Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 8.djvu/246

 "200 NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. vm. MARCH 5, 1921. on them, for all, in greater or less degree, still possess real interest, and deserve to be written of yet once again. The first is Thomas Edwards author of ' The Canons of Criticism ' a man who should rouse lively sympathy in the breast of every reader of true possessor of the instincts of a scholar, he found Warburton's emendations of Shakespeare's text to. be beyond all endurance, and, in the work above-named, made an onslaught upon them as delightful to the spectators as it was Infuriating to Warburton. The ' Canons ' were added to in edition after edition, and if now there is no need for any but the curious to read them, it is worth remembering that? they, did yeoman service in the cause of sound scholarship at the moment when they first appeared. Edwards 'was a barrister, owner of a small estate at Baling, a man with a circle of friends and acquaintances of some note (Samuel Richardson among them), and himself capable of turning a good sonnet after the model of Milton. One name that appears in connexion with Edwards furnishes the central figure to the next study, the amiable and learned William Heberden, M.D., who, like Dr. Arbuthnot, illustrates the pleasing characteristics of the eighteenth century medical practitioner. The essay on " Hermes " Harris is in Mr. Austin Dobson's best manner. It gives us ample information, in a spacious uncrowded style, moving easily onward and having the stage enlivened by many familiar personages pleasantly, for the nonce, grouped around one relatively unfamiliar. 'The excellent writer on " grammar and virtue," member for Christchurch, beloved of Fanny Burney, a magnate in his own county, but among men of genius, for all his solid erudition counting chiefly as " intelligent and humble," -.certainly lives on in our day only through the labours of the genealogist or the kindly attention < of such students as Mr. Dobson. A larger and graver theme is the life of John Howard. Our author verbally acknowledges that in Howard's magnetic personal influence lay the secret of his astonishing achievement, but he hardly makes us feel the greatness either of Howard's force or of the task he set himself. In fact this subject proves both too big and sombre for the canvas, and to some extent intractable by Mr. Austin Dobson's manner. ' The Learned Mrs. Carter,' on the other hand, is delightfully done being not the less delectable for those traces of acidity which no one seems able to renounce in writing about the erudite females of the eighteenth century. It is a nice question why the learning of, say, Lady Jane Grey or Elizabeth never provokes a smile, while Elizabeth Carter, say, or Catherine Talbot is praised with something of a patronizing jocularity, with a scarce perceptible disparagement. De St. Aubyn's portrait of the Abb Edgeworth engraved by Anthony Garden forms the frontis- piece of this book. The noble story of the Abbess relations with the royal family of France is the last of this group told completely, and very carefully illustrated by a plan of Louis XVI's apartments in the Temple. There is no .need to comment on it. Perhaps in this last essay, particularly, we regret a certain looseness of style nto which Mr. Austin Dobson sometimes falls. Thus he tells us that in his visits to the Tuilleries Edgeworth "as a matter of fact. . . .was literally taking his life in his hand." And in the last sentence of so deeply affecting a history he brings us down to earth with a jar by placing Edgeworth among the " un cenotaph ed Martyrs to duty." Are we to admit such a verb as "to cenotaph " ? Not without a shudder, nor without a grudge against Mir. Austin Dobson for lending such a monster his countenance. Le Comique et la Signification. By W. Uhrstrom. (Stockholm, Norstedo, 2 kr. 50 ore.) H. BERGSON'S " Le Rire " seems to have inspired this lively little study. It is divided into three sections each abundantly illustrated. In the first the comic element depends on exaggeration, but without any alteration of the proper sense of the words used ; in the second the comic expression has one sense for one speaker another for the other ; in the third, it bears two senses simultaneously. Some of the stories are old, as, for instance, the witticism about the Church histories of Choisy arid Fleury ; one or two are of English derivation. Allowing for the chilling effect of their being pre- sented as specimens for classification, most of them will raise a laugh, arid, having reached the last page, the reader will find himself able, more easily than before, to see what was the trick that has amused him. Our Clapham Forefathers, being a List of Inscrip- tions from Tombs, Monuments and Headstones of the old Parish Churchyard. Compiled by the Rev. T.'C. Dale. COPIES of this little work may be obtained from R. de M. Rudolf (41 The Chase, Clapham Com- mon, S.W.4) who furnishes an interesting preface. Full particulars of names and dates are given for 725 M.I. now to be seen either in the Church or the churchyard, together with over 100 more, now lost, which are preserved in the Note-book of Barak Longmate, now in the Public Library at Camberwell. The Atkins monument is the best known feature of this kind belonging to the Church, but there are others worth noting, and several interesting names occur among the mass of inscriptions. Each inscription is numbered, and an index of names makes reference an affair of a moment. 10 (K0msp0nfoniSu EDITORIAL communications should be addressed to " The Editor of * Notes and Queries ' "Adver- tisements and Business Letters to " The Pub- lishers" at the Office, Printing House Square, London, E.C.4. ; corrected proofs to the Athenaeum Press, 11 and 13 Bream's Buildings, E.C.4. ALL communications intended for insertion in our columns should bear the name and address o? the sender not necessarily for publication, but as a guarantee of good faith. WHEN sending a letter to be forwarded to another contributor correspondents are requested to put in the top left-hand corner of the envelope the number of the page of * N. & Q.' to which the letter refers.
 * N. & Q.' A devout student of Shakespeare,