Babyland and Our Little Women, heretofore published by the D. Lothrop Company, will be published hereafter by the Alpha Publishing Company, 212 Boylston street, Boston. The Pansy will continue to be published by the D. Lothrop Company, and edited by Mrs. G. R. Alden.

The Argosy (New York) which was started as the Golden Argosy December 2, 1882, being then an eight-page weekly paper, the size of Harper's Weekly, has changed its form now to that of Munsey's Magazine, and will hereafter be published monthly.

Rudyard Kipling's new poem, "The Last Rhyme of True Thomas," was copyrighted in this country March 19, by D. Appleton & Co. The Critic says: "As single poems and short stories by the more distinguished English writers are regularly set up and copyrighted nowadays in this country, exchange editors and minor publishers must indeed be lynx-eyed to avoid infringements of copyright and all that follows."

Romance (New York) is printing this year a series illustrating the different varieties of the short story. Thus a group of three tales illustrating the story of adventure appears in the April number; a group of three illustrating the realistic story will be published in May; of romantic stories, in June; of sea stories, in July; of mystery stories, in August; and so on.

The title of the novel which Charles Dudley Warner has written for publication in Harper's Magazine later in the year is "The Golden House." It is a story of New York society, a sequel to the same author's "A Little Journey in the World," and will be illustrated with characteristic pictures by W. T. Smedley.

With the April number ("Midwinter Fair Number") the editorial and business. control of the Overland Monthly will be assumed by Rounsevelle Wildman, late United States consul at Singapore, and at Barmen, Germany. Mr. Wildman has been more recently the proprietor of the Idaho Statesman, Boise City, and is also known in literature as a contributor of stories and sketches to Harper's Weekly, St. Nicholas, the Youth's Companion, and other periodicals.

Charles L. Webster & Co. will issue, April 15, Mark Twain's new story, "Tom Sawyer Abroad," by Huck Finn, edited by Mark Twain. It is a continuation of the adventures of Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn, and "Nigger Jim," and will, no doubt, be received with delight by their many admirers.

What is called by the Cosmopolitan (New York) the "most interesting literary event of the age" is the publication, in its April number, of a Corsican story by Napoleon. It is from " a manuscript prepared by Napoleon when a boy and confided to his uncle, Cardinal Fesch."

The Journalist (New York) celebrated its tenth birthday anniversary March 24. The Journalist is indispensable to any one who wants to keep informed of the doings of newspapers and newspaper men throughout the country. Editor Forman is to be congratu

lated on its success.

The Photographic Times (New York) for April 6 will contain an interesting account of an interview with Edison, and a description of his latest invention the kinetoscope. The article is illustrated by some photographic reproductions of pictures taken by the instrument. The rest of the magazine is made up of matter interesting to every photographer, amateur or professional.

The Literary Northwest, of St. Paul, Minn., has been merged into the Midland Monthly, of Des Moines, Iowa, of which Johnson Brigham is the editor.

A Society of Illustrators has just been organized in London, its object being to protect the interests and defend the rights of its members -the same work, in short, that the Society of Authors is supposed to do for writers.

The variety of the April Century is enhanced by a paper by Dr. Edward Eggleston, entitled "Wild Flowers of English Speech in America," a topic upon which Dr. Eggleston may be considered an expert. To the same number Mrs. Florence Earle Coates contributes a biographical and critical paper on Matthew Arnold, dealing with his literary and religious influence; and a portrait of Mr. Arnold, engraved by Tietze, is published as the frontispiece of the magazine.

Lovell, Coryell, & Co., who have just removed to a new location at the corner of Sixth avenue and West Twentieth street, New York, announce a cheaper popular edition of Mrs. Oliphant's survey of the literary activities of the last sixty years, entitled: "The Victorian Age of English Literature."

The circulation of the Forum has increased very largely since the price was reduced to twenty-five cents a copy, or $3 a year. The quality of the magazine is as excellent as ever. The publishers say: "The aim of the Forum has been to be worthy of its thoughtful patronage; and it will henceforth be better than ever before."

Both letter-press and pictures in the Magazine of Art (New York) for April are of the highest excellence. An admirable article by Cosmo Monkhouse on John Macallan Swan, A. R. A., is one of the most interesting features of the number. The frontispiece is an original etching by David Law.

A life of the late Lucy Larcom is being prepared by Rev. Dulaney Addison, of Beverly, Mass., who asks for the loan of letters in possession of Miss Larcom's friends that may be helpful to him.

Arsène Alexandre, the author of a recent work on French caricature, contributes to Scribner's for April a bright account of the work of Forain, Caran d'Ache, Robida, and others who make the humorous and satirical papers of Paris to-day. In the same number Austin Dobson describes the famous book shop of Robert Dodsley and the noted company who were wont to be seen there.

The Quarterly Illustrator (New York) for May contains 377 illustrations by 155 wellknown artists, including twenty-seven portraits of American artists, reproduced from photographs. This periodical is invaluable to those who wish to study the best examples of the latest methods of book and magazine illustration.

The Magazine of Poetry (Buffalo) is published monthly now. The March number contains brief biographies of Nathaniel P. Willis, Andrew Lang, William Winter, and several minor poets.

Leisure Hours (Philadelphia), which published in its March number the best portrait of George William Childs yet printed, has in its April number a large portrait of Mr. Gladstone that is equally good.

For the first time since her marriage, Mrs. Herbert D. Ward drops her husband's name and writes for the April number of the Century a striking story, "The Supply at St. Agatha's," over the familiar name of Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. Her reason for taking up the old name again, it is said, is because her present story is purely in the line of her earlier efforts.

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St. Nicholas for April has a sketch of the life of Mrs. C. V. Jamison, author of that very popular story, Lady Jane," and its successor, "Toinette's Philip," the concluding chapter of which is published in the same number. The sketch is accompanied by a youthful portrait of Mrs. Jamison, taken from an oil painting.

The system of aërial telegraphy invented by Claude Chappe is described in the Popular Science Monthly for April by Walter Lodian in a fully illustrated article, entitled "A Century of the Telegraph in France."

The Educational Review (New York) has arranged for a series of striking studies of the spirit and ideals of the chief American universities, the first of which, written by George Santayana, and relating to Harvard College, appears in the April number.

Mrs. Molesworth, the popular writer of children's stories, is a woman of Scotch and English parentage, born in Holland. She is a believer in methodical work, and makes it a rule to sit down at a certain hour and compel herself to write two pages. If, at the expiration of that time, she finds she is not in the mood for writing, she puts her work aside and renews the attempt later.

In order to understand writer's cramp it is necessary to remember what physiologically is involved in the education of the muscles to perform certain complicated acts. The will does not pick out the muscles which are to be brought into play to hold a pen; it simply

directs itself to the result. The combination or coördination of the muscles is determined by the will, but is effected by another agency.

The performance of writing is a very complicated process, requiring for its efficient performance the integrity of a great number of different parts, which the books explain at length, but the naming of the various muscles and nerves is not necessary here. Failure in any one portion of the moving apparatus interferes with the production of the movement that is required, and the kind of failure is determined by the location of the lesion, or, in other words,

No. 5.

by the nature of the process, or function, which is lost or disturbed. The pen movements may be guided partially by the eye, but the guidance is defective for the most complicated acts. If the motor nerve be damaged, the muscle is pro tanto palsied. If the sensory nerves be injured, sensation is defective. If the sense of muscular condition be in abeyance, the power to control either the kind or force of contraction is without its guide. Many movements are automatic; we adopt them without education and without effort; others are the result of laborious practice. It would seem that the body is naturally endowed with certain paths or lines of nerveaction, along which al! moves easily.

But the process of education in performing writing consists in frequent repetition by an act of the will of certain complicated movements. Repetition makes them easy, until at length they are executed without effort, and almost unconsciously. By education what was once difficult and required effort becomes more and more easy and at last automatic. It cannot be doubted that some changes may and do take place in the nutrition of the parts, through which these lines of nerve-action run, and their education involves structural alteration in the organs. No man writes well who has not keen sight and quick sense of touch, just as no man plays the violin well who has not an acute ear and a delicate power of feeling in his fingers. In all cases of educated movement some "sense" is needed, and it is an important element in the process by which the result is obtained. What happens ir. writer's cramp and like maladies is a perverted nutrition of the parts, a worn-out activity, or a degeneration, which may arise without over exertion. The

disease is known to pass readily from one side of the body to the other.

Coördination of movement is a most complex process, requiring integrity of sensation, as well as of motor nerve and of cerebellum. The real mischief may be some want of limiting and guiding influence ordinarily through sensation from external impressions. Although we speak of this kind as "cramp," there is not an actual condition of cramp. The muscles are not paralyzed, and are equal to all other work, except the particular actions in which they acquired the disability. There is impotence in respect to the particular position and movements involved for writing. There is no disorder of intelligence, no lack of ideas, and the motor apparatus is intact; but the muscles, so long and constantly employed in the prehension of the pen, the poising of the hand and forearm, and in the movement of the pen, become unequal to the task.

Three divisions are suggested by Benedict the spastic, the tremulous, and the paralytic form.

It may not be amiss to give quite in detail the symptomatology of the disease as set forth by various authors, for no two persons are afflicted exactly alike, and those who suspect they may be afflicted will thus be able to determine with more accuracy whether the symptoms apply to their own case.

The spasms of the hand, with incoördination, which are manifested in writing appear most frequently within the territory of the median nerve, of the radial nerve, or, finally, of the ulnar nerve. the spasm in the direction of the median nerve may be tonic, in which case the thumb and index finger are curved inward and seize the pen convulsively; at other times the

spasm is clonic, and then these two members are forced to perform a movement of propulsion, which often causes the pen to twirl around its own axis, or presses the pen firmly to the paper.

In the beginning of the affection - and it comes like a thief in the night- a disagreeable sensation of tension in the hand is felt only after the patient has been writing for a long time, and hardly attracts attention at first, until the hand becomes more and more fatigued, and, together with the fingers, soon becomes attacked with tremor, which forces the patient to rest frequently while writing. As this difficulty in writing becomes more marked, the formation of the thick and fine strokes becomes interfered with, and the letters become small, poorly formed, and indistinct. When the attempt is made to correct this imperfection by increasing the attention and the efforts to handle the pen, an increase in the spasms and weakness of the arm and hand are the result. This is soon followed by complete spasm of the flexors and extensors, and contraction in certain muscles of the fingers, producing a painful tension, more marked in the extensor muscles of the forearm, but involving even the muscles of the shoulder and thorax. The growth of the disability is slow, but sure.

Fatigue in the much-used muscles, pain in the forearm, in the wrist, and in the hand are experienced. So strong is the sense of fatigue, and it may be pain, that the arm is steadied, and the pen is seized with a firmer grip, and great efforts are made to relieve the fatigued muscles by writing with the whole arm. The writing changes its character and becomes irregular. The muscles of the first three fingers after a time are given to fibrillary trembling. The thumb is especially affected, and is also often the seat of a dull, aching pain.

Finally, writing becomes impossible. The pen is taken up, a strong effort of the will tries to force the muscles to the task, but they obstinately refuse to execute the movements. Supervision of the higher senses over the muscular movement ceases to be exercised. In other words, the mode of writing becomes largely automatic. For a time the patient writes better, when he is not occupied in directing the

formation of every letter, and allows the muscles, as it were, to take care of themselves. Constantly, however, he feels the necessity of mental action, and this action invariably increases the difficulty, until the very moment the attempt is made to write, the pen, actuated by the muscles of the fingers, executes such disorderly movements as to bear no analogy whatever to the words which he attempts to write.

The spasm is much worse if the patient is excited or is particularly anxious to do his best. Besides fibrillary trembling, a condition of tonic spasm seizes the thumb and flexors of the fingers. It is quite natural that the great efforts which the patient makes to relieve the fatigued muscles should affect his nerves, and the oftener he fails, the more nervous he becomes. We may safely assert that very seldom is a sufferer from writer's cramp and similar muscular affections entirely free from nervousness. There are still other groups of cases in which marked paresis or weakness of the flexors of the thumb and fingers exist. I have always noticed that all the symptoms mentioned occur only during, and shortly after, the patient has been engaged in his special act of writing, telegraphing, pianoplaying, or similar work, disappearing after a few moments' rest, to appear again on the resumption of the same action. A patient with writer's cramp may perform all other acts with the hand and arm with impunity, except writing. In many cases he can write with a pencil for a short time comparatively well, but as soon as he attempts to use the pen, his muscles do not obey his will. The same applies to all other mechanical occupations.

The telegraph operator is very often able to write or draw without the slightest difficulty, but as soon as he touches the key, he is powerless. I could mention many similar cases.

Now let us consider the theory, for it is only theory, as to the nature of this difficulty. From my point of view I divide all cases of this kind into two classes, local and central.

It is only those of the local cases that I attempt to cure. It is my first duty, consequently, to determine first the nature of the case before me. If it is a central one, I have generally found that not only the special muscles used in writing, telegraphing, etc., are

affected, but that the whole arm, very often the whole side of the body, shows a paralytic condition, generally accompanied by a sort of severe tremor or numbness. This, however, is not always so. Now, as to the local cases; generally, as I have said already, both nerves and muscles are affected.

I come now to the most critical point of this distressing disease, to the causes. They are as various, I think, as the effects. From my experience I divide the causes into three classes: (1) weakness of the nerves, (2) weakness of the muscles, and (3) weakness of both nerves and muscles.

The nervous system is so complicated and so finely organized, that it is very difficult to understand why sufferers from these troubles are able to perform their usual duties without difficulty to-day and find themselves helpless tomorrow. It is equally hard to account for the fact that some are much more disposed to contract these troubles than others. In cases of this kind, more or less disturbance of the activity of the nerves is apparent, causing in a great many cases an oversensitiveness. This I will illustrate as follows: Some patients when alone can get along with their work fairly well, but when they are conscious of observation they are more or less disturbed. The same can be said of one afflicted with any impediment of speech, or with stuttering. He will talk with much less difficulty when he is unobserved than when he is closely watched.

The second cause is weakness of the muscles. Particular muscles of the hand and arm may be constantly exercised in daily duties and become very strong, while others, through unintentional neglect, become correspondingly weak and flabby. This uneven condition will eventually produce cramps and trembling of the weak. muscles, which later on will be conveyed to the stronger muscles, that should work in harmony with the weak ones.

The third cause is weakness of both nerves and muscles. These cases are by far the more numerous and, unfortunately, the more difficult ones, and require great patience and painstaking effort on my part, as well as on the part of the patients, and are due to an overworked condition of both muscles and nerves. I have