supposing overmuch-that you have not introduced into the sanctity of the chamber the last novel from Mudie's. Because certain it is that old favourites must give way to that spic-and-span novelty with the carefully affixed yellow label. Then you approach the bookcase, and haphazard, not of prearranged determination, you take your book. A volume of Sterne has come to hand. The fireside book par excellence. Much-abused author of Uncle Toby and the Widow Wadman, the most genial of all companions in a lonely chamber.

Of all the writers of English prose, it seems to me that none has had an influence at once so permanent and widespread upon the lighter literature of this country as the author of "Tristram Shandy." You may trace him everywhere. Deriving much of his own quaintness and peculiar flavour from older sources, he mixed it with his own original genius, and transmitted the mixture to posterity. Undoubtedly he is the father of the modern school. of English essayists. More correctly dubbed so than Addison, or Steele, or Goldsmith. We pretend to read Addison, and we pretend to admire him. But its little better than pretence. If our own experience does not tell us that, any bookseller will. Sterne is not only read, but studied by those who themselves hope byand-bye to plead guilty to the accusation of having a style. As far as I know, there is but one solitary and cold allusion to Sterne in the whole of Lamb's Essays. Yet Lamb's indebtedness to Sterne is obvious. While it will be freely acknowledged that both writers indulged unstintedly in the same sort of quaint old-world reading, it cannot be denied that the influence of Sterne is apparent all through the Essays of Elia. Derived from Sterne, and possibly through Lamb, the tone and manner of the former writer is clearly discernible in the works of that author, who has written the best and bitterest things ever penned about him. Indeed, the very essay in which Thackeray belabours Sterne with all the honesty and indignation of his big nature, is the very one by which, in the clearest possible manner, he betrays his indebtedness to the object of his wrath.

That essentially distinct class of writing-too ephemeral in interest, and too hurried in execution to be called a school-known in our day as "special correspondence," of which Mr. Sala is the most voluminous and most vivacious illustrator, is founded, I think, to a great extent on the "Sentimental Journey." The enshrinement of mere personal matters, the dilating on trifling circumstances, the magnifying to prodigious proportions of the waifs and strays of the voyage-it has all been done before. If Mr. Sala in Paris happens to have a toothache, it is instantly dignified into a national disaster, and the details of the sad affair are perused next

morning in the newspapers by a thousand sympathisers. Well! a hundred years ago a thousand readers were sympathising with Mr. Sterne concerning "that hacking cough" of his, though not one ir a hundred, had they met him in the street, would have known the reverend gentleman from Adam.

We have been somewhat prolix over Sterne. Rare companion of the hearth, infallible driver out of blue devils, see how the vision of Betty and the corporal whirl away in that last wreath of smoke. And observe my Uncle Toby's grave and puzzled countenance innocently regarding the obtrusive blandishments of the widow, as we close the volume and reseek the shelves.

Lamb has been mentioned. He stands at the head of those essayists concerning whose writings the word homely may, with some fitness, be used. And used without any idea of suggesting their reception as anything else than "classics." Leigh Hunt, gentle soul, and pleasant chatterer, is another. In our own day, there seems to be but one essayist having the exact quality which admits to the temple of the fireside-Oliver Wendell Holmes, author of the "Autocrat of the Breakfast-table." But Charles Lamb do we especially and emphatically enshrine as the deity of the hearth. No kindly reader will regard him merely as an abstraction, an unrealised entity, an essence only recognisable in the word author. As we dwell on his page he is really and personally present with us. With what tender feeling did he himself regard these "winter evenings-the world shut out." There is a warmth about his work which betrays a close room and glowing embers. It has a ruddy light upon it. He cannot give shape to his fancies in the glaring sunlight. "The mild internal light," he moans, "like fires on the domestic hearth, goes out in the sunshine." And with a delicious touch of sentimental humour, he concludes one of his essays with "We would indite something about the Solar System-Betty, bring the candles!" Of all names possible to mention this is surely most properly and peculiarly the one to be borne in mind as the embers settle themselves into a "solid core of heat."

Of poets there are few whose books are for the precious interval of smoke and slippers. Among contemporary poets none. Tennyson men don't read much after leaving college. Browning should not be attempted except after a severe course of physical and mental training. Swinburne may be read advantageously on the top of an iceberg. We must go back a little for our selection. We can't call Byron a fireside poet, nor dare we be so impertinent in the case of Shelley. Clearly Wordsworth would resent it, as would Coleridge. No one in his senses would call Southey a bard to be read by the hearth-or anywhere else.

I went into a theatre the other night, which, in face of the fact that there was nobody in town, bravely kept open during the outof-town months, and seems to have thrived upon it. When I entered, one of the actors was playing the part of a lawyer, and during the performance he had to deliver certain words prepared for him by his author. Apropos of something which I didn't see, he quoted a couplet which I didn't catch, adding, after the manner of Dr. Pangloss, "Crabbe-out of date." Then, in mild depreciation of the individuals who allowed Crabbe to go out of date, he lifted his hands and shrugged his shoulders.

It has been quite the thing for many a year to poke fun at the Rev. George Crabbe. Those witty rogues the brothers Smith commenced the ill treatment in their "Rejected Addresses." And Rogers, I think, sneered at him as "Pope in fustian." But in spite of all Crabbe is a rare fireside companion. A perfect mine of unaffected and cheery sentiment, a storehouse of interesting incident, with a flow of vigorous metred and memorable garrulity. Its quite refreshing to read even his arguments. Here we have the "Borough," and therein the well-remembered style:

"LETTER XIII.

66 THE ALMSHOUSE AND TRUSTEES.

"The Frugal Merchant-Rivalship in Modes of Frugality— Private Exceptions to General Manners-Almshouse built-Its Description-Founder dies-Six Trustees," &c. &c.

And the dear gentleman proceeds dealing you out in little jerks his homely "argument" in the most natural and confiding manner possible. Exhibits his enticing bill of fare, and bids you welcome to the little repast. Not that it's all so tame either as you would imagine, supercilious critic! Consider the ways of that notorious scoundrel Blaney treated of in this very "Borough," and be wise. Look at him in the noonday splendour of his guilt, see him last of all in the workhouse, when

The old men shun him, some his vices hate,
And all abhor his principles and prate,
Nor love nor care for him will mortal show
Save a frail sister in the female row.

And reflect upon the misery which is sure, sooner or later, to overtake people who read Voltaire. A little old fashioned it mayhap, and gossipy, but when the night is cold and the fire burns with a more than usually brilliant sparkle, commend me to Crabbe.

"Sweet Auburn" can nowhere receive the proper tone save from the presence of quietly consuming not that whizzing

gaseous-coal, although Dr. Goldsmith himself would perhaps have had but a small respect for readers who read him so.

Gray's "Elegy," which albeit an elegaic composition, is in point of fact no elegy at all, is, methinks, most surely relished when, doors secure and curtains drawn, warm light fills the room. It requires that contrast to give keenness to the appreciation. The cold outline is felt to be more intensely cold as that last log crackles in the blaze. The tolling of the curfew seems to steal musically through the drawn curtain. And the ploughman is plodding towards a fire as bright as mine. "Chill penury" is an idea only bearable amid comfortable surroundings, suggesting if not prompting the exercise of charity.

But meantime our fire has dwindled to half a dozen cinders, and the thread of our discourse is irrecoverably lost.

Of modern literature and of its fireside aspect, we have been somewhat unmindful. Truth to tell, however, there is in most of the books of our time a something quite out of keeping with the glow, a sneering, cynical something calculated to make us feel ashamed of homely and tender associations. We have some, however, whose flavour suits the humour. And as we return Lamb and Sterne to their places on the shelf, the eye lights sadly on the "Christmas Carol" and the "Cricket on the Hearth." WILLIAM MACKAY.

THE HANDWRITING UPON THE WALL.

"WE live in troublous times !"

The remark is old and stale: each succeeding generation has probably made it, convinced that the particular epoch in which it lived was, of all epochs, the most remarkable.

What does this prove, however, but the truth of Solomon's saying, that "There is nothing new under the sun?" What, too, but the different light in which we regard the affairs of others from those of ourselves, and how the reasoning and reflective faculties are at all times liable to become distorted from the inherent selfishness of our nature?

Nevertheless, we repeat it, "we live in troublous times!"

Events, political, social, and religious, do seem to be hurrying past of a magnitude, and with a velocity, unprecedented, since man's history first began.

Hurrying past, as if telegraphs and railroads were but outward

and visible signs of the rapidity with which mundane affairs in general are commencing to move.

Whither?

This is, indeed, a momentous question, and one which has at all times excited the interest and exercised the ingenuity of our kind. For, despite the unseen hand which absolutely holds our intellects in subjection, and prevents our being able, even for a second, to penetrate behind the limits of this material world, man ever has strove, and ever must strive, to clear up the mysteries of those mighty problems connected with the final destiny of his

race.

Nor is it extraordinary that, in the endeavour, the principal text book made use of should be the sacred annals which treat of life and death. Where else, save in this volume, which, as a Christian people, we believe to be writ by the hand of God, could we possibly hope to gain the clue we seek? Accordingly, it is to the Bible we have long been accustomed to turn in our perplexity, struggling from a comparison of past and passing events, with the utterances contained in it, to read rightly the signs of the times, and especially to ascertain" when shall the end of all things be."

What though these efforts have as yet been attended with but limited success? Is not the failure to be attributed to inability to comprehend the meaning of the indications enshrined within the volume, and not to any want of accuracy in the indications themselves?

Is it not possible that, in consequence of increased knowledge, these difficulties may disappear, and that we may yet be permitted to obtain some insight into the solution of the problems we have alluded to?

But these speculations open out to our view a field vast and almost illimitable-far be it from us to presume to obtrude therein. We only wish to make a few remarks upon passing events, and, from their scrutiny, to draw attention to the handwriting upon the wall.

How short-sighted and vain are man's imaginings; how erroneous often his most cherished calculations; how mistaken his fondest and firmest beliefs! Of this, what can be a stronger proof than the events which have taken place since 1851?

In that year, and for some time before and after it, the idea was widely spread that the days of warfare were past, that mankind had become too civilised to kill one another in battle, and that nations were too wise to allow the arbitrament of the sword to decide their disputes.

The temple which was raised in Hyde Park, and of which