THE MAGAZINES.

THERE is nothing striking in the Magazines of this mouth, but there are many good papers. One of the best in the Contemporary Review is the very careful and, indeed, exhaustive history of recent events in Egypt, called, "Egypt and Constitutional Rule." The writer is most temperate in tone, and obviously familiar with all facts, and his conclusion is that the recent revolution is retrograde ; that Egypt, which had passed under the dominion of law, however imperfect, is again under absolute government, and this government is in the hands of the soldiery, acting through a, shadowy representation. The soldiery he obviously believes to be anti-Christian in feeling, as well as inclined to postpone all other objects to the welfare and ascendancy of the Army. The defect in the argument of the paper, otherwise most instruc- tive, is a tendency to consider that the first object of good government in Egypt is the payment of the Bond- holders, and that a suspension of the service of the Debt would be the greatest of disasters,—or in other words, that Egypt exists mainly for the benefit of a ring of usurious credi- tors. It is the existence of this feeling which induces all Egyptians to regard the " advice " of the European Powers, and indeed of almost all Europeans, with such immovable dis- trust. They see that the French and English notion of "good government" in the Valley of the Nile is simply government which will make the ten per cent. now enjoyed by specu- lators even more secure. Lady Verney, in "Autumn Jot- tings in France," continues her fierce attack upon the sub- division of land, the good side of which she entirely fails to see. If her account covered the whole ground, the people, who are absolutely sovereign, would abolish compulsory division at death, or sell their lands to the large proprietors, who, in the writer's opinion, could manage them so much better. They do neither. Lady Verney brings out, however, with much truth the dreadful over-labour by which the advantages of small pro- prietorship are secured, and the sordidness of life it is apt to produce,—a sordidness which induces the peasant, in number- less cases, to affect poverty. Lady Verney clearly believes in the poverty, but the huge aggregate investments of the

peasantry tell a very different tale. Mr. Bear, in his paper

• on the "True Principle of Tenant-right," contends bravely with the Duke of Argyll, and unlike many writers on this side, states clearly what he means. The pith of the Duke's argument is that a tenant cannot be entitled to the whole benefit of his improvements, because without certain in- herent qualities in the soil—which belong to the landlord—those improvements would not pay. Mr. Bear replies that the inherent qualities are the very things for which the tenant pays his rent, and therefore they belong to him. He thinks this is admitted, inasmuch as the tenant bears the whole loss of a mistaken attempt to improve the land. The landlord does not share that. We fancy the landlord would say he did. His farm is injured, and therefore its selling value, a point Mr. Bear scarcely sufficiently considers. Nobody disputes that a tenant hires the inherent qualities of the soil, the only question is for how long. The landlord says for the lease ; the tenant says for the lease, and as much longer as the effect of his improvements stays in the soil. The same radical difference of opinion ap- pears in Mr. Bear's summary of the whole question. He says: —" Payment for value received is the only fair measure of com- pensation to tenants due from landlords, just as payment for value withdrawn is the fair measure of damages for deterioration due to landlords from tenants. This is the true principle of tenant- right" The Duke of Argyll would not dispute that. He only asserts that much of the increment in value of an improved farm is not " received " from the tenant at all, but is the result of a cer- tain use of the landlord's property, viz., the capability of improve- ment inherent in the soil. By far the most instructive paper is, however, one on "Emigration from Ireland." Its author, the well-known Mr. Take, presses home the fact, always too much forgotten by those who discuss Ireland, that nearly a fifth of the people live in a condition of abject poverty. More than 200,000 heads of families, representing a population of 1,000,000, have no other means of subsistence than "from one to ten acres of poor bog land." In Donegal, Mayo, Galway, Clare, and Kerry, 77,000 holdings are rented under £4, and 47,800 under £10 a year. It would be impossible for these families to maintain themselves, even if a large proportion of them were not deeply plunged in debt. They will never be contented, or even quiet under such circumstances, and never far from the neces- sity of State relief. Mr. Tuke maintains that for them nothing can be done—the reclamation of waste land being too costly and too slow—except to assist them to emigrate, and utterly denies, on the evidence of his large experience, that the people are un- willing. Whenever, he says, the people can afford to go, they do go, the richer districts sending out the largest pro- portion of emigrants. Mr. Take, who is, we must observe, entirely in favour of the payment of rent, draws a terrible picture of the poverty of some evicted families, and says, "When evic- tions take place among the very poor, who, when evicted from the miserable dwelling which has served as a home, and has been the roof-tree perhaps of generations, have absolutely no means whatever for their support but the workhouse, there arises in my mind a most serious question as to the propriety of the State being called on to employ all its powers to enforce the debt, without some other alternative to offer than the dreaded workhouse." He advocates as the only remedy State loans to the Unions to assist emigration, the sum required to keep five families in the workhouse sufficing, if capitalised, to assist 100 families to emigrate. Every £5,000 will move that number. Mr. Take, however, does not show that the place of the emigrants will not be immediately filled up, and that is the difficulty with statesmen, who have to look beyond the immediate result. Miss Cobbe, in a very careful and detailed reply to her critics on the subject of Vivisection, certainly shows that the English physiologists, who deprecate so much the comparison between them and the German, French, and Italian physiologists who practise vivisection, not only take no pains to show these foreign collaborators their own difference of principle when they meet, but, on the contrary, appear to show them the utmost personal sympathy, even though, the moment their back is turned, they cry out in horror at the bare notion of sanctioning any such practices here. Miss Cobbe also shows that both Professor Rutherford and Dr. Roy have recently performed vivisections which can hardly, by any possibility, be conceived of as otherwise than truly agonising. There is no pretence, indeed, that Professor Rutherford's experiments were performed under aumsthetics at all, though some of his friends choose to declare that curari is a partial anwsthetic, simply because they wish so to regard it,—

and this though Claude Bernard held that if it altered the amount of sensitiveness and suffering at all, it rather enhanced it. As for Dr. Boy's horrible experiments, it is no doubt asserted that they are done under complete anmsthesia, but Miss Cobbe shows, by quoting a careful physiological criticism on them by a competent hand, that in the opinion of one good physiologist at least, parts, and the most terrible, parts of these experiments, could hardly have yielded any result, if chloro- form or any anesthetic had been used in sufficient quantity to exclude suffering. Miss Cobbe exposes some astonishing inaccuracies on the part of her opponents.

The Nineteenth Century begins with a protest against the Channel Tunnel, signed by men of all degrees, parties—except

the Land-leaguers—and political opinions ; and continues with an article, "What is Money ?" by Viscount Sherbrooke. It contains nothing new, that we see, but it is written with the rare lucidity and force which were Mr. Lowe's special gifts, and incidentally propounds a question which, to our minds, disposes of the whole theory of bi-metalism. Why, if the theory is true, should we stick to the " hi "? The advantages of a single standard are clear, but if we quit gold, to introduce gold and silver, why not gold, silver, and copper, or any other metal universally valued ? Indeed, why should not every debt be liquidated at will in gold or coals ? How any reasoning human being can read through page 508, and continue to believe in the advantage of a double standard, we are at a loss to conceive. Dr. Siemens repeats his theory of solar energy recently laid before the Royal Society, which is contained in brief in these lines, the article being filled with proofs of too technically scientific a nature to be condensed here :—

"1. That aqueous vapour and carbon compounds are present in stellar or interplanetary space. 2. That these gaseous compounds are capable of being dissociated by radiant solar energy while in a state of extreme attenuation. 3. That the vapours so dissociated are drawn towards the sun in consequence of solar rotation, are flashed into flame in the photosphere, and rendered back into space in the condition of products of combustion."

Mr. C. Zeller forwards a carious sketch, far too greatly con- densed, of apocalyptic ideas among the ancient peoples, with a translation of the prophecy of Hermes Trismegistus, preserved by Apuleius and Lactantius. This is a distinct prophecy of the abandonment of the world to evil and lawlessness, of its destruction by flood, fire, and pestilence, and of its renewal by God in its pristine beauty. It is quite possible that the prophecy has been borrowed from the Jews, but it may

have been original, and it contains this thought, which is certainly not Jewish,—that one of the signs of the evil day will

be that "men will cease to honour and admire the world, this unalterable work of God, this glorious image of what is good, adorned as it is with manifold beauties, the work of the Divine will." How Charles Kingsley, whose creed is almost contained in that sentence, would have exulted in that quotation 1 Mr. C. F. Gordon-Cumming produces further evidence that it is possible by oiling the waves seriously to diminish the effect of storms upon a ship, a subject attracting some scientific atten- tion, but of little practical importance ; and M. le Baron d'Estournelles sends a most readable paper on "The Supersti- tious of Modern Greece," which are, in fact, survivals under new forms of the old ideas of Greek paganism. Curi- ously enough, the subordinate spirits, and especially the Nereides, the Daimon, or genius of the house— now called the Stichio — and certain elves called the Kalikantzari, who are in all essentials minified copies of the god Pan, have completely outlived the higher deities. Greece has forgotten Zeus, but not the Parcm, whom she now calls Meres (Moirai). The Nereids, probably from the teaching of the priests, have come to be regarded as malevolent, but they arc still when seen almost always dancing :-

"At midnight, when the waters are sleeping, the NereIds come to bathe in it. The people believe that all springs are lukewarm at this hour ; no one would dare to approach and drink, for fear of being carried off, for the nymphs think they are alone, and come out of the water naked ; they comb their wet hair, and adorn themselves on the banks of the streams. They are so beautiful in the clear serenity of the night, that no mortal may look upon them with impunity; although some authora aver that they have goats' and asses' feet liko the Satyrs, it is said of them, as of Lamia, Pair as a Nereid.'" Sometimes they intermarry with mortals, and such an ancestry was attributed to Petros Bey, the hero of the Morea before the

Independence. Sir Fitzjames Stephen, in a sketch of the English Criminal Law, promises us a work of great interest—a

history of English Criminal Law—on which, he says, he has

been engaged for years ; Mr. R. J. Nevin sends a warm defence of his friend the Canon Campello, who recently seceded from Rome ; and the author of John Inglesant fights hard, and evid-

ently from strong conviction, for the right of the conscious agnostic habitually to take the Sacrament :—" Even if it be granted that there is no hereafter for the individual conscious- ness, worship, as no Comtist will deny, still remains the most becoming attitude of man ; and if so, where can he worship, with BO little to jar his taste, as in this simple, touching rite ?" It seems

to us that in that sentence Mr. Shorthouse forgets that man has duties to others than himself, which duties are denied when he appears to accept a religion in which he does not believe. The public are not told that the worshipper is only cultivating in himself the something which makes for righteousness, and are, therefore, so far, deliberately deceived. What, indeed, can be the benefit to a man's soul—if, being without immortality, he has a soul—of acting Christianity ?

In the Fortnightly, Mr. F. Harrison protests with his accus- tomed eloquence against over-worship of the nineteenth century, and its marvellous means of locomotion, which, nevertheless,

he thinks useful to progress ; and M. V. Chirol gives a curious account of "French Diplomacy in Syria," which has recently been revolutionised, the Republic abandoning the Church, but

which is still directed to the task of ultimately acquiring Syria, as a basis for commercial activity and a substitute for Marseilles, which will lose, it is calculated, all its prosperity through the opening of the St. Gothard Tunnel. The article is a little dreamy, but gives a strong impression of French activity in Syria. Mr. E. F. G. Law strongly affirms that the Conservatism of Russia is breaking up, even the peasants learning much from the soldiery dispersed among; them after the late war, and be- coming, for economic reasons, discontented with their lot. He admits, however, that the great mass are still unmoved, and that, therefore, in spite of the Nihilistic activity of the middle- class, a revolution is, as yet, an impossibility. That is the con- clusion of all who know Russia. Mr. Morley contributes a bright monograph on James Mill, commencing with a criticism on Mr. Bain's biography, which, in its delicate severity, is one of the best things we have lately read :—

" It is no slight on an author to say that he does not write as well as Plato, bat Mr. Bain carries the licence which every author has of writing worse than Plato, almost to excess. There is no light in his picture, no composition, no colour. It would be too much to ask for the polish and elegance, the urbanity and finesse, of a discourse at the French Academy ; but the author is really more severe than is per- mitted in his disdain for graces of style and the art of presentation. A writer does well to he concise, yet the Greeks have shown us that a writer or an orator may attain the art of conciseness without being either dry or ungenial. It is not enough to give us a catalogue, however industriously compiled, of the external incidents of a man's life in the order of time, of his books and articles, and even of his ideas. Such things are mere memoranda, and not biography. Of these laborious memoranda, there are enough and too many. Mr. Bain gives us, for instance, a minute description of Ford Abbey, where James Mill and his family spent many months with Jeremy Bentham, who then lived there. The original plan of the front,' it seems, compels us to divide the whole range into seven portions,' and to each of these seven portions the reader is virtuously trotted, learning, if be be so minded, how many divisions there are in the archways, how many windows in each floor, at what distances the windows are from one another, what the upper story used to be and

is, what the lower story With the highest respect for Mr. Rain's conscientious and painstaking method, we submit that he has not seriously reflected on the things that are worth telling, on the relation of details to the whole, what it is that the reader seeks to know, what it is good for him to know,—on the difference, in short, between a jejune list of dramatis persme and the drama itself."

Mr. Morley is too lenient to James Mill's excessive hardness and dryness of nature, though he comments with nearly sufficient severity on the entire absence of imaginative insight in Mill's account of the Hindoo religion and Hindoo civilization. Mr. "Alfred Aylward" pleads strongly for the surrender of Natal to itself, and the junction of the Colony with the Free State and the Transvaal into one large Africander Republic, friendly to the British, but not obedient to them. That, he says, would be the best solution, and, granting the friendliness and the extinction of slavery, it might be a good one ; but who will guarantee either condition ?

There is nothing very remarkable in the padding of the Cornhill, except the article on "Talk and Talkers," noticed last week ; but there is a very noteworthy bit of writing, the author- ship of which we entirely fail to detect, called " reppiniello ; or, Twenty-four Hours with a Neapolitan Street-boy." We do not know that we ever read anything more perfectly artistic and delightful, or ever saw so very much said in light, almost

careless phrases. We cannot resist the temptation to quote just this one scene, out of a dozen as good, if not as original. Peppiniello is the true Neapolitan ragamuffin, living by selling cigar.ends, and a little theft, but without innate badness. He is kind to his little sisters, and would not have them steal, not because stealing is wrong, but because boys may do many things which girls may not. It would be as incorrect for girls to steal, as to bathe like the boys, in the Bay. He saves every centesimo he can acquire, but as he reaches the garden gate of the palace, he throws over it a two-centesimo piece, with a hardly perceptible motion of his hand, and without turning his head

On each side stands a colossal bronze statue of a man governing an unruly horse. The Emperor Nicholas of Russia sent them as a present to King Ferdinand after his return from Italy, and they were supposed by the Italian Liberals of those days to convey a delicate hint as to what the Autocrat of the North considered the true prin- ciples of government. Of all this Peppiniello of course knows nothing ; but the stalwart forms have made a deep impression on his imagina- tion, and he has invented this strange way of paying his adoration to them. He does not number them with the saints, still less has he any intention of paying them divine honours. What he attributes to them is great, though by no means unlimited, power, and some such capricious goodwill to himself as the boatmen frequently show. He is not given to analysis, and he sees no contradiction between this worship and the rest of his religious creed ; indeed, the bronze statues ffil a place that would otherwise be left vacant in his pantheon. He looks upon them as leading strong, joyous lives of their own, and caring on the whole very little for human affairs,. though he thinks they must be somewhat pleased by sincere devotion. At best, they are only good-natured, not good ; and so they stand far below the saints, whose whole time is spent in acts of graciousness and pity. But then, you cannot call upon the saints to help you in committing what the Church calls a sin, though doubtless they will often save you from its consequences. With respect to the two bronze figures, he has no such scruples, for he is convinced that their moral code is no more stringent than his own. So be called upon them when the children at Santa Lucia seemed inclined to abandon him to the police, and we know how well he got out of that scrape. Never- theless, he keeps his irreligious faith a profound secret, partly front a fear of ridicule, no doubt, but partly also because he has a shrewd suspicion that the objects of it are more likely to pay attention to his prayers if the number of their worshippers remains strictly A new story ("The Ladies Lindores ") commences in Black- wood, which, for some unintelligible reason, has not its author's name, though it is written on every page. It promises to be one of Mrs. Oliphant's greater successes. There is an article- of curious interest on " Fenianism, by an ex-member of the Fenian Directory," from which we quote a fact. The Fenians intended, shortly after the Manchester affair, to have kidnapped Lord Derby, and held him as hostage for the lives of those accused of the policeman's murder. The plan only failed from an impression that the accused would be let off. The seizure would not, of course, have influenced the Government, but it shows that the possession of great properties near Liverpool has some drawbacks. The writer, who is very well informed,. believes that the American Fenian organisation is as strong as ever, and that should its members ever accept a dictator, it would become actively dangerous.