260
NOTES AND QUERIES. [io- s. v. MARCH 31, im
out of six appear of an edition without notes of
Knight's 'Shakespeare.' These contain the come-
dies, together with * King John ' as the beginning
of the historical plays. ' The Golden Treasury of
American Songs and Lyrics' gives a capital and
representative selection of poems by Poe, Bryant,
Aldrich, Lowell, Wendell Holmes, Emerson, and
other songsters. The 'Literary Essays' of
Macaulay prepare the way for the historical essays
and the other writings of that great Whig historian.
The reissue of the essays of Froude we are disposed
to regard as one of the best contributions to a
series^remarkable alike for its prettiness, its cheap-
ness, and its worth.
The Voice of the Mountains. Edited by Ernest A. Baker and Francis E. Ross. (Routledge & Sons.) THIS pretty little volume, written by two members of the Climbers' Club, and dedicated to its first president, is welcome. Poems to mountains, like Coleridge's magnificent 'Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale of Chamouni ' and Byron's "Mount Blanc is the monarch of mountains," are well known. A volume devoted entirely to the praise {chiefly poetical) of mountains is, however, so far as we know, a novelty. Such a volume compiled from the poets named, Tennyson, Swinburne, Drayton, Wordsworth, Scott, Clough, Alexander Smith, Matthew Arnold, and others is now given, has a charm all its own, and will need little commendation. It is curious that ' The Naturalist's Poetical Companion,' a delightful work too little known, includes in its ^numerous contents but two poems nominally concerning mountains, though not really so. One of these is, indeed, Burns's ' To a Mountain Daisy,' and another an ode to a ' Moun- tain Rill.'
The Pocket Richard Jeff tries. By Alfred H. Hyatt. >* (Chatto & Windus.)
THIS dainty little volume, destined to be a favourite with nature-worshippers, consists of a series of characteristic passages from the writings of Richard Jefferies. It is beautifully printed and got up, is a pleasing companion, and to the intelligent and sympathetic reader a mine of delight. Such volumes have a charm of their own, and this is one of the best,
Quarterly Review, January, 1906. (Murray.) MR. H. STUART JONES'S excellent paper on 'Art under the Roman Empire ' will remove not a few (prejudices of long standing. It is a common opinion, inherited from our teachers of past genera- tions, that wh le at their best the Greeks carried the highest ideals of art to a perfection never seen elsewhere, the Romans were mostly mere copyists. We need not say that there is a truth hidden in this, but as commonly taught it is mere error or prejudice. Still, though we must admit that for the most part study took the place of inspiration, this was by no means inevitable. For example, there can be nothing more exquisite than some of the Roman reproductions of natural forms which have survived the general wreck. Mr. Schiller writes wisely on Plato and those who went before him. He grasps his subject firmly, and does not wander off into profitless generalities. He further- more possesses an amount of outside knowledge which has been of great service to him. He points out (sarcastically, let us hope) that our faith is not now quite so firm as it once was" that there is no
mental discipline in knowledge acquired without
repugnance." This he contrasts with Aristotle's
dictum that "all men by nature desire knowledge "
a fact which, as we think, cannot be reasonably
called in question, though Mr. Schiller regards it as
"pathetically optimistic." We have been much
pleased by Mr. Sidney T. Irwin's 'Hazlitt and
Lamb.' They were men so widely different in
almost every aspect of their lives that it would be
mere futility to try to draw comparisons between
them. Lamb has long since received justice;
Hazlitt has suffered, and continues to suffer mainly,
it may be, from old-fashioned political prejudices,
which are wont to linger long after their causes
have become obsolete. Thus it has happened that
Hazlitt's life and the literature he produced have
remained in shadow. The warmest admirers of
Hazlitt will admit, if we mistake not, that his
temper was far less attractive than that of his
contemporary. ' Originality and Convention in
Literature,' by Prof. F. B. Gummere, is a thoughtful
paper, but not easily to be comprehended by the
careless reader. Some of the conclusions arrived
at are, in our opinion, by no means calculated to
win acceptance among the very small body of men
who have given attention to the study of literature
as an art.
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notices :
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CONSTANT READER ("Slander, meanest spawn of Hell"). Tennyson's 'The Letters,' I. 33.
R. EDGCUMBE ("Voice an opinion "). Discussed at 7 th S. x. 91, 257.
OXON (" I shall pass through this world but once"). See 10 th S. i. 247, 316, 355, 433.
A. ROUKENS, the Hague. Thanks, but anti- cipated ante, p. 137.
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