Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/247

 9'"S. VII. MARCH 23, 1901.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

239

words, " Caendo, e cajendo=cercando ; non ha questo verbo se non questa voce del gerundio, e per lo piu s' accompagna col verbo andare " (i.e., this verb is only used in this gerundive mood, and mostly together with the verb andare, to go). H. KREBS.

Oxford.

COL. THOMAS COOPER (9 th S. vii. 168). If your correspondent will turn to ' N. & Q.,' 3 rd S. xi. 417, 491, he will find some informa- tion which may be of service. I will supply him with a MS. copy should he have any difficulty in referring to the articles in question. EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

71, Brecknock Road.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

Dictionary of Quotations (French and Italian). By Thomas Bentield Harbottle and Col. Philip Hugh Dalbiac. (Sonnenschein & Co.) CONCERNING the need that existed for a book such as is here supplied there can be no question. In- quiries after such have been made in our columns, and we have ourselves lived in constant need of a work of the class. Of the competency of the two compilers for the task undertaken there is also no doubt. Col. Dalbiac was responsible for the first volume of the series, and Mr. Harbottle for the second. For the former, which constitutes the most important and serviceable dictionary of Eng- lish quotations, see ' N. & Q.,' 8 th S. ix. 359 ; for the latter, which is the best existing guide to classical quotations, see 8 th S. xii. 518. It was originally hoped to include in a third and final volume Euro- pean quotations generally. This was naturally found impossible. Yet one more volume, occupied with German and Spanish quotations, is still to be expected. This is a matter on which the reader is to be congratulated ; and if the forthcoming volume is, as it is bound to be, equal to its predeces- sors, it is sure of a cordial welcome. The wit and wisdom of Sancho Panza will in itself fill up no inconsiderable space, while, to take a solitary book in a language such as the German, full of pregnant utterances, Goethe's Conversations with Eckermann is in itself a mine.

Turning to the present volume, we find it is admirably rich in both Italian and French quota- tions. Absolute completeness is never to be hoped. There are pages of Montaigne in which each con- secutive sentence is a gem of thought or language. Moliere is practically inexhaustible, as are Rabelais, Voltaire, Balzac, to say nothing of La Rochefou- cauld, La Bruyere, Chamfort, and a score others. A volume of ' Pens6es' from Balzac has already been given to the world. In a second edition we shall hope to see a quotation or two from Rivarol, such as " Get heureux pouyoir des mots qui sillonne si

Erofondement 1'attention des hommes en ebranlant mr imagination " ; and we commend the insertion of Arnolphe's observation to Agnes (' Ecole des Femmes,' III. ii.)-

Du cote de la barbe est la toute-puissance ; the " La joie de 1'esprit en marque la force " of

Ninon de 1'Enclos (we quote from Barbey d'Aure- villyandSainte-Beuve); and Voltaire's observations on what are called sacred verses,

Sacre"s ils sont ; car personne n'y touche. We might continue long. Our desire is not, how- ever, to trace inevitable omissions, but to recom- mend to our readers a work of solid value and merit. We have tested the book again and again, and are grateful and surprised at its fulness. The translations and explanations are generally useful and adequate. Now and then, but rarely, the reader would probably be thank- ful for further information. In the case of " La venue des coquecigrues " of Rabelais a simple translation is scarcely enough. The average- reader should be told that, the coquecigrue being an imaginary animal, the period indicated is " never." In the Italian section materials are less overwhelm- ing. We fail to find who first said " Traduttore, traditore ! " and cannot straight off supply the omission. There are, of course, numerous quota- tions from Dante, among which we do not find the immortal passage beginning

Ricorditi di me che son la Pia : Siena mi fe, disfecemi Maremma. In these days, however, there is no means of satis- fying a Dantophile short of quoting the entire ' Divina Commedia.' There is less need of a hand- book to Italian quotations than for one to French. The present is, however, welcome. We gladly hail the new volume, and place it at hand by its fellows for constant reference. The indexes are all that can be desired, and the cross-references seem to us. better than in the previous volumes.

Robert Louiv Stevenson : a Life Htiulij in Criticism.

By H. Bellyse Baildon. (Chatto &' Windus.) MR. BAILDON was Stevenson's schoolfellow in 1864 and 1865 at the day-school of Mr. Robert Thom- son, M.A., Frederick Street, Edinburgh, and en- joyed a certain amount of juvenile intimacy with him. Since Stevenson's death Mr. Baildon has written concerning him in Temple Bar, lectured on him in England and Scotland, and contributed to Englitche Studien, edited by the late Prof. Koel- bing, of Breslau, a series of articles in English. He has now issued what claims rather to be a critical estimate of Stevenson than a life, and has enjoyed the exceptional advantage of having it issued by Messrs. Chatto & Windus, the publishers of Stevenson's best books, in the same shape as Stevenson's own works. A book seeing the light under such conditions is likely to share a measure of the popularity enjoyed by the works with which it deals, a result to which the inclusion of two admirably characteristic portraits of Stevenson will further contribute. Not specially novel or im- portant is what Mr. Baildon has to tell us concern- ing Stevenson's personality. Of the opportunities of visiting the author of ' Catriona,' ' Weir of Her- miston,' and 'The New Arabian Nights' which were afforded him he was unable to avail himself, and he has consequently little to add to what has been said by others more happily situated. Mere scraps of information concerning Stevenson's quaint and delightful if in a sense rather perverse individu- ality are welcome ; and it is interesting to find him, even in early school-days, collaborating with Mr. Baildon in a novel, the plot of which was of the true Stevensonian type, its scene being Jamaica