LONDON, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1870.

LITERATURE

by two institutions, the kagal or kheder-hakagal, the communal government, and the beth-din, the Talmudical Court, which is partially recognized by the Russian laws. The government is indeed elective, but both electors and elected must have obtained a certain rank in the com

The Book of Kagal─[Kniga Kagala]. Hebrew Local and Universal Societies-[Yev-munity, gained nominally by proficiency in the reiskiya bratstva myestniya i vsemirniya]. By J. Braphmann. (Wilna.) It is singular that no recent traveller in Russia has thought of telling us something about the Russian Jews. Yet there are two millions of them, chiefly concentrated in Poland and the Western Governments. Their condition is curiously anomalous: in Bessarabia, they are not allowed to live within fifty versts of the frontier, and in other districts they form 35 per cent. of the population, and possess all the property and wealth of the place. In Kharkof, till a short time ago, no Jew was allowed to remain, while in Yelisavetgrad, which you will reach in a day, your driver will reply to your interrogatories by telling you, that if you continue to call him a Jew (zh) instead of a Hebrew, he can have you fined twenty-five rubles. While Rabbinical schools are closed in Odessa, the first synagogue is being opened at Moscow; while poor| Hebrews in some of the smaller towns are prohibited all occupations but usury, Polyakoff stands high in the confidence of the Government as a maker of railways, and is prevented from buying the most magnificent palace in St. Petersburg only because a lingering scruple forbids the sale of the family chapel to a Jew. The Jews in Russia, hampered by contradictory enactments and restrictions, have almost created an imperium in imperio, and have their own customs, their own dress, their own laws, and even their own language,—at least the mixture of corrupt German, Polish, Russian and Hebrew, which they all speak, is known as the Israelite language, and can be heard to advantage at the Jewish theatre at Warsaw.

Everybody in Russia has regarded the Jews with such contempt and indifference, that the revelations of Mr. Braphmaun-himself a Christianized Jew-on Hebrew laws and customs, supported by authentic documents from the archives of Wilna, have excited a great astonishment, and have at once re-opened "the Hebrew question," which has been for some time rising in importance. Some Russian Some Russian liberals propose various remedies and measures; some, who call themselves very liberal, think the Jew should have no civil rights, while others, with whom we believe our readers will agree, say there is one very simple remedy: abolish all distinctions, and educate the Jews equally with other Russian subjects, and there can be no Hebrew question.

With the Hebrew question in Russia, however, we have at present nothing to do, and the books of Mr. Braphmann are chiefly interesting to us as showing the peculiarities of Hebrew law and life actually existing in Russia, derived from the Talmud and the ancient Judaic law. The line of Schiller,

Die Juden bilden einen Staat im Staate,

has been wonderfully realized in Western Russia and Poland; where the Jews have formed and preserved to this day in every city or town a Talmudical municipal republic, of a very aristocratic kind, in which the patrician caste have arbitrary and despotic power over the plebeians. This government is carried on

learning of the Talmud, and often granted in reality to rich men for a money consideration. The Kagal not only directs the schools and internal government of the community, but supervises and regulates all the affairs of Hebrews with the non-Hebrew population, forbidding or allowing them, as it considers best for their interests. This power is completely arbitrary, and there can be no appeal from it. The authority of all external laws and regulations is denied, and said to be not binding on Hebrews, and they are strictly forbidden to have recourse to a Russian court in disputes with each other, even when the Russian laws coincide with the Hebrew. The Kagal, however, does not scruple to have recourse to the external authorities, when necessary and practicable, to assist it in its objects. The Kagal claims to have authority over the whole territory and population of the district. NonHebrews are there, and in possession of property only as infringers of the rights of the chosen people of God. The Kagal grants or sells the right of living in the district to a new comer, and without the necessary paper a Jew coming from another district would find it impossible to live or support himself. The property of non-Hebrews is, according to the Talmud, a free wilderness, or, as Rabbi Joseph Kulun says, "a sort of free lake," in which only that Hebrew can place nets who has obtained a right for it from the Kagal. Thus regarding the property of non-Hebrews as the general property of the community, the Kagal sells to Jews the right to occupy this property, and even draws up bills of sale and receives money from them. More than that, it sells the right to exploiter individuals, to lend them money and to get hold of their property. Things of this kind seem almost incredible, although Mr. Braphmann quotes in full formal acts, one selling the right to the shop of a Russian merchant, another a part of the city lands with the buildings that may hereafter be erected by the Government, and another a whole Franciscan convent. After such a sale no other Jew can interfere, without the permission of the purchaser, and should a Jew purchase or get hold of real estate belonging to a Christian, which had not previously been disposed of by the Kagal, he would have to buy again from the Kagal before his rights would be recognized by the Rabbinical Court, or by his fellows.

Besides its power of fixing the residence of Jews, the Kagal claims the right to interfere with their choice of occupation, and to prevent them from exercising it; regulates even the details of their domestic life; fixes the number of persons that can be present at a marriage or festival, the musicians that can be employed, and many other petty things. One of its greatest powers is in the butchering of cattle. The Jews, even with us, as is well known, can eat no meat but that killed in accordance with the precepts of the law of Moses; and in Russia this rule is most strictly regarded: but the religious instincts of the people do not keep them so much to its strict observance as

the active supervision of the Rabbinical authorities. They are the more particular as they collect a tax on meat, which supplies funds for communal purposes. This tax has been recognized and confirmed by the Russian laws, and the Government officials are required to assist in its collection, on the ground that the Kagal will thus be able to make good the deficiencies in the Government taxes of Jewish communities. No doubt, part of this tax comes from Christians. The Kagal is also authorized by law to impose a tax on all liquors sold in taverns and dram-shops kept by Hebrews in country villages. This tax, of course, falls on the consumers; the purchasers are all peasants, and there are no other dram-shops. Another curious instance of a tax on the whole population, for the benefit of the Jews, is found in Wilna. In the Jewish quarter there has long been permitted a tax on provisions for the Kagal; and a few years ago the Kagal succeeded in persuading the city authorities to remove the public fish-market to that quarter, thus laying the excise on the whole community. This tax, in 1867, was farmed out by the city council for 340l. One might almost think Judaism the State religion there.

The Kagal maintains its authority by means of such taxes, and by severe punishments inflicted by the beth-din. These include forbidding intercourse of the neighbours with the condemned, prohibiting him to ply his trade, preventing his wife from purifying herself with the bath, and excommunication. As he who transgresses one tittle transgresses the whole law, excommunication is threatened for very slight offences, and, in a town almost wholly Jewish, it is really civil death. Sometimes, as occurred a few months ago at Shkloff, actual physical punishments are used. In that case, a woman suspected of improper intimacy with a man-suspected only, for the Rabbinical court has no rules of evidencewas beaten almost to death, and driven naked along the public street. In cases of great obstinacy, the arm of the civil power is sometimes called in; and to prevent an appeal to the civil courts from its decisions, the beth-din takes good care to have the parties sign beforehand, on stamped paper, documents which would prevent such action. The author accuses the Kagal of buying up Government officials, to make them wink at any stretch of power in their proceedings.

The local brotherhoods or societies are powerful agents of the Kagal. The author divides them into learned, whose object is to expound the Talmud, industrial or trade-unions, religious and benevolent. The chief benevolent societies are those for buying up captives, and the burial societies. As no Jews are held in bondage, the objects of the first of these can only be guessed at. Burial societies were instituted because the clergy are forbidden to perform funeral rites, which are considered secular and unclean works (to such a degree, that even now, if the burial of a Jew has to take place on a feast-day, it must be done, if done at all, by Christian hands). These societies become often instruments of great oppression and extortion. In 1866 a Jewess named Broyd complained to the city authorities of Wilna that the burial society had taken from her 1,500 rubles (1887) for the burial of her husband. She did not wish to pay, but the body was left unburied for five

days, and then the society compelled her to pay, and to sign a paper that she had given this sum to the society for benevolent purposes. When the Kagal learned that she had complained, they fined her 500 rubles (607.) in addition, as a contribution to the deficiencies in the recruiting tax for poor Hebrews. The local authorities could do nothing to assist her, but were compelled to assist the Kagal to collect the tax, on the ground that in matters relating to the communal liabilities of Hebrews, the Kagal was a government institution. A similar case has very recently occurred at Kief. The only remedy against such extortions is to become a member of the ruling class; and for that end every plebeian Jew tries, if possible, to have his sons educated in the Talmud, that they may gain the necessary rank, and be better off than himself. The Alliance Israelite Universelle is an attempt to unite all Jewry by means of such societies.

Mr. Braphmann writes with no animosity towards the Jewish race, to which he himself belongs, but attacks sharply the system of the Kagal, which, in his opinion, is disliked by the most of the lower class, and does far more than the Government to keep the Jews in a state of separatism. Until this influence is overthrown, he thinks it impossible for the Russian Jews to coalesce with the rest of the population of the empire.

Albeys, Castles and Ancient Halls in England and Wales: their Legendary Lore and Popular History. By John Timbs. 2 vols. (Warne & Co.)

MR. TIMBS's industry is well known to his particular public. If he devoted as much time to thinking over and classifying his materials as he must do in getting them together, his success would be greater than it is, though that is not small with the author's clientèle, who only want to be amused. We must admit that they are also often instructed. Mr. Timbs is lucky in his subjects. The present one is especially good; good in itself, and should be good in its influences. It should give young People especially a desire to visit the historical places of their own land. Mr. Timbs might have omitted some chapters, or replaced them Ly others on localities he has passed over in silence. In either case, he might practise condensation to the profit of his readers. His Look need not, therefore, be characterized like the tragical mirth of Pyramus and Thisbe as Leing "tedious brief," but one may have too much even of a good thing.

Mr. Timbs has given a very fair account of Anne Boleyn's old home, Hever Castle, Kent: but why has he omitted to notice a house adjacent, and quite as historical, namely, Ightham? Like Hever, it is a moated house, but it is not in equally good repair. Its hall and chapel are of great interest, and so is the house generally. It once belonged to Sir Richard Brackenbury, Lieutenant of the Tower when the princely sons of Edward were imprisoned there. Brackenbury gave up his Lieutenancy for a time. He was too honest to be fitted for the awful work in hand; but whether he exactly knew the nature of that work is not so clear; or if, knowing it, he Joint-blank refused to have any part in it. The only certain fact is, that Sir Richard was released, or dismissed, from his duties, and a

less scrupulous official took the keys and the responsibility attached to them. Ightham, as it stands now, may help the visitor to realize the scene of what was passing then: the murder in the Tower, and the sad and silent Lieutenant, seated at one of the windows of Ightham, looking with a pre-occupied air over the gloomy landscape, and wondering what chance or mischance was next to turn up in once merry England.

Then, among the Sussex historical houses, Mr. Timbs has forgotten to make record of one of the most interesting in the whole county-Wakehurst. It is at once one of the quaintest and one of the grandest of old country-houses. It stands on the high ground of the county, and its neighbourhood is one of great beauty and interest. The initials of the Culpepers, who built it in Elizabeth's time, may still be seen over the porch. Since that period, the house, which perhaps has the heaviest stone roof in England, except that of the Chapel of King's College, Cambridge, has seen many masters. The old grey house is altered too, from what it was three centuries ago. One of the Peytons levelled the protruding wings, nearly to the face of the centre of the house itself. After the Peytons ceased to reside at Wakehurst, this old mansion was let for short periods, to a varied succession of tenants, including artists and lawyers, who hired it for their holiday vacation. Its interior may be recognized in several pictures that have challenged admiration at the Royal Academy; and if ever the public should get the chronicle of what sort of life was led at Wakehurst, when some celebrated lawyers and ladies kept revel there, there will be rare chapters of social history that will be well worth the reading. In the present day, the old half-ruined mansion is being restored by the Marchioness of Downshire for her second son, who will then occupy it, and who will have a namesake for a neighbour in Squire Hill, of Rockhurst.

In treating of Ham House, in Surrey, Mr. Timbs tells us that "the Picture Gallery is hung with portraits mostly by Sir Peter Lely and Vandyck." The fact is, that the whole house is a gallery. Some of the most valuable pictures are most ungratefully guarded. The persons who at present enjoy their rich possession, seem to care nothing for portraits. In the Great Hall, there are fine specimens of Vandyck, Kneller, and Sir Joshua Reynolds, fulllength portraits; among them the Jane Savage, whom Milton has immortalized in his verse. One of these portraits stands beside the door, and every time the door is swung fully back, the handle breaks through the canvas, or rather passes through the hideous hole, which has a look about it as if the original offender had made the breach ages ago. Owners of heirlooms are not often careful of what they have to transmit to their heirs. Ham House, on the whole, is well preserved, but then few and far between are the visitors who are permitted to inspect its treasures. Occasionally, its own lords have treated it with singular neglect. There was one of the Earls of Dysart who lived away from it for so many years in an obscure London lodging, that when he went down, alone, and out of curiosity, to see the old house, he was not recognized. He made good his right, however, to pass through the gate, which is never opened but for the master of the mansion, and he passed up

the avenue into the hall. On treading on the polished floor, his feet slipped up, and my lord lay on his back. The Earl gathered himself together, uttered wicked words, which were much in fashion at the time, and declared that he would never enter the confounded house again. He went back to his London lodgings, and Ham House, Petersham, saw him

no more.

When we find Mr. Timbs at Alnwick, he tells the old story, how the freedom of the borough is obtained by the candidates for civic distinction being decked in white shirts and nightcaps, and struggling through the miry pool called Freeman's Well. The author has no idea that this ceremony has long since been abolished, and that such abolition has been recorded by local historians,-whose works Mr. Timbs should have consulted before he wrote his narrative. Alnwick suffered in the Border Wars; but it is nobly restored. More than one castle of the earlier times was destroyed for the satisfaction of private vengeance. The latter was not always without justification. Mere wanton idleness and its consequences worked all the ruin. Here is a single sample. When Henry the Second had William de Fossard as his ward, the King gave him up, with his right of guardianship and its profits, to William Earl of Albemarle. The Earl lodged the handsome young fellow in his castle, and left him there to amuse himself in many a long absence of the host. Unluckily for the Earl, whatever the youth may have thought of it, the Earl's fair sister was left in the castle too. The idle young pair fell in love, and such terrible disgrace came of it that De Fossard had to fly from the wrath of the Earl. The latter, failing to secure the offender's person, devastated his property: he assailed De Fossard's castle at Montferrant, and with such effect that not one stone was left standing on another. People who looked at the ruins used to utter various wise saws on the perils of loving not wisely but too well.

There is at least one example of a man selling the castle which he inherited, and the succession to which belonged to his heirs. Dudley Castle, now one of the finest of our picturesque ruins, was transferred in this way. Towards the middle of the sixteenth century, the weak and impoverished Baron Sutton, of Dudley, sold that stately edifice. He was literally turned out of it into the street by his rigorous creditor, Dudley, Duke of Northumberland. The English people have always shown an alacrity in the application of nicknames. As the despoiled lord "loafed" about the Dudley market-place, passers-by of the "genteelest" sort saluted him mockingly, and called him, "My Lord Quondam." Baron and duke died in the same year, 1553: Sutton in his bed; the duke on the scaffold.

The castle, with the title, reverted, without purchase, to Sutton's son. By the marriage of his grand-daughter with Sir Humble Ward, two properties and two names became united. The present Earl Dudley is their descendant; his style and title designate him as Earl Dudley, of Dudley Castle.

We have only to wish that Mr. Timbs had furnished his youthful readers with instances of life in castle, hall, and abbey. Half the social, and no little of the religious and political life of England, might thus be illustrated. The materials are within his reach. Indeed, the thing itself has been done more than

once,

but

not, as far as we know, for the younger people. Among the many singular incidents of castlelife is that which relates to a Castellan, who, on hearing of an intended visit from the King, burnt his castle to the ground, as being less costly to him than having to entertain royalty and royalty's followers. The Abbots were almost as sorely perplexed at such threatened visits, but they had a reputation for extending hospitality to kings with much magnificence. They were as good hands at making a gloomy apartment look bright and gay as any clever stage-manager. As for castle and convent, the young ladies who came from the first went to school in the second, and went home for the holidays and incipient love-making, just as young ladies in their teens do now. The subject is perhaps not within Mr. Timbs's limits, but it is one that would produce as many stories as those told by that brilliant company who forgot Florence and the plague, and joyously bowed to the rule of their queen, Pampinea.

P. Terentii Afri Comoediae. Edited by T. L. Papillon, M.A. Part I. Andria, Eunuchus. (Rivingtons.)

THIS edition, which forms one of the series called "Catena Classicorum," is good so far as it goes; but there is a certain thinness of work in this book as well as in some other of the "Catena." The notes are such as a careful lecturer prepares for his class when he is dealing with a subject on which he has nothing| very special to say, and in which he takes no decided interest. On most points of difficulty, we have the opinions of previous editors, but we do not see much critical power in the new one. Indeed, Mr. Papillon seems hardly to have mastered the latest criticism of the Roman comedians: he scarcely mentions Ritschl, whose work, indeed, has been mainly on Plautus, but yet has important bearings on Terence too; and though Fleckeisen's edition is alluded to in the Preface, his readings are rarely followed, the preference being given to the very inferior text of Zeune; while undue importance is given to Bentley's emendations, which are sometimes approved of, even when they violate laws of comic metre discovered since Bentley's day. Mr. Papillon tells us in his Preface that he defers the discussion of the metre and prosody of Terence until the end of his work. We cannot but think that he has published the first part without sufficient preparation in this respect. Thus, at line 52 of the 'Andria,'

easy and probable; but he surely should have noticed the peculiarity. So too at Eun. 415, mehercle is scanned, without any remark, as a trisyllable, again contrary to the Terentian usage. Some notice should have been taken of peculiarities like maledicere (Andr. 23), vocabulā (Eun. 264), and of the shortening of a vowel before two consonants; the loss of final r is mentioned at Eun. 157. In matters of spelling, Mr. Papillon is often wrong, and sometimes inconsistent; he generally writes cena, &c. rightly, but we have coenavit (Andr. 89); we generally find the incorrect hiccine and similar forms, though hicinest is written correctly, Andr. 908; we have ingenium est (Andr. 77), but vivendumst (182); oratio est (141), but iniuriast (156); and, lastly, such undoubted mis-spellings as illico (Andr. 125), olera (369), eiiciat (382), renunciata (499), herus and hera occasionally, humerus (Eun. 313), suceus (316), coiimus (538), &c.

If we leave the text, and come to the explanatory notes, we shall find more to praise and less to blame. Mr. Papillon seems to us to have a nice feeling of the usage of Latin, which often makes him a better guide than other editors. Thus he explains the infinitive vivere, at Andr. 799, exceedingly well; Bentley's viveret is quite needless; and the complicated construction of Eun. 925-8 is excellently unravelled: there is no occasion to alter the text with Wagner, even though the et at the end of a line is suspicious. Sometimes Mr. Papillon adopts what seems to us the less forcible explanation: surely mihi ought to be supplied (as by Parry) after dolet, in Eun. 429; the comic force is greatly increased thereby, and the difficulty of the tense is avoided. At Andr. 477, no sufficient sense is obtained by reading (with Mr. Papillon) num immemor es discipuli? instead of immemores. Simo says, "It is not that your pupils have forgotten their parts, is it? it is your bad management." There are some excellent notes on the phrases magis atque (Andr. 699), and utrum ne (Eun. 720); and on the use of the indicative where the subjunctive seems logically required, at Andr. 528. It is in notes like these that Mr. Papillon shows his greatest strength: he is less good in the illustration of idioms which are almost confined to the comedians; he makes far too little use of Plautus to explain Terence; thus in explaining the ablative qui, no mention whatever is made of the abundant use of the word by Plautus (see Brix on the Trin. 464); at Andr. 79 he speaks of the use of condicio for a marriage as "later," but it occurs so in Trin. 159, ut eam in se dignam condicionem conlocem: this deficiency constantly appears. We find also a good deal in Mr. Papillon's speculations on the cases with which we cannot agree. It is unquestionably wrong to call the vocative, as he does at Eun. 559, "a shorter form of the nominative." The vocative is the simple base, sometimes euphonically shortened; the nominative is the base

Liberius uiuendi fuit potestas; nam anteawe have the extraordinary information given us that uiuendi is dissyllabic, though the true scansion of the line is given by Dr. Wagner. Again, at Eun. 494, we are told that there is a hiatus in the line, which must be scanned ūna irě cum ămică îm¦peratorem in via: it is surely astounding that Mr. Papillon should not have seen that the hiatus is between cum and amica, not where he places it. At 459 of the same play, Bentley's inge-plus a case-suffix, which never belonged to the nious emendation abdomini for ex homine is mentioned with approval, and scanned as a trisyllable, which is impossible: and reference is made to Hecyra, 3, 1, 1, for a similar scanning of nemini, which is a mere delusion. At Andr. 483, deinde is made trisyllabic, though it occurs so nowhere else in Terence. Mr. Papillon may be right in not altering the text, though Fleckeisen's emendation is both

different from that of the locative-ablative and instrumental, which are held with much likelihood to have expressed first of all relation in space; that the genitive-suffix was rather adjectival, and the genitive was what its name (yeviký) implies, the class-case; that its use was, as the late Mr. Garnett well said (Essays, p. 223), "to establish the same sort of connexion between words that the relative does between clauses, namely, to show that one of them may be predicated of the other." We believe that the genitive afterwards contracted local significations, in consequence of the loss or confusion of the cases which ought to have expressed those meanings. Thus in such phrases as animi dubius, animi may well have been originally locative, like domi, &c.; but when the full form of the genitive (probably animo-is) was weakened down to animi, the distinction between the cases was lost, and their usage confused : animi in this phrase was called a genitive, and mentis sanus, &c. followed in due course. This confusion is recognized by Mr. Papillon in a good note on the phrase domi focique (Eun. 814); but there he says, wrongly, that "the functions of the Sanskrit locative were originally discharged in Latin, as in Greek, by the dative case." Both Greek and Latin had distinct forms for the dative and locative, viz., oi (ai) and i. In Greek we have both oikų (i.e. oiko + o) and oïkoi (i.e. oiko + i); in Latin the dative oi (equoi, &c.) sank to o; it was preserved in the archaic quoi = cui. The locative i was found, as is well known, in domi, Romai, Karthagini, &c.; some of which, by phonetic change, became confused with other cases, genitive or ablative. But there seems not the least ground for Mr. Papillon's theory that the locative was originally represented by the dative, upon which, as he says, in Latin, the ablative at last encroached.

Mr. Papillon sometimes etymologizes, and is generally ingenious and suggestive. We do not, however, agree with him in supposing the e in equidem and enim to be a prosthetic vowel, like the Greek -Aaxis, &c. The use of this vowel in Greek seems to be one of the distinguishing marks between the Greek and Latin. In equidem it is most probable that the e is a demonstrative particle, as in ecastor, &c., to which quidem was added. For enim, see Corssen's Aussprache, &c., vol. i., p. 387, 2nd edit. From the same authority (p. 493) Mr. Papillon might draw a good many more instances to fortify himself in the belief that lacto has nothing to do with lac. We do not think that sentus, dirty, can be an old past participle of sino, in the sense of "let alone": the n of the verb is not radical. By a slip in the note to Andr. 857, ellum is said to = ecce illum; it is, of course, en illum.

Traditions and Hearth-side Storics of West Cornwall. By William Bottrell (an Old Celt). (Penzance, Cornish; London, Trübner & Co.)

that which was spoken in the now shadowy period of the Giants of the Mount. If to see er was to be subdued to reverential homage, to hear fall from her lips the sounds that once found echoes among the hills of Towednack must have been something startling. The voice of the dead, as it were, found utterance through the lips of the living. The voice was the voice of Pengersee, but the hands were those of a modern country dame. She was, however, the last of the British-speaking Britons; she looked upon Anglo-Saxons as upstarts, and she died with a bosom full of legends, which she would never narrate but in a tongue incomprehensible to most of the listeners.

Some of those legends must have been known to the degenerate half-English race around her; but it is probable that not a few of those have died out. Railroads, and tourists who travel beyond railroads, have given new thoughts to remotely-situated people, who used to live on old stories. It is very good that what may be left of such tales should not be allowed to die. There are more ancient legends to be picked up in Cornwall than elsewhere in England; and Mr. Bottrell being, as he tells us, an Old Celt, is appropriately employed in collecting those illustrations of past ways of thought and action. He has performed his tak for the sake of Cornwall in particular, but the book has an interest for England and English-speaking people generally. It is like the Thames, which belongs to both the past and the present. If there be any difference of opinion as to the origin of some of the legends contained in the volume, it will be still more like the Thames. That ancient river has been so neglected of late, that learned people are at angry issue as to where it rises. Captain Burton may have to head a home expedition, to determine whether the head of the Thames be in Warwickshire or Gloucestershire.

Mr. Bottrell's name is rather Norman than Celtic; but we will not press that point: Etymology, like Statistics, may be made to prove anything. In such cases we know, as Voltaire has told us, that consonants go for little, and vowels for nothing at all. "Old Celt" or not, Mr. Bottrell has done excellent service. It resembles, in many ways, the service which the learned and light-hearted Irishman, Mr. Patrick Kennedy, did for old Irish folk-lore, in his volume of Legends illustrative of the old Irish Celts. There is perhaps a little overmuch in the British hearth-side stories of giants, demons, and magicians, but these were the natural Productions of the localities in which we find them. What is to be expected in the region of wildly-hewn rocks, of pathless mountains, of gloomy valleys, and dark, deep waters, over whose shores the skylark will no more warble than it does over Glendalough-what, we say, is to be expected in such regions but giants on the rocks, demons in the mountain recesses, mischievous imps in the valleys, and equivocal nymphs, neither fish nor flesh, upon and beneath the ever-shadowed waters? bound to say that there is a modern leaven among the witchery. A good deal of the fun and manners of to-day is mixed up with matters that happened before the Flood-if they happened at all.

We are

Then, the chief uses of a book like this lie not in its stories, but in its suggestions, and in the circumstances which connect the past with the present. One of these circum

stances is to be found in Cornish names, which are all significant, and yet which bear no meaning to an ordinary ear. The general reader who has heard of Pelagius knows not, probably, that the early Free Inquirer's British name was Morgan, or that the two names have but one sense,-implying a person living near the sea. Morvah is another British term made musical by its open termination, and means the sea-coast. The Merovingian kings came from such a place, and thence their designation. Zennor is Holy Land, and Penzance is Holy Head, with the adjective put last. Pengwyn is White Head. The penguin is so called because of the whiteness, or fairness, of the bird's head. But the bird was so named among the Patagonians, where it was first seen by Europeans: and with those people pen signified white, and gwyn, head. With the ancient British it was just the reverse; Velandrouchar is old British for wheat-mill. Mr. Bottrell pleads for the preservation of the old

names of fields when built over. Trewartha terrace is happily named, as Trevartha means Higher Town. Vounder-nowath, he adds, treating of names given causâ honoris, "would have been quite as pleasing a name to Cornish ears, as Alexandra road." So he prefers Caernowith to New Castle, for a newly-built edifice. In words like Nan-cott, old valley, Tal-daves, sheep-hill, and Tre-methack, the medical or doctor's town, the qualifying word comes last. There are many good suggestions made by the author to landed proprietors for giving appropriate, that is, significant British names to their houses and estates, and thus preserving the relics of the old language. Some of them would be exceedingly dangerous to the jaws of ignorant strangers. If pronounced, they would be empty sounds, and would probably be twisted out of their genuine meaning, just as Moeshayle, maidens' brook, has been vulgarly Saxonized into Mouse-hole! But Saxon sounds are not altogether foreign to British words. Our familiar apple lives in Bos-aval, apple or orchard-house. The word probably comes from a long way off. In Polish, Mr. Jablonski is simply Mr. Apple-tree! That the old language has not altogether died out, and that it can be turned to good purpose, the following passage will show:

6

"This old Cornish word ' Bucca' (still in common use) has various significations, and none very clearly defined. It appears to belong to the same family of words as the Irish Pookah,' and the Welsh Pwcca.' As above, it is often applied to a poor, half-witted person of a mischievous disposition-one about whom there is anything weird or wisht-to a ghost, or any kind of frightful apparition, and by association of ideas to a scarecrow. By Buccaboo,' which is probably a corrup tion of Bucca-dhu' (black spirit) we mean Old Nick, or one of his near relations. As an example of this, there is a story told of an old lady who lived long ago at Raftra, in St. Levan. The old dame, when more than fourscore, was so fond of card-playing that she would walk almost every winter's night, in spite of wind or weather, to the village of Trebear, distant a mile or more, that she might enjoy her favourite pastime with a family of congenial tastes who resided there. The old lady's step-daughter wished to put a stop to what she regarded as rather scandalous vagaries, as the old dame seldom arrived home before the small hours of the morning; with this intention the young mistress persuaded the serving-man to array himself in a white sheet, &c., so as to personate a ghost that was accused of wandering about a lonely spot over which old madam would have to pass. The winter's night was dark and rainy, when, about

midnight, the ghost seated himself on the side of Goonproynter stile, where he had to wait two or three hours. The dear old lady was in no hurry to leave pleasant company, as it was Christmastime. At last she passed Padz-jigga, mounted the stile, and seated herself to draw breath opposite the ghost. Over a while she said, 'Hallo! Buccagwidden (white spirit), what cheer? and what in the world dost thee do here with Bucca-dhu close behind thee?' This cool address so frightened Bucca-gwidden that he ran off as fast as he could lay feet to ground, the old lady scampering after, clapping her hands, and calling, Good boy, Buccha-dhu; now thee west catch Bucca-gwidden and take'n away with thee!' The ghost was so frightened that he fell in a fit, and was never right in the head after. Then he was a real Bucca in the sense of our Betty's sweetheart, and the strongminded sociable old lady enjoyed many more years of her favourite pastime with her friends in Trebear."

We need hardly say that Bucca is cousin to Bogey, or that the latter word, slightly modified, implied in Eastern Europe a power not necessarily malicious. "Boze sbav Polske!" is God save Poland, where two words out of the three have affinities with English. This brings us to other subjects, connected, however, with malicious potentialities. The sisterhood of witches was once very lively in Cornwall. The young and pretty members of the community had much to do with the Devil; but, in this case, the fiend was in reality a sort of local Don Juan, who only assumed the fiend. The witches died out, but something more than tradition of their doings survives. There is a game yet to be joined in, which has reference to this question :

"To play the game of burning the old witch, shovel-hilt, is placed with each end resting on a a pole about five feet long, such as a pike-staff or low stool. A lighted candle is placed on the floor at a short distance from the pole, on which the person who undertakes to burn the witch endeavours to keep sitting, with the feet also (crossed at the aukles) resting on the pole clear of any other support or help, except a stick about five feet in length. In a slit at the end of this stick is placed the paper, or rag figure, to represent the witch to be burnt for fun, by the person sitting in this ticklish position, who often falls many times before the paper figure can be burnt at the candle on the

floor."

A

Conference of Pleasure, composed for some Festive Occasion about the Year 1592. By Francis Bacon. Edited, from a MS. belonging to the Duke of Northumberland, by James Spedding. (Longmans & Co.) THE discovery, in 1867, of a MS. in Northumberland House containing copies of some of Bacon's early writings has enabled Mr. Spedding to print the whole of the piece bearing the odd title of "Mr. Frauncis Bacon of Tribute, or giuing what is dew." This consists of Praise of the Worthiest Vertue,' four parts, or speeches, with the titles "The ""The Praise

of the Worthiest Affection," "The Praise of the Worthiest Power," and "The Praise of the

Worthiest Person," the real subjects being respectively Fortitude, Love, Knowledge, and Queen Elizabeth. Of these speeches, the two last were first published in 1734, in "Stephens's Second Collection," with the titles "Mr. Bacon in Prayse of Knowledge," and "Mr. Bacon's Discourse in Prayse of his Soveraigne," but the character and occasion of them were doubtful. The Northumberland MS. not only makes it clear that the four speeches form parts of a whole, but supplies a copy of the two first speeches, which are entirely new and unknown, and are now printed for the first time. New pieces by Lord Bacon have an interest of their own, and are well worth the care and trouble which Mr. Spedding has bestowed upon them. His task has not been altogether an easy one. The MS. is damaged at the edges and lower margins, and nothing could be done except to supply the missing words by conjecture, at the same time marking the conjectural words by the use of brackets. The way in which this has been done is very satis factory; most of the conjectures are convincingly happy, and the editor has clearly done the best he could with his materials. A fac-simile is given of the outer page of this MS., which is a very singular one. It originally contained merely the title of the work. After wards, a list was appended, forming a table of contents of some similar MS. which may once have been attached to the first one, but is now lost. This list includes the titles "Richard the Second," and "Richard the Third," which would seem to refer to Shakspeare's plays so named. Another title makes mention of a play called 'The Ile of Dogs,' (not Isle, as printed on p. xix), which is followed by the mysterious word "frmnt," which has not been understood; but we take it to be merely a short way of writing fragment. But this is not all. The leaf has been scribbled over in every direction, and contains scraps of English and Latin verse, the name Mr. Frauncis Bacon several times repeated, and, strangest of all, the name of William Shakespeare at least eight times over. What does this prove? Most certainly Mr. Spedding is right in suggesting that it is an early evidence of the growth of Shakspeare's fame, as we thus find his name written so frequently by an idle hand, merely to try a pen, or for amusement. "At the present time," says Mr. Spedding, "if the wasteleaf on which a law-stationer's apprentice tries his pens were examined, I should expect to find on it the name of the poet, novelist, dramatic author, or actor of the day, mixed with snatches of the last new song, and scribblings of My dear Sir,' 'Yours sincerely,' and 'This Indenture witnesseth.' And this is exactly the sort of thing which we have here."

The four speeches are supposed to be spoken by four friends, each of whom is supplied with a theme, and makes the best he can of it. They are therefore to be considered as rhetorical exercises, and not necessarily expressing Bacon's own opinions. They certainly have the appearance of being written, partly in accordance with some request, and partly with a view to self-improvement. In Passus xx. of the Vision of Piers the Plowman (second version), Langland discusses the relative values of the four cardinal virtues, viz., Temperance, Fortitude, Justice, and Prudence, and assigns the highest place to Temperance. Bacon, however, argues in praise of Fortitude. His

reasons for placing Fortitude above Temperance are of the following nature. (We must premise that the words or parts of words in Italics are conjectural.)-

"Will you affect to be admirable? Will you neither followe others nor spare your selfe? Will you make your life nothing but an occasion and censure of others? Oh, but I mean no such matter: no vain glorie: no malignitie: no diffidence: no censure: I desire but a release from perturbations. I seeke but an euen tenor of minde. I will not use because I will not desire. I will not desire because I will not feare to want. Loe we see all these circumstances, all this preparacion, is but to keepe afarr of feare and griefe, which Fortitude reioyceth to challenge and to chase: but when once a feare and greife commeth, such as all men are subject unto, if it be a feare and greife which ariseth not of the destitucion of a pleasure, but the accesse of a disfortune, then what use hath he of his temperance? Will he not then esteeme it a great follie that he hath provided against heat of sunshine and not of fyre? doth he not take it for a madness to

think, if a man could make himself impassible of pleasure, he should make himself at one labor impassible of paine? whereas contrariwise it is an introduccion to beare stronger greifes, to desire often without having. But lett Fortitude and strength of minde assist Temperance, and see what followeth then? a man is able to use pleasures and to spare them; to containe himselfe in the entry or greatest downfall, and to entertaine himself euer in pleasure; hauing in prosperitie sence of joy, and in adversitie sence of strength. Therefor it is Fortitude that must help or consummate or enable all vertues."

In the second speech, we find Love placed above Fortitude, as thus:

"And now to you, sir, that somuch commende vertue Fortitude, and therein cheiflie commended it because it doth enffranchise us from the tirannyes of fortune, yett doth it not in such perfeccion as doth loue. For Fortitude indeede strengtheneth the mynd, but it giueth it no feeling, it leaueth it emptye, it ministreth unto it no apt contemplacion to fix it self uppon, that it may the more easilie be directed from the sence of dolours. . . . But loue doth so fill and possesse all the powers of the minde as it sweetneth the harshnes of all deformities. Lett no man feare the yoke of fortune that's in the yoke of loue. What fortune can be such a Hercules as shalbe able to ouercome two? When two soules are ioynd in one, when one hath another to devide his Fortune withall, no force can depresse him.”

But the third speaker takes higher ground still, and exalts Knowledge above Love. "Are not," he says, "the pleasures of the intellect greater then the pleasures of the affecc[i]ons?" Lastly, the fourth speaker brings the whole to a climax by singing the praises of his sovereign in no measured terms, dashing at once into the argument by boldly declaring that "no praise of magnanimitie nor of loue nor of knowledg can intercept her praise that planteth and norrisheth magnanimitie by her example, love by her person, and knowledge by the peace and serenitie of her times. And if these rich peeces be so faire vnsett, what are they when sett? and sett in all perfeccion?" Such a sentence as this must have been very comfortable to Her Majesty to read.

The fourth speech, however, which is much the longest, is also the most interesting, owing to the numerous historical allusions in it. The editor has done well in adding some notes upon them, especially as regards such matters as the visit of Elizabeth to Tilbury Fort, and the battle of Zutphen, where he takes occasion to criticize some statements in Mr. Motley's to criticize some statements in Mr. Motley's History of the Netherlands.'

On a reconsideration of the whole piece, we

are struck with a certain resemblance in the plan of it to the narrative in the third and fourth chapters of the first book of Esdras, which Southey has so well versified in his poem entitled 'The Triumph of Woman.' There also we find the praises of four things, which are compared together in relation to their strength. Wine is first declared to be the strongest thing; but other speakers follow, who show successively that the King is stronger than Wine; that Woman is stronger than the King; but that Truth is stronger than Woman. If Queen Elizabeth felt unduly elated at reading her own praises, she might have done well to consider the words of the old apocryphal Scripture: "Wine is wicked, the King is wicked, Women are wicked, all the children of men are wicked, and such are all their wicked works; and there is no truth in them; in their unrighteousness also they shall perish As for the Truth, it endureth, and is alway· strong; it liveth and conquereth for evermore.

NOVELS OF THE WEEK.

Fenacre Grange. By Langford Cecil. 3 vols. (Tinsley Brothers.)

Against Time. By Alexander Innes Shand. 3 vols. (Smith, Elder & Co.) Lady Wedderburn's Wish. By James Grant. 3 vols. (Tinsley Brothers.) Among Strangers. By E. S. Maine. (Smith, Elder & Co.)

'FENACRE GRANGE' is as uninteresting and badly written a book as could be met with in a circulating library. It is pompous, and also coarse. The pomposity arises from the author trying to imitate the style of M. Victor Hugo, to whom the book is dedicated; and much as we admire the great Republican's works, it will be generally owned that a bad imitation of his peculiar method of writing is about as distasteful a thing as one can imagine. The coarseness of the present work is of that character, unfortunately only too common in recent novels. which arises from a frequent allusion to-if not an apparent delight in the degraded women of the demi monde. It is time that a strong protest should be entered against the way these beings are now dragged into novels. Formerly they were held to be among the things not to be named in general society, or in works intended for general reading; and we cannot see in what way they have changed for the better, so as to justify their taking the exalted position in life that some authors seela to think them entitled to. It may serve the purposes of the moralist to introduce one of these creatures in a novel, and reveal there the blackness of her life, and may perhaps do good,

although we have our doubts even of this; but simply to mention them in the way that is done in the present work, and in innumerable novels of the past three or four years, is unpardonable. We are sick of the "tiny brougham" and its contents, and of the very thinly veiled manner in which some authors gloat over them.

After what we have said, it will not surprise any one to be told that the author of Fenacre Grange' should choose-as he does to assume habitually in this work an insultingly disrespectful tone when speaking of women in general. The following passage, though a very mild one of its kind, illustrates our meaning. Respect for our own pages has