Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/147

 ii s. i. FEB. 12, i9io.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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Mr. Dobson could start a school of writers like himself ; but the grace without affectation and the judgment would only come after years of apprenticeship to letters. Mr. A. Maurice Low is interesting, as usual, on ' American Affairs ' ; and Miss Singleton in ' Some Irish Fairies ' almost persuades us of that belief in the supernatural which Ireland retains in a material age.

The Nineteenth Century opens with an article on ' The Naval Situation and Party Politics,' by Sir W. H. White. We have almost ceased to take any interest in a subject which is so notori- ously overwritten, and nearly always from a party point of view. Mr. Ellis Barker, who discusses ' The Parliamentary Position and the Irish Party,' declares that Home Rule can do no good to the Irish, who should, however, be more than com- pensated for its loss by the blessings of Tariff Reform. Miss Gertrude Kingston in ' She Stoops to Canvass,' does not confine herself to incidents of electioneering, but explains how the country should be governed. Few sensible people are likely to approve of so obvious and violent a partisan. To talk about " Mr. Lloyd George with his personal animus against men of breeding " seems to us distinctly bad taste, the worst sort of election manners. Two excellent articles are of Prof. Foster Watson on ' George Meredith and Education ' and Mr. Pett Ridge on ' The London Loafer.' Both say well things hardly realized by the average man of to-day. Mr. Edwin A. Pratt is against ' The Canal Revival Scheme,' and points out that continental systems of the kind can hardly be fairly compared with our own. ' Ibsen as a Norwegian,' by Dr. Halvdan Koht, gives Mr. Gosse full credit for his pioneer work in making Ibsen known, and inci- dentally corrects him in some details. Ibsen was, apparently, lucky in the pensions he secured when he was a writer of promise rather than per- formance. Mr. C. F. Cooksey, who opens his article with some wordy and wholly unnecessary rhetoric, offers some ingenious speculations on ' The Origin of Stonehenge.' Aided by local place- names, Geoffrey of Monmouth and Walter Map, and his own investigations of various sites, he suggests that the stones now known as Stone- henge were brought to the spot they now occupy from Arreton Down in the Isle of Wight, and the Salisbury Avon was used to transport them. Xi -a r the village of Bulford " may be seen in the river a stone evidently intended to form part of one of the trilithons." An earlier transportation to Arreton Down was made from Le Platon, a hill close to the town of Bolbec at the mouth of the Seine. These operations are, apparently, ascribed to a Belgo-Gallic race, which left traces in England of a comparatively high state of culture that was not indigenous. We cannot exhibit in a small space the various hints out of which this theory is built up. Suffice it to say that it will interest all antiquaries.

A STRIKING picture of the late George Salting from a " gum print " by Dr. Otto Rosenheim is the frontispiece of this month's Burlington, and the first editorial article is devoted to the Salting Collection. The same collector is the subject of a short personal notice by Dr. C. H. Read. ' The Ludwig Mond Bequest ' follows. An article on the passing of ' The New Gallery ' speaks with entire justice concerning the tyranny of modern

commerce. This well-known gallery is, it appears, to be " offered up as a sacrifice to the Moloch t of modern civilization, the foreign restaurant." ' English Enamels on Brass of the Seventeenth Century ' are said by Mr. Edward Dillon to be rare, and very little is known of their origin. Mr. Dillon thinks that this sort of art was introduced from Russia, which has the same sort of enamelling in little portable ikons. Two enamelled firedogs are reproduced which were probably in Nonsuch Palace in James I.'s day. Mr. Roger Fry has a subject to his heart in ' The Umbrian Exhibition at the Burlington Fine-Arts Club.' He also continues the translation of the French appreciation of Cezanne which began in January, and which is full of striking generaliza- tion. ' Art in America ' is this month partkni- larly strong. We find a description of the lavishly arranged new museum at Boston, with a plan ; and an account with illustrations of portraits by Van Dyck in New York, and Dutch pictures in the Hudson-Fulton Exhibition. Here is. indeed, much to attract the lover of fine painting. Mr. Kenyon Cox says : "In figure painting the Dutchmen are still our masters ; in landscape we have learned things they did not know."

BOOKSELLERS' CATALOGUES. FEBRUARY.

MR. F. C. CARTER of Hornsey sends two Cata- logues, No. 20 and Extra Series No. 1. The former contains under Norfolk a MS. relating to the Manor of Northelmham, 1628-50, which includes a complete record of the transfers of property, presentments for offences, &c., in this- Court Baron, 61. Under Charter Rolls are grants of Free Warren in these Rolls for Edward II. and III.,, with index ; Cartulary of Bermondsey Abbey, 1080-1432, &c., the MS. bound in contemporary vellum, stamped arms in gold on covers, 6Z. 6s. The modern Record Office Calendars do not index the Charter Rolls for the above reigns, and this index gives the names of persons as well as places. Under Emblems is a collection of 366 views of cities in Denmark, Germany, Switzer- land, and other places, each in brilliant gold and" colours, with emblems by a contemporary hand r circa 1620, 4Z. 10s. There are axitographs of George IV., William IV., and Victoria. Under Brachygraphy is Gurney's ' System of Shorthand.' Under Curiosa are portraits of smugglers, giants, female soldiers, and persons who lived from 107 to 152 years. The general portion includes ' Footsteps of Dr. Johnson in Scotland,' by G. Birkbeck Hill, Edition de Luxe, large 4to r vellum, in box, 11. 14s. ; Lean's ' Collectanea,' 5 vols., royal 8vo, 1902-4, 11. 15s. ; Moore'* ' Epistles ' and Poems, chiefly written in Ame- rica, first edition, 4to, calf, 1806, 7s. 6d. (contain* the first issue of ' The Canadian Boat Song ') ? Richardson's novels, 20 vols., cloth, 1902, 1 T. 8s. ; and the W T orks of Taylor the Water Poet, folio, original calf (new back), 1630, 31. 15s. (no engraved; title, and a tear in one leaf, otherwise a clean and ! perfect copy). Among views and portraits are a collection of sixty of Oxford and Cambridge, 1738-1830, the whole in a large folio volume, half -morocco, 31. ; ' Eminent Men in the Reigns of Charles I. and II., including the Rebellion/ 1793, 21. 8s. ; Nash's ' Views ' ; ' Johnson rescuing, Goldsmith from his Landlady,' &c.