Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 12.djvu/466

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s. xn. DEC. 5, 1903.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

The American Revolution. Part II. Vols. I. and II. By Sir G. Otto Trevelyan, Bart. (Longmans & Co.) WITH the two volumes now issued Sir George Trevelyan's task of supplying a history of the American Revolution is presumably accomplished. His scheme has apparently been modified during its progress. In the preface to the first part, pub- lished in 1899, he owns that the work is to some extent substituted for a continuation of The Early History of Charles James Fox,' issued nineteen years previously. The first part in question dealt with the decade between 1766 and 1776, ending, after Bunker's Hill and Lexington, at a period when George III., having accomplished his purpose, had rooted out from the councils of the State "frankness, courage, and independence, together with some other things with which his councils could even worse afford to dispense/' Resuming at this point his narrative, Sir George continues it until he reaches the American successes of Trenton and Princeton, and Howe's subsequent concentration of his army. At this date he abandons the record of the progress of American arms, and shows us in the four following chapters the influence upon England and Western Europe of the events he has described. It is difficult to believe that any patriotic sentiment led to this apparent shrinkage of scheme. The effect is none the less to spare the reader the chief details of British humiliation and defeat. As in the previous volume, an attitude of calm judiciality is maintained, and even in the case of George III., upon whose pigheadedness and desire to rule England upon the principles which had cost {Stuart monarchs their heads or their crowns the responsibility for the loss of the colonies is thrown, an effort to be scrupulously just is always percept- ible. To the truthfulness of the king, no less than to his keenness of insight in State matters and to the personal influence by which others besides Dr. Johnson were impressed, full justice is done. As it is obviously impossible to deal with, or even indicate, the various points in which the book is noteworthy, we may only mention a few separate matters. Curious in itself, though easily explicable, is the influence of Macaulay over his connexion and biographer. In no previous work of Sir George's have we found this influence equally assertive. Take the signature of the Declaration of Indepen- dence and the results by which it was attended or followed. With the alteration of names, this, which will be found i. 182-3, might almost pass for a com- panion sketch in prose to the ballad of ' The Armada.' It is impossible for us to quote in support of this assertion, but those familiar with Macaulay's spirited lyric cannot fail in perusal to perceive the justice of our comment. The pictures of political characters have their old vivacity and fidelity and this holds true of the subordinate characters in the drama as well as the active participants in it. Fox's famous declaration in answer to Wedder burn's comparison between Lord North and Lore Chatham is quoted : " Not Lord Chatham (he cried), not Alexander the Great, nor Csesar, hac ever conquered so much territory in the course o all their wars as Lord North had lost in one cam paign." General John Sullivan is dismissed, in phrase the application of which might be extendec so as to include the mother country, as "one o:

hose fatal generals with whom America has oeen cursed in every war she has ever waged." Of the beginning of a war the conclusion of which was, in a sense, so disastrous Sir George holds that 'England never entered upon a great military nterprise with so large a supply of men qualified oy standing and experience to lead her battalions." One of the most interesting parts of the work is hat descriptive of the influence of the Loyalists, or Tories, as they are called, and of the active mismanagement which was necessary to consolidate he Republican party. Concerning the situation. >f the American Quakers, ".potentially the keenest >f fighters," much is said. An interesting story s told of the misfortunes of a Loyalist who was he father of Leigh Hunt; a second of a Lord Stirling, among the Republican leaders, who was, or claimed to be, a descendant of the famous author of ' Monarchicke Tragedies.' All that is said about the Hessian troops is worth attention, especially the circumstances attendant upon their evy ; and it is satisfactory that the chief com- plaints of offences against honesty or compassion ncurred by the English troops were directed against jur foreign stipendiaries. Much of Sir George's- banter, which is often effective, is directed against General Charles Lee. The most animated passages n the work are those descriptive of the rolling up jf the Hessians in Trenton. Of the two separate portions into w,hich the history may almost be livided, that dealing with political development n England is the more spirited and absorbing. Both portions are, however, deeply interesting, and ihe work is a fine, if rather hurried addition to our knowledge of a period of almost unprecedented storm and stress. The index might with advantage be made more comprehensive.

Wakemaii's Handbook of Irish Antiquities. Edited

by John Cooke. (Dublin, Hodges & Co.) TWELVE years have elapsed since the appearance of the second edition of the 'Irish Antiquities, Pagan and Christian,' of W. F. Wakeman, a book that has done more than almost any other to- popularize a fascinating study. A third edition' has now been called for, and is issued under the care of Mr. John Cooke. It has received much in the way of recension and more in that of addition, the chapters on ' Burial Customs and Ogam Stones/ ' Stone Fonts,' ' Lake Dwellings,' ' Stone and Bronze Ages,' and 'Early Christian Art' being practically new. Over sixty illustrations have been added, and the book has been brought generally in line with modern research. Irish archaeology offers great temptation to the student, and much exploration has yet to be done, some of it, it is to be hoped, at public expense. A handbook better or more con- venient than this is not to be expected, and the supremacy accorded it as a popular guide will be maintained by the new and eminently scholarly edition.

THE new number of the English Historical Revieiw is of unusual interest. In an article on 'The Anarchy of Stephen's Reign ' Mr. H. W. C. Davis shows the very good ground there is for the use of this phrase, and indicates that both Mr. Hewlett and Mr. Round have gone a great deal too far in minimizing it : " They have not unfrequently been, taken to affirm that the exceptions which they prove are really typical instances ; that the reign, of Stephen was not one of anarchy tempered by