The first step in the elevation of woman to her true position, as an equal factor in human progress, is the cultivation of the religious sentiment in regard to her dignity and equality, the recognition by the rising generation of an ideal heavenly Mother, to whom their prayers should be addressed as well as to a Father. “'If language has any meaning we have in these texts a plain declaration of the existence of the feminine element in the Godhead, equal in power and glory with the masculine-the heavenly Mother and Father.

A number of religious women prominent in the reform movement have repudiated this "Woman's Bible" as preposterous and mischievous. The press discusses the probable effects of this production on the suffrage movement and woman's progress generally. Following are a few of the comments:

A Retrograde Movement.-"This attempt of the new women' to disparage the Bible, to whose uplifting teachings woman owes all her large advantages and exalted and honored position and influence to-day, is a retrograde movement. Col. Robert Ingersoll has spent many years of his life trying to destroy the Bible and its influence by telling people that it is a very bad book, degrading women and demoralizing the race, and is only a pack of myths and lies. It is to be regretted that the women of the revision committee so-called should follow Colonel Ingersoll's loose and unscholarly and shallow treatment of the Christian Scriptures. At the very outset they assume that the Bible is written by dishonest persons-'sacred fabulists' one reviser. calls them—and that it is no authority whatever in the subject of woman (so the head of the committee says). If this is so, why on earth do these 'new women' go to the expense and worry of getting out this new 'Woman's Bible'? The exegetical part of this ambitious work is based chiefly upon Ingersoll's assaults upon the Bible, and the only Christian commentator the women exegetes seem to be acquainted with is old Adam Clarke, whose work is a century old. Against the great, brainy exegetes like Delitzsch, Elrard, Meyer, Burgon, Schaff, Hart, Farrar, Ewald, and scores of other great scholars whose knowledge of Hebrew and Greek can. not be successfully denied and whose skill in exegesis is unchallenged, against the ripest scholarship of the world, these women have arrayed themselves, and the results, as seen in the 'Woman's Bible,' are pitiably weak."-The Journal, Minneapolis.

A Mistake Even as a Literary Performance.-"The 'Woman's Bible' is certain to bring ridicule and contempt upon the idea of woman's intellectual equality with man, as well as to inspire grave doubts as to her common sense in general. The worst of it is, the book must stand the critical eyes of the future. In this century study and criticism of the Bible have occupied the most cultivated, sympathetic, and scholarly minds. To cite one. well-known instance in our own tongue, we have had given to us Matthew Arnold's 'Literature and Dogma,' a book which is a distinct contribution to literature, as well as to the higher criticism of the Bible. It will go hard for the women of our time when posterity compares Mrs. Stanton's book with Arnold's, which was written without pretense of authority, and with not only the entire absence but with abhorrence of trumpet and drum, and which shines in every page with learning, wit, and highest culture.

"Setting aside the atrocious taste of the book, its narrow and cramping spirit, its lack of imagination, sympathy, and spiritual perception; passing over all these, which naturally attract first attention, and looking at the work solely as a literary performance, it must be pronounced, as we said in the beginning, a mistake.”—The Times-Herald, Chicago.

The Suffrage Cause Hit Hard.-"Altogether, this book will give great aid and comfort to 'Pagan Bob' Ingersoll and his kind. It will doubtless end all veneration for the Bible and Christianity among women of a certain class, and, on the other hand, it will

surely split the female 'emancipation,' with the accent on the 'man,' army into more divisions than it has ever yet had. Many women who have thought that they were quite 'new' will feel that they are too old to give up the Bible and its comforts for such compensation as they can find in the destructive criticism and slapdash comments of Mrs. Stanton and her co-workers. They will cleave unto things tried and proved by those whom they trust and love, and forever turn their backs upon the interests and movements championed by women who insist that all the religions of the earth degrade woman and that 'so long as woman accepts the position that they assign her her emancipation is impossible. "In making and publishing the extraordinary book miscalled 'The Woman's Bible,' the woman suffragists will find that they have far overshot the mark they aimed at. What they have hit, and hit hard, is the cause most dear to them."-The Leader, Cleveland.

"There are woman-suffragists who are devout believers, and there are woman - suffragists who are strenuous unbelievers. Some of the latter class have seen fit to issue a commentary on the Scriptures, as they were at perfect liberty to do. We presume a great ado will be made over the fact, and the woman-suffrage movement will be held responsible. But when you come to think it over, it is no stranger that there should be infidels among the woman-suffragists than that there should be infidels among the civil-service reformers, the free-traders, and the Prohibitionists. The fact does not furnish any argument for or against womansuffrage."-The Voice, New York.

"If the woman's rights advocates hoped to promote the inter. ests of their cause by attacking the Bible and producing a work destructive of Christian faith, they have plainly overshot their mark, and brought ridicule only upon themselves.”—The Free Press, Burlington.

"It is all an egregious mistake. The authors of the 'Woman's Bible' have tried to combine the idea of plenary inspiration with the rationalism of the new woman, and they have made a sorry mess. Believers will accuse them of sacrilege and rationalists will justly call their conclusions silly.”—The Journal, Chicago.

A

THE RIGHT to PRIVACY AFTER DEATH. CELEBRATED case, which presents unique legal questions and is full of interest to laymen, has just been finally decided by the New York appellate court. It is known as the Schuyler statue case, and involves the right of individuals or associations to erect a memorial in honor of a dead person regardless of the wishes of the latter's relatives. Mrs. Schuyler, who died several years ago, was an earnest and unostentatious worker and philanthropist. She was averse to publicity or notoriety in any form, and strongly objected to any attempts to draw general attention to her benefactions. After her death, however, an organization known as the Women's Memorial Fund Association was formed for the express purpose of raising money for a statue of Mrs. Schuyler, as the "typical woman philanthropist." Certain distant relatives of Mrs. Schuyler brought suit to restrain the association from carrying out its purpose, giving as the chief ground for objection that the proposed memorial was annoying to them because it would have been obnoxious to Mrs. Schuyler were she living. They claimed that the memorial would be a violation of the right to privacy of Mrs. Schuyler and her living relatives. The lower courts granted a permanent injunction against the memorial association. Justice Van Brunt, of the Supreme Court, held that an individual does not forfeit his or her right to privacy by becoming a philanthropist, and described as “audacious" and unprecedented the course of the association which proposed to disregard the known views of Mrs. Schuyler and the protests of her relatives. The Court of Appeals, however, reverses this decision and sets aside the injunction. A striking passage in the opinion discussed the plea of privacy as follows:

"Whatever right of privacy Mrs. Schuyler had died with her. Death deprives us all of right in the legal sense of that term, and,

when Mrs. Schuyler died, her own individual right of privacy, whatever it may have been, expired at the same time. The right which survived (however extensive or limited) was a right pertaining to the living only. It is the right of privacy of the living which it is sought to enforce here. A woman like Mrs. Schuyler may very well in her lifetime have been most strongly adverse to any public notice, even if it were of a most flattering nature, regarding her own works or position. She may have been (and the evidence tends most strongly to show that she was) of so modest and retiring a nature than any publicity, during her life, would have been to her most extremely disagreeable and obnoxious. All these feelings died with her. It is wholly incredible that any individual could dwell with feelings of distress or anguish upon the thought that, after his death, those whose welfare he had toiled for in life would inaugurate a project to erect a statue in token of their appreciation of his efforts and in honor of his memory. This applies as well to the most refined and retiring woman as to a public man. It is, therefore, impossible to credit the existence of any real mental injury or distress to a surviving relative grounded upon the idea that the action proposed in honor of his ancestor would have been disagreeable to that ancestor during his life."

The court further stated that the consent of descendants or relatives is not necessary where the intention is to do honor in an appropriate and orderly manner, and that no injunction can be granted where it is inconceivable to the court that the feelings of any sane and reasonable person could be injured by the act. The association, therefore, is at liberty to proceed with its plan. There is but one dissenting opinion, by Justice Gray.

Press commentators differ considerably as to the soundness of the decision. Some regret it as a concession to the tendency of the age to invade privacy, while others declare it to be in perfect accord with equity and common sense. We reproduce some of the comments:

Good Law and Good Sense.-"The decision of the New York Court of Appeals in a case that has attracted considerable attention in the past two or three years, involving the right of an art association to erect a statue in honor of the late Mrs. G. L. Schuyler, is both good law and good sense. It is strange that anybody should have expected a different decision, and still stranger that there was a dissenting minority of the court. . .

"Mrs. Schuyler was a lady of great wealth, and fine culture and ability, all of which precious possessions she used in the noblest way to benefit her fellow beings. She was in a certain sense, the purest and worthiest sense possible to the use of the word, a public character. She made herself an object of love, admiration, and gratitude to the best portion of the public. Nothing could be more fitting than a suitable, permanent memorial to her

memory.

"But it seems that a relative, who had not appreciated either her exceptional excellence or the fine and high feelings that prompted the movers for the memorial, arrogated to himself, or tried to, the right to forbid and prevent this expression of public esteem which Mrs. Schuyler had so worthily earned. So he undertook to prevent by legal measures the erection of the memorial. The court of last resort has said in effect that it is none of his business. Good for the court of last resort!"-The Advertiser, Boston.

deceased

In Harmony with the Sensationalism of the Day.-“The inconveniences which may arise under the decisions are, that any man's enemies or blackmailers may annoy any family with perfect impunity, or extort money from them by proposing to build, and by collecting money for a monument calculated to make a person's memory odious or ridiculous, or to drag it into a kind of publicity which he when living would have loathed. The decision, in fact, is in entire harmony with the state of public feeling which has given us a sensational and scandalous press, by treating the individual's dislike of notoriety as of no consequence, so long as it amuses or entertains the majority. In truth, we do not see that it would not authorize a monument to a living man in spite of his protest or prohibition, and make his opposition to it 'fanciful, altho it brought into prominence a defect, or an eccentricity, or a deplored and recanted opinion."-The Evening Post, New York.

Status of the Venezuelan Question.-The Salisbury reply to Secretary Olney's note on Venezuela is understood to have been formally delivered to the State Department by the British Ambassador, but nothing definite is known regarding the contents of the reply. A number of Republican papers have been charging President Cleveland with "holding up Congress" and "trifling with the people" by leaving the capital at such a critical time and going off for a ten-days' trip for ducks in Carolina waters. The New York Tribune said: "The President is absent at a bad time for his own reputation. He casts discredit upon his professed anxiety about the currency by his absence from the post of duty and responsibility at such a time, upon his professed patriotic feeling regarding affairs in Venezuela and Cuba, and upon his professions of interest in the fate of Christian missionaries in Turkey. Can anybody conceive that Lord Salisbury would at such a time deliberately put himself out of reach by telegraph?" There was also some talk in the House of passing a resolution asking the State Department to submit to Congress the Venezuela correspondence without waiting for the President's return, but the plan was promptly abandoned. Meantime the exciting press discussion of the probability of a serious disagreement with Great Britain has almost entirely subsided. The Boston Transcript, an old Republican paper, commented as follows on the President's apparent indifference to the Venezuelan complication: "Of all the fraudulent cries of hypocritical party politics, that based on the supposed popularity of warlike bluster over the Monroe doctrine is the most short-lived of fiascos, and every politician of any standing who has lent himself to this cheap business will have speedy occasion to repent it. Not even the ardent young blood of the once 'White Fleet' that strained at the leash so hard in the Chilean war supports this form of jingoism. The Venezuelan 'crisis' is about over, and never was dangerous. enough to disturb the peace of mind of any true patriot. In the most unconcerned manner possible the President has left his. duties at Washington, and gone a-gunning in the South, but not in South America. As he probably knows something of the purport of Salisbury's presentation of the British side of the contention, his composure in the matter should have a soothing effect upon the barking war-dogs in Congress who have been scattering their pyrotechnical rhetoric wherever it was possible to create a feeling against British pretentions. But the people are not being deceived by this transparent politics. They think the Venezuelan question is in perfectly competent hands, and regard the ravings of party politicians on the subject as matter fit for ridicule rather than serious consideration."

TOPICS IN BRIEF.

THE President doesn't seem to care who makes the laws of the people so long as he can shoot the ducks.-The Tribune, New York.

"WELL, I read the President's message through from the start to finish," said Banks. "What was the bet?" inquired Rivers.-The Tribune, Chicago.

WIGSOME: "I see that a set of advanced women are compiling what they propose to call a woman's Bible."

WAGSOME: "Yes. And I suppose they will supplement it with a her book in place of a hymn book."-The Bulletin, Philadelphia.

A DEMOCRATIC paper talks about the Republicans contemplating a raid on the Treasury. What, raid a deficit? You might as well try to steal a post-hole.-The Tribune, Cincinnati.

THE ANGEL'S CHRISTMAS QUEST. "Where have ye laid my Lord? Behold I find him not!

Hath He, in heaven adored,

His home forgot?

Give me, O sons of men,

My truant God again!

"A voice from sphere to sphere

A faltering murmur-ran, 'Behold He is not here!

Perchance with man,

The lowlier made than we,
He hides His majesty.""

Then, hushed in wondering awe,

The spirit held his breath,

And bowed: for, lo, he saw
O'er shadowing Death,

A Mother's hands above,
Swathing the limbs of Love!

An equally earnest poem is one by Christian Burke, in The Pall Mall Magazine:

ADESTE FIDELES. I

This is that Holy Night!-O World, be still!—
Surely, if we but listen we shall hear

That Song that all the luminous dark doth fill,
The Choir of Angels chanting soft and clear,
"Glory to God and on the Earth Good-will!"
Now with the eager Shepherds let us run
Across the starlit plains, 'mid shadows dim,
To that poor shelter where the. Mother Maid
Ere break of day her first-born glorious Son
Within a narrow crib adoring laid,
Because His people found no rest for Him.
O mighty Love, that we requite so ill,
How often wilt Thou deign to seek Thine own,
Who give Thee yon bare manger for Thy throne!

II

Come all ye Faithful!-let us watch a space:
Mary and Joseph will for us make room,
That we may look on Him Whose radiant face,
Like some fair flower in all its lovely bloom,
With light and glory fills this lowly place :
Lo! we have traveled from a country far,
Through years of failure, deserts sad and wild,
And, even as of old came Eastern Kings,
With costly treasures, led here by Thy Star,
We, too, would bring Thee our poor offerings,
O Word Incarnate! Bethlehem's Holy Child.
Accept our gifts and us of Thy great grace-
Myrrh of our Sorrows, Frankincense for Faith,
And Gold for Love that is more strong than Death!

In the following quaint little carol, its author, Josephine Preston Peabody, artistically carries out the portrayal of a novel conception, the last line-"Smilest Thou?"-being singularly winning and suggestive. We take the poem from The Atlantic:

THE SONG OF A SHEPHERD-BOY AT BETHLEHEM.

I.

Sleep, Thou little Child of Mary:

Rest Thee now.

Tho these hands be rough from shearing,
And the plow,

Yet they shall not ever fail Thee,
When the waiting nations hail Thee.
Bringing palms unto their King.
Now I sing.

II.

Sleep, Thou little Child of Mary, Hope divine.

If Thou wilt but smile upon me,

I will twine

MR. STODDARD'S WELCOME TO SIR EDWIN ARNOLD'S "TENTH MUSE."

THE

HE list of the Muses has been augmented by Sir Edwin Arnold, who has added a tenth one, whose name is "The Press." Mr. R. H. Stoddard, the critic of The Mail and Express, thinks that Mr. Arnold must have a very good opinion of himself or a very ill opinion of his readers, or he would have hesitated a long time before publishing his latest book, "The Tenth Muse and Other Poems." Mr. Stoddard further says that any

clever man might easily have written this poem, but that a very clever or a very modest man would not have printed it after it had served the occasion for which it was written. He then pro

ceeds to decorate Sir Edwin's chaplet as follows:

'He has been before the world as a poet forty or more years, and has written during that period on many themes and in many measures, but, except at rare intervals, and by some happy accident, he has written nothing which can fairly be considered poetry. He is not deficient in poetical perception and poetical conception, but his mind is so essentially and stubbornly prosaic that he never fully realizes the value of either. All is grist that comes to his mill, which goes on grinding and grinding without regard to the grain and what comes from the hopper. He has, or is believed to have, one qualification which the average writer of English verse does not possess, and that is scholarship in other languages than his own-in Greek and Latin, which he studied at school and college, and in Arabic, Persian, Sanskrit, and other Eastern tongues acquired by reading and travel in later years. It is upon his familiarity with these last rather than upon his classic proficiency that he has ventured most and achieved most, not so much in the way of accurate translation, in which scholars say he is lacking, as in the way of impulsive inspiration, of which his best-known specimens are 'The Light of Asia' and 'The Light of the World.' He was more fortunate in the first epiclets than in the last, partly because a certain curiosity respecting Buddha and Buddhism was a fad when it was published, and partly because the majority of his readers were compelled to take his version of both on trust. From a literary point of view they knew but little about Buddha, and so were free to accept him, or reject him, as an ideal religious teacher. From the same point

of view, however, they knew much about Christ, and so, remembering their New Testament, they could not care for 'The Light of the World,' which, if not a profane, was a poor parody of its divine simplicity. Both these poems were in, or were meant to be in, blank verse, a form of which Sir Edwin Arnold was profoundly ignorant, and which, when not successful, is intolerable."

DR. BOTTI'S excavations near Pompey's Pillar, in Alexandria, have resulted in an important discovery, viz., the site of the Serapeum, where the last of the great libraries was preserved. It is the first fixed point gained in the recovery of the ancient topography of Alexandria. An elaborate account of his researches has been given by Dr. Botti in a memoir on L'Acropole d'Alexandrie et le Serapeum, with a plan. Numerous inscriptions were found, and a few tombs, also long subterranean passages under the site of the ancient buildings.-Biblia, December.

N°.

TISSOT'S " LIFE OF CHRIST."

O series of paintings has ever attracted more visitors or awakened deeper interest than that by M. James Tissot illustrating the life of Christ, recently exhibited in Paris. Miss Edith Coues, who has enjoyed the privilege of knowing this great artist intimately in his own home, contributes to the December Century an article on his celebrated work. Miss Coues says that in the production of this work M. Tissot has been impelled by a desire to use his art for the purpose of presenting a truthful idea of the figure of Christ and the personages of His time-to disengage the whole, as far as possible, from the mass of conventional legend and inaccuracy which surrounds that period; that with this idea he made, in 1886, the first of two journeys to Palestine, beginning a serious study of its topography and of the various races which have from time to time taken root there-their manners, customs, dress, gestures, architecture, government-endeavoring to sift through the overlying mass of foreign influences (Arab, Turkish, Persian, and Latin) the true elements of the old Jewish civilization, and essaying to enter into the mental and moral attitudes of that race of Judea so unique in its design and destiny. Miss Coues tells us that the effect of these paintings on those who visited the exhibition was both curious and interesting to observe, and testified amply to the emotional power of the work. People were seen to go away weeping; women made the tour of the rooms on their knees. It partook, toward the end, of the character of a pilgrimage, many people coming from the provinces in groups. artist's luminous portrayal of the Savior is thus described: "Throughout the whole the figure of the Christ gives an impression of apartness, something strong and serene exhaling from His presence. He is always represented in a white garment. Alone on the mountain, tempted of the devil, whose gigantic figure, ominous and black, covers half the sky, He stands calm, distinct, almost luminous, untouched by the shadow of evil. Again, amid the deep purple and red gowns of the disciples, His figure stands out with an immaculateness strangely touching. In the picture of the 'Angels Ministering unto Jesus,' where they renew His strength with aliments not of this world, divinely and mysteriously fortifying Him for His task, there is a certain awfulness of light and whiteness. Thus throughout the representations, even in crowds and apparent physical nearness, His figure is kept apart and untouched.

will be remembered that Paul, upon whom a careful and costly education had been bestowed, was also a maker of tents."

Miss Coues says that not the least curious and interesting of the series are the so-called "portraits" of the personages of the Gospels, in which every possible distinguishing characteristic has been carefully studied and portrayed. We quote further:

"There are various representations of Mary, from her earliest youth, through maturity and old age; and in these M. Tissot, while bringing his highest art and powers of imagination to bear, has in no way departed from the historical records of the Jewish customs of those times. Thus, in the picture of the 'Annunciation,' there are no conventional furnishings of the room, no accessories of a purely imaginative kind, such as are found in all the pictures of the great masters on this subject. The room is bare of furniture, as were the sleepingrooms of the Jews; the narrow carpet, serving a bed, is unrolled, and one end slightly raised for the head; the Virgin, in a deep blue gown, is on her knees, with clasped hands and slightly bowed head; and in a corner of the room is the angelic messenger. The portraits of the apostles were among the first of the series, and differ slightly in manner from the later pictures, which have a certain patience in the working out of the details that is not noticeable in these. The portrait of John is perhaps the most beautiful, as, young, puissant, inspired, he stands with upturned face and slightly outstretched hands, clad in a white and green robe, the shape and color alike significant. There is Mary Magdalen before her conversion, brilliant and jewel-laden, but still with something of dawning spirituality in her eyes; later the penitent woman, tho never represented as she has been generally conceived, with uncovered face and flowing hair, but veiled to the eyes, as was the invariable custom of the Jewish women of that day. Many beautiful scenes and places are represented, as, for instance, the garden and house in Bethany where Lazarus and his sisters lived, and where, soothed and comforted by an understanding and adoring friendship, Jesus so often came. Directly in front was the Mount of Olives, while the holy city spread itself out below. This spot, with its palms and olive-gardens, which is the only part of the environs of Jeru. salem that is other than melancholy and almost barren, M. Tissot has selected for one of his most beautiful pictures, that of 'Christ Resting at the House of Lazarus.'

The

"In 'The Last Supper' there is an exquisite blending and relating of dark rich tones, crimsons and purples and deep yellows, and a symmetrical and masterly arrangement of line. Some artists and historians of the customs and manners of that time represent several of the participants of a feast reclining on the same couch or divan, lying down on the left side, which enabled them to stretch out their right hands for their food. M. Tissot has chosen to represent short sofas or chairs, covered with richly The rest of the room, scarcely defined, serves simply as a dim background. There seems to be an incandescence in the figure of the Christ, and the apostles are represented with an accuracy that takes minute account of the differences of character, of employment, of district, of purpose, each standing out distinct and individual.

colored rugs.

"Tissot, like Renan, supposes the family and friends of Jesus to be in rather better worldly circumstances than they are usually represented, which, while it gave him an opportunity for the betrayal of the fine raiment and rich interior, would seem, nevertheless, to be accurate, as it was customary among the Jews to have an occupation of some sort, no matter what the condition of the family. This was not necessarily indicative of poverty. It

"The picture of Lazarus after his resurrection is also most interesting-touching, as it does, on a deep mystery. It is said of him that, tho genial and benevolent before his death, and loving to mix with his kind, after his return to life he lived in a sombre chamber apart, his spirit having had who shall say what glimpse of the other world during those hours that he lay in the tomb, and unable ever afterward to adjust itself to the common life of mortals. There is, again, a whole series of pictures illustrative of certain phrases, as, for instance, 'Where Two or Three are Gath. ered together in My Name.' Here one sees several persons praying, and invisible to them is the Christ bending over and then circling them with His mantle, the ends of which He holds in His outstretched hands, while light and warmth radiate from His presence."

We have in vain tried to procure a portrait of M. Tissot, but are enabled to present one of his appreciative young friend and essayist.

MR. J. M. LE MOINE, the Canadian littérateur, says that "The History of Emily Montague," published in London by Dodsley in 1769, was the earliest novel written in Canada; and Sillery, Quebec, where it was written, can therefore (The Canadian Gazette says) claim to be the cradle of Canadian literature. Frances Brooke (nee Frances Moore), authoress, was the wife of the Rev. John Brooke, military chaplain at Quebec. The heroine-the accomplished Emily Montague-discourses so eloquently on the charms of Canadian scenery and social amusements at Quebec, that several English families, it is said, sought in consequence a home on the shores of the St. Lawrence.

TWO VIEWS OF THOMAS HARDY'S NEW

MR.

STORY.

R. HARDY is getting some pretty hard licks as he runs the gauntlet of criticism with "The Simpletons," alias "Hearts Insurgent," alias "Jude the Obscure," his new novel. The Springfield Republican thinks it a thousand pities that Mr. Hardy could not have profited by the "wise censorship" which pruned his story while it ran under the two titles first named, instead of "indulging an eccentric taste and spoiling a fine and noble tragedy by dragging in Rabelaisian indecencies." We quote from the article as follows:

THOMAS HARDY.

"Even in the purified periodical form 'Hearts Insurgent,' as it was known through the greater part of its course, is hardly milk for babes, and it is difficult to see how the vulgar obscenities and immodest revelations which are restored in 'Jude the Obscure' can make it more attractive to middle age.

"To say the truth, Mr. Hardy's profoundest admirers are growing decidedly anxious over his future. There are many educated people who believe, and not without reason, that he has done greater work than any other English-writing novelist now living. There is no more original or individual writer in the whole history of English fiction. Both in humor and in tragedy he is unmistakably great. But in his recent work a tendency has been showing itself and constantly growing stronger and more offensive, to emphasize the sensual and erotic side of life to a degree quite incompatible with sound art. It must be owned that even in his earlier stories there is visible to careful scrutiny a tendency in this direction, a faint pruriency which blended so delicately with his grotesque humor that it would scarcely be discoverable or important but for the light thrown on it by these recent. unfortunate outbreaks. Nearly all his heroines are of the earth, earthy. Bathsheba shows in more restrained form the same traits as Tess, and the temptress of 'A Pair of Blue Eyes' is of the same mold. They are all daughters of Eve, with unrestrained and fickle passions, and either no conscience at all or a conscience of so erratic a type as to be worse than useless. But in his later work, beginning with 'Tess' and continuing through 'Life's Little Ironies,' this fleshly tendency has increased so rapidly and assumed such unpleasant forms as to cause grave solicitude to those who do not wish to see a writer of rare and original quality turned into a secondhand Zola."

A critical notice of "Jude the Obscure" in The Westminster Gazette contains the following paragraph:

"We have sometimes wondered how long it would be before some really eminent novelist would be smitten with an infection of the new views, so-called, about marriage. It has come at last, and the victim, unfortunately, is Mr. Thomas Hardy. Let us say at once that we are not disposed to pick a quarrel with or enter into controversy about any opinions which may or may not be found in the book which is the symptom of this malady. Our complaint is first and chiefly that this way of looking at the subject has thrown Mr. Hardy off his art. Instead of a story which seemed to spring from life, like 'The Woodlanders,' or which is charged with romance, like 'Tess,' we have one which seems to be made up of shreds of 'advanced' conversation in London drawing-rooms, or of articles on the Woman Question in the monthly reviews-a story the conscious aim of which appears to be to concentrate in itself all the gloom and melancholy of all the

We have had many hard cases

revolting members of either sex. of marriage in recent fiction, but Mr. Hardy must needs have the hardest case of all, and for both sexes at the same time. His new book seems conceived as a microcosm of all imaginable matrimonial miseries."

Mr. Howells takes a favorable view of "Jude the Obscure," expressing himself with much force and earnestness. We extract a part of his remarks in Harper's Weekly, as follows:

"I have always felt in Mr. Thomas Hardy a charm which I have supposed to be that of the elder pagan world, but this I have found in his lighter moods, for the most part, and chiefly in his study of the eternal-womanly, surviving in certain unconscienced types and characters from a time before Christianity was, and more distinctly before Puritanism was. Now, however, in his latest work he has made me feel our unity with that world in the very essence of his art. He has given me the same pity and despair in view of the blind struggles of his modern English lower-middle-class people that I experience from the destinies of the august figures of Greek fable. I do not know how instinctively or how voluntarily he has appealed to our inherent superstition of Fate, which used to be a religion; but I am sure that in the world where his hapless people have their being, there is not only no providence, but there is Fate alone; and the environment is such that character itself can not avail against it. We have back the old conception of an absolutely subject humanity, unguided and unfriended. The gods, careless of mankind, are again over all; only, now, they call themselves conditions.

"The story is a tragedy, and tragedy almost unrelieved by the humorous touch which the poet is master of. The grotesque is there abundantly, but not the comic; and at times this ugliness heightens the pathos to almost intolerable effect. . . . All the characters, indeed, have the appealing quality of human creatures really doing what they must while seeming to do what they will. It is not a question of blaming them or praising them; they are in the necessity of what they do and what they suffer. One may indeed blame the author for presenting such a conception of life; one may say that it is demoralizing if not immoral; but as to his dealing with his creations in the circumstance which he has imagined, one can only praise him for his truth.

"The story has to do with some things not hitherto touched in fiction, or Anglo-Saxon fiction at least; and there can not be any doubt of the duty of criticism to warn the reader that it is not for all readers. But not to affirm the entire purity of the book in these matters would be to fail of another duty of which there can be as little doubt. I do not believe any one can get the slightest harm from any passage of it; only one would rather that innocence were not acquainted with all that virtue may know. Vice can feel nothing but self-abhorrence in the presence of its facts."

RELATIONS OF EDITOR AND CONTRIBUTOR.

S there a sort of "veiled hostility" existing between editors. and contributors? "A Literary Hack" recently asserted that such is the case. Mr. Frederic M. Bird, the editor of Lippincott's, qualifiedly agrees with the "Hack," remarking that it is humiliating that two persons, or classes of persons, who are necessary to each other, who live in good degree by and for each other, the object of whose work is mutual advantage and the public benefit, should not be on friendly terms; yet, says he, they rarely are. He applies a couplet from the "Bab Ballads"

"It's human nature, p'r'aps; if so, Oh, isn't human nature low?"

and goes on to say that teacher and pupil ought to be friends, but oftener, in the student's opinion at least, they are "natural enemies:" employer and workman ought to be on good terms, but there is frequent coolness between capital and labor; buyer and seller should be friendly, yet they have separate points of view, and interests that are apt to collide. Now, says Mr. Bird, contributor and editor are vender and purchaser, and other elements complicate their relations. He then sketches a "writer,' as follows:

"He is a professional, a casual, or an amateur, as it may be. In any case, with one exception out of five hundred, he must be