CURRENT LITERATURE.
The Portfolio. An Artistic Periodical. Edited by P. G. Hamerton. No. 1, January. (Seeley.)—We notice with pleasure the first number of this periodical, to which we turn with relief from the immense mass of ephemeral illustrative find pictorial work which crowds our tables nowadays. The Portfolio does not seek to compete with its contem- poraries in the quantity of what it supplies to the public, does not give, for instance, engravings at the rate of three or four a penny. But it aims at furnishing what may ho of permanent value. The head of Vashti reproduced in autotype after a pen drawing by Mr. Poynter, whose "Israel in Egypt" and "Catapult" will be fresh in the recollec- tion of our readers, is by itself worth the price of the whole. The "Pinnacle of St. Louis" at Sens is an interesting specimen of thirteenth- century Gothic. It is a lithograph in three tints, in a style which will be novel to most English eyes. Mr. Hamerton illustrates with three etchings the first part of what, for want of a better word, we must call a tale, the "Unknown River." The editor combines in an uncommon degree the literary and artistic qualification for his work, and we wish him success.
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