Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 8.djvu/457

 10 s. YIII. NOV. 9, 1907.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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Major Desbriere now arrays, it stands out more clearly than ever that the whole responsibility rests on Napoleon, who, by giving positive orders with- out knowing the details which ought to have con- trolled them, and by depriving his officers of a

initiative or discretionary power, sent the fleet t its destruction." ' Henry V III. and the Englis Reformation ' gives high praise to the work don by Mr. Fisher, Mr. Innes, and Mr. Pollard revealing the true condition of the country, and th nature of the forces at work when the second Tudo king took it upon himself to influence the futur destinies of England and her daughter-countries b reshaping the religion of his kingdom for his ow: particular ends. "In point of character Henr, resembled, more closely than is thought, the typica Englishman, who, as Mr. Bernard Shaw wittib says, 'when he wants a thing never tells himsel that he wants it. He waits patiently until ther comes into his mind, no one knows how, a burnin conviction that it is his moral and religious duty t( conquer those who have got the things he wants.

Henry's 'moral attitude' no longer seem

effective to posterity, because with freedom o thought our standards of morality have advanced but it appeared effective to the landgrabbers of thi sixteenth century, though naturally the Romar Catholics were enabled to see through it." ' Rom and the Repression of Thought' deals with a more modern form of the struggle in which "She of the Seven Hills" is always engaged and ' An Interpreter of Japan ' is a criticism of the writings of Lafcadio Hearn, or rather a summary of his opinions regarding the Eastern people among whom he chose a wife. "The longer his acquaintance with the Japanese was extended, the deeper grew his distrust of them, despite his admiration and many a close and unshaken bond of friendship." Their want of the emotional power, which means so much for good or evil, also im- pressed him. Lacking the brutality of the West, they also lack the force and depth of nature which constitute the virtue linked with that defect. " Tenderness," he declares, " is not of the Orient man. He is without brutality, but he is also with- out that immense reserve force of deep love and forgiving power which even the rougher men of the West have. The Oriental is intellectually, rationally capable of all self-sacrifice and loyalty. He does the noblest and the grandest things without even a ghost of tender feeling." 'The Baghdad Railway' shows the advantages which will come to Mesopotamia, and therefore to the neighbouring countries and the world at large, if the Germans are allowed to do work there such as England and France are doing in the north of Africa. " Under the selfish rivalries and jealousies which are apt to distort and colour a national application of European ideas there has always been a deeper motive at work." England and France are not mere landgrabbers, but " the missionaries of Western civilization." Will any one venture to make this claim on their behalf and deny its application to Germany ?

The Nineteenth Century for October opens with a discourse by Mr. Andrew Carnegie on 'The Second Chamber,' which shows adequate knowledge of the "wivantages of the American Constitution, but hardly of the English. The article seems to us of little practical value. ' Some Racial Character- istics of Northern India and Bengal,' by Ameer

Ah, and F fc;lp and Deities of South India ' bv the Bishop of Madras, are both well worth reaS^ ing. Mr G. W. E. Russell in 'The Portent of Yarmouth returns to a pet subject, the Dis- establishment of the Church. The Bishop of Hereford whose independence of thought and action makes all that he publishes noteworthy writes on 'An Experiment In Rural Libraries for School and Home/ which might well be taken un in many districts The old Horary provided by the village parson of a past generation was, to our knowledge absurdly restricted and inadequate: ( T J ' ?' Williams deals with ' The Early History of London Advertising.' An interesting paper of a similar sort miriit be made out of the beginnings of pictorial advertisements. Canon Vau4an an accomplished botanist, has a good articleonLin naeus. The most interesting thing in the number is, however the second part of Bishop's Welldoni discussion ot 'The Authenticity of Ancient Litera!

& l 860 ^ E f ld S S cred ', He show s that the Gospels of the four Evangelists were received in

nrl f 2" a > ^ f u he seco d century as authentic- Chnr^ ; tho tatiye by every part of the Christian Church. He thinks it probable that the Fourth Gospel represents the teaching of St John written down by one of his pupils; and he con- cludes with the remark that the new Testament except for Philemon and 2 Peter, can boast better external evidence than "the great mass of ancient Greek and Latin terature." Mr. J. A. Spender concludes an excellent number by some shrewd

8 ' m W rdy fabric f ' Mr ' Shaw ' s

IN The Cornhill Mr. Robert Bridges has an admir- able appreciation of The Poems of Mary Coleridge ' which are but little known to the general public' partly, perhaps owing to an elusive quality which' requires something between a philosopher and a ^/r- 01 " Jts understanding. The specimens offered Miss Coleridge s muse show that her work had real distinction. . In The Man in the Iron Cage' the Rev. S. Baring-Gould revives the story of a spectre who was seen by many people of a sensible not to say unbelieving tendency towards the world of ghosts. 'The Campaigns of 1807 ' by Sir Foster Cunliffe and 'Rome before the Battle of Mentena,' by the Rev. E. F. Wayne, are rather solid fare for the ordinary man, but of interest to the historically minded. Through the Vortex of a Cyclone,' by VV- 1. Hodgson is en revanche sensational enough for anybody, and exhibits the courage of a modern photographer, who will " take " in tht arms t death pictures he has little hope of " developing "

Ei vi, B DSOn, in hi ? series essa y s ' At Large ' ' '

deals with ' Travel,' and gives us the usual sensatfon

of placid cultivation. He is all for indefinite in- iuences rather than definite impressions, and he is ashionable in discovering that most people have a ood deal to see in England. He wants to be quiet x>o. Iravel is essentially a distraction, and I do pt want to be distracted anymore." "Distrac- lon here means drowning thought. But a good

many people keep to a later age than Mr. Benson's- delight m new impressions of men and things. Jthers regard themselves, to speak chemically, as saturated solutions," filled full of noteworthy natter, and want no new friends and faces. Mr

Senson seems to us to have a " sad lucidity of soul " vluch is not ordinary, and which hardly makes for omance, the btevensonian sense that gives some