Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 10.djvu/26

 NOTES AND QUERIES.

[11 S. X. JULY 4, 1914.

The Cornhill Magazine begins with the first chapters of a novel entitled ' Two Sinners,' by Mrs. Ritchie. It starts out pretty well. The poem " A True Dream,' from the unpublished remains of Mrs. Browning's early .work, is several degrees "better as poetry than the relics hitherto exhumed. Mr. A. C. Benson has some graceful commonplaces about old buildings in a paper called ' The Beauty of Age,' and Julia Cartwright contributes one of her pleasant studies of the Italian Renaissance in 'Cardinal Benibo and his Villa.' Mr. Stephen Paget in the first instalment of a series called ' The New Parents' Assistant' makes several sound and shrewd remarks which, however, are nearly lost in a mass of quasi-humorous illustration and paradox, which for some reason or other remains rather unconvincing. Of Mr. Bradby's three essays under the common title ' By the Wayside,' the third, ' White, Black, and Grey,' is decidedly the best. 'For good tales and several are really good the reader will turn to the Marchesa Peruzzi de' Medici's description of her life in the house of her father, the sculptor J ulian Story, at Rome, where Hans Andersen and Robert Browning both figure ; and also to Sir Henry Lucy's wonted ' Sixty Years in the Wilderness.' ' The Illustrious Garrison,' by Lieut.-Col. MacMunn, gives in a sufficiently telling way the story of Sale's Brigade at Jellalabad ; and there is a short story, 'Pride of Service," by Mr. Boyd Cable, of which the stuff, and also the descriptive treatment, are excellent ; indeed, it wants only firmer, less amateurish handling of the characters at the climax to give it a claim to quite outstanding praise. Just a year ago we commented sympathetically on an excellent article by Mr. Hesketh Prichard about the Grey Seals of Haskeir. We congratulate both him and the editor of The Cornhill upon the effect of that article, which, through the intermediation of Mr. Charles Lyell. M P.. " stung the Legislature into legislating," and has brought to pass the Grey Seals ("Protection) Bill. This has now gone through its third reading in the House of Lords, and provides a close season ior grey seals from 1 October to 15 December.

THE July number of The Nineteenth Century is one of the best of recent years. The AbW Ernest Dimnet has an article, important for its literary as well as for its social information, on the question "* Does the Church play any Active Part in France ? ' The situation, as he depicts it, is of unique interest. The history of religion may often be shown by the "historian to repeat itself. The position of the 'Church in France to-day would seem to be in all literalness unprecedented. Miss Edith Sichel gives -us an attractive account of the late Emily Lawless ; and Mr. Darrell Figgis draws from the volumes recently given to the world by Mrs. Parnell a por- trait of Charles Stewart Parnell, which certainly explains his peculiar effectiveness, as the descrip- tions of him prior to the publication of this new life do not. One of the most charming papers in the number and of a type to please, we think, many of our readers is Mrs. Stirling's ' A Georgian Scrap-book,' this being a book of extracts compiled squire and wife of another, and a friend of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's. Diana had a discerning eye in the matter of excerpts, and a brisk sense of humour, and the matter here selected out from her selections is most of it eminently worth while. Miss Arabella Kenealy contributes a lengthy and
 * by Diana Bosville, daughter of one Yorkshire

fascinating answer in the affirmative to the query ' Is Man an Electrical Organism ? ' stating, with considerable ingenuity and force, speculations which seem everywhere in the air about us just now. Miss Gertrude Kingston is a trenchant critic of the last three generations : her opinions seem to have been formed almost too exclusively from what she has observed in one stratum of society, and in, perhaps, only some of the circles even of this. Her warning note about the schoolboys of the present generation certainly deserves attention.

IN the July Fortnightly Count Ilya Tolstoy continues his reminiscences of his father, the naive and homely record still of early childhood, with nothing in it unparalleled, but fairly interest- ing as to the details given. There is an account of the family sayings which became, within the family, proverbial, and this suggests that it would be interesting to have a collection of these started, no matter from what family, so they were properly authenticated and genuine. Mr. Gilbert Cole- ridge contributes a charming paper on Sir Thomas Browne, a personage whom it never seems weari- some repeatedly to contemplate. Prof. Gaston S^vrette interprets to us M. Jean Richepin's interpretation of Shakespeare correcting parts of it where he deems it needs correction, as, for example, in the matter of Desdemoua's character, whom M. Richepin, perversely we also think, will have to be "curious, super-subtle," "an intellectuelle." Mr. J. F. Macdonald admires Mr. Zangwill's play 'Plaster Saints,' and gives his reasons for doing so in a skilful analysis. Mr. William Archer's 'Manners in India,' and Mr. Wilfrid Ward's ' Oxford Liberalism and Dogma,' are perhaps not so far beyond the scope of ' N. & Q.' that we must forbear to mention them, being as they are very well worth consideration. The remaining papers are on national and interna- tional political questions,

JHoitws to (tercspotttonts.

ON all communications must be written the name and address of the sender, not necessarily for pub- lication, but as a guarantee of good faith.

To secure insertion of communications corre epondents must observe the following rules. Lei each note, query, or reply be written on a separate slip of paper, with the signature of the writer and such address as he wishes to appear. When answer- ing queries, or making notes with regard to previous entries in the paper, contributors are requested to put in parentheses, immediately aftar the exact heading, the series, volume, and page or pages tc which they refer. Correspondents who repeat queries are requested to head the second com- munication " Duplicate."

W. H. P, Forwarded.

MR. L. STANLEY JAST ("Sundial Motto"). Ecclesiastes iii. 15.

L. V. desires to thank the correspondents who have sent him replies re " Wildgoose."

MAJOR CUTHBERTSON and MR. R. M. HOGG. " Inveni portum " has been discussed at 6 S. i. 494 : ii. 136, 409; iv. 76 ; 7 S. ix. 168, 237; and 9 S. ii. 41,229. ,