says, " It proclaims a servile war, inflames the brutal passions of the slave,

and threatens to convert the sunny South,' so late the laud of peace, prosperity, and happiness, into another St. Domingo.

This implies throat-cutting, and all the savage cruelties and brutal barbarities which the fierce passions of the degraded African are capable of perpetrating." Paradise, one perceives, has not the most humanizing influence on the mind. "A. K. H. B."

contributes a just, but somewhat bitter criticism on the practice of altering poetry in new editions— a practice which threatens to destroy some of the most popular of our songs, and which has been carried to a great extent in Mr. Patmore's beautiful collec- tion, the " Children's Garland ;" and " Shirley " writes a highly appreciative review of "Robert Browning," whom he believes, we think with little foundation, to be neglected. He is no more neglected than caviare, or olives, or any other delicacy which is not substantial food, and which only few appreciate. His verses have not become current, because their real beauty as sayings is their sardonic force, the only sort of power the masses do not really appreciate. Take an epigram " Shirley" quotes, and which is one of the most terribly suggestive in the language :—

"As for Venice and its people, merely born to bloom and drop,

Here on earth they bore their fruitage, mirth and folly were the crop. What of soul was left, I wonder, when the kissing had to stop ?"

Read that in a middle-class parlour, and the men will giggle, and the women say, as they do of Pope's best "points," "How severe !" We wish "Shirley" had influence enough in the magazine to keen out this sort of stuff.

" We think our heart shall never fail In doing good, in righting wrong, In comforting the weak that ail, In marching forwards with the strong ; " Yet all the while there lives within That solemn strife of soul and sense ; Or, after strife, a worse sets in— The languid lapse of indolence."

A worse what ? Strife ? If so, strife is a languid lapse; and if not, what is the sense of the verse ?

Cornhill is full, as usual, of readable articles, some of which, however, approach a little too closely to the Household-Words type. " The Inner Life of a Man-of-War," for example, contains nothing bnt a not very striking description of a very well-known scene, without new thought or suggestion, or anything worthy the space devoted to it. A magazine is not the place for a cata- logue raisonrde of a ship's crew, unless the author has some thought to offer with his materials for thought. "The Working Man's Restaurant" is open to something of the same objection,

but then the information is new, and the facts recorded throw a most pleasant light upon a great social question. Mr. Corbet, a merchant of Glasgow, has succeeded in establishing great -dining-halls for the poor, which are entirely self-supporting, yet which furnish breakfast for 3d. and dinner for 4-141., the breakfast consisting of porridge, milk, coffee, butter and roll, and dinner of -soup, beef, potatoes, and plum-pudding. The food is sufficient in quantity, and so good that the restaurants can scarcely sup- ply the demand, the three halls have grown into thirteen, and 155,000 customers attend per month. The manager buys only frst-class meat ; the waiters, all girls, are highly paid ; nothing is ever warmed twice ; and yet these establishments are absolutely self-supporting. The writer professes to explain how this result is attained, but, as far as we understand his descrip- tion, it springs only from economy, good management, and care- ful cooking, and may be imitated anywhere by any one with a brain. The relief to the poor, there being rooms set apart for women, is almost inconceivable, and the managers find it easy to maintain the strictest order. Drink is, of course, forbidden, and among other advantages the poor learn for the first time how much of actual comfort is purchaseable with the pennies spent upon drink. Reading-rooms are attached to the halls, and are free, but the operatives never enter them without buying a penny ration, a roll, or cup of coffee, or something to avoid the idea that they are " beholden'. to anybody for the privilege. The plan might, be tried in London with enormous advantage, the main dgficulty here being the great cost of a site. The article on " The Punishment of Convicts" is, though a less readable, a Much more thoughtful paper, the writer combating well the popular delusion on the effect of terror as a deterrent. Terror, if consistently and unswervingly applied, is a perfect deterrent, as is shown by the excessive dread people entertain of fighting any law of nature, the infraction of which causes immediate pain. Five hundred people, for instance, would lead a forlorn hope for five who would take a red-hot poker in their bare hands. "It is perfectly possible to put down a religious or political movement, even when it is supported by the strongest public sympathy and the highest abstract principles. There can be no doubt that the same course might be taken with clime, and that if criminality were hunted as vigorously in England as heterodoxy used to be in Spain, there would in course of time be as few criminals here as there were heretics there." If stolen goods burnt the hand that stole them, nobody would steal. It is uncertainty of punishment which encourages crime, and that uncertainty must always exist in a free state where the governing class has its healthy moods of pity. The writer believes that by choosing crimes carefully, and only using severity for those which public opinion condemns, the law might be made much more deterrent; and has a curious suggestion for making " hard labour" real. He would make the convict keep himself, giving him such and such wages for such and such work, and selling him rough rations within the prison. The convict would then endure precisely the lot of the labourer, with this difference, that he could never earn enough to make him heartily comfortable. If active, he would be moderately well off; if idle, he would be hungry ; and if sick, his residence in hospital would be registered against him at so much a day. The " Sharp- shooters of the Press" is a severe comment on that style of criti- cism in which the Saturday Review at one time used to indulge, and of which Alphonse Karr is, on the Continent, perhaps, the greatest master. The author, however, writes as if he himself belonged to the Ishmaelites of literature, and his description of the tribe he castigates might have teen written by one of themselves. "Like the rest of his brethren Alphonse Karr longs for an aristo- cracy, not of birth nor of wealth, but of education and talent ; not of genius or wisdom, but of intellect and wit : and one, we may add, where a principle shall be esteemed according to its success." The sketch of Heinrich Heine is a little too bitter, that exqui- site singer having, with some of the Jew insolence and tendency to sarcasm, a sincerely affectionate heart. The true literary Ishmaelite loves nothing, because his power is really derived from that pleasure in the infliction of pain which is inconsistent with heart. " Romola " improves as it advances ; and we may 'end, in spite of feeling and judgment, in becoming interested in the wonderful portrait of Tito, the goodnatured, sweet-tempered, intellectual Greek, whose love of things pleasant makes him traitor to father, wife, and friends, and whose crave to be cushioned round with goodwill is based on cowardice and not love. " The Small House at Alliugton," too, is developing into one of Mr. Trollope's best stories, though we are a little tired of

the Ladies de Courcy, who have now made their appearance is some five successive novels.

Macmillan has little this mouth except the ably offensive paper by Mr. Arnold, which Mr. Maurice has answered in another column, and a curious, though by no means exhaustive, descrip- tion of national systems of bodily exercise. This is an account of the physical training first advocated by Ling, then adopted in Sweden, thence transferred with modifications into Prussia, and, after being revolutionized, adopted in Fiance. In Prussia the system has become one of purely mechanical "exercises," all aimless, and all failing to give new strength to the body or energy to the limbs. The system has become a mere drill, but, carried on continuously in winter and summer, it enables the soldier to execute combined movements with such precision that the spectator is blinded to the individual want of power. The French system, on the contrary, beginning with a whirl of the head from shoulder to shoulder, and ending with a sort of dance, is intended to produce nimbleness, but does not develop the muscles or the natural health. It includes, how- ever, leaping, walking, and running, all of which, except the first, are hampered with absurd regulations. In running, for example, the men are told to keep their mouths shut, though all natural runners beep them open ; and in walking the man is taught to put the toes first to the ground—an order which would cripple an Indian groom, the best walker known among men. The true principle of gymnastic training is effort, and its rationale is laid down with much clearness by Mr. Maclaren. "To reca- pitulate : All exercises of mere position act directly on the joints, instead of acting on them through the muscles. Such exercise is, therefore, addressed to the wrong part of the body: it is ad- dressed to the joint, when it should be addressed to that which moves the joint. It is the old and exploded treatment of disease revived for the treatment of an abnormal physical condition— subduing the symptoms instead of waging war with the cause." The number contains a most poetical song by Miss Rossetti, un- fortunately too long and too closely linked together to admit of quotation.