The Palatines in America. BRIEFS ON NEW BOOKS. The story of the Puritans as pioneers in New England has been often told. So, too, in a lesser degree, there has been full recognition of the builder work done by Quakers in Pennsylvania and Huguenots in the Carolinas. Now, at last, another group of refugees, similar in character and purpose to Puritan and Quaker and Huguenot, has found its historian. The Rev. Sanford H. Cobb, whose residence at Richfield Springs, New York, has familiarized him with the earlier seats of this people, has made a valuable addition to the record of our Colonial period in his Story of the Palatines" (Putnam). There are many students of general history who are familiar with the history of the devastation of the Palatinate of the Rhine by the armies of Louis the Fourteenth, yet are ignorant of what that province suffered under its absolutist and bigoted rulers of the next two generations. These Palatine electors emulated that shortsighted French monarch's treatment of the Huguenots, and between 1708 and 1750 drove to a refuge in America over sixty thousand of their best subjects. Many a student of our Civil War who is conversant with the details of that great campaign-beginning in "the Wilderness "—which carried Grant to Richmond, is ignorant that its starting-point, the Germanna Ford through the Rapidan, took its name from a colony of these exiles for conscience' sake, planted in the wilds of Virginia by Governor Spotswood in 1710. New Berne in North Carolina had become, in the previous year, the seat of another colony from the Palatinate, led by the Swiss gentleman Christopher de Graffenried, of the older Alpine Berne. But the great immigration of the Palatines was into New York and Pennsylvania, beginning in 1708, and occupying first the banks of the Hudson in the vicinity of the present Newburgh, whose name possibly enshrines a remembrance of the princely house of Neuberg which ruled over the Palatinate. But the Palatines were not to find a home on the Hudson, nor in any large numbers even within the colony of New York. Mr. Cobb has well told how the English government, and Governor Hunter, after doing everything possible to bring these afflicted people to a better land in America, turned upon them in their poverty, through disappointment as to economic returns which the environment would not produce, and at last drove them despairing to the Indians on the Mohawk. Even here their sufferings did not cease. The stepfatherly care of the government was made more burdensome by the oppressions of wealthy and influential landgrabbers, and so in 1723 a third pilgrimage brought the far larger number of them to the Susquehanna and the Swatara. Here at last, under the Quakers, was freedom and kindly government; and during the next twenty years that portion of Pennsylvania was planted directly from the Palatinate with thousands of families of sturdy and enterprising farmers the forefathers of the "Pennsylvania Dutch." Thus New York lost from her body politic a most valuable element, although enough remained in the original settlements to give America the first apostle of freedom of the press in John Peter Zenger, and to give the next generation that noble soldier of the Oriskany, Nicholas Herkimer. And so she lost Conrad Weiser and Henry Melchior Muhlenburg, and gave to Pennsylvania those other more famous Muhlenburgs, and Zollicoffer, Heintzelman, Siegel, and the Hartranfts. Mr. Cobb has told his story well, and whilst he has done justice to these worthy pioneers, he has not been unmindful of the real merits of Governor Robert Hunter, and of his large services to the commonwealth where he made some sad mistakes. Leisure hours in academic cloisters. We have always been inclined to avoid books called "Idle Hours" or "Dozy Hours," just as we avoid newspaper columns called "Saunterings" or "Gossippings." And almost everybody, we imagine, is inclined to avoid an essay on Pepys as instinctively as one avoids pronouncing that gentleman's name. Still, Mr. W. H. Hudson has claims to attention, and thus we were fortunately led to read his "Idle Hours in a Library" (Doxey) with more sympathy than we should have supposed from title or table of contents. All the essays are not on Pepys,-to tell the truth, only one is; nor are all the essays to be read in idle hours; indeed (the author to the contrary, however) we cannot easily regard them as having been written in idle hours. They are descriptive essays, it is true, and descriptive essays, as such, may have been written or may be read in idle hours. But one cannot imagine Mr. Hudson idly noting the points which go to make up the essay on Elizabethan England; nor can we readily think of a person idly reading the essay on Mrs. Manley and Mrs. Behn. But we will stop what may seem little more than quibbling about a title; enough if we make it clear that these essays are not of those discontinuous ramblings, those roundabout perambulations, those familiar idlings, which begin at any subject that comes to mind, or rather that the mind comes to, and wander a happy-go-lucky course at the suggestion of personal association. These essays are "unacademic," it is true; but each puts before the reader a perfectly definite object. They are, we think, different in merit and in interest. The essay on Elizabethan England is the best, for there is the most in it, and it will be read with pleasure by idler and scholar alike. The essay on Mrs. Manley and Mrs. Behn, on the other hand, is not in subject or in treatment such as to attract or hold an idle interest; its real interest is for the student, although it is not put in such form as to be most useful to him. The essays on Pepys and on the Bohemia of Henri Murger are the two which come nearest the implication of the general title. The first almost led us to break a fixed resolve and read the famous diary, and the second made us glad we had already experienced the Vie de Bohême. To tell the truth, essays of this character are very hard to write well, and even when well written they remind us of the saying of someone to the effect that "at no other period than this were there so many people who wanted to know about books without reading them." To such readers, certainly, Mr. Hudson does not address his work. Others, we suspect, would appreciate his critical opinions, and would, indeed, value them more highly than his descriptive reports. Mr. Hudson accomplished such good results when he was busy in a library that relatively one regrets that he allows himself the privilege of idling there. Some good words about Style. The essay on "Style" which Mr. mentary paper documents that he has left to posterity." We should not know where to look for a finer comment than this upon the Buffonian text that is so generally misquoted. Nor would it be easier to pack more of truth into a few words than we find in such a passage as this: "No two words ever coincide throughout their whole extent. If sometimes good writers are found adding epithet to epithet for the same quality, and name to name for the same thing, it is because they despair of capturing their meaning at a venture, and so practice to get near it by a maze of approximations." We must close our extracts somewhere, and select for the purpose this solution of a vexed question: "According as they endeavor to reduce letters to some large haven and abiding-place of civility, or prefer to throw in their lot with the centrifugal tendency and ride on the flying crest of change, are writers dubbed Classic or Romantic." Who has ever made the distinction more subtly than this, or with choicer turn of phrase? Mr. Raleigh's essay deserves a place on the shelf by the side of Stevenson, almost by the side of Pater and Arnold. "For Greeks in the form of a slender and tastefully printed volume (Arnold) is one of the most remarkable pieces of critical writing that we have seen for many a day. The author not only has a great many real things to say, but he is also the master of a style of his own that attains high distinction. Rather than amplify these propositions in the usual critical fashion, we prefer to fortify them by such quotations as space allows, persuaded In view of the recent Græco-Turkish that even within the present narrow limits, the book War, Mr. W. Alison Phillips's "The may be made to give adequate testimony in its own War of Greek Independence, 1821 behalf. Here is a typically beautiful passage: to 1833," is a very timely book. The author con"The mind of man is peopled, like some silent city, fronts the vital problem of the future of the Balkan with a sleeping company of reminiscences, associa- Peninsula, and asks what aid in its solution can be tions, impressions, aptitudes, emotions, to be awak- derived from the history of Greece in this century. ened into fierce activity at the touch of words. By One is surprised to find that Mr. Phillips still looks one way or other, with a fanfaronnade of the march- with hope to the Greeks as possible regenerators of ing trumpets, or stealthily, by noiseless passages the peninsula, for his entire book is a logical refuand dark posterns, the troop of suggesters enters tation of any such conclusion. It represents the the citadel, to do its work within. The procession Greeks as almost completely destitute of the civic of beautiful sounds that is a poem passes in through virtues, and even more lacking in the personal the main gate, and forthwith the by-ways resound ones. Such a vivid portrayal of lying, thieving, to the hurry of ghostly feet, until the small com- murder, outrage, assassination, treason, and at times pany of adventurers is well-nigh lost and over- cowardice, joined with a picturesque sentimentality whelmed in that throng of insurgent spirits." Again, and the most desperate courage, is almost without how fine, and at the same time how weighty, is the a parallel. In cruelty, the Greek far surpassed the passage with which the essay closes: "Write, and Turk; in treachery he was preeminent; and the after you have attained to some control over the record of butcheries of men, women, and children, instrument you write yourself down whether you committed after capitulation on promise of personal will or no. There is no vice however uncon- safety, is revolting. To give one instance out of scious, no virtue however shy, no touch of mean- hundreds, we select the following from an account ness or generosity in your character, that will not of the slaughter after Navarino, an account given pass on to the paper. You anticipate the day of by a Greek priest: "Women, wounded with musket judgment and furnish the recording angel with ma- balls, rushed into the sea, seeking to escape, and terial. The art of criticism in literature, so often were deliberately shot. Mothers, robbed of their decried and given a subordinate place among the clothes, with infants in their arms, plunged in the arts, is none other than the art of reading and inter- water to conceal themselves from shame, and were preting these written evidences. Criticism has been then made a mark for inhuman riflemen. Greeks popularly opposed to creation, perhaps because the seized infants from their mothers' breasts and kind of creation that it attempts is rarely achieved, dashed them against the rocks. Children, three or and so the world forgets that the main business of four years old, were hurled living into the sea, and Criticism, after all, is not to legislate, but to raise left to drown" (page 59). After this catalogue of the dead. Graves, at its command, have waked horrors, the author adds: "The other atrocities of their sleepers, oped, and let them forth. It is by the Greeks, however, paled before the awful scenes the creative power of this art that the living man which followed the storming of Tripolitza." The is reconstructed from the litter of blurred and frag-writer informs us that the Turks, on the contrary, were seldom guilty of such outrages. The Greeks, not satisfied with butchering the enemy, were a Scourge to their own countrymen; and if neither Turk nor peasant was at hand, these famous warriors fought with each other. In fact, they did this in season and out of season, from the beginning to the end of the war. The decades that have passed since the struggle for independence do not seem to have improved the character of the Greek, if we may be permitted to judge from the events of the last war. It seems, therefore, that we are justified in surrendering a hope which never had a rational basis, the hope that with the Greek lies the welfare of the Balkan peninsula. This does not mean that the Turk is fitted to secure it. Against that, the centuries have decided irrevocably. The Turk is, indeed, just, moderate, and tolerant; but he is a failure as an administrator, and his religion stands in the way of progress. Consequently, the question is as far from solution as ever. Mr. Phillips has consulted the best and most recent authorities, he writes in a delightfully clear and interesting fashion, and his accuracy is unimpeachable. The two volumes, by Mr. J. Fitzgerald Molloy, entitled "The Romance Pictures of 18th century Dublin life. of the Irish Stage" (Dodd), belong to the class of books whose aim is to bring back actors who long ago strutted and fretted their hours upon the stage. At times we wonder if it would not be wiser to leave the graves of these poor mortals undisturbed. In their lives, these actors, through the characters they impersonated, often made men nobler by some pregnant thought that fell from their lips, but, shorn of the form the dramatist gave them, and made to appear in their own naked selves, their ennobling power vanishes like the tinselled frippery of the theatre before the cold light of day. Only here and there in the course of many years is a great actor born, and when such a man dies, there is, to use Hazlitt's words, "a void produced in society, a gap which requires to be filled up." Let authors, if they will, try to fill up these gaps with their books, but let them remember also that it takes a very great actor to make a gap which it is worth while to fill. If anything will redeem the books before us from the ephemeral existence accorded to most works of the sort, it will in all probability be the vivid and varied picture they give us of the social life in Dublin during the eighteenth century. That was a time when life in the Irish capital ran high; when vast crowds thronged to witness scenes of pomp and circumstance like the arrival of the Viceroy or the procession of the Trades; when men won and lost fortunes on the cock-fighting on Cork Hill; when young sparks about town thought no more of fighting a duel than of drinking a glass of claret; when the narrow streets of the city were filled with routs of hooting children following some malefactor who was being whipped, with coachmen and chairmen fighting for the right of way, with dandies and drunkards swearing and singing coarse songs and jostling each other about; when robbery stalked abroad at midnight, and beggary was witty and picturesque even in her rags. It is needless to say that a work which reflects and reproduces such scenes as these is worth the reading, and it is this reproduction of the life of the time that made Mr. Molloy's work worth the writing. The Campaign of Sedan. It is a difficult matter for one with military training to describe a campaign from a military standpoint and make his details clear to the non-military reader. That this can be done, however, is shown by Mr. George Hooper's "Campaign of Sedan," first published in 1887, and now republished in less expensive form as a volume in "Bohn's Standard Library" (Macmillan). The work contains an excellent statement of the condition of the armies of Prussia and of France previous to the outbreak of war, and emphasizes Prussia's advantage at the outset in that she could quickly mobilize her troops. The language is simple yet forcible, and the story of the war itself is so well told that interest is sustained throughout; while the maps, both of the general field of the war and of particular battles, make it possible to follow, step by step, the progress of the campaign. The book ends with the battle of Sedan. The introductory chapter, and the succeeding one on the causes of the war, while presented in an entertaining fashion, do not show that accurate historical knowledge which marks the remainder of the book. Thus, on page 10, in a reference to the harmony of Prussian statesmen on the question of war with Austria, the statement is made that the famous ministerial council of February, 1866, was unanimous in the decision for war, when as a fact both Von Bodelschwingh, Minister of Finance, and the Crown Prince of Prussia, spoke and voted against the war. Such points, however, might easily escape the attention of a writer whose chief interest was in military affairs, and do not detract from the real value of the work—the clear exposition of a great military campaign. The story of a musician's life. When a master of any art or science or profession takes us into his confidence and tells us the true story of his life, we feel it to be a privilege to listen. In "Marchesi and Music" (Harper) this service is rendered by the most famous of living teachers of the art of singing. In her forty-one years of professional life, Madame Marchesi has known nearly every prominent musician of the period, either as friend or as instructor. Consequently the book is full of most entertaining and instructive reminiscence of famous persons, ranging from Nicolai and Mendelssohn (under whose auspices she made her first important appearance before the public) to Massenet, Verdi, Ambroise Thomas, Humperdinck, and other living composers. And side by side with these anecdotes of celebrities, these records of artistic triumphs and brilliant public events, runs a pleasing thread of personal narrative, showing the "truewomanly" side of the illustrious head of the Ecole Marchesi. The glimpses of everyday life, with its early struggles against poverty, its thwarted aims, its griefs in the loss of beloved children, its simple fireside pleasures, and its domestic companionship, are as well worth noting as the more striking incidents. Thus the book has an interest for others beside musicians, and furnishes an excellent commentary on the words which Madame Marchesi announces as her "motto," "Faith, Labor, and Perseverence." BRIEFER MENTION. Volume XI. of "Book Prices Current," published in London by Mr. Elliot Stock, covers the auction sales of the year ending last November. The volume is larger than its predecessors, being augmented by extensive indexes, as well as by the catalogue notes demanded by the unusual number of scarce and valuable books (especially in the Ashburnham collection) sold during the year. The number of lots catalogued is 37,358, and the amount realized was £100,259, a far higher average price than is recorded for any previous year of the publication. Mr. J. H. Slater is the compiler of the work, and gives us the comforting assurance that in bookbuying "just at present there is no great mania to enlarge upon." That noteworthy series of monographs issued under the name of "The Portfolio" has long occupied a unique and enviable position among art periodicals. In the literary excellence of its text, and the beauty of its illustrations and mechanical make-up, it is unsurpassed. The latest issue is an interesting and scholarly essay on Peter Paul Rubens, by Mr. R. A. M. Stevenson, author of the monograph on Velazquez, previously published in the same series. The illustrations accompanying Mr. Stevenson's text consist of two finelyexecuted photogravures and thirty-two plates printed in sepia and black and white. "The Portfolio published in this country by the Macmillan Co. is A volume on "Astronomy "is contributed to the "Concise Knowledge Library" (Appleton) by the collaboration of Miss Agnes M. Clerke with Mr. A. Fowler and Mr. J. Ellard Gore. There are nearly six hundred pages, illustrated, in this "popular synopsis of astronomical knowledge to date," and the text is unusually readable. In this connection we may also mention "A New Astronomy for Beginners" (American Book Co.), a high school text-book by Professor David P. Todd. The author has had the laboratory (not the observatory) constantly in mind during the preparation of this book, and emphasizes throughout the physical aspects of the science. Encouraged, probably, by the success of their excellent "Illustrated English Library," Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons have begun the publication of a new series on somewhat similar lines, which they inaugurate with George Borrow's "Lavengro." The type used in this "New Library," as it is called, is handsome and readable, the paper of a good quality, the presswork well done, and the binding, although somewhat inartistic, is stout and durable. These strong points, combined with the popular price of one dollar per volume, should make the series a success. LITERARY NOTES. The "History of the Indian Mutiny," by Mr. T. Rice Holmes, first published in 1883, is now issued by the Macmillan Co, in a new (fifth) edition, thoroughly revised, and extended to a thick volume of nearly seven hundred pages. Turgot's "Reflections on the Formation and the Distribution of Riches," translated and edited (we presume) by Professor Ashley, is published as an "Economic Classic" by the Macmillan Co. The original of this work is dated 1770. "The Diplomatic Relations between Cromwell and Charles X. Gustavus of Sweden" is the title of a doctoral dissertation offered at Heidelberg by Mr. Guernsey Jones, and now published in pamphlet form by the State Journal Co., Lincoln, Nebraska. The Christian Literature Co. are the publishers of an American edition (two volumes in one) of Professor Max Müller's translation of the twelve classical Upanishads, hitherto known as forming a part of the series called "Sacred Books of the East." "The Bible References of John Ruskin," compiled by Misses Mary and Ellen Gibbs, is a recent publication of the Oxford University Press. The work has been done with both intelligence and conscience, and the book is one that both Ruskinians and Bible students will find useful. Mr. Henry Sweet's "First Steps in Anglo-Saxon," published by the Oxford University Press, is an even more elementary book than the " Anglo-Saxon Primer " of the same author. An extremely simplified grammar, some forty pages of text for reading, and as many pages of notes, make up the contents of this little book. "The Artist," one of the best of English art periodicals, has recently extended its material and scope, and now appears in greatly enlarged form. The March issue contains a number of interesting articles, all of which are profusely illustrated. Messrs. Archibald Constable & Co. of London are the publishers of "The Artist." We have already spoken of the first two sections of the bibliography of "Elizabethan Translations from the Italian" prepared by Miss Mary Augusta Scott, and published by the Modern Language Association of AmerA third section of this work, including 111 titles of "miscellaneous translations," has just been issued, leaving but one more to appear. ica. The James Russell Lowell memorial park is in danger. Of the $35,000 needed for the purchase of the Elmwood estate only about two-thirds has thus far been subscribed. The time of purchase has been extended to May 1, but if the fund is not made up by that date, the trustees will be forced to cut up the land into building lots, and the opportunity to secure Elmwood for public purposes will have been lost. The "Christmas Books," in one thick volume, and "The Old Curiosity Shop," in two of less generous dimensions, are now added to the "Gadshill" edition of Dickens, edited by Mr. Andrew Lang, and imported by Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons. From the same importers we also have Volumes III. and IV. of "Frederick the Great," in the dignified "Centenary" edition of the works of Thomas Carlyle. James Payn, born in 1830, died a few days ago. He has been for half a century an unwearying literary worker, producing novels, essays, and miscellaneous journalism, in great profusion; and will be remembered not for any one distinctive achievement, but rather for the varied entertainment that he has provided for two generations of readers. A genial temperament, much knowledge and industry, an agile fancy, and a wide acquaintance with men and affairs, all combined to make his work acceptable without bestowing upon it the least measure of enduring quality. He will be missed and mourned by a host of readers in both England and America. The "Temple" edition of the Waverley novels, imported by Messrs. Charles Scribner's Sons, is well under way, thirteen of the forty-eight volumes being now ready. In addition to the two volumes of "Waverley," published some time ago, we have lately received " Guy Mannering," "The Antiquary," "Rob Roy," " Old Mortality," and "The Heart of Midlothian," each in two volumes; and "The Black Dwarf," in one volume. It would certainly be difficult to say wherein this dainty little edition could be improved. TOPICS IN LEADING PERIODICALS. April, 1898. Adequate, Problem of the. Dial. Alleghanies, A Nook in the. Bradford Torrey. Atlantic. George, Henry, and his Final Work. O. T. Morton. Dial. Aspects of the. Harper. Railway Traveling, Comfort in. G. A. Sekon. Pall Mall. LIST OF NEW BOOKS. [The following list, containing 152 titles, includes books received by THE DIAL since its last issue.] GENERAL LITERATURE. William Shakespeare: A Critical Study. By George Brandes; trans. from the Norwegian by William Archer, Miss Mary Morison, and Miss Diana White. In 2 vols., large 8vo, gilt tops, uncut. Macmillan Co. Boxed, $8. net. The Letters of Victor Hugo, from Exile and after the Fall of the Empire. Edited by Paul Meurice. Second series; 8vo, gilt top, pp. 249. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. $3. Tourguéneff and his French Circle: A Series of Letters. Edited by E. Halperine-Kaminsky; trans. by Ethel M. Arnold. 12mo, pp. 302. Henry Holt & Co. $2.50. A Literary History of India. By R. W. Frazer, LL.B. With frontispiece, 8vo, gilt top, uncut, pp. 470. "Library of Literary History." Charles Scribner's Sons. $4. Forty Years of Oratory: Lectures, Addresses, and Speeches of Daniel Wolsey Voorhees. Compiled and edited by his three sons and his daughter, Harriet Cecilia Voorhees; with a sketch of his life by Judge Thomas B. Long. In 2 vols., illus., large 8vo. Bowen-Merrill Co. Boxed, $6. Emerson, and Other Essays. By John Jay Chapman. 12mo, gilt top, uncut, pp. 247. Charles Scribner's Sons. $1.25. Allegories. By Frederic W. Farrar. Illus., 12mo, gilt edges, pp. 365. Longmans, Green, & Co. $2. Elements of Literary Criticism. By Charles F. Johnson. 12mo, pp. 288. Harper & Brothers. 80 cts. A View of the Views about Hamlet. By Albert H. Tolman. 8vo, pp. 30. Baltimore: Modern Language Ass'n of America. Paper. Treasure Trove: Forty Famous Poems. Compiled by William S. Lord. 12mo, pp. 32. Evanston, Ill.: The Index Co. Paper, 10 cts. HISTORY. Drake and the Tudor Navy, with a History of the Rise of England as a Maritime Power. By Julian S. Corbett. In 2 vols., illus., 8vo, uncut. Longmans, Green, & Co. $10. The Building of the British Empire: The Story of England's Growth from Elizabeth to Victoria. By Alfred Thomas Story. In 2 vols., illus., 12mo. 'Story of the Nations." G. P. Putnam's Sons. $3. The History of Greece from its Commencement to the Close of the Independence of the Greek Nation. By Adolf Holm; trans. from the German by Frederick Clarke. Vol. IV., completing the work; 12mo, gilt top, pp. 636. Macmillan Co. $2.50 net. A History of the Indian Mutiny and of the Disturbances which Accompanied it among the Civil Population. By T. Rice Holmes. Fifth edition, revised and enlarged; with maps, 8vo, uncut, pp. 659. Macmillan Co. $3.50. Law and Politics in the Middle Ages. With a synoptic table of sources. By Edward Jenks, M.A. Large 8vo, uncut, pp. 352. Henry Holt & Co. $2.75. Modern France, 1789-1895. By André Lebon. 12mo, pp. 488. "Story of the Nations." G. P. Putnam's Sons. $1.50. How the Dutch Came to Manhattan. Penned and pictured by Blanche McManus. 8vo, uncut, pp. 82. "Colonial Monographs." "E. R. Herrick & Co. $1.25. The Diplomatic Relations between Cromwell and Charles X. Gustavus of Sweden. By Guernsey Jones. 8vo, pp. 89. Lincoln, Nebr.: State Journal Co. Paper. BIOGRAPHY AND MEMOIRS. My Life in Two Hemispheres. By Sir Charles Gavan Duffy. In 2 vols., with portrait, large 8vo, gilt tops, uncut. Macmillan Co. $8. The Two Duchesses: Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, and Elizabeth, Duchess of Devonshire. Edited by Vere Foster. With portraits, large 8vo, uncut, pp. 497. Charles Scribner's Sons. $6. Memoirs of a Highland Lady: The Autobiography of Elizabeth Grant of Rothiemurchus, afterwards Mrs. Smith of Baltiboys, 1797-1830. Edited by Lady Strachey. Large 8vo, gilt top, uncut, pp. 495. Longmans, Green, & Co. $3.50. Pasteur. By Percy Frankland, Ph.D., and Mrs. Percy Frankland. With portraits, 12mo, pp. 224. "Century Science Series." Macmillan Co. $1.25. |