THE MAGAZINES.

IT is amusing to contrast Mr. Chamberlain's essay in the Fort- nightly Review, on the next page of the Liberal programme, with the political article in Blackwood, whose writer makes Mr.

Rae's memoirs of Wilkes, Sheridan, and Fox a pretext for a triumphant war-dance around the supposed corpse of the Liberal party. This occasionally smart, but always violent paper is rather pleasant reading, and a stronger example than Blackwood has given us for some time of that leading characteristic of its political lucubrations, a colossal capacity for believing that anything it wishes to be true is a fact which only fools can dispute. The heaven-born ' and his supporters had the monopoly of genius and virtue, while "Mr. Rae's politi- cal heroes" merely illustrate the Bishop of LL9.ndaff's complaint that "patriotism was a scandalous game played by public men for private ends ; and the knaves and scoundrels of this day are very like them, only not so clever." This is the sum of the mean- ing of the article, which concludes by an exultant statement that "the system and the party now lie before us in ruins, and it is only a very rash and misguided admirer who can go back to their early founders and fortunes to vindicate the necessity for their reconstruction." In short, Liberalism is the Devil, but the Devil is dead. "The spurious philanthropy of self-constituted demagogues," rendered " obsolete " by "modern Toryism," is an image with a mischievous reminder in it of Mr. Pickwick's utterances as jotted down by Count Smorltork, but much allowance is to be made for the fine frenzy of the medicine-man capering on behalf of his tribe. Part II. of "The Abode of Snow" is amusing, though it, too, abounds in growl,—about the calumnies which are circulated and believed respecting the pleasant idleness of Indian officials, the dissipations of Simla, and the unfitness for their posts of the great officials ; about the roads and the Russians, about the poor whites and the half-castes, and "the handful of Englishmen, who have a great deal too much to do." But even the growly bits are entertaining, and the writer's grave explanation of the risks of flirtation, to say nothing of "something more," at Simla, on account of the dis- tracting surveillance under which everybody lives, is comic. Major-General Lysons contributes a letter on "Army Control," reactionary, but, we think, reasonable. It seems to be true that in the transaction of military business under the present system there is always a link missing, and that in the proper anxiety to diminish the number of departments, an unmanageable amount of business has been heaped together on this particular one. "Alien Laws "form the particular International Vanity discussed by the clever writer of this entertaining series. It is the driest topic he has yet selected, but he makes it amusing, and concludes an encouraging list of the successive reliefs which have been granted to oppressive legislation, with the following remarks :—

" The moral of the tale is that it is vastly pleasanter to be alive now than it used to be. This fact is decidedly agreeable, but it does not prevent our hoping, for our children's sake, that things will continue to improve. If so, other countries will perhaps become, some day, so irresistibly attractive to us all, that nobody will be able to remain a citizen of any land, and that nationalities will consequently be sup- pressed. If so, there will be no more war."

We look in vain for a foot-note to the address of this dangerous enthusiast, disavowing all complicity with his views on the part of the editor.

Macmillan might be thought dull but for a short memoir- of Lady Duff Gordon, written by her daughter ; and a. tale by Bret Harte. Besides these, we have a second section of the supererogatory laudation of Prussian ecclesi- astical policy, of which we had the first part last month ; a plea for the Eurasians, by Sir Alexander Arbuthnot, who. depicts that mixed race in terms which contrast with those used by the writer in Blackwood; and a reprint of Professor Huxley's able speech about Priestley, delivered at Birmingham last August. The two first-named articles are very pleasant.. This last glimpse of the writer of the delightful letters from the Nile is a treat Lady Duff Gordon's daughter. has evidently inherited quickness of perception and drollery from her mother. Her account of her last visit to her mother and her sojourn among the Arabs is very funny. She tells a good story against herself of a blunder she made at a grand entertain- ment given to her mother and herself at " Keneh," by the " Maohn :"—

" I had always heard the Maohn spoken of as 'Oum Azeein,' an& addressed him so all dinner-time with great civility. I saw Omar laugh behind my mother, and at last he said, ' Oh I Sitt, that is not his name, but people call him so for laughing. ' Oum Azeein ' means 'mother of beauty,' and seest thou not that he is ugly, and has but ono eye l'"

Bret Harte's tale, "The Fool of Five Forks," is humorous and touching, but in neither attribute is it up to the beat level of the author. It is injured by a touch of coarseness and caricature, but there are good bits in it. Among them are "the easy vitupera- tion of a backward season," by the self-appointed committee of four who come to find out what the " Fool " has been doing with his money, and the Fool's question to the committee,—" Ye didn't enny of yez ever hey a sort of tremblin' in yer legs—a kind o' shaki- ness from the knee down ? Suthin' that begins like chills, and. yet ain't chills. A kind o' sensation of goneness here, and a kind o' feelin' as if you might die suddent ! When Wright's Pills. don't somehow reach the spot, and quinine don't fetch you." There is delightful drollery in the description of the rise of Five Forks, and of the visitors to the Valley of Big Things ; and a touch of the grim humour characteristic of Bret Flarte, in the sudden drop from, a smart exploitation of the picturesque to the tragic event which vindicates the folly of the Fool.

The remarkable essay on the new solar theory on which we commented last week is the chief feature of an admirable Corn- hill. We cannot recall a better number of any magazine, for either the variety or the interest of its contents. By his own picturesque and forcible descriptions of what the great Latin poet did not discern in the sea, the author of an essay on " Virgirs Sea Descriptions" proves his allegation that those descriptions are failures, that "Virgil might fairly be styled sea-blind." This essay is a little whimsical, but quite charming. The whole question between the Japanese and Chinese is stated in an article on Formosa, and the great island is made as intelligble to us as Jersey. One of Mr. Leslie Stephen's discriminating criticisms makes us guiltily conscious of having under-estimated Crabbe hitherto ; and a useful, but depressing article on "Women and Charitable Work," makes us wish we had not read it, but that everybody else should read it and act upon it. It is so true and so miserable, that a vast amount of harm is being done daily- by ignorant, ill-directed, and zealous efforts to do good. Only two things seem to be safe from the fate of such efforts,—local exertions to abate overcrowding, and the encouragement of emigration to the Colonies. "Keeping Faith" is the title of a skilful variation on an old theme; that of the beautiful girl of the beginning of this century whose affianced lover learns that she has become hopelessly disfigured by small-pox, but per- sists in keeping faith, which were better broken for the sake of

bath. The delicacy of touch, the fidelity of the local colour, and the subdued pathos of this story are rather enhanced in merit by -their application to a well-worn subject ; the reader is curious to discover whether there remains any novel combination in which the scourge of the pre-Jenner age may play a part. Mr. Black is making his heroine's sister Mabyn as charming as his heroine, Wenna, herself, and somehow it seems hardly fair. Mabyn's malicious, thoroughly girlish delight when she flatters herself she has done a little business of the evil-eyed kind with respect to her sister's engagement to Mr. Boscorla, by making that elderly suitor purchase an "engaged ring" with emeralds in it, because,

"Oh, green's forsaken, and yellow's forsworn,

And blue's the sweetest colour that's worn !"

and Harry Trelyon, at the bird-and-beast shop in Seven Dials, are the gems of the present instalment of "Three Feathers." There is a mole in a railway milk-can half filled with earth in that shop in Seven Dials which inspires lively curiosity. We have not yet completely surrendered to Wenna Rosewame ; she is s little too conscientious, but there are symptoms, slight, but promising, of her declension from the absolutely perfect to the entirely captivating level. Mr. Hardy's "Far from the Madding Crowd" resumes its earlier interest in the chapters for this month, in which the laborious artificiality which has injured it too much lately is discarded, and several artistic touches must be recognised. One of them occurs in Bathsheba's talk to her- servant, Liddy, when sheinows the worst aboutTroy, her husband. " Liddy, if ever you marry—God-forbid. that you ever should 1.—you'll find yourself in. a fearful situation ; but • mind this, don't you flinch. Stand your ground, and be cut, to pieces. That's what I'm going to do." With no more outspoken -reference to it, the crowning scene of the fatal, passionate court- ship is brought back to the reader's mind—when Bathsheba -stood stock-still while her lover's practised sword played about her, and a lock of her hair was shorn by it from her upheld, fear- less head—recalled with all the force of actual contrast, and the bitterness of it to the woman's wounded heart.

An interesting and pleasant sketch of the career of Master Betty, the "Young Roscius " of seventy years ago, who as- tonished the world for just three years and three months, and then retired from the stage, to a happy and respected life, which came to an end only a few weeks ago ; and a clever -essay on the little-known French poet, Theophile de Viau, are the most noteworthy contents of Temple Bar. Mrs. Lynn Linton's naughty young person, Dora, is soaring to great heights of wickedness, in her serial story, "Patricia Kemball,"—to quite unnatural heights, we think. A young girl in Dora's position might be the monster of heartlessness, hypo- crisy, and cruelty which she is made ; she might be a fawning hum- bug, an illimitableliar ; she might be capable of transacting a clande- stine marriage, and of deeply regretting it afterwards, because it hinders her from wedding a " lord ; " but she would be too well -acquainted with and too much afraid of their consequences, to take to actual theft and forgery, at the instigation of the man of whom she is already tired. The writer makes too much of the callous, selfish caution of Dora's character in the beginning, to lose sight of it altogether, at this stage of the story, without great inconsistency.

Fraser for this month is too full of papers that appear to be rather written to order, than written because the subjects took hold of the writers. This remark, however, does not apply to the thoughtful essay on Priestley, by Mr. Turner, which is an ex- cellent supplement to Professor Huxley's criticism, touching some of Priestley's characteristics with great delicacy and insight, and measuring his general powers and the astonishing ease with which he accepted all the logical consequences of his mobile, but not very deliberative or weighty judgment, with a calm mind and by a -carefully-considered standard. But Mr. Escott's essay on the House of Commons and its orators, is eminently written to order ; not that it is without excellent remarks, but that long paragraphs seem to be inserted simply as cement, or for the pur- pose of getting over so much ground. And the article on Church reform, the general tenour of which has much that is wise in it, is of the same rather tame calibre, There is, however, a pleasant and natural paper on the merits and defects of the Irish Convent Schools, by a former pupil, in which there appears to be no special pleading, but perfect candour. The 'Chinese Love-Story' is fresh, but like Chinese literature, as far as we know it, prolix.

Of two articles in the Contemporary Review, we have already said enough in other parts of this journal ; we .allude, of course, to Mr. Gladstone's on Ritualism, and Mr.

Matthew Arnold's defence of his " Literature and Dogma." Besides these, Mr. Bayne contributes a thoughtful paper on "Charles I. and his Father," and Mr. Fergusson a sharp attack on Mr. Burges's plan for ornamenting St. Paul's Cathedral, while Mr. Fergusson's name will certainly lend weight to his criticism. There are no less than three papers on pure philosophy,—one on "The Philosophy of the Pure Sciences," by Professor Clif- ford; another, on "The Speculative Method," by Mr. Lewes, and a third, on "Contemporary Evolution," by Mr. St. George Mivart. The first and the last of these certainly deserve more study than we have yet been able to give them, and very likely the second also, at least in the case of those who know enough of Hegel to make it remunerative. But three stiff philo- sophical papers in a single number of a magazine, are hard lines for the reader.

The Fortnightly, besides Mr. Joseph Chamberlain's clever and lively, but somewhat flippant paper on " The next page of the Liberal programme," which we have more or less discussed already, and to which 'we would now return only to regret the absurd and really childish vindictiveness of its reference to the only first-rate Liberal politician who has heartily pressed the immediate right of the agricultural, labourer to the franchise,— Mr. Forster,—we have an interesting criticism on Mr: Disraeli's novels by Mr. Leslie Stephen, who seems, however, to us to ascribe a great deal too much imaginative capacity to Mr. Disraeli, when he regrets that Mr. Disraeli did not stick to novel-writing; and who, in the general estimate itself, assigns, we' think, a great deal too little importance to the wit of Mr. Disraeli s super- ficial sketches of women of fashion, French cooks, and the im- pertinent aplomb of Eton boys. We hold that Mr. Disraeli never thoroughly conceived even a single character in any one of his novels, but that the brilliancy of his first superficial sketch of persons like Mrs. Guy Flouncey in "Tancred," or the old Whig family in " Sybil," marks the limit and climax of his genius. Mr. Stephen seems to us to estimate far too highly Mr. Disraeli's perfectly cold and artificial imagination, when he places "Henrietta Temple" and "Contarini Fleming" above the novels in which his author made such excellent use of his political experience, It is all very well to say that really great literary men are greater powers than great statesmen. Perhaps so. But is there the least warrant in Mr. Disraeli's writings,—beyond their elasticity, which is too mercurial for any great success,—for supposing that he could have achieved a really high place in literature? His fancy and imagina- tion seem to us to have far too much pinchbeck in them for any such achievement. The Editor of the Fortnightly gives a panegyric, not in his acutest or most characteristic style, Of the work on "Super- natural Religion," recently reviewed in these columns ; and Dr. Appleton contributes an argument in favour of "the Public Endowment of Research," which is likely to attract special atten- tion, at a moment when the Commission appointed to investigate the financial resources of the two Universities have just published their report. Dr. Appleton succeeds in showing what, for our own parts, we would willingly have granted him, as a premiss quite beyond reasonable dispute,—that it is very unsatisfactory to leave original research, especially in the less fruitful sciences, to the bare chance of supporting itself ; and that it is still more unsatisfactory to find men who are well fitted In every way to extend the boundaries of our knowledge by original research, compelled to direct their energies into other and less valuable channels, by the necessity of gaining a livelihood. We are quite indifferent, too, to Dr. Appleton's elaborate proof,—with which we quite concur, though we think common-sense would lead us to it, without any danger of hesitation,—that new knowledge which individuals won't pay for, may rightly be paid for by the State, since, whether it be technically economic wealth or not, it is certainly a very important element in social well-being. All this seems to us so much a matter of course, that we wonder at the pains Dr. Appleton has taken to prove it ; but our difficulty begins where his discussion ends. The State may properly pay for education, because there is a very simple mode of ascertaining that the work paid for is done ; but where is the mode of ascertaining that original research, in any sense of advantage to the State, is really within the reach of the person to be endowed? How are we to prevent the virtual waste of the means devoted to original research? How are we to secure that the 'original investigators' to be endowed, won't turn out a large number of fruitless and perhaps pedantic inquiries, just for the sake of justifying their position, with- out adding anything really worth the sacrifice to the knowledge of the race ? If it is certain that a great deal of the money spent on University Fellowships is, for public purposes, pretty well wasted, is it not in the highest degree probable that the endowment of Research will be, in great part, a fund added to that waste? Is there not reason to think that the most we can safely do in the direction indi- cated by Dr. Appleton, is to endow a few eminent men who have already proved their aptitude for original research, and their passion for it, by considerable discoveries made disinterestedly? Only these would, unfortunately, be very few ; and yet surely the attempt to endow the mere intention of young men to enter on a course of scientific research, would be a rash, expensive, and un-

• fortunate one? These are the questions to which Dr. Appleton should apply himself, if he really wishes to vanquish the prac- tical difficulties in the way of his recommendation.