dia for many years, and the familiarity thus acquired with the scenery and local customs has helped his poem quite as much as his studies in the Buddhist literature and ritual.

THE POETICAL WORKS OF GEOFFREY CHAUCER. Edited by Arthur Gilman, M.A. Riverside British Poets. Boston: Houghton, Osgood&Co.

It is well known that Professor Child, the editor of the original edition of the Riverside British Poets, declined to edit the poems of Chaucer for the series until materials were available for securing a better text. Since then the Chaucer Society, of London, has supplied this want by rendering available for the use of scholars six distinct texts of the Canterbury Tales, and a number of other manuscripts of the various poems and prose works, most important of all being the manuscript in the possession of Lord Ellesmere, which has long been known to be the best in existence, but which has hitherto been inaccessible. Valuable details and suggestions have also been contributed by the various eminent scholars connected with the society. Indeed, so diligent and thorough have been the researches in this comparatively barren field that it would seem as if the limit of Chaucerian discovery had at last been reached.

Mr. Gilman is the first to sift and utilize this new material, and the three volumes before us seem to leave nothing to be desired in a popular edition of the works of the first great English poet. The text is mainly that of the Ellesmere manuscript, with corrections and emendations obtained by a comparison with all the others. The chronological order of the poems adopted by the Chaucer Society, and Mr. Furnivall's new arrangement of the Canterbury Tales, are here followed for the first time. One of the most important questions to which students have directed their attention recently has been that of the authenticity of several of the poems. This is now pretty definitely settled, and the spurious poems are, in this edition, grouped in a body by themselves. Among these are "The Romance of the Rose," "The Flower and the Leaf," Chaucer's Dream," and seven others that have appeared in all previous editions, with no intimation of their doubtful character. Notes and explanations of difficult words are placed at the foot of each page of the text. By this method is avoided the inconvenience of a general glossary, which always puts the reader in the disagreeable attitude of a translator, and detracts seriously from the enjoyment of the poetry. An index of subjects and names is added at the end, conveniently supplementing the notes that accompany the text. The editor's introduction contains " The Life and Times of the Poet," including much valuable information about the

The directions for reading Chaucer are explicit and minute, being condensed mainly from the writings of Professor Child and Mr. A. J. Ellis upon this subject. The explanations of contractions, use of negatives, prefixes, and other strange forms, together with the few brief rules for pronunciation, are admirably adapted to the needs of general readers, who have never made a special study of early English. By carefully observing these simple directions at the outset, no attentive reader can fail to acquire readily a good degree of facility in the reading; and he will probably derive an additional enjoyment from the quaint orthography and diction. These antique forms once become familiar, and their easy rhythmical movement mastered, the reader loses all feeling of strangeness, and goes ambling along with the Canterbury Pilgrims, as merry as the merriest of them or sallies out, of a bright dewy morning, to hail the first blown " daisie, or the eye of day," with the living Chaucer chatting amiably by his side.

THE LIFE OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. Written by Himself. Now First Edited from Origi. nal Manuscripts and from his Printed Correspondence and Other Writings. By John Bigelow. Second Edition, Revised and Corrected. Philadelphia: 7. B. Lippincott & Co. In his "History of American Literature " Professor Moses Coit Tyler says of Franklin's Autobiography that it is still the most famous production in American literature, that it has an imperishable charm for all classes of mankind, that it has passed into nearly all the literary languages of the globe, and that it is, as Mr. Bigelow states, "one of the half dozen most widely popular books ever printed." This verdict would probably be acquiesced in by the great majority of readers competent to pronounce an opinion; and such being the case, Mr. Bigelow has rendered a genuine service to letters in securing a pure and complete text. He was fortunate enough, while serving as American Minister in France, to obtain Franklin's original manuscript, and, on comparing it with the previously-accepted version, found that the earlier editor had taken great liberties with the text-omitting some portions, abridging and amplifying others, and in general modernizing the language, thus depriving it of a good deal of its raciness. Justly conceiving that the reading public would prefer to have the autobiography exactly as Franklin wrote it, he has restored the original text, retaining even the quaint and somewhat erratic spelling. In addition to this, regretting, as every reader

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must have regretted, that the Autobiography ends with 1757, leaving the most interesting portion of Franklin's career untold, Mr. Bigelow has compiled from the bulky correspondence and writings of Franklin such a continuation of the Autobiography as brings the story of his life, as told in his own words, down to the later stages of his last illness. "Franklin's narrative," says Mr. Bigelow, as I have arranged it, is at once so full and so consecutive that there has been small occasion for editorial interference; but whenever an allusion is made that might not be intelligible to the general reader, or a stitch is dropped in the web of the narrative, I have endeavored to supply what was lacking in foot-notes, leaving the Franklin text entirely unbroken."

This work, when it first appeared, several years ago, at once superseded all other editions of the Autobiography and became the standard version of Franklin's life; but, unfortunately, it was issued in such elaborate style as to be practically excluded from a general or popular circulation. The present edition has not only been revised and amended, but has received some material additions, and, though still issued in handsome library form, is offered at so substantial a reduction in price as to bring it within the reach of all classes of readers.

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STUDIES IN GERMAN LITERATURE. By Bayard Taylor. With an Introduction by George H. Boker. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. The twelve chapters of this volume are so many lectures which were delivered by the late Bayard Taylor before the students of Cornell University. He intended them to be simply introductory to a more extended course of reading or study in German literature, treating each subject briefly, but comprehensively, and ticing," as he says, "only those works which give a distinct, characteristic stamp to each literary period." Within these limits a most excellent outline is afforded of the literary history of Germany, from the first rude beginnings in the fragments of its ancestral Gothic to its splendid culmination in the works of Schiller and Goethe. The first six lectures give a clear and interesting description of all that deserves the name of literature in the long period extending from the earliest times to the end of the seventeenth century. The Minnesingers, the Nibelungenlied, Luther's translation of the Bible and its influence upon the language, the guilds of the Master-singers, and the work of the Silesian school founded by Opiz, are the subjects naturally claiming most attention. The scope of the remaining lectures is indicated by their titles: "Lessing," Klop stock," "Wieland and Herder," Goethe,"

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The editor of this posthumous volume has acted wisely in presenting these lectures to the public in their original form. Even had Mr. Taylor carried out his intention of re-writing them for publication, it is doutful if the more elaborate and finished form of the essay would have compensated for the loss of that rapid incisive manner, and familiarity and piquancy of illustration, so pleasing and effective in the lecture. The style is necessarily, for the most part, descriptive, everywhere lively and vigorous, and at times even eloquent; while in the final lectures, notably in the analysis and exposition of the underlying meaning of Faust, and in the estimate of the eccentric qualities of Richter's genius, the author rises to the higher plane of helpful and interpretative criticism. Not the least valuable, and certainly the most enjoyable, feature is the selection of illustrative passages from the various authors under treatment, which are felicitously translated by Mr. Taylor into verse retaining the exact rhythm and metre of the original.

FOREIGN LITERARY NOTES.

A ZANTE publisher announces a complete edition of the works of Solomos, one of the best poets of Modern Greece.

PROFS. CARDUCCI AND MONACI have undertaken an edition of the poems of all the Italian troubadours who wrote in Provençal.

DR. ERNEST GROPP, of Berlin, has just published an interesting dissertation "On the Language of the Proverbs of Alfred."

DR. WAGNER, of Hamburg, is bringing out a new edition of Shakespeare in thirty sixpenny parts, with English introductions and notes.

It is said that there is some probability of a selection of Thackeray's private letters being published. Many of these epistles are adorned with sketches by the author, full of that delicate and charming humor that the public has already seen in his legend of the "Rose and the Ring," a fac simile of which was published some years

ago.

MANY will learn with regret that during the late troubles the curious collections in the Se. raglio at Constantinople have been rifled. A well-known literary man, H. E. Munif Effendi, Minister of Public Instruction, has been ordered to institute an inquiry; the custodian has been dismissed.

M. TURGENIEF intends passing the coming winter in St. Petersburg. It is said that he wishes to make himself more closely acquainted with the present aspects of Russian social life than his residence in Paris permits. The announcement also encourages the hope that the

result may be yet another work from the pen of the famous Russian novelist.

MR. CHARLES DICKENS has just completed an exhaustive Dictionary of the Thames," somewhat on the plan of his now well-known " Dictionary of London." Besides full details as to fishing, rowing, and yachting matters, articles are contributed by well-known specialists on the geology, ornithology, botany, art and lit erature of the river. The business of the port of London also receives a fair share of attention. The book, which will be published forthwith, contains nineteen maps and plans.

THE Association for Promoting the Higher Education of Women at Oxford is now in working order. A scheme of lectures has been issued, and the two boarding houses, the Lady Margaret and Somerville Halls, have each their full complement, or nearly so, of students-in all about twenty-two, quite a sufficient number to start with. Among the lecturers are Prof. Nettleship, Mr. C. W. Boase, Mr. A. H. Acland, and Mr. A. C. Bradley.

THE title of Major Serpa Pinto's work describing his journey across Africa is 'The King's Rifle; from the Atlantic to the Pacific, across Unknown Countries." It is derived from the fact that, on his departure for his expedition, the king of Portugal presented him with his own rifle, a weapon valued at £500. As an indication of the perilous nature of the journey it may be mentioned that, of the entire force composing the expedition, and numbering over 100, only two or three survived, the rest having been destroyed by savages, wild beasts, fever, etc.

IT is believed that the earliest example of the sonnet in German literature is a translation of a sonnet by Bernardino Ochino, of Siena, from the pen of Christoff Wirsung, published in 1556. The Italian original was hitherto unknown, but it has just been discovered by Dr. Reinhold Köhler in a very rare book entitled "Apologi nelli quali scuoprano li Abusi, Sciochezze, Superstitioni, Errori, Idolatrie et Impieté della Sinagoga del Papa; et spetialmente de suoi Preti, Monaci, et Frati. Opera insieme vtile et dilecteuole" (Geneva, 1554).

MR. H. SWEET's collective edition of the oldest remains of the English language, which will be published by the Early English Text Society, is nearly ready for press. It will include all the texts earlier than Alfred's time, grouped chronologically and by dialect, and will be accompanied by a very full glossary and grammar. All the texts will be taken directly from the MSS. For this purpose Mr. Sweet has obtained the loan of various MSS. from Continental libraries, among them the Epinal glos

sary, which is probably the oldest specimen of English in existence. The proper names in Bede will be given from four MSS. The Runic inscriytions will be transcribed into ordinary letters on a uniform system. All the English Charters preserved in contemporary vellums will be printed in full, the boundaries of the oldest West-Saxon Charters (going back to 778), which were suppressed by Kemble, and the proper names being also given.

THE Clarendon Press (Oxford) has just issued a reprint, in convenient size and at a small price, of the Wycliffe translation of the New Testament (made about 1380), as revised by John Purvey, 1388. In 1850 the Rev. J. Forshall and Sir F. Madden published in four quarto volumes the Wycliffe translations, with notes, collations of MSS., and a critical introduction. This reprint does not give the varia. tions in readings as Forshall and Madden's quarto does, but a MS. in the British Museum is followed, which is regarded as the best typical MS. The reprint brings most interesting information within the reach of all students of the history of our New Testament.

DR. JUSSERAUD, the author of the able little volume on the English drama before Shakespeare, is to have a whole number of the Revue Critique given up to him for his review of Prof. Skeat's edition of the three versions of "Piers Plowman" published by the Early-English Text Society. Dr. Jusseraud takes a great many important points hitherto overlooked on the life and character of William, the author of the poem, and brings forward evidence to show that he was a bondman, freed by entering a religious order, that he at first led a bad life in London, and was afterward converted, and then condemned most strongly in others the sins of which he had been himself guilty in his earlier days.

A WRITER in the Otgolósok endeavors to show that the greater number of the most distinguished Russian authors have not been Russians, but descendants of immigrant foreigners. Thus, at the end of the seventeenth century, the most prominent representative of the Russian literary movement was Simeon Polotsky, a Pole. After him came Prince Antiochus Kantemir, of Tartar descent. It is true that the genial Lomonosof, who flourished during the first half of last century, was untainted with any admixture of foreign blood. But since his time the most honorable places on the Russian Parnassus have been occupied by persons of foreign extraction. Among the founders of modern Russian literature, Karamzin (KaraMurza) was of Tartar, Ozerof of German, lineage. The poet Griboyedof sprang more remotely from a Polish ancestor. Count Khvos

tof's ancestry culminated in a German margrave. Zhukovski was on his mother's side a Turk, and Bunin (Bunikevski) the scion of a Polish family. Neledinski, Meletski, and Baratinski were also of Polish descent. The poet Lermontof's father was a Scotchman, his mother a Tartar lady. A Polish gentleman, Yanovski, assumed the Little-Russian family name of Gogol, which one of his descendants has made so familiar to Russians. And, lastly, Pushkin's paternal ancestor was a German named Radschi, who migrated to Russia in the middle of the thirteenth century, while his mother was descended from an African negro.

SCIENCE AND ART.

HOW INSECTS BUZZ.-There are two classes

of insects which make a buzzing when they fly —those known to entomologists as Diptera and Hymenoptera. How is the buzzing produced? is a question that has been often asked. A French naturalist has answered it in a paper presented to the Academy of Sciences at Paris. The buzz combines a deep and a sharp sound.

The deep sound proceeds from the wing, provided that the vibrations are sufficiently rapid. The sharp sound, usually an octave above the other, is produced within the thorax, as has been ascertained by experiment. A supposition prevailed that it was due to the passage of the air through the stigmata and the vibration of their valvules; but these openings have been stopped with bird-lime, and yet the sharp sound continues. It keeps on even when the wings are cut off. The explanation is, that the insect still endeavors to fly, and employing the wing muscles, occasions vibrations of the thorax, and thereby produces the sharp sound, more or less intense, according to the size of the insect.

PHYSIOLOGICAL ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE.Mr. Clairefond, a Frenchman, has published a small book, the title of which, translated, is "A New Application of the A, B, C, or a Physiological Study on the Origin of Language." He revives the argument that the earliest attempts at human speech were imitations of natural sounds or the cries of animals; and he contends that out of recollections and repetitions of those sounds the names of certain natural phenomena, and of animals and other objects, originated. He finds numerous examples in the French language, and thinks that proofs might be found in other languages, if search were made, and suggests that the Geographical Society of Paris might furnish instructions to their travellers to collect from among the natives of different countries all the sounds traceable to the source indicated above. Mr. Clairefond is of opinion that the series of

sounds, words, and expressions thus collected would aid in the discovery of the origin of language. Taken in connection with natural sounds, the origin of words in our own language such as thunder, sigh, whisper-becomes evident.

BALLOONING IN WAR.- Ballooning will henceforth form a part of the art of war, for by order of the War Office a balloon equipment has been placed in the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich. Two balloons for experimental purposes and a portable furnace for the manufacture of hydrogen gas are in commission; and a party of men and officers of the Royal Engineers have been instructed in ærostatics and in the preparation of net-work and other appliances required in actual service. Among these is a kind of rope not more than half an inch thick, but of such strength that it will bear a strain of three tons, which may be expected to do good work with the grappling-irons. The balloons and all the appurtenances have been made within the Arsenal, so that ample supplies can be produced as required in working out the important aeronautical question. That balloons may be employed with great advantage in war has already

been demonstrated. To look down into an enemy's camp or to spy out his movements behind a ridge or in the rear of a wood may tend to the defeat of his plans and the shortening of a campaign; and this may be done by means of a captive balloon. But very much more might be done if a free balloon could be made to sail in any direction; and this is the problem which the Royal Engineers and the Aeronautical Society have now to work out.

BRAIN GROWTH.-One of the important results of recent palæontological research is the law of brain growth found to exist among extinct mammals, and to some extent in other vertebrates. According to this law, "all tertiary mammals had small brains. There was also a gradual increase in the size of the brain during this period. This increase was confined mainly to the cerebral hemispheres, or higher portions of the brain. In some groups the convolutions of the brain have gradually become more complicated. In some the cerebellum and the olfactory lobes have even diminished in size.” More recent researches render it probable that the same general law 'of brain growth holds good for birds and reptiles from the mesozoic to the present time. The cretaceous birds, that have been investigated with reference to this point, had brains only about one third as large in proportion as those nearest allied among living species. The dinosaurs from our Western Jurassic follow the same law, and have brain cavities vastly smaller than any existing reptiles. Many other facts point in the same direc

tion, and indicate that the general law will hold good for all extinct vertebrates.-Nature.

YELLOW FEVER POISON.-Dr. Schmidt, of New Orleans, after much study and observation, has come to the conclusion that the contagion of yellow fever is a poison" of animal origin, or, in other words, is a product of a secreting cell, mainly eliminated by the glands of the skin in a liquid form, to be rapidly converted into a vapor.' The disagreeable odor of yellow fever arises from the poison being a product of a modified or vitiated secretion. The poison having been in active existence ever since it was first known to the civilized world, has travelled from country to country, and may be kept at bay by a strict and properly regulated quarantine. For this a sure knowledge is required of some chemical agent which will destroy the poison without destroying the articles or merchandise which it may be needful to disinfect. The American Public Health Association in a Report recently published state that they have not found a single instance of yellow fever originating in any locality; it has always been imported. When the disease appears in places wide apart, the transmission appears to be wholly due to human intercourse; and the Association are convinced that the only trustworthy means of prevention is isolation. “Quarantines,” they state, established with such a degree of surveillance and rigor that absolute non-intercourse is the result, have

effectually and without exception protected those quarantined from yellow fever."

THE RUSSIAN ASIATIC EXPEDITION.-The Russian Government is about to send an expedition to Central Asia under the command of the Grand Duke Nicholas. The aim of the expedition is to select the route of the Central Asian Railway, to examine the navigability of the Oxus, and to decide the possibility of di. verting it into the Caspian. The route will be from the River Ural to Karasugai, on the Syr Daria, thence via Tashkend and Samarcand to the Oxus at Kunduz (Afghanistan); afterward along the river to Khiva, and across the Kara Kum to Krasnovodsk. The work of the expedition will be: 1. To collect information as to the cost of the railway, the ability to obtain materials for its construction, whether fuel exists on the route, and the amount of labor obtainable. 2. To investigate the speed of the Oxus, the height of its banks, the population of the nearest towns and settlements, and the existing commerce on the river. 3. To examine the Khiva oasis, the floods of Sari Kamish, and the ancient bed of the Oxus, commonly known as the Uzboc. 4. To carry out astronomical observations all the way along the route, to make military plans, to sketch the features of the country, to collect objects of

PARIS ASTRONOMICAL MUSEUM.-Gratifying progress is being made with a view to the approaching inauguration of the astronomical museum now forming at the Paris Observatory. It will be adorned with figurative representations of the principal celestial objects, as well as with the portraits of the successive directors of the Observatory. A pair of Mercator's globes, dating from the middle of the sixteenth century, are of great interest. That figuring the earth is the first on which meridians of lon

gitude and parallels of latitude were laid down. The great equatorial lakes of Africa, it is reported, are all to be found upon it. The glass cases contain the first portable meridian circle constructed on Admiral Mouchez's plan; the pendulums of invariable dimension employed by Captains Fraissinet and Duperré in their voyages round the world, for the determination of the absolute value of the intensity of the centripetal force and of gravity at different points of the earth's surface; and the apparatus used by M. Cornu, of the Institute, with a view to determine the velocity of light from observations made between the Observatory and the tower of Montlhéry. Another glass case, adds the Journal des Débats, contains the standard mètre of the First Republic, made in conformity with the law of 28 Germinal, an III.; the toise used in 1738 in Peru for measuring a degree at the equator; the toise used in Lapland some short time afterwards for measuring the polar degree; and the platinum kilogramme made by the Republican Commission of Weights and Measures. Fresnel's lens, the first ever graduated, is also deposited in the new museum, and the object-glass of the great astronomer Cassini, which he used in successively determining the existence of Jupiter's satellites, Saturn's double ring, the abnormal flatness of Jupiter's poles, and the vast velocity of his rotation, as well as that of Mars. In another of the vitrines are to be seen the doubly refracting prisms with the help of which Arago measured the diameter of the great planets, Neptune excepted. Admiral Mouchez exhibits in the museum the relief plan of the island of St. Paul, where he so successfully observed the transit of Venus, and the complete collection of the photographs taken during this famous transit of 1874 is to be shortly added.