Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 4.djvu/51

 M* a. iv. JULY s. loos.] NOTES AND QUERIES. Southampton, and says that it was while' looking out upon the beautiful scenery of the harbour and river, and the green glades of the New Forest on it* farther bank, that the idea suggested itself to Dr. Watts of "a land of pure delight," and of "sweet fields beyond the swelling flood dressed in living green,' as an image of the heavenly Canaan. " JOHN T. PAGE. West Haddon, Northamptonshire. NOTES ON BOOKS, 4o. The Work* of Horace. The Latin Text with Conington's Translation. (Bell & Sons.) As enchanting and a scholarly little volume is this, just small enough to be carried in the waistcoat pocket, and exquisite in paper, print, and binding, in a novel of Capt. M itrry.it, if we rightly recollect, the period of which was that of war with France, those exercising the guns, while passing near an iiland in French possession, aimed a gun in pure wantonness at a figure on the beach. To their sur- prise, and somewhat to their dismay, it fell. Send- ing a boat to the spot, they found on the beach the body of a well-dressed man who had been reading Horace. That fate is hardly likely to befall a man of to-day, who will probably be on a motor-car, and will certainly not be reading a Latin classic. If any si/holarly creature capable of such an action is left alive, here is the ideal volume for him. With a few unimportant deviations the text is that of the latest edition of the ' Corpus Poetarum Latinorum.' Though scarcely inspired, Conington's translation ii scholarly and " elegant," to use a word of which the eighteenth century was proud. We hope this •pirited effort on the part of the publishers will be successful enough to elicit a companion volume of Virgil. There are those—unhappily few in these later days—to whom these works would constitute i library. The Tragediei of Algernon Charles Svrinlmrne. In Five Volumes.—Vol. 1. The Queen Mother and Rosamond. (Chatto & Windus.) A COMPLETE edition of Mr. Swinburne's tragedies is an indispensable complement to the collec- tion of his poem-, the appearance of which we have noted. The first volume of this is now issued in precisely the same form as the previous collection, and will obtain no less warm a welcome. Those who read in the first edition the two works now reprinted, and prophesied or hailed the arrival of a great poet, were but few. Not until 'Atalanta' Sashed u|>on the sight was the world fully witched. After the enthusiastic reception of this, and the grudging and not easily comprehensible outburst acaiiut ' Poems and Ballads, the first edition of 'The Queen Mother' and 'Rosamond' became one of the scarcest and most coveted of poetical works. What is still the pecuniary value of the original edition we know not. So soon as a work becomes generally accessible, and the thirst of the lover of poetry can be quenched, matters of the kind interest only the collector or the connoisseur. Now that the plays take their regular place in the poet's works it is interesting to see how all the promise of the coming harvest is there. With a marvellous psychological study of Catherine de' Medici, the Queen Mother, and that, no less admirable, of Charles IX., her verminous issue, and with its- picture of the sufferings of Denise de Maulevrier, 'The Queen Mother'anticipates the great follow- ing dramas dealing with Mary Stuart. Allusions- to the Queen of Scots, indeed, occur in its pages. In ' Rosamond.' meantime, which is concerned with- an altogether different epoch, we find those precise gifts of style which later aroused the enthusiasm of Mr. Swinburne's admirers and the wrath of his maliguers. Very tender is the pleading of Rosa- mono, and the malignancy and scorn of Queen Eleanor are biting and terrible. Little in the- dramatist's subsequent work is more intense than are the closing scenes of 'Rosamond.' When King; Henry says about Eleanor, For the queen, See how strong laughter takes her by the throat And plucks her by the lips, we feel that the poetic and dramatic method is- fully mastered. In the case of a work that has been so long before the public criticism and quota- tion are both out of place. We can but welcome- the appearance of so desirable a collection. The Angel in the House. By Coventry Patmore. (Bell & Sons.) IN a pretty cover, and in a form at once cheap and attractive, we have here Coventry Patmore's most popular poem. We accord it a welcome such as it deserves, and express a hope to possess in a similar form his best poem, 'The Unknown Eros.' Dainty little volumes such as this are to us an unending; delight. Night* at the Opera. — Bizet'* Carmen, Gounod1* Faiut, Mozart'* Don Giovanni. By Francis Burgen, F.S.A.Scot. (De La More Press.) THE object of this series, the later volumes of which are competently edited by Mr. Francis Burgen, is avowedly to supply in an attractive form an ana- lysis of the music and a comment or running com- mentary on the dramatic element in the great operas. So far as the present instalment is con- cerned the task is well executed. Musical passages- are given, together with information concerning the composer and the circumstances of the first production, and the whole constitutes a sort of preparation for a ' Dictionnaire des Operas' like that of Clement and Larousse. IN The Rurlinyton Magazine for July the first part appears of ' Some English Architectural Leadwprk,'' by Lawrence Weaver, F.S.A. This is comparatively an untried subject, and both comment and illustra- tions are deeply interesting. An important article, also finely illustrated, is that of Mr. W. R. Lethaby on ' The Painted Chamber and the Early Masters of the Westminster School.' A capital frontispiece is supplied in Gainsborough's 'Portrait of Mr. Vestris.' Some fine views accompany an account by Mr. Robert Dell of Sutton Place, by Guildford. Por- traits of Mrs. Irwin by Sir Joshua, and of Augustus- Welby Pugin, and a painting attributed to Franchise- Duparc, are noteworthy features in a capital number. WOMAN" holds a large, we will not say dispro- portionate, share in The Fortnightly, and the articles on her position and doings constitute the most readable portion of its contents. Especially entertaining to masculine readers, though, we-