rate have been correct in that matter. He declares that words ending in an unaccented y, change it into i and in the superlative make one syllable of -iest. Happiest of metrical investigators, who can not only neglect, but also make, what rules he pleases!

On pp. 9 and 10 he has a whole list of adjectives in -ed, which must therefore have the -ed pronounced, and coolly adds that thay are used as adjectives, though he has put them in a list of exceptions to the rule that -e- in -ed is not pronounced except after t and d! In the application of the same deep wisdom, he gives us swoln as syncopated. All over pp. 10 and 11 Sp. shows that he cannot distinguish between the licence which a poet may allow himself and common usage in pronunciation. On p. 13 he has “medecine" (sic!), in which thn second e is not pronounced; what would he say if he knew that the i in medicine is silent? In the same way he says p. 13: "Wenn man brother einsilbig nähme” (?). But he is kind enough to add that such examples of verschleifung do not occur. A proof, I suppose, that Dryden should have spent a couple of years at Halle under the instruction which has led Sp. to such splendid results. There he would have learnt that the -le after a consonant is often verschleift by poets. As Dryden had not that advantage, he uses noble, people &c. as words of two syllables!

We meet many bits of Halle wisdom which we have seen before in these dreary pages. For instance all about v between two vowels on pp. 17 and 18, about proclisis des bestimmten artikels p. 19; the pride with which he relates on p. 21 that by looking into the 1 st. edition and the folio of 1701 he found an instance of proclisis, which the editor of the edition he used had produced artificially, is entertaining. Broke for broken, spoke for spoken and so forth give him occasion to show that he has mastered his spelling-book. On p. 26 Sp. says that Dryden in general follows the pronunciation of the present day, and then goes on p. 29 to give us the following pronunciation divine, súccessor, ágainst, béfore, bétwixt, without. He gives conjuring in the same list, although the accent is right. I suppose he has been accustomed to conjúre! p. 34 we have power, flower, shower, prayer, given, driven, heaven &c. as monosyllables. Suppose the next Halle dissertator should set about to show what modern poet has pronounced them otherwise.

On p. 36 he has under as a trochee. The empire groans under your bloody reign. This is rather surprising. With Sp.'s capabilities for absurd pronunciation, we should have expected under.

What Sp. p. 37 says about schwebende betonung is nonsense, although he tries to shelter himself behind Schipper. The examples he gives do not come under Schipper's remark. Fancy schwebende betonung in the following case:

Than the sún (!) sees upon your western shore. Of course such a case of schwebender betonung must occur to anybody who uses his fingers instead of his ear.

On p. 50 we have the rhymes (!): descend, hand; now, low; own, done; choose, oppose; here, there.

On p. 53 Sp. makes the ambitious attempt to make use of Ellis to clear up difficulties in Dryden's pronunciation. He had better not attempt this until he has learned the pronunciation of the present day, and then he will be able to

see what differences exist between Dryden's pronunciation and ours. That poet has no doubt a very considerable percentage of printer's rhymes at his door. Sp.'s treatment of run-on-lines (of course he says enjambement!) is worthy of his school. As an instance of separation of the auxiliary from the principal verb, he gives p. 68:

Meantime your valiant son who had before
Gained fame.

Worthy of Goswin König is the following:

Treaties are vain to losers; nor would we,

Should Heaven grant peace, submit to sovereignity.

How there can be enjambement, to speak Sp.'s language, between a prin cipal and a subordinate sentence is past my comprehension. It may be supposed that under these circumstances Sp.'s resumé in the last pages of his dissertation is not worth much, but he supports himself on Paul Meyer, who it will be remembered, has treated Dryden's heroic verse in the same bold way, unmindful of the Biblical warning: "If the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch”. St. Petersburg, Dec. 1897. R. Boyle.

1) Max Stoye, Das verhältniss von Cibber's tragödie 'Caesar in Egypt' zu Fletcher's "The False One'. Halle, dissertation. 50 ss. 8o. 1897.

2) Gotthardt Ost, Das verhältniss von: 'Love Makes a Man' zu Fletcher's dramen: 'The Elder Brother' und 'The Custom of the Country'. Halle, dissertation. 83 ss. 8o. 1897.

Two Halle dissertations, not on metrical subjects! It is to be hoped that they may be taken as a sign that the temporary aberration to metrical subjects is now over and will not trouble the world again. It was the highest time! They have brought down the reputation of Halle, which formerly stood high, to the lowest level, as far as regards English. A metrical investigation conducted as it was in Halle, with an apparatus designed for the older stages of the language, inevitably levelled all differences of mental power in the students and afforded no play for the individuality of the authors.

Such subjects as those chosen by the two authors above-mentioned show at once how far a man is fit to grapple with his subject. He can show how far he is master of the necessary literature, what grasp he has of his material, and whether he moulds it to his purposes or allows it to mould him. These two dissertations are instances in point. Ost has a far firmer grasp of his materials than Stoye. The latter commences by referring to the disinclination shown by Fletcher to the historical drama, which he illustrates by a passage in the Elder Brother in which the poet uses the expression "dunce Hollingshed". In his next three sentences he shows that he believes that the reason why the Historical Drama had ceased to exist, was that the unworthy James could not incorporate the ideal of national greatness as Elizabeth had done. In the first place, the Historical Drama had died a natural death before the end of Elizabeth's reign, and in the second place, so far from venerating Elizabeth and despising James, contemporary testimony (Bishop Godwin) informs us that the whole

nation felt freed of an oppressive burden when the Queen died and began to look back to her with the veneration she deserved after 7 or 8 years of experience under James.

Thus even the scanty introduction which Stoye gives us, about one printed page, proceeds from false premises. Fletcher did not turn to ancient history for his subjects from inclination, but because he dared not draw his materials from contemporary or modern history from a wholesome fear of Sir Henry Herbert, Master of the Revels, and his terrible red pencil. That he had no such natural disinclination, he showed by joining Massinger in Sir John Barnavelt.

After mentioning Cibber's rather scanty merits in literature, as one of the first who reacted against the corruption of the Restoration Drama, Stoye goes on to compare Caesar in Egypt with Fletcher's False One. In the course of this comparison it never occurs to him to call attention to the different metrical styles of Fletcher and Massinger in the False One and Cibber's in Caesar in Egypt. The hollow ring of Cibber's stilted verse is perhaps the most ridiculous of all that caught the ear of that foppish, apish and laughable age. Pope knew what he was about when he enthroned Cibber as king of dunces. To understand the affectation of that womanish period. one must compare Cibber with Garrick, who, like a second Cervantes, with one fresh breath of nature, blew the card-house of Cibber and contemporaries about their ears. But Stoye, although he is good enough to own that, on the whole, Cibber has not succeeded in equalling Massinger and Fletcher, yet he has given their ideas in another form "nicht ungeschickt", as he says on p. 46. There are hardly any examples given of Cibber's language which are not mere fustian. E. q.

"Boast you your merits, and of me complain,

Then see from what great Caesar shall ordain,

Which most deserves, the king or queen, to reign."

Stoye calls attention in his account of Cibber's play to the sins committed against the precepts of Aristotle and Freytag. But he has not a word of his own to say. He then goes on to analyse the characters, comparing what they are with what they should be according to Aristotle, Lessing, Freytag and Bulthaupt. In treating Cleopatra, he says that the only females in Beaumont and Fletcher who have not something of Doll Common in them are Amoret in the Faithful Shepherdess and Arethusa in Philaster. He might have mentioned a dozen more who have just as much right as Arethusa to be regarded as exceptions from Flecknoe's and Coleridge's reproaches.

It is somewhat singular that Stoye just after he has given Ward's opinion of Cleopatra as: "a cunning beauty, scheming at any cost for her own ends" should in the next page put her down as one of Ward's “devoted women"! In the next page he describes her in words which make the idea of a 'devoted woman' and Cleopatra in connection with them ridiculous. If Stoye wants to see what Ward meant by a 'devoted woman' let him turn to Ordella in Thierry and Theodoret or to the Double Marriage &c. And let him stick to Ward. What Oliphant can tell him is either "new but not true, or true but not new”. Stoye's language is rather heavy, sometimes clumsy. On p. 32 he says that Cleopatra: "spielt die zurückhaltende und unwürdige“ instead of “not worthy of Caesar".

On p. 40 he says: “Die sittenlosigkeit in England, die durch die

folgende herrschaft des puritanismus für kurze zeit eingedämmt war, brach nach der rückkehr der Stuarts um so schlimmer wieder hervor, um unter Karl II. ihren höhepunkt zu erreichen". As if Charles II were not the first of the Stuarts after the rule of the Puritans!

Stoye's work is certainly not brilliant, but at any rate it has given him an occasion to show that he is pretty well read in English and that he has not done his work in a slovenly manner. His colleague Ost makes quite a different impression. A short introduction of not quite 4 pages shows that he has formed a just estimate of the period he treats of from the best sources, and that he has made the ideas, which he has originally derived from those various sources, so much his own, that they harmonise into one in his picture. In comparing the Elizabeth period with the Restoration, Ost says: "Es war keine sinnlichkeit, die aus einem gewaltigen lebensgefühle und überschwellenden lebensdrang entquoll; sie hatte nichts von dem sonnigen optimismus, von dem übermuthe und der kraft, von der blutfülle des Elisabethanischen zeitalters an sich, wo eine litterarische fruchtbarkeit sondergleichen herrschte. Die menschen des restaurationszeitalters waren schwächlich; sie waren blutarm".

We have the characteristics of the two periods here put before us powerfully in a few words. The reaction that set in under William of Orange, of which Collier made himself the mouthpiece, is just as briefly but strikingly put: "War die dichtung unter Elisabeth, wie in allen literarischen blütheperioden, wesentlich eine angelegenheit des herzens gewesen, hatte sie dem gemüthe zur selbstbefreiung gedient, war sie dagegen unter Karl II. meist ein mittel des reizes zur befriedigung der sinnlichkeit geworden, so musste sie vom ende des 17. jahrhunderts an wieder sclavenarbeit verrichten und in den dienst der moral treten; sie wurde ein mittel der belehrung und besserung". And here he appropriately introduces Cibber, one of the first who enrolled themselves under the banner of the new didactic, moralising movement. Where Stoye in his prosaic way simply mentions the fact, Ost connects it by means of various threads with the other elements in his picture. He says of Cibber: "Seine bedeutung beruht auf seinen comödien, und hier hat er das unbestrittene verdienst, zuerst energisch mit der zuchtlosen richtung seiner zeitgenossen Wycherley, Congreve, Farquhar (Vanbrugh) gebrochen zu haben. Für diese abhandlung kommt er nur in betracht als tragödiendichter, als solcher steht er ganz unter dem einfluss seiner zeit, d. h. des von Frankreich eingedrungenen pseudoclassicismus". And then he goes on to say that Cibber also recast Shakespeare's Richard III.

Ost after introducing Cibber with a few words of apt preparation, as above, goes on to say: “Aber war jene zeit auch nicht im stande, sich ein capital von eigenen literarischen schätzen zu erwerben, von dem man leben konnte, man war doch nicht ganz auf ausländisches angewiesen; man griff zu den stücken der blütheperiode zurück, bearbeitete und modernisirte sie und verhinderte so einen vollständigen bruch mit der nationalen literarischen vergangenheit, wie er in Deutschland eintrat". Very well observed!

In their manner of comparing the action in the respective dramas the authors are also quite at opposite poles. Stoye treats the action alone and afterwards the characters, 'sonstige änderungen' and then 'sprachliches'. The two latter he might have spared himself, and he toils through the two former in a wearisome hum-drum way. Ost does not treat the character and action separately,

but shows us in a plastic, well carried out manner, how the dramatists develop the character from the action. He always keeps Cibber's figures and Massinger and Fletcher's separate and well defined so that there can be no mistake about them.

Stoye finds, it is true, that Cibber does not reach his original, but, from the passage quoted above, he seems to be taken with the hollow roll of the poet's verse. Ost is quite clear on this point, although it might have seemed natural, if the many abominations in The Custom of the Country had somewhat dimmed his sight. He sees the good points in the play and is not blind to its weaknesses, but does not hesitate one moment to declare that there can be no idea of putting Cibber on a level with his original. After granting that poet his two scanty merits his moralising tendency (in so far as it was, under the circumstances, a merit), and his upholding the connection between his own period and that of Elisabeth, he goes on to say: "Aber sonst ist (Cibber's drama) ohne den geringsten ästhetischen werth, und man möchte verinuthen, dass Cibber gar keine künstlerische absichten gehabt hat, sondern sich nur hat ein stück verschaffen wollen, in dem er selbst eine wirksame rolle spielen konnte und das ihm so eine gute einnahme einbringen sollte . . . . Seine werke haben mehr kulturgeschichtliches, als ästhetisches interesse" A conclusion in which I heartly agree with Ost. It is a pity that he has wasted evidently superior powers, sharpened by a judicious course of reading, on a subject not worth of them. St. Petersburg, Juli 1897. Robert Boyle.

Rud. Fürst, Die vorläufer der modernen novelle im 18. jahrhundert. Ein beitrag zur vergleichenden litteraturgeschichte. Halle a. S. Max Niemeyer. 1897. 240 ss. 8°. Pr.: mk. 3,60.

Das buch ist eine hervorragende leistung. Der verfasser beherrscht seinen stoff vollkommen, und man muss über seine belesenheit staunen, die sich vom anfang bis zum ende seines buches kundgiebt. Es sind nur sehr wenige ihm nicht zugänglich gewesene, hierher gehörige schriften, die er nicht aus eigener anschauung kennt. Seine darstellungsweise ist eine im allgemeinen übersichtliche und folgerichtige, doch ist der unterschied zwischen roman und novelle nicht scharf genug hervorgehoben, vielfach spricht er überhaupt nur von englischer etc. prosa. Freilich ist es nicht immer leicht, sich einer vermengung beider zu entziehen. Einer andern gefahr ist der verfasser glücklich entgangen: er lässt mit richtigem takt die eigentlichen kindergeschichten, soweit sie nicht direct hierher gehören, aus dem spiele. Von dem umfassenden standpunkte aus, den der verfasser einnimmt, erscheinen manche sonst wohl anders aufgefasste einzelheiten in neuem lichte, vgl. p. 18 Aphra Behn, p. 20 Steele's Tatler. Gut gefallen hat mir auch die einleitung zum zweiten abschnitte p. 37 ff., ferner p. 96, p. 103 ff. die characteristik der werke Fielding's. Das buch ist in jeder beziehung lehrreich und interessant. Die kurzen bemerkungen, welche ich folgen lasse und welche dem verfasser zeigen sollen, wie aufmerksam ich sein buch gelesen habe, beziehen sich vornehmlich auf mein specialfach, das Englische. Der verfasser theilt seinen stoff