temperament, an absence of anything like moral or religious training in youth, luxurious surroundings and frivolous society in womanhood, and the product is likely to be, according to opportunity and circumstance, a harlot or a nun. Poor Mrs. Greville is both. She is first introduced to us as the daughter of a great family, unacknowledged and separate from her paternal relations, living with her mother and a friend in a retired cottage in Wales. Her father was the younger son of the Earl of Pierrepoint (the book abounds in titles, not specially well chosen,) and married beneath him; an outrage which leads to much ranting, "hissing," and objurgation between father and son in the first chapter. By the time, however, at which we are introduced to Eveline, poor Capt. Gaveston has been killed in action, leaving his wife and child penniless, and dependent on the charity of Col. Greville, his friend and companion in arms. When Greville, on his return to England, makes the acquaintance of his ward, she is a remarkably pretty girl of seventeen, with plenty of wit, just the object in short to attract irresistibly an unworn heart at forty-three. There is, unhappily, a certain angler in grey, much more charming to the eyes of seventeen, who has been successfully fishing in more ways than one during his sojourn on the idyllic Usk. However, he and the Colonel do not clash, and Eveline Gaveston, at her dying mother's request, becomes the wife of her veteran benefactor. We are agreeably surWe are agreeably surprised to find the short married life of Col. and Mrs. Greville a complete success. He is ardent, and she devoted; and when he dies, and endows her with his large fortune, we congratulate ourselves on the charming child having developed into a noble woman, chastened, but strengthened by the discipline of self-sacrifice she has learned in tending her gallant invalid. But the exigencies of the plot require that our hopes should be suddenly dashed. Eveline belies her character, turns into a very silly fine lady, and among all her admirers singles out for passionate adoration the sinister fisherman in grey, who has in the meantime sufficiently forgotten her to become a married man and the father of a family. This selfish roué, who has no quality but a questionable kind of beauty to recommend him, obliterates in Eveline's mind all recollection of the mother whom she passionately loved, the husband for whom she learnt to feel a proud affection, and the dictates of a high spirit and hitherto sensitive modesty. Here we think the author has sinned against all probability. If it were necessary to drag the poor girl through the dirt in order to exhibit the efficacy of " Catholic" charms, the Greville episode should have been omitted. A happy and faithful married life would have set her above the danger of the one and the need of the other. As it is, there is a "new departure" from the date of Eveline's widowhood, and we resign ourselves to a story not altogether unskilfully handled of sin and degradation, terminating in a deathbed with all the fashionable accessories. With the exception of Col. Greville, there is nothing which can distinctly be called a man in the book; the women are better, but rather colourless. The author is devoid of humour; and, though not without literary ability, has not justified her appearance as a novelist.

M. Gaboriau and M. Hector Malot are, neither of them, gentlemen who waste their days, and short as is the time that has passed since we reviewed 'La Corde au Cou' by the first, and 'Clothide Martory' by the second of these writers, we have already once more to notice a novel by the one, and two new volumes by the other.

M. Gaboriau's new book disappoints us much. The interest of 'L'Affaire Lerouge' no longer clings to M. Gaboriau's work, and L'Argent des Autres' is a very dull production. The case is far otherwise with M. Hector Malot. He is going forwards instead of back, and the new book, in two volumes under separate titles, which is now before us, is an advance upon even his excellent 'Clothide Martory.' The story is a sad one, and if the scene were laid in England it would not be true to life, as it turns on the blind devotion to the mother which often leads a Frenchman to prefer his mother to his wife, and which is almost unknown among ourselves, though it forms both a good and a bad feature of the French family. M. Malot will make himself a name.

Literary Remains of the late Emanuel Deutsch. (Murray.)

as

THIS volume contains a reprint of many of the best papers of one of the most accomplished scholars of the present generation,—a man of many sides and at home in many languages, a foreigner by birth and education, but one who had acquired a mastery over the English language, both as a speaker and writer, such we venture to think, could hardly be paralleled. The book is accompanied by a sketch of his life, in a few graceful pages of tantalizing brevity, which leave, we regret to add, on the mind of the reader a painful impression of overtasked energies, and of a want of appreciation where Mr. Deutsch had the best right to have expected it. From this memoir we gather that Mr. Deutsch was born, in 1829, of Jewish parentage, and that, in his childhood he was brought up by a learned uncle, and underwent, if the statements in this biography can be fully depended on, a discipline sufficient to have stamped out altogether the intellect of an ordinary boy. Thus we are told that, "winter and summer he had to rise at five o'clock, and to study without fire or food for one hour or two, until the time of daily prayer had arrived, in which another hour was passed. The rest of the day, until 8 P.M., was passed in close application to his books, one quarter of an hour being the only time allowed for recreation, and about the same for exercise and fresh air." In his thirteenth year we find him distinguishing himself above all the other boys in the "Gymnasium " of his native town, Neisse, and three years later, already entered at the University of Berlin.

How he was occupied during the next ten years we readily infer from the knowledge of the Indo-Germanic languages and the sound acquaintance with the leading Semitic dialects he displayed in after-life, but we have scarcely any hints on this subject from the pen of his biographer. In 1855, at the age of twentysix, he came to England for the first time, and obtained what might have proved congenial employment, in the Library of the British

Museum; but we fancy that some of his former colleagues in that institution will learn with surprise that his appointment there was the result of a commission to Mr. Albert Cohen, of the firm of Asher & Co., in Berlin, from the British Museum, "to recommend an assistant for the Library Department." Assuredly that department ought to be grateful for the "assistant" they thus obtained, but every true friend of Mr. Deutsch must regret, that talents so remarkable as his were henceforth entombed in what he himself calls "that Pantheon called the British Museum."

From this period his biographer tells us, what, indeed, we know to be but the simple truth, that "for fifteen years with mighty ardour and magnificent industry he studied and wrote, wrote and studied," the outward result of these labours being the body of Essays republished in this interesting volume, 190 articles written for 'Chambers's Encyclopædia,' and almost unlimited aid given to innumerable students on all classes of linguistic research, given by him freely in a noble spirit of generosity, but, we fear, not unfrequently to persons who made no kindly use of the intellectual stores lavished upon them.

Devoted as Mr. Deutsch's life was, from the day he unhappily was engrossed by the Museum, to literature of all kinds, and, especially, to those Semitic studies to which, as a Jew, he was naturally the most inclined, there is little apparently known (far too little!) of his personal and private history; yet some glimpses we can discern even in this briefest of biographies. Thus we are told he was able to make one journey of no common interest to Jerusalem, the coasts of Phoenicia and Cyprus,

His

(his able report on this journey is, we believe, still lying among the archives of the Great Russell Street "Megathecon," and likely to remain there unheeded),—and we know that in Cyprus he described and copied the Phonician Inscriptions in Mr. Lang's collection (now in the British Museum), and some others in that of M. de Cesnola, by a strange blunder (as we deem it), now the property of the Americans. We know, too, that had more time and money been at his disposal, he had much at heart to visit Palmyra and Baalbek. Mr. Deutsch was also selected by the Trustees. of the British Museum to. accompany the expedition to Abyssinia, but, after having accepted this post, he was induced by some friends in England to withdraw from it. biographer thinks that had he gone, he "would sadly have wasted his valuable time," as "nothing of the slightest importance was found in the country." But that nothing was found where there was no one competent to seek for it, is no proof whatever that much of real interest might not have been procured, had any Ethiopic scholar of moderate pretensions been placed on the staff of Lord Napier of Magdala. M. Antoine D'Abbadie and other travellers have brought valuable MSS. and coins from Abyssinia, and so might Mr. Deutsch; in any case, he would not have brought home, as did this expedition, hundredweights of modern MSS., of little value beyond the parchment on which they are written. It is further probable that Mr. Deutsch lost favour with his employers by accepting a post he ultimately resigned; and that to this circumstance may be partly traced the tedious delay

opiates given in certain stages of intermittent fever. And he proceeds to illustrate his doctrine thus:-"Hoc pacto celeberrimus ille vir Andreas Mervill cum magno Reipub. (præsertim literariæ) detrimento (ex ignorantiâ Medici senis atque superciliosi, cui in more erat contra Corticem Peruvianum, quasi communem pestem, immaniter ubique debacchari) e vivis ante diem sublatus fuit. Siquidem, postquam absque evidenti aliquâ Indicatione, in intervallo, post tertium paroxysmum Febris Tertianæ legitimæ, præparationis gratiâ (uti omnia methodicè fieri viderentur) sanguis ab Ægro ætate provecto, post enematis rejectionem, liberè extractus fuisset, et in subsequenti intervallo, Alvus decocto amaro_subducta, & paulo ante tertium paroxysmum Emeticum propinatum; Hoc modo stratâ viâ, sub initium paroxysmi subsecuturi exhibebatur magnum Febrifugum, haustus scil. ex Aqua Theriacali, &c. Eger stragulis opertus, vel potius sepultus jussu medici, ad somnum & sudores sese componebat; ut saltem Algorem et Horrorem primum insultum paroxysmi comitari solitos evitaret, & brevi, somno profundissimo & sudoribus colliquativis correptus, spatio horarum xxjv., tempore paroxysmi, Apoplecticè periit, Qui tamen ex unciâ unâ Corticis Peruviani ritè ministratâ (uti ego medico hanc historiam fronte satis perfrictâ narranti excandescens regerebam) spatio xxjv. horarum Orei & morbi fauces facile evasisset. Ob talem praxin Muliercula reprehendendæ sunt, & acriter corripiendæ, multò magis Medici & Philosophi, quos oportet nihil Empiricè, nihil absque urgente ratione, multò minùs contra rationem & manifestam Indicationem præscribere."

Perhaps you may be willing that a physician should translate Morton's medical Latin into modern English. If so, take it as follows:

"In this manner was that most famous man Andrew Marvell carried off from among the living before his time, to the great loss of the republic, and especially the republic of letters: through the ignorance of an old conceited doctor, who was in the habit on all occasions of raving excessively against Peruvian bark, as if it were a common plague. Howbeit, without any clear indication, in the interval after a third fit of regular tertian ague, and by way of preparation (so that all things might seem to be done most methodically), blood was copiously drawn from the patient, who was advanced in years." [Here follow more details of treatment, which I pass over.] "The way having been made ready after this fashion, at the beginning of the next fit, a great febrifuge was given, a draught, that is to say, of Venice treacle, etc. By the doctor's orders, the patient was covered up close with blankets, say rather, was buried under them; and composed himself to sleep and sweat, so that he might escape the cold shivers which are wont to accompany the onset of the ague-fit. He was seized with the deepest sleep and colliquative sweats, and in the short space of twenty-four hours from the time of the ague-fit, he died comatose. He died, who, had a single ounce of Peruvian bark been properly given, might easily have escaped, in twenty-four hours, from the jaws of the grave and the disease: and so burning with anger, I informed the doctor, when he told me this story without any sense of shame. If old women are to be sharply rebuked for such practice, how much more physicians and philosophers, whom it behoves to prescribe nothing empirically, nothing without urgent reason, mnch less against

reason and clear indication."

Horatian ode on the return of Cromwell from
Ireland, can never die.
SAMUEL GEE, M.D.,
Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians,
London.

"THE NEW SHAKSPERE SOCIETY."

WELL, we are getting some fun out of The New Shakspere Society," at any rate. Here is Mr. Thoms accusing me of being illogical. To show me what logic is, he draws his own conclusion from my premisses, which he misstates, calls that conclusion most "absurd and illogical," and then says it's mine. Again, as an analogue of the relation between one English poet and another, he cites that between Greek and English history. Is this logic?

But I re-echo Mr. Thoms's "Enough of controversy," and sympathize most warmly in all he says about the study of Chaucer and Shakspeare. Mr. Thoms knows, I do not doubt, fifty times as much about Shakspeare as I do; though I haven't read his 'Notelets.' I have worked as a volunteer under Mr. Thoms for many years, am now working under his successor in Notes and Queries, Dr. Doran, and have a private's regard for my old Captain. I should be sorry, indeed, if my comments on Mr. Thoms were not "capable of a more kindly interpretation" than that which he suggested last week. Most certainly the "subtle irony" he attributes to my words was never meant by me. And as to excluding " Mr. Thoms, or anyone else, from the "New Shakspere Society," my one anxiety is that he and ten thousand other men should join it. There is absolutely no restriction on membership, except the payment of an annual guinea; and if men would but amuse themselves by paying that, instead of sticking pins into me, I might be reading Shakspeare instead of writing answers to

66

the Athenæum.

FREDK. J. FURNIVALL.

THE SHAPIRA COLLECTION.

I SEND you an extract from a letter from Mr. Tyrwhitt Drake :

"Jerusalem, Feb. 11, 1874.

"I HAD noticed, as I thought, a difference in style between the later inscribed and the earlier uninscribed pottery, but my suspicions had never taken a definite form till early in November. I then received accounts from some Bedawin, who said that the 'written jars' were made at Jerusalem, and thence transported to Moab, buried there, and shown to Mr. Shapira as found among ruins or in caves. This information I privately transmitted to the Palestine Exploration Fund, on the 11th of the same month. On the 24th of December my inquiries resulted in a statement voluntarily made by a potter, one Haj 'Abd el Baki,* with whom I had been in communication since the end of November, of which the following is a transla

tion:

the chandler used to come over to me and ask me 'Since more than a year, Selim and his father to make for them large and small pots, and to take from me clay, and make it into images, and write upon them, and bring them to me to bake for them, make of it hundreds of different objects; such as and they called them "Antika," and they used to birds, and heads, and images, and hands, and spoons, and such like: and I baked them and returned them to them, and they gave me a bakshish,

"No one who has, as I have, seen almost every object in the collection, will, I think, fail to admit the differences observable between the earliest and the latest. Among the former, few were inscribed; and among the latter it is just the contrary; the later pottery differs, too, in texture from the earliest. The theory which seems to me most probable is, that having sold a genuine lot of antique earthenware to M. Shapira, the forger then proceeded to dupe this energetic collector, of whose honesty and good faith in the matter I have no

doubt.

"I cannot see why so much stress is laid on the fact, that some of the tessera have the impression of linen (or as it rather seemed to me of rough grained wood) at the bottom, for everyone must be well aware that marks as fine, or even finer, such as the lines in finger prints, are found in pottery, whose antiquity is undisputed, if it has been preserved under favourable circumstances.

think also, that if M. Ganneau had seen the former collection, he would not have stated that, if in some specimens which I have not seen, the saltpetre has penetrated the rough, the whole mass, it is because the clay was still less baked, and the bath was longer prolonged.' I distinctly remember one of the early jars, made of good red pottery, being destroyed by the efflorescence of salt, and consequent flaking off of the outer coats, in a manner similar to that which may be seen in the case of some undoubtedly genuine terra-cottas found in Palestine, and now in my possession. . . . At present, I fear the genuine and the forged are inextricably mixed up in the Berlin Museum, unless some competent archæologists are able to separate them. I may add that immediately on receipt of the news communicated in the columns of the Athenaeum, Dr. Kersten, Acting Consul General for Prussia, proceeded with Pastor Weser, the Lutheran Minister here, who accompanied Shapira to Moab, and searched Selim el Kari's house throughout, but did not succeed in finding any evidence to confirm the charge laid to his door. C. F. TYRWHITT DRAKE, F.R.G.S."

It is almost needless in communicating the above, to explain that Mr. Drake is the gentleman referred to in my note on M. Ganneau's letter,

published in the Athenæum of January 24th. It may be added that the following is the passage in Mr. Drake's letter of November 11th, 1873: "The reports I hear are that Selim el Kari (a well-known scoundrel and forger) has been manufacturing the idols and pottery, selling them through the Adwan Arabs. There seems, so far as I can at present judge, to have been an original trouvaille, of many specimens of which I sent home sketches, while later forgeries have been made in imitation of these. These latter lots I have not either drawn or described, and the texture of the pottery has always seemed to me much different from the original lot, being harder, redder, and free, or almost so, from saltpetre."

By the same post, I received a letter from M. Ganneau, dated November 12th, in which he says, "Je suis sur la piste de la fausse fabrication des inscriptions de Shapira." W. BESANT.

Jerusalem, Feb. 19, 1874. SINCE my letter of the 12th inst., an unofficial inquiry, to which I was invited, has been held at the German Consulate, by Pastor Weser and Mr. Dinsberg, to try and find out the truth of the statements made by the potters to M. Ganneau,

addition to our store of facts respecting a true Englishman. Marvell was not poisoned, but was only killed by a man who obstinately adhered to the worst traditions of the Middle Ages. Fortunately for the old conceited doctor we do not know his name: we can fancy the scorn with which he would treat a fellow-doctor living in Pall Mall at the time, Sydenham by name. The prophetic insight of Morton no doubt has not escaped you. Marvell's reputation is great in the republic, but greatest in the republic of letters. The patriotic member for Hull is not yet forgotten; but he who wrote the Song of the Bermuda emigrants, and an

never left with me any piece, however small, but delivered them to me counting them, and received them back in the same manner.

in the Athenæum of January 24, 1874.

The result of this inquiry, which extended over four days, is most unsatisfactory. The old man, 'Abd el Baki, declared for three days that he knew nothing of the matter, and that he never made the declaration (published in my former letter) in the English Consulate, though when the document was shown him he acknowledged the signature. The boy, Hasan ibn el Bitar, at first declared the story he told to M. Ganneau to be in all respects true; he then, after two such declarations, changed his tactics, and asserted that M. Ganneau had taught it him. The other potters denied all knowledge of

the matter. On the last day M. Ganneau was present, and an arrangement seems to have been made among the potters. 'Abd el Baki and Hasan both swore roundly that they had been taught their story by M. Ganneau, and Selim el Kari completed the attack by saying that he had been offered 100% by that gentleman if he would confess that he and Mr. Shapira forged the pottery. After such contradictory statements and varying evidence it was both useless and impossible to proceed further with the case.

on

The conviction rests unchanged in my own mind, that the declaration made to me December 24 by 'Abd el Baki is the truth. It is now, however, utterly impossible to estimate the extent of the forgeries. The seeming combination and pre-arrangement of testimony among the potters show that the forgers (for there are probably more than one) have spared no pains to hide the truth, in which they have succeeded but too well. The manner of their attack on M. Ganneau seems to me to point to their guilt, now impossible to prove, though it seems not unlikely that a few months' patient inquiry would have served to settle and define the extent of it.

CHAS. F. TYRWHITT DRAKE, F.R.G.S.

Jerusalem, Feb. 19, 1874. ALLOW me to inform those of your readers who have perused M. Ganneau's letter concerning the above subject, that the evidence adduced therein is just now being sifted on the spot by four gentlemen of the highest character, one of whom is an Englishman; and, although the Minutes of the Proceedings are not yet in my hands, I am warranted in telling you that all the witnesses on whom M. Ganneau relies have been found utterly worthless.

I, for myself, have not given any credence either to their former testimony or to their present statements levelled against M. Ganneau; but the investigators have, by a severe cross-examination of several days' duration, not only of the witnesses themselves but also of many other persons to whom attention was drawn in the course of the inquiry as being connected with the pottery-trade, not been able to produce the slightest evidence against the genuineness of my collection, nor has the sudden search of Selim, the suspected forger's house, brought anything to light to warrant the accusation.

Moreover, it has proved impossible, in spite of many attempts, to obtain from any of the potteries here any work resembling the Moabite pottery; whilst, on the other hand, during a visit to Moab, which I paid some two months ago, together with the Rev. H. Weser, seven more vases with inscriptions were found by us which, from the place and the circumstances under which they were dug out, must unquestionably be genuine.

I hope, with your permission, to give you, byand-by, a detailed and complete refutation of the charges brought against the genuineness of my collection. M. W. SHAPIRA.

Jerusalem, Feb. 17, 1874. THAT part of my report on this subject which appeared in the Athenæum of Jan. 24 has not been received here, as might have been expected, without producing considerable disturbance. did not conceal from myself the probable consequences of doing what I considered, and still consider, my duty.

I

M. Weser, a German clergyman, who takes a very peculiar interest in the affair, instituted, immediately on the news of my letter reaching Jerusalem, a personal inquiry into the facts that I had revealed. I was not made acquainted with this inquiry at its commencement, and it was only two days ago that he wrote inviting me to hear the new declarations of certain persons named in my report-declarations presenting "essential differences" to those obtained by myself. I had no reason for refusing this gentleman, whom I had not the pleasure of knowing, the means of carrying to its end an examination which he had undertaken of his own accord, and which he told me, on the

occasion of his visit, was to preserve a strictly private character. Perhaps it would have been more correct if he had addressed himself to me from the commencement. However, this little irregularity could easily be overlooked, after receiving his verbal explanations, and I proposed a meeting at the temporary residence of my friends and neighbours, Lieut. Conder and Mr. Tyrwhitt Drake. I went there with M. Lecomte. Pastor Weser was accompanied by two of his fellow-countrymen, one of whom served as Arabic interpreter.

The apprentice Hassan ibn el Bitar, whose declaration you have had already, was brought forward, and declared, in my presence and on his oath, that having been brought to my house, I had locked him up, beaten him, and threatened him with death, to force him to repeat the lesson which I had taught him.

After him, we heard another potter, Abd el Bagi, called Abu Mansoura, of whom Mr. Drake had previously obtained a deposition, written before the English Consul, certified by him, and containing similar revelations to those of Hassan on the ceramic proceedings of Selim. The new witness swore by Allah and the triple divorce that I had sought him out and told him that he must repeat, word for word, all that he said and signed later on before the Consul.

Baker el Masry next affirmed, also on oath, that Hassan, on coming away from me, had told him exactly what precedes.

Another potter, Ahmed el 'Alamiyé, deposed in the most energetic manner, and on the most sacred oaths, that all the declarations related above were the exact truth, that he absolutely did not know Selim, and had never worked for any one of that

name.

To crown the whole, they brought the hero himself, Selim el Gari, who, as I am informed, had been arrested and imprisoned up to that moment at the German Consulate.

Selim, after having protested his entire innocence, turned to me with an oratorical gesture, which was not without dignity, and began to apostrophize me with vehemence. Thereupon, one of the German gentlemen, who served as interpreter to Pastor Weser, interrupted him sharply, and told him to be quiet.

Surprised at the eagerness with which his silence was commanded, and not suspecting the intention, probably charitable, which animated the interruption, I insisted on Selim being allowed to finish his discourse, and ordered him myself to speak at full liberty.

"M. Ganneau," he went on, "meeting me two months ago in the street of the Christians, under the Arch, near the Greek convent, told me that he would give me a hundred pounds if I would affirm that the Shapira pottery was false, and was fabricated by Shapira and myself."

In all these depositions there is a remarkable and striking unanimity. Summed up, they amount to this:-M. Ganneau, by laying traps, by blows, threats of death, promises, bribery, and other measures not to be confessed, has obtained, or tried to obtain, lying evidence to prove the falseness of the Shapira antiquities.

The matter, put thus clearly, admits of only one way of looking at it :-(1) Either I have devised this black plot. (2) Or these men are either hardened scoundrels, or else poor devils telling their story from fear or interest, and under pressure of the kind that they pretend me to have exercised on them.

I do not know which alternative Pastor Weser and his countrymen have decided on adopting, not having wished to insult them by asking, and supposing that this absurd accusation would refute itself by its very enormity.

Let us put aside personal feelings. In admitting the first hypothesis the matter would be settled; and not only at the bar of public opinion, but in the courts of justice, would my conduct be arraigned. But even then one would have to consider: (1) the reasons which would have urged the adoption of a line of conduct so dangerous, and, so to say, so

clumsy; (2) the reasons why these worthy Arabs did not accuse me at once,-why they commence, as Pastor Weser loyally informed me, the one (Hassan) by repeating twice purely and simply the confession taken down by me; the other (Abd el Bagi) by absolutely denying his written deposition placed in the hands of Mr. Drake; and, lastly, the reasons why they have suddenly turned round, like one man, and denied their contradictory statements, in order to accuse me, with common accord, of the most unlikely conduct that could be imagined.

If, on the contrary, their story be taken for what it is worth, we find ourselves facing the second hypothesis, which may be considered under two different aspects

(1) Either these people lie by an instinctive movement of self-defence natural to Arabs when they think they are threatened; or, which is more probable, considering their suspicious unanimity, in obedience to an order given by the only man among them really compromised; and they now deny entirely the truth they made no difficulty about confessing six weeks before.

(2) Or else they lie to-day, as they lied six weeks ago; and we have no more right to believe what they said then, to Drake and to me, than what they say now.

In the former case the conclusion is clear: it is what I have exposed in my report, and which I maintain still-the pottery that I have seen, with all like it, is false.

In the second case, I should have made myself the echo of a calumny in setting down inconsiderately imputations invented at pleasure. But, then, how to explain that these arbitrary imputations contain details presenting the most strange coincidences with all that we know already of the affair, the persons, and the things mixed up?

How, for example, could the young apprentice Hassan, who, I repeat, related the facts perfectly simply, without being guided by any leading ques tions, know the name, the profession, and the successive residences of Selim? How could he, spontaneously, describe the little tessera of clay (sahtout), the statues of men, dogs (sic), and women, the vessels covered with writing, &c., if he had never seen them? How, on the other hand, could the workman interrogated by Mr. Drake have given him separately information entirely agreeing with that of Hassan? The only reply is that, what these people said then was true, or that I have, in fact, organized the fantastic conspiracy that they now bring to light. Lastly, and not the least argument, if I had been the dupe of a lie, Selim would be innocent: now if Selim is innocent, his role is perfectly simple; strong in his cause, he has only to deny. Why have recourse to the expedient, desperate in its audacity, of accusing the very man who hoped to unmask him of trying to corrupt him? Either he tells the truth, and the pottery is authentic, or he lies in accusing me, and the pottery is as false as his allegations. He has bound himself to one of these conclusions indissolubly, and with his own hand. To myself, this clumsy calumny seems as good as a confession. Those who do me the honour of supposing me incapable of the basest, the most odious, and at the same time the most stupid machination, may say with me-habemus confitentem reum.

To sum up, we have returned to our point de départ; but our journey has not been in vain. We have, on the way, eliminated the possibility of error; we have brought ourselves face to face with a dilemma. Either I am myself an illustrious impostor, or the pseudo-Moabite pottery must be definitively banished from that scientific domain into which it should never have been allowed to enter. CHARLES CLERMONT GANNEAU.

Literary Gossip.

MR. TOM TAYLOR is the new editor of Punch.

A STORY by Mr. Black, the author of 'A Princess of Thule,' will be begun shortly in

one of the magazines. It will be illustrated by Mr. Du Maurier.

THE HON. GRANTLEY BERKELEY has just completed a new work, upon which he has been for some time engaged. It is entitled, 'Fact against Fiction; or, the Habits and Treatment of Animals Practically Considered.' It will treat of hydrophobia and distemper; and, of course, of a variety of matters con

nected with sporting pursuits. There will also be "Some Remarks on Darwin." The book will be issued next month, by Mr. Samuel Tinsley. The same publisher will issue shortly a new story, in three volumes, entitled 'Barbara's Warning,' by Mrs. Houstoun, a lady who is best known as "The Author of 'Recommended to Mercy.'

A MEETING of the General Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund was held in the Jerusalem Chamber, on the 24th of February, at which it was resolved to present to the Museum of the Louvre the small fragments of the Moabite Stone brought to England by Capt. Warren. These contain fifty-six characters out of the whole 669 which have been recovered. Casts of the small pieces have long since been taken, and the Committee of the Fund are now promised a cast of the two large fragments.

THE fourth part of Dr. William Smith's elaborate Atlas of Classical and Biblical Geography will be published by Mr. Murray about Easter. The fifth part, concluding the work, and containing the letter-press, will be ready by Christmas.

A GRANT has been made by Her Majesty of 751. out of the Civil List to Mrs. Moxon (Lamb's "Isola "). Mr. Tennyson has headed the subscription for her benefit with 1007.; Lord Houghton gives 201.; Mr. Murray, 217.; Mr. Forster, 107. 10s.; and Messrs. Longmans, 107. At the same time, it is due to Messrs. Ward, Lock & Tyler, who at present publish the works belonging to Mr. Moxon's estate, to say, that they have scrupulously fulfilled the obligations imposed on them by the trust deed. Mrs. Moxon's difficulties are not owing to them.

THE Government have decided that Dr. Livingstone's body shall be brought home at the public expense. Lord Derby telegraphed instructions to Aden on the 27th of last month, and the body will probably arrive in England in five or six weeks. A memorial will shortly be presented to the Dean of Westminster, requesting permission for the interment of the body in the Abbey.

MR. JAMES TAYLOR, Honorary Secretary to the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, has republished in the last number of

the Society's Journal, a most interesting letter from the late Mr. Grant Duff, author of the 'History of the Mahrattas,' giving an account of the circumstances under which he wrote his history. It is dated "Eden by Banff, January 30th, 1846," and is addressed to the late E. H. Goldsmid, of the Bombay Civil Service. have room only for a few extracts :

was only known in a very superficial manner. As I went on collecting, I was obliged to unite the fragments in order to ascertain what was wanted, and I soon found myself obliged to employ agents, not merely within the confines of Maharashtra, but all over India. I wrote the greater part of the work when otherwise working twelve and fourteen hours daily without intermission (and of what sort you know), whilst some of the gentlemen with me, who had their full share of public business, par

ticularly Mr. W. R. Morris, still in the Service, most zealously assisted in translating the mass of materials which were selected from a still larger mass, read over without discovering a single fact on which we could depend. To account for some apparently very careless passages, I must tell you that I was subject to very severe headaches, which at last became very agonizing, returning every fifth day, and lasting from six to sixteen hours at a time, requiring me to work with wet cloths girt about my head, and I always could do best and most as the fit went off, so that I very often was induced to write on, upon these occasions, requiring no sleep until next night. I was, as might have been expected, driven home; but it was some time before I had health or inclination to get through the task I had undertaken. At last I sent the MS. to the late Mr. Murray. It was read and approved of by the person to whom he submitted it. I waited upon the potentate of Albemarle Street, who told me he would publish

the work if I would alter the title. I said it was a history of the Mahrattas, and only of the Mahrattas.' 'Who knows anything about the Mahrattas?' "That's the reason,' said I, 'the book has been written; no one does know much about them.' 'Well,' replied Murray, and who cares to know? If you call it the Downfall of the Moguls, and the Rise of the English, or something of that kind, it may do, but a "History of the Mahrattas"-that will never sell!' I was not in

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the least discouraged, although I too well knew that what Mr. Murray said was true, and amongst other drawbacks, although India is now beginning to excite a little more interest in England, no one can write or speak of India as of Europe the feeling which cheers and impels the writer or the orator by an indescribable. pathy is wanting, and hence the tiresome task which the narration of events purely Indian imposes. Of course, I do not mean such narratives could have been made by the fancy of De Foe. as Orme's Carnatic, which is more exciting than it I got the MS. laid before Sir James Mackintosh, who most kindly, without stopping to finish it, walked from Cadogan Place to Paternoster Row (before the days of omnibuses), and at his recommendation Longman & Co. immediately wrote to me offering to publish it. It went through the press in six weeks, and many errors corrected by me escaped the vigilance of the compositor: the reason was the MS. was too distinctly copied; had it been in such an abominably indistinct hand as selected, but because distinct, I got one of the less mine, one of their best men would have been experienced. The late Mr. Rees was the partner with whom I chiefly communicated. No publisher in London at that time understood the business so thoroughly. When calculating the sale, I was surprised when he put down a very small proportion for India. The reason he said was,

upwards of 1,700l. by what I had done, and indeed, excepting a very few, I do not suppose any Director or aspirant of that period even opened the Mahratta History after they became Directors-a matter of no consequence, excepting as discouraging to such servants of the Company as may engage in extraordinary labour, and whom most certainly it is their province at least...* in order to stimulate others in a like course."

-It is not creditable to the nation which holds

India that the History of the Mahrattas' should be allowed to remain out of print. A second edition, completed down to the annexation of Soltara, is urgently wanted, and we hope that the attention which has been drawn to the matter by Mr. James Taylor's publication of Grant Duff's letter may lead to an édition de luxe being brought out.

HERR KARL ELZE, of Dessau, the author of the Life of Byron,' has in the press an edition, with a copious Introduction, of Samuel Rowley's play, 'When you See Me, you Know Me; or, the famous Chronicle Historie of King Henrie the Eight.' It will be published in this country by Messrs. Williams & Norgate.

MR. BLANCHARD JERROLD will write a personal and biographical sketch of the late Shirley Brooks, with the aid of materials in the possession of the family, for the May number of the Gentleman's Magazine.

A PRIVATELY printed volume, "The Visitation of Yorkshire in 1584-5," is in the press, and will shortly be ready. One hundred copies will be printed in octavo size, and fifty in quarto. The work is under the editorship of the Rev. Ponsonby A. Lyons, who has for several years been associated with the late Mr. John Gough Nichols in the new edition of 'Whitaker's History of Whalley.' The quarto impression of 'The Visitation' will be uniform

with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Collection of Pedigrees which are compiled by Mr. Joseph Foster.

Ar the recent sale, in Paris, of M. Pauthier's Chinese library, the trustees of the British Museum made some valuable purchases, among which were several works on the geography of Central Asia, and a number of books having an important bearing on the historical and classical literature of the empire. The books, as a rule, fetched very high prices; one, in a single volume, containing illustrations of the people of the nations tributary to China, was sold for no less than 1,100 francs; and it may safely be said that every work fetched its full value.

MR. THOMAS C. JACK, Publisher, Edinburgh, has nearly ready for publication a new Welsh Family Bible, with Peter Williams's Comments, extensive extracts from Matthew

Henry's Commentary, and introductions to all the Books of Scripture, by the Rev. R. T. Howell, Swansea.

"It ought, and perhaps would, have been undertaken by Mr. Elphinstone had he not so soon then removed from the Deccan to Bombay. I began to

collect materials at his (Mr. Elphinstone's) and Sir Thomas Munro's suggestion, lest we should lose the only chance of recovering the records of a very extraordinary power, the history of which