And here are one or two quotations that perhaps might go in:

The reply of the Duke of Guise (we think), who, when somebody complained of the offensiveness of a cadaver: "The smell of a dead enemy is always sweet."

"O let me join the choir Invisible," etc.

(George Eliot.)

"The world would be empty if men were wise." (Frederick Lockyer-" The Judgment of Paris.")

"No man ever was as wise as

looked" (Sydney Smith is said to have made this remark about Daniel Webster. But it probably was said earlier than that and perhaps of somebody else.)

"Even Nature betters her own handiwork with practice. Her first effort at making a bird was simply ridiculous."

Again, "Hopeful son" is from the Winter's Tale and but of course there is no end. The Burchard saying (p. 678) about a certain political party being the party of Rum, Romanism and Rebellion, however unjust or unacceptable, owing to its contemporary inclusion here, is still literally a "familiar quotation," and should no more be excluded in a collection of familiar quotations than should the phrase, "A little black crooked thing that asks questions," be excluded because, once upon a time, it was distasteful to Mr. Pope. And Gen. Porter's saying that "a Mugwump is a person educated beyond his intellect" (p. 682) might have been supplemented with several other definitions of that bird, as "a Republican who votes the Democratic ticket:" or Senator Chandler about "prizes in the lottery of assassination," or "Jones he pays the freight," or the saying of the Kodak, "You press the button, we do the rest," might also go in on this principle. After all is said, the bulk of Mr. Bartlett's or any other volume must always be filled by Shakespeare. It will interest students of current phrases to know that when the street gamin of 1892 says he is "not in it," he is quoting Euripides, whose version ran: "Cowards do not count in battle; they are there, but not in it" -another sample of the curious notes which SHAKESPEARIANA'S kind correspondents have made from time to time of discoveries in Shakespeare of most of the periodic slang of the day: such as "painting the town red," "too thin," etc., etc. Indeed, except the Browning episode, which is perhaps inserted to illustrate the wide difference between "Familiar Quotations" and "Quotations which Certain Persons Think Ought to be Familiar," no praise is too high for Bartlett's "Familiar Quotations."

MISCELLANY.

THE question as to Browning's claim to immortality, raised by the author of the address, "The Society and the Fad," to a discussion of which we devoted so much space in October, 1890, appears to be settled by Browning's own friends sooner even than the President of the New York Shakespeare Society had anticipated. Not two years after Browning's death the London Browning Society itself has disbanded, on the ground that there is nothing more left to elucidate. Meanwhile, two hundred and seventy-six years after Shakespeare's death, our count shows one hundred and forty-seven active Shakespeare societies zealously at work, all of them finding plenty of matters to "elucidate," not to mention new matter constantly accruing. Readers of SHAKESPEARIANA will bear witness that there has been no failure of new matter in its pages, and the German Jahrbuch still publishes about the same quantity of material (only annually instead of quarterly) as does SHAKESPEARIANA. And we may add that this magazine was not changed from a monthly to a quarterly from any diminution of material. As a matter of truth, the change was decided upon for exactly the opposite reason, viz., to print a higher and more selected class of matter, and to avoid as much as possible repetitive matter. It may be interesting to our readers to know that as matter of fact our change from the monthly to the quarterly has in nowise or to any extent diminished the matter submitted to its editors. Indeed, the number of conscientious and able men and women all over the country who kindly send us their manuscripts seems to be constant in increase. Our endeavor has been, and we think will be, to hold and maintain the line of the first Shakespearian Society—that is, to print matter illustrative of the date and contemporary sources or motives of the plays. Many noble essays SHAKESPEARIANA reluctantly declines, by reason of its unwillingness to deal too much in purely esthetic, or rhetorical, or "sign-post" criticism. Did space permit, SHAKESPEARIANA would be glad to take its readers into its secrets and dilate upon some of the curiosities of its editorial table. For instance: We received not long ago a letter addressed to the care of our publishers, asking us to send the writer (the editor of a newspaper, by the way) the name of one or two good books about Shakespeare!!! And, some time since, we received a manuscript entitled "A History of Shakespearian Criticism," very well written and correctly spelled, the principal feature of which was, as one might say, disproportion. The manuscript contained, that is, about 25,000 words, 500 of which summed up the "criticism" of the years 1616-1888, while the remaining 24,500 were devoted to a scathing denunciation of the several cipher theorists who were born at about the latter date. Both of the above were far from discouraging to us. For the letter from the editor showed us that the name of the master of dramatic poetry was still penetrating into the parts of the Philistine and the infidel, and the other that, as we have always maintained, the cipherists and, indeed, all the other cranks, were building better than they knew. Many a good Shakespearian came into the fold, not through the gate, but over the Baconian fence, and did good work after he got there. But we have wandered from our text. Browning, according to the first Browning

Society, needs no further attention. All eyes will now turn, of course, to our American ones, and, painfully, to our rather esteemed contemporary, Poet Lore (which, by the way, we had intended to enumerate above among the curiosities which came to our editorial table).

IS SHAKESPEARE the man's poet, and the only man's poet we have? The tendency is to make us believe so.

Indeed, if late numbers of The Critic are to be credited, the dotage of poets seems to be something far sillier (from any adult point of view to which most of us have access) than the summit of silliness so far reached in other people. Only a few weeks ago this newspaper printed a letter-evidently from a would-be great admirer of Browning —which told a story of his (Browning's) last days, when he returned from a drive, exclaiming, "Oh, I have composed a new poem, and must go up and write it down." On being urged by some ladies to "tell them. all about it" (indeed, what else could the ladies have done, under the circumstances?) the aged poet said, "Oh, it is all about the ladies wearing birds in their hats! and I don't know how the ladies will like it, for it is very strong." (The aged poet evidently thinking that "the ladies" would be terribly cut up, etc.)

Later, again: The Critic prints another letter, this time about Tennyson saying that nobody could read his poetry but himself, and reading it to all who pretended to be anxious to listen, interspersed with such ejaculations as "Isn't that pretty good, eh?"

As for poor Lowell. If he could only read his ana as it has been printed weekly by The Critic, we think he would be sorry he ever died. Some of us, at least, remember Mr. Lowell as a man, and would like still to so remember him. Here, for instance, is one young cub, who claims (now that he cannot be contradicted) that Mr. Lowell once nodded to him, writing a letter to The Critic to say that Mr. Lowell told him that he (Lowell) never wrote a private letter without re-reading it to see if it sounded musically! Perhaps Mr. Lowell may have had this weakness, but we doubt it, or that if he had it, he would have confided it to his nearest friend. Altogether, here is a manly set of pictures of our poets, truly! Browning an unconscionable old duffer chattering to the ladies about his rhymes, and hoping they won't offend them; the author of "In Memoriam" dwindled into a fussy old party intoxicated with the gorgeousness of his own poetry, and Lowell a poseur even in his business correspondence. We are sorry that one of these stories (the one about Tennyson) comes, according to The Critic, from Dr. Rolfe. But until confirmed, we take the liberty of doubting them all.

We expect of course this sort of thing from the Simple Susan periodicals which reach us monthly, whose mission is to collect all the effeminate rumors respecting current personages. But for so unusually valuable a periodical as The Critic to so far forget its cue as to admit a lot of this chatter among its correspondence is not, to say the least, 'bracing.

AND here is another important item: "Lord Tennyson was much irritated during a recent interview by his visitor's continually pronouncing Ralph' in the common English fashion, so as to rhyme with

safe.' At length he sharply corrected the speaker, emphatically pounding the table meantime. But he declared that the name should rhyme with laugh' and 'chaff.'" Is there a fourth sex: and should we add to the Frenchman's enumeration-men, women and clergymen, and make it-men, women, clergymen and literary persons?

THE PRESS AND THE BANKSIDE.-Says the Albany Law Journal of September 19: "The fourteenth volume of the Bankside Shakespeare sets forth the play of Pericles in the Player's text of 1609 and the text of the Third Folio, of 1663-4. The introduction is one. of great research, ingenuity and learning, and corroborates our opinion that the President of the New York Shakespeare Society is one of the most sensible and acute of living Shakespearian scholars. Mr. Morgan argues strenuously for the genuineness of this play, notwithstanding that it was not included in the First Folio of 1623, by the supposition that it was such an acting favorite that the publishers of the First Folio could not acquire the copyright. This argument is well worth consideration. Our opinion as to the authorship of Titus Andronicus and this play remains unchanged. . . . We observe that he seems to abandon his main theory in favor of the genuineness of Titus, which we had described as the theory that it was the dramatist's first attempt, and that it naturally effervesces with boyish friskiness and wantonness and childish love of unadulterated horrors,' and plants himself upon the argument that 'Shakespeare was essentially a playwright, who catered to the barbaric tastes of his audiences.' The argument is strong intrinsically, and is cleverly urged by the editor. We are quite willing to acknowledge that there is more to be said for Pericles than for Titus. But it is still a powerful argument against it that it was first included with Shakespeare's acknowledged plays in company with six others which are conceded to be spurious. We greatly admire, however, the robust and lawyer-like reasoning of the lawyer, which is in refreshing contrast to what Richard Grant White would have called the 'piddling,' and what we prefer to call the fantastic, far-fetched and absurdly inconsequent and inconclusive arguments of the verse-testers, who are only a shade less ridiculous than the Baconians. Not the least interesting parts of this excellent introduction are the fac-simile of Shakespeare's will, and the cut of the composing font of the Elizabethan era, with the editor's acute demonstration of typographical errors chargeable to it and to the common practices and the evident carelessness of the printers and proof-readers of that time. The work of Furness, Rolfe and Morgan, to say nothing of Verplanck, White and Hulson, and a visit to Stratford, will convince anybody that the Americans are the foremost of all peoples in the understanding and the appreciation of the world's greatest poet."

From the New York Tribune.

The introduction is an ingenious if not absolutely convincing argument for the authorship of Shakespeare. Like most of Mr. Morgan's Shakespearian criticism, this is characterized by originality of view and closeness of research. He can see no reason why Shakespeare should not have written the whole of it, bad as well as good, and he makes the most of the consideration that the great dramatist was, first

of all, a man of business, who catered to the tastes of the public, and who sought above all else to put paying plays upon the stage. Now it is certain that Pericles was one of the most popular of plays, notwithstanding, or perhaps because of, its defects. A mere paraphrase of the old story of Appollonius of Tyre, without dramatic unity or form, Shakespeare put into the acting version little more than those touches of nature which make it live. Mr. Morgan has to meet a difficulty in dealing with the theory that it was one of the author's earliest efforts, for while much of it is crude and raw, the better portions are in truth as mature as anything Shakespeare wrote. This has been pointed out by Richard Grant White; and Mr. Morgan has not apparently found a sufficient explanation of the fact. Mr. Morgan's observations upon the causes of textual corruption form quite a distinct part of his argument, and are both ingenious and fresh. He gives a fac-simile of Shakespeare's will to show how easily the poet's very bad handwriting might have been misinterpreted by the printers, and he gives an illustration of the Elizabethan type-case to exhibit the helps to error which were afforded by the positions and relations of the letter-boxes. The whole of this is quite new and very well put, though of course Mr. Morgan is at odds with the majority of the modern school of Shakespearian critics, who prefer to shut their eyes to the realities of the poet's own time and the probabilities based upon the study of those times, and sit reading modern meanings into his text and applying modern standards to his motives. We have no doubt that Mr. Morgan is right in his main contention, namely, that Shakespeare was, if at all, only incidentally concerned with ethical purposes; that he was above all a realist in construction; that he took human nature as he saw it, and put it into his plays; that in short, to use his own words, he held the mirror up to Nature. But this may be admitted without accepting Mr. Morgan's position as to the authorship of Pericles, and notwithstanding his exceedingly bright and clever plea for the canonical orthodoxy of the play, we are of the opinion that the case is still open, and that a Scotch verdict of "not proven" is the most that can be anticipated.

In view of the greatly reduced space at the disposal of the Editors, it is urgently requested that contributors refrain as much as possible from quotations from the Plays, referring instead to passages in point by the Bankside line notation (or if not practicable, to the act, scene and line of the Globe Edition). Proof is not sent to authors unless particularly requested, or unless the subject-matter require it. Please address all matter intended for the Editors, books for Review, etc., to Box 323, WESTFIELD, UNION CO., NEW JERSEY. The Editors cannot undertake to answer personal letters, or to return unused matter unless stamped envelopes are enclosed for the purpose.