9 th S. II. OCT. 8, '98.]
NOTES AND QUERIES.
299
fault we can find is that the biography is perhaps
too short. Canon Ainger refrains from criticism,
though he is communicative as to the reception
awarded by the public to successive works. The
biography is very interesting. It is characteristic
of the amiable and accomplished biographer that
the less pleasing aspects of the immortal poet (and
he had such) do not appear. Is it quite accurate to
say that the drama or ' The Foresters ' is "as yet
unpublished"? We have now before us a copy
with the name of Macmillan, New York and
London, as publishers, and the date 1892. Of
scarcely inferior interest from any point of view,
and of even greater interest from one, is the life
of Thackeray by his son-in-law, Leslie Stephen.
This is the longest biography in the volume, and is
eminently judicious and readable. Mr. Stephen
has the courage to say that the action of Thackeray
which led to Edmund Yates quitting the Garrick
Club was "injudicious." It was no less. So popular
was Thackeray with the members of the club in his
time that the fight between the two men, even
though Yates was championed by Dickens, was
unequal. In writing the life Mr. Stephen has, it
may be supposed, had access to all the material
which Mrs. Ritchie is employing in her biographical
edition of her father's works. Thackeray was a
great club man. Apart from the more important
clubs of which he was a member, the Athenaeum,
the Garrick, and the Reform, some of the smaller
clubs he helped to form are in a sense alive, and a
few unpublished trifles of his throwing off in con-
nexion with them could with some difficulty be
traced. A great amount of important work has
once more been assigned to Mr. Thomas Seccombe,
by whom it is ably and conscientiously done. Among
many excellent biographies by Mr. Seccombe are
the Sir William Temple, Bonnell Thornton, John
Thelwall, reformer and lecturer, and James Thom-
son of 'Seasons' fame. This last is the most im-
portant of the sub-editor's articles. Mr. Seccombe
holds that in the possession of the true poetic
temperament Thomson has not been surpassed even
by Tennyson. He is far from regarding the poetical
product of the two men as equal. A biography to
which our readers will naturally turn is that of
W. J. Thorns, the founder of ' N. & Q.' This is sym-
pathetically written by Mr. E. I. Carlyle. Miss
Kate Norgate has an admirable life of Thomas a
Becket. Tillotson is treated by the Rev. Alexander
Gordon. Under Theobald, Thurstan, &c., many
eminently satisfactory lives by the Rev. W. Hunt
will be found. Mr. Stanley Lane - Poole deals,
under Temple, with Lord Palmerston, the Prime
Minister. Mr. C. H. Firth is still concerned with
regicides and others of the Commonwealth period.
Mr. Fraser Rae writes on Richard Tickell. Mr.
Thomas Bayne, Mr. H. R. Tedder, Mr. Aitken, Mr.
Churton Collins, Mr. Thompson Cooper, Mr. Lionel
Cust, Mr. W. P. Courtney, Mr. F. M. O'Dowd, Dr.
Norman Moore, Mr. Henry Davey, and Miss Lee are
a few only of those whose contributions deserve a
notice considerations of space forbid us to accord
them.
MR. T. FISHER UNWIN has reprinted, in a shilling edition, Scott's Fortunes of Nigel, with the author's introduction slightly abridged and his notes, to- gether with a frontispiece presenting Margaret Ramsay in her page's dress.
THE only distinctly literary paper in the Fort- nightly consists of Mrs. Spear's ' An Italian Gold-
smith,' the title of which, we are free to confess,
led us to expect a short story. It is to Goldsmith,
the author of ' The Vicar of Wakefield,' that Mrs.
Spear draws attention, and not to some worker in
the precious metals in Genoa or Turin. Salvatore
Farina is the novelist held worthy of a comparison
that Britons must regard as honouring. Pleasant
and readable enough is the article, but the trans-
lated passages fail to convey to us, who do not
know the author's works, an idea of the resem-
blance on which Mrs. Spear dwells. Mr. John F.
Taylor, Q.C., draws a parallel between ' Bismarck
and Richelieu,' in which the balance of favour is on
the side of Richelieu. Ouida has, under the head
' Canicide,' one of her vigorous protests against our
treatment of animals. She tells some very shocking
and almost incredible stories, and is once more in
grim earnest. Mr. Demetrius C. Boulger sends an
article on ' Twelve Years' Work on the Congo,' show-
ing what has been done by the King of the Belgians
in the way of founding a "Black Empire." The
Congo region is described as twenty - three times
the size of Belgium. The approaching visit of the
Emperor William to Palestine is dealt with by
one who elects to remain anonymous, and who
dwells on the political significance of the under-
taking. ' A Diary at Santiago ' is by Mr. Frederick
W. Ramsden, lately British Consul for the Province
of Santiago de Cuba, and is accompanied by a map.
According to the statements made, it took in the
bombardment fifteen tons of metal for every man
killed. Still slighter than the space allotted to
literature in the Fortnightly is that in the Nine-
teenth Century^ wherein Prof. St. George Mivart,
dealing with ' Helbeck of Bannisdale,' takes a view
of the book widely different from that previously
expounded in the same magazine by Father Clarke.
The most amusing paper in the number is the
species of apology for the French by Sir Hubert
Jerningham. Sir Hubert's observations are based
on Mr. Bodley's recently published work on France.
Very difficult is it for the Anglo-Saxon race to
understand the French, or for the French to under-
stand the Anglo-Saxon. " They give it up and call
us hypocrites. We give them up and call them
frivolous. Both terms are inexact." Mr. Sidney
Low asks 'Should Europe Disarm?' and seems
disposed to answer, " Not yet." He has a serious
complaint against that pestilent personage the
modern military and naval inventor, whom he
describes as " a cosmopolitan nuisance." Lady
Wimborne's article on ' The Ritualist Conspiracy '
describes itself in its title. Mr. Henry de Mosen-
thal writes a life of Alfred Nobel, ' The Inventor of
Dynamite.' The story of the invention is very
interesting. Mr. William Sharp concludes 'The
Art Treasures of America.' The Hon. Walter
Rothschild has a good paper on ' The Birds of the
Bass Rock.' ' The Story of Murat and Bentinck '
lets one into some diplomatic secrets. Sir Herbert
Maxwell writes on ' Tuberculosis in Man and Beast.'
A very important paper is that by the Moulvie
Rafiiiadin Ahmad on ' The Battle of Omdurman
and the Mussulman World.' Thte frontispiece to
the Century consists of a reproduction of Hoppner's
exquisite 'Countess of Bedford.' A capital account
by JM. Armand Dayot of Edouard Detaille follows.
This has some wonderfully fine illustrations by
Detaille, presenting that eminent painter in a quite
new light. His sketches are full of life and cha-
racter, and have in some cases marvellous humour.
Another of Gilbert Stuart's ' Portraits of Women '
