"theses" are unexceptionable. Mr. Cook furnishes a large collection of illustrative games, among which the chess-player will find a number of old friends. The author admits "that these games are not, as a rule, models of correct play," and it is, perhaps, to be regretted that he did not rather select specimens with other qualifications than total weakness on one side and brilliant sacrifices on the other.

But we must call his attention to the two "Vienna" games on page 45, whose result together with the notes upon them are likely to mislead the student. Herr Steinitz's sacrifice in the game with Rosenthal is unsound, as the eminent master admitted to us. In the following game Black's sacrifice is equally indefensible, and its success was merely due to weak play on the other side. If Mr. Cook will examine a game at this opening, played between Herr Steinitz and two Manchester amateurs, he will, we think, agree with us on this point, and alter his note in the next edition. In fact, both games and analysis betray a preference, on the author's part, for brilliant and hazardous attacks, rather than that plain, solid, and prosaic style which has no object but winning the game. This will detract somewhat from the real merit of the book in the eyes of advanced players, but will not make it less popular with a great many. In conclusion, we must congratulate Mr. Cook upon the work, taken as a whole. He has shown that his theoretic knowledge is exceedingly wide; and we may add that his modest reserve in publishing no games of his own (except one which he lost) will cause no one to think lightly of his powers as a practical player. Taking into consideration the narrow limits of the book, the immense field to be traversed, and the author's disadvantage in not being able to consult with players of the highest class, we are of opinion that the few errors which we pointed out in no carping spirit, and which can easily be rectified, do not prevent the work from thoroughly fulfilling its object, being both an excellent vade-mecum for every chess-player, and a permanent addition to the literature of the game.

Memorials of Manchester Streets. By Richard

Wright Procter. (Manchester, Sutcliffe.) TOPOGRAPHY and local history generally are better understood than they used to be. Mr. Procter's book is, as far as it goes, a proof of this. Not that we wish for a moment to

disparage the works, or to mortify the spirits (supposing them capable of mortification), of the compilers of those unreadable folios which cost so much time, give so little information, and which, in the most dilapidated condition, fetch fancy prices, like unusable old China. If they do not, indeed, invariably fetch such prices, the "fancy figure" is set against them, like the high price which Walpole's Chinaman put upon the vase cracked by an earthquake!

Mr. Procter has done well for Manchester streets. He would have done better if he had talked less, or rather, not at all, about everything else, when he has, or oftener when he has not, the opportunity. If, when dealing with one subject, he "looks back" to a former subject fully dealt with, we object to being taken from Manchester to Zoar, and being

treated with the story of Lot and Lot's wife.

Mr. Procter's personal reminiscences of Manchester streets are worth the telling. We like them the better as, in this way, a score of men might supply materials for a History of Manchester, each furnishing exclusively his own, and taking but little from mediæval or even modern heaps. The smallest trifles may serve for illustrations of local life within the limits of the writer's time and that of two

was manifested as they stood at their doors gazed from their windows. As The Job Hindler lifeboat was drawn triumphantly along, his neigh bours waved their hands and raised their cheering voices."

Job Hindley died last March, and this

record is added to the story of the noble Manchester tripe man :

"Just prior to his decease he had the gratifica tion of

Fires on some Lancashire hearths last as long as human lives-longer than many. We hear of one at Cartmel which was burning when Mr. William Field was born there, nearly eighty years ago, and which has never since "gone out"! "It is easily kept in," says Mr. Field. "We cut a peat from the adjoining moss, put it under the embers at night, and in the morning nothing is required save fresh fuel." In telling the story of Job Hindley, Mr. Procter gets away to the Pays des Landes and the people who pass their lives on stilts. We are surprised, therefore, and grateful that, in describing the fire preserved at Cart mel, he avoids alluding to the story of the sacred fire of Vesta, and the final extinguishing of it by Theodosius the Great. We are sure, from his illustrative style, that this has been an oversight, for which we are truly thankful.

generations, father and grandfather before too, hearing that his lifeboat, in its first exper at sea, had been the means of rescuing eleven him. In this way, one gets ocular and hear-sailors, and he promptly forwarded five pounds to say evidence that can be duly estimated. be divided amongst the crew. In addition to Accordingly, we are glad to have a tankard private legacies, Mr. Hindley left by his will under such old signs as The Sun and Poet's nearly three thousand pounds to public charitie Corner (Apollo and the Bard aptly brought together), and to call for a "Churchwarden and a "Go, cold" at The Stump and Pie Lad. We are by no means above going to Dirt Fair, and we are by all means more than glad to meet with the eccentric and Rev. Joshua Brookes, whose name seems to speak of some affinity with the great anatomist, whose strange owls and bones used to be gazed at stealthily, but with delight, by boys daring enough to climb high enough to peer over the oncemysterious wall, a terror and attraction, between Blenheim Steps and Marlborough Street. The Manchester Rev. Joshua was a humourist who created humour in others. Contemporary with him in the last century was Patten Nat," which is Manchestrian for "Nathan Wood." Patten-maker Nat once borrowed a barrow belonging to the church; he was rolling it irreverently homeward over the graves in the churchyard, when he was arrested by a sharp blow from behind, and by the voice of the dealer of the blow, Mr. Brookes, exclaiming, "How dare you wheel that barrow over consecrated ground?"-"I thought," replied ready Patten Nat, "that as the barrow belongs to the sexton, it was consecrated too!" There are other worthies who are pleasant to meet, but we pause at one because he illustrates the fact that large fortunes have been raised in Manchester on other foundation than cotton. The hero is Job Hindley.

"In Job's case a sudden misfortune resulted in a permanent blessing. Had no accident befallen him in youth, he would probably have passed through life as one of the countless everyday workers, who merely eat, drink, and make merry, leaving the world neither better nor worse than they found it. But the loss of his right arm (while working for a firm of calenderers in Tib Street) forcing him from his original trade, he then adopted a new and more lucrative line of business the dressing of substantial tripe, the preparation of nutritious cowheel. This course he pursued with singular success, until at length he chose to retire upon his gains. Tact and energy in the accumulation of his means have been supplemented by wisdom and goodness in the distribution thereof. Finding himself in the possession of a thousand pounds which he could spare, he presented that sum (reserving the interest) to the Manchester

Mr. Procter alludes to a local actress, Mrs. Ward (née Hoare), as being "many years the rival of Mrs. Siddons," which is something new. He is not aware that Mrs. Ward had a more celebrated sister in Mrs. Sage, the lady aeronautist of her day. Mr. Procter wisely refrains from going too far a-field for Manchester worthies; but the list is long enough, from Humphrey Chetham to little Tommy Lye. The latter name will extort a smile of homage, too, from the old lovers of racing. What a humorous, stunted dwarf Tommy looked in colours on some "Flying bit of High Mettle!" After he retired, like Chifney, dressed in black, white cravatted, and broadbrimmed, what a perfect dwarf "parson" Tommy looked! Some of the worthies are noteworthy for their Christian names. Fancy Mrs. Adams, whose husband, Roger, founded the first Manchester newspaper in 1719, carrying her twin babies to the font, calling one Dorothy, which was justifiable, but asking an orthodox clergyman, who had nothing heathenish or mythological about him, to baptize the other (a brother to Dorothy) as

Orion! Place names are often as queer as

personal names. The dirtiest corner in Manchester, like a similar one at Ramsgate, is called "Paradise."

The city has, of course, one of those law cases which leave opinions extremely divided It might be included in the next edition of 'Puzzles and Paradoxes,' but it would task judgment upon it. The time is 1817: Mr. Paget's powers to establish a definite

Royal Infirmary, in return for important services rendered gratuitously in his youth. By this timely act of benevolence he secured while living the posthumous donors receive upon their tombstones good-will and warm eulogies of his fellows, which only. Subsequently, with an additional five "At the date here given, Margaret Marsden, s hundred pounds, he presented a lifeboat to the widow, had been, during ten years, servant in the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, the station house of Mr. Thomas Littlewood, adjoining the assigned to it being Seaton Carew, Durham. Three-nooked Field, Pendleton. The family con These judicious presents were publicly acknow-sisted of four persons-the master and mistress, ledged in the Town Hall of his native city on Margaret, and a younger servant, Hannah Parting Friday, December 19, 1873. Taken in its entirety, ton, aged twenty. Mr. Littlewood had a grocer that was a proud day for the residents of Red shop in Salford, where every Saturday he attended Bank and Long Millgate-an honest pride, which to meet his customers, the market people. On

Saturday morning, the 26th of April, 1817, Mr. and Mrs. Littlewood went to their business as

usual; at their return in the evening, they found several neighbours gathered near the house apprehensive of something wrong. A ladder being procured, the dwelling was entered by an upper window; and on descending, the two servants were found murdered-Hannah weltering in her blood on the floor, Margaret on her chair. A poker, bent and bloody, lay upon the dresser; a stained cleaver was also found. About one hundred and sixty pounds in notes and gold were missing, in addition to some plate and wearing apparel. Who had committed the crime? None could tell with certainty; but four men had been noticed hovering about during the day. Suspicion therefore attached to them: they were described, and speedily hunted down. Two were apprehended in St. George's Road, one in Silk Street, Newton Lane; the other at the Swan Inn, Sugar Lane: all on the following day. Committed to the Assizes at Lancaster, the prisoners were thus arraigned before the Lord Chief-Baron, in the month of August then next ensuing :-William Holden, forty-seven; James Ashcroft the elder, fifty-three; James Ashcroft the younger, thirty-two; David Ashcroft, forty-eight; John Robinson, fifty-three. The last-named was acquitted, there being no evidence to connect him either with the crime or

with the other persons accused. The foreman of the grand jury was Edward Geoffrey Lord Stanley, then in his nineteenth year. In his charge to the petit jury, at the conclusion of the trial, the ChiefBaron observed that the circumstances of the case were extraordinary; without doubt blood was spilled in considerable quantity, yet not drop was visible on any of the prisoners; nor was any part of the missing property found upon them,except, perhaps, the money, which could not be identified. But two of the prisoners had suddenly become possessed of bank-notes and gold, of which no satisfactory account was given. The strong favourable points he considered overbalanced by the general tenor of the evidence, which, though circumstantial, formed a connected chain. The prisoners solemnly denied any knowledge of the murder, but their denial went of course for nought. It is the peculiar and unavoidable hardship of accused persons-whatsoever the accusation may be-that their lips are virtually sealed, even against the truth. The jury almost immediately returned a verdict of guilty against all the four men, who were thereupon sentenced to death, to be followed by dissection. On Monday, 8th September, the execution took place. While upon the scaffold, William Holden said to the multitude, "I am now going to meet my God, and in the face of Him I declare I am as innocent of the concern as the child yet unborn.' David Ashcroft said, "You are all assembled to see four innocent men suffer. I would not now tell a lie for all the world.' As soon as the elder Ashcroft came upon the scaffold, he kissed his son. After the ropes were affixed, they all sang a hymn which David gave out. It was the well-known hymn beginningI'll praise my Maker whilst I've breath, And when my voice is lost in death,

Praise shall employ my nobler powers: My hours of praise shall ne'er be past, While life, and thought, and being last, Or immortality endures. While they were singing, the drop fell, and the guilt or innocence of the four men remains to the present day a debatable point-a problem unsolved."

Of course, Manchester in the two Jacobite periods, '15 and '45, is not omitted. This double story, however, remains to be told as it deserves to be. It is one of the most stirring and touching in our annals. There was in it a mingling of earnestness, unselfish honesty, folly, recklessness, wild dancing, and wilder lovemaking with Jacobite Manchester belles, wilder in politics than those gallants whom they led in that dance to death. The stories of some of those hapless fellows in doom have to be read

contrary to the traditional form; but, tried by their fiery ordeal, they were, with one or two exceptions, brave gentlemen. As brave as any were two who were the most humbly born, Syddall, the wig-maker, who suffered death with heroic dignity, after '15; and Syddall, the son, who left his father's vocation, and suffered death as nobly and unostentatiously as his father did, after the '45. Some day, perhaps, this tragic, but far from disgraceful (quite otherwise), episode in Manchester history will be narrated by a writer able to grasp the many threads of these Jacobite incidents. Meanwhile, we take leave of Mr. Procter (having noticed slight shortcomings), with congratulations on the appearance of a volume which is not ill written, and is well illustrated, and which may possibly give the author a claim to be hereafter included among the worthies of Manchester.

By H.

Philip Mannington; and Eisleben.
Schütz Wilson. (Tinsley Brothers.)
The Gosau Smithy. By the Author of 'Dorothy
Fox.' 2 vols. (Daldy, Isbister & Co.)
Les Mystères Mondains. Par Adolphe Belot.
(Paris, Dentu.)

MR. HARDY, who has now, we think, for the
first time allowed his name to appear on a
title-page, is at once an interesting and a dis-
appointing writer.
appointing writer. He is, perhaps, the most
vigorous of all the novelists who have appeared
within the last few years; his powers of de-
scription, his skill in devising "situations,"
his quaint humour, secure him a high place
among novelists of any age; while, on the
other hand, a sort of recklessness seems at
times to overcome and neutralize all these
qualities, and the coarseness upon which we
remarked in reviewing his 'Desperate Reme-
dies,' some four years ago, still disfigures his
work and repels the reader. He is evidently a
shrewd observer of the talk and habits of the
Somersetshire rustics; and yet he puts such
expressions into their mouths as "Passably
well put," "Every looker-on's inside shook
with the blows of the great drum to his deepest
vitals, and there was not a dry eye throughout
the town," and so on-expressions which we
simply cannot believe possible from the illite-
rate clods whom he describes. Then, though
his style is often admirable, he gives us such
monstrous periphrases as "a fair product of
Nature in a feminine direction," and other
specimens of the worst "penny-a-liner's" lan-
guage, till we almost despair of him; and
then, a little further on, we come to such an
admirable variation of an old aphorism as
"Men take wives because possession is not
possible without marriage, and women accept
husbands because marriage is not possible
without possession." And so on throughout
the book, "nil fuit unquam sic impar sibi";
and we are alternately attracted and repelled
by admirable delineations of man and nature
on the one hand, and gross improbabilities on
the other, till we lay it down, unable to say

whether the author is an ill-regulated genius or a charlatan with some touches of cleverness. How his present story could ever have even been supposed to be written by George Eliot we cannot conceive, though her influence has been plainly visible in some of his former books; we should say, on the contrary, that some of the scenes, notably that where Sergeant Troy goes through the sword exercise before Bathsheba, are worthy, in their extravagance, of Mr. Reade, and of him only; while At the stronger parts are Mr. Hardy's own. least we know of no other living author who could so have described the burning rick-yard, or the approaching thunder-storm, or given us the wonderful comicalities of the supper at the malt-house. The contrasted characters of the three chief men of the story are also well worked out; the man of single eye, who waits and works patiently, scarcely hoping even for recognition, but ready to help the woman he loves, literally through fire and water; the profligate soldier, who comes, sees, and, for a time, conquers; and the reserved, middle-aged farmer, falling in love for the first time at forty, and then driven almost, if not quite, to insanity by disappointment,-all play their parts well, and take their due shares in the development of the story. On the whole, we leave Mr. Hardy with some hope. He ought to hold his peace for at least two years, revise with extreme care, and refrain from publishing in magazines; then, though he has not done it yet, he may possibly write a nearly, if not quite, first-rate novel.

It must have been in the dead of night that the author of Messrs. Bentley's new publication found his inspiration. It combines all the horror and absurdity which one usually connects with the suggestions of a disordered liver. The love-making, which in general is the central machinery of a novel, is here reduced to a secondary position, and the interest of the tale is concentrated on a ghastly murder, of which the hero is for some time, on what seems to be strong circumstantial evidence, supposed to be the perpetrator. His cousin, who bears a grudge against him for supplanting him in a rich inheritance, contrives, by practising various diabolical arts, of which drugging his victim is not the least important, to throw upon Lionel suspicion so grave, that it is only by an ingenious escape from prison that he avoids the last penalty of the law. Lionel's success in this matter is but one degree less marvellous than the devices by which he finally clears his character and throws the burden of guilt on the real culprit. He is certainly much assisted by the unaccountable obtuseness of the police, whom he manages to satisfy of his own decease by allowing them to inspect a waxen figure through a glass window in a coffin-lid, and afterwards, with the aid of the razor and a little dyeing, he passes for his own brother till he has laid his plans for the dénoûment. This consists in his conviction of the villainous cousin by suddenly exhibiting to him and to the rest of the family circle, on the anniversary of the murder, a picture, properly lighted and posed, of the tragic end of Osmond as it really occurred. The device is even more successful than that of Hamlet in the play, for the murderer is not only startled into an ecstasy of guilty fear, but actually dies from the effect of the shock. Other evidence being forthcoming, Lionel and

his wife, whom he has married quite out of order in the first volume, live happily ever after. Of that lady we learn little, except her praiseworthy belief in her husband's character throughout. The best-drawn figure is that of Mr. Tom Bristow, a cheery young stock-jobber, who is of great service to the plot, and wins with much dexterity the hand of the second lady, daughter of an unusually foolish country squire. The whole story is grossly absurd, though lively enough.

Theresa' is an improvement upon the feeble novelettes which Miss Craik has written during the last three or four years. It is not a powerful work, for Miss Craik does not possess much power; but the tale has been elaborated with a good deal of care and taste. We are glad, too, to find Miss Craik has, to a great extent, got rid of the mannerisms to which she used to be so prone, and we can, on the whole, congratulate her upon her new production.

Mr. Wilson possesses more general knowledge and culture than the majority of novelists, but he is unacquainted with the principles on which a work of fiction should be constructed. When he has learned these, and has discarded the terribly hackneyed materials he employs in the book before us, we have no doubt he will give us a much better novel than 'Philip Mannington.'

In spite of a simplicity which is almost insipid, and occasional traces of hurried writing, Mrs. Parr's tales are not wanting in graceful passages, and possess a considerable amount of blameless interest. Some of them are rather sad, as that of "The Gosau Smithy,' a story of Swiss peasant life, in which a pair of faithful lovers are ruthlessly drowned in a lake. 'La Bonne Mère Nannette,' too, has a painful history, though her self-sacrifice and fidelity bring their reward in the evening of her days. 'Little Nan' is the pathetic story of an orphan girl, whose early life among a set of kind-hearted tramps, and later trials under the severe discipline of a "respectable" school, produce a discord which mars her girlish days, though in the end she finds happiness as the wife of a good man who attempted to be her benefactor in childhood. The second volume consists of love-tales in a higher grade of society, mostly natural and pleasing, though a little inclined to be "goody." Yet they smack of observation, and are true enough to that peaceful type of nature to which the author is wise in confining her attention.

We do not think that M. Belot's new novel will reach its forty-second edition, like its author's 'Mademoiselle Giraud, ma Femme,' nor even its thirty-third edition, like his 'Femme de Feu.' It is a stupid book, which begins three times over, and anything more irritating than a novel with several openings we do not know.

The Chinese Reader's Manual: a Handbook of Biographical, Historical, Mythological, and General Literary Reference. By W. F. Mayers. (Trübner & Co.)

MR. MAYERS's book has supplied a want which has been long felt by students of Chinese. It is only uttering a truism to say that one of the chief difficulties in the way of translating a Chinese book lies in the obscurity which

surrounds the numerous biographical and historical allusions which are met with at every turn. To gather them from the most recondite sources, and to refer to them in the most covert terms, is the effort of every Chinese author. The more thickly they are scattered over the pages of his work, so much the more does the writer pride himself on the erudition of his style. The fact that each and all have been quoted by generations of writers detracts in nowise from the esteem in which the works of another copyist are held. Fifteen generations of competitive examinations on the same subjects have so contracted the national mind that all attempts at originality in metaphor have long died out. Every woman's waist is likened to a "bending willow"; every loving pair, to a "Yuan" and a "Yang"; every letter-carrier, to a "wild goose "; and so on through all the recognized subjects for metaphor. It is not often that, as authors, the Japanese can be compared favourably with the Chinese. But in this respect they may be, though their flights of imagination are not always very striking or very picturesque. It is better for a man to liken himself to a toad in a stone, as did lately the writer of a memorial addressed to the Mikado, than for an author, from sterility of imagination, to be driven to illustrate his position by a hackneyed reference to some well-known character in history. To this barrenness of intellectual enterprise is due the frequent use of biographical and historical allusions in Chinese literature; and as rightly to understand these a wide range of reading and a deep study of the "huge and ill-arranged Chinese repertories" of knowledge are necessary, few foreign students have gained more than a superficial acquaintance with the most common. To elucidate some, and "to furnish a clue to others, and at the same time to bring together from various sources epitome of historical and biographical details,” are the principal objects of the work be

fore us.

an

Mr. Mayers has divided his book, like an old-fashioned sermon, into three parts. The first he calls an 'Index of Proper Names,' and within it are embraced, together with information on the subjects we have referred to, "accounts of mythical beings and legends connected with animate or inanimate objects.' The second part consists of a collection of numerical forms of expression, called by Mr. Mayers 'Numerical Categories,' which the peculiar tendency of the Chinese mind has led them so largely to adopt; and in the third part are given carefully prepared chronological tables of the Chinese Dynasties. As a specimen of the complete way in which Mr. Mayers has executed his task, we will quote the first entry at p. 1:-" A-fang Kung. A vast Palace built by She Hwang-ti, B.C. 212, near the city of Hien-yang, his ancestral capital. It was an enlargement of a prior edifice, to which the name A-ki Fang had been given. The Palace was erected within the Park or hunting-ground called Shang lin Yuan, and 700,000 criminals and prisoners were employed at forced labour in its construction. The central hall was of such dimensions that 10,000 persons could be assembled within it, and banners 60 ft. in height might be unfurled below. Vast as it was, the son and successor of the founder

commenced his brief reign, in B.c. 209, by adding to its magnificence.'

The biographical portion is full, and contains notices of persons of renown in every epoch and condition, from the date of the Flood down to the present time. The nomerical categories form an important sup plement to this part. Their frequent use in Chinese literature, unaccompanied with any explanation of their hidden meaning, is a constant source of difficulty to the student; and though some may be said to interpret themselves, as, for instance, San ho, “The Three Rivers," yet others are of themselves quite unintelligible. For example, the expression San chang, "The Three Sentences," requires a gloss before its meaning in composition can be rightly understood. Mr. Mayers tells us that it refers to the three penal sentences which were "promulgated by the founder of the Han Dynasty, B.C. 202, who abolished the enactments of Ts'in She Hwang-ti, and proclaimed the following in their stead:Life shall be given for life; compensation shall be given for wounds; imprisonment shall be the penalty for robbery." All who have been compelled from time to time to make researches in Chinese biographical dic tionaries and encyclopædias, will fully appre ciate the benefit Mr. Mayers has conferred upon students of Chinese by his. present book. In the choice of the material he has shown a wise discretion, and the great variety of sources from which it has been collected bears testimony to the industry and learning of the compiler.

CHRISTMAS BOOKS.

the

The Hunter and the Trapper in North America;
or, Romantic Adventures in Field and Forest.
From the French of Benedict Révoil By
W. H. Davenport Adams. (Nelson & Sons.)
Wrecked on a Reef; or, Twenty Months among
Auckland Isles. From the French of F. E
The Autobiography of a Man-o'-War's Bell: &
Raynal. (Same publishers.)
Tale of the Sea. By Lieut. C. R. Low, (late) L.N.
(Routledge & Sons.)

The Gentleman Cadet, his Career and Adventures

at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich : a Tale of the Past. By Lieut.-Col. A. W. Drayson, R.A. (Griffith & Farran.) Edda; or, the Tales of a Grandmother. History of Denmark from the Earliest Ages to the Aocession of the Oldenburg Dynasty, A.D. 1448. Edited by Philojuvenis. (Nisbet & Co.) MORE Christmas books. The first two of the present batch are translated from the French, but they with are of different degrees of merit. We agree the translator of 'The Hunter and the Trapper,' that M. Révoil" had a faculty of observation which makes his volume pleasant reading," but we cannot allow that the narrative "is entirely free from exaggeration," and we are not quite sure that we have not read the story of Negro Dick and the Prairie wolves before in another place. It seems familiar, and we think it is of German origin. The story of the Texan hunter and the peccaries Indeed, the success of the hunter, his the is decidedly good, but also very decidedly American. marvellous, as well as the tales, which he merely escapes and fortunate accidents, all tend to the transcribes. Boys will read the book and forget it. Not so the second work, 'Wrecked on a Reef, of which we heartily approve, as wholesome from the evident truthfulness of the narrative, and instructive because it encourages self-reliance work a "religious book," the volume will teach without vanity. Although we cannot call the lesson to a young mind which, once leamed, is not forgotten. Boys need not be alarmed; the