SCHOOL Boos.—The Fourth Book of Thucydides. Edited by C. E.
Graves, M.A. (Macmillan.)—This book contains three of the most important incidents in the first part of the Peloponnesian War,—the capture of the Spartans at Pyles (this narrative Mr. Graves has already edited for the eeries of "Elementary Classics "), the defeat of the Athenians at Helium, and the loss of Amphipolis. Its interest, therefore, is particularly great, while it is, perhaps, easier on the whole than the other books—if, indeed, Thucydides ever is easy. Speeches form but a small proportion, the only one of much import- ance being that of Herrnocrates to the Sicilian Congress. The situa- tion, therefore, is judicious. No book can be better adapted for the wants of an upper or lower sixth,—for any lower form we should not be inclined to Ilse it, for the most skilful manipulation can hardly make Thucydides into an "Elementary Classic." Mr. Graves' com- mentary is excellent, and fully boars out his reputation as an accurate scholar and an effective teacher. We do not know of any set of notes which better deserve study. The young scholar who should examine them thoroughly, not contenting himself with merely getting what help they furnish *towards finding the general meaning of the text, but examining with their guidance the niceties and significant irregu- larities of the Thucydidean style, would find himself amply repaid. —Homer's Odyssey. Book IX. With a Commentary, by John E. B. Mayer, M.A. (Macmillan.)—The Commentary has the familiar characteristics of Professor Mayer's work—richness of illustration (not, however, as has been sometimes the case, carried to excess) and a painstaking accuracy which leaves nothing unexplained. The note on p. 5 may be taken as a specimen of the former. Ulysses says that there is no XapIECITEpOP TAOS than to see a great company possessed with gladness, while the guests sit in order and listen to the minstrel, and the tables are laden with bread and flesh, and the cupbearer ladles wine out of the bowl, and pours it into the cups. Plato thought that this taught sensuality. Aristotle considered it a praise of judicious enjoyment. St. Basil the Great seems not to know what to think. Ulysses is n type of patient virtue with him, yet this passage seems to put happi- ness on a low level These are the three greatest names, but Professor Mayer cites twenty others. He points out that the diffi- culty lies in the misunderstanding of TAOS, which is not the philo- sophic summum bonum, but rather a boon. There is no more gracious boon to this toil-worn wanderer than to see this joyous gathering The completeness of the annotation can only be appreciated by use. These forty-four pages (not an extravagant proportion to just half' the quantity of text) contain a great amount of useful and interest- ing matter.—Sallust's Catilinarian Conspiracy. Edited by A. M. Cook. (Macmillan.)—This is a useful edition. Sallust is not un- frequently read by forms which are hardly equal to the task of mastering him. In any case he requires much elucidation. In the fullness of help given we must put Mr. Cook's work above thatof Dean Merivale (the Dean, we fancy, has not had the advantage of being a schoolmaster). We may take, for instance, the passage in c. 12 :—" Pudorem, pndicitiatn, divine atque humane promiscua, nihil penal, neque moderati habere." Both annotators point out the difference of meaning between pudor and pudicitia ; but only Mr. Cook observes that promiscua habere goes with these two words as well as with d Irina and humane, and that pro miscue is equivalent to ri/ia, this latter point being one that a boy is pretty certain to miss if he is left to himself. The rendering that would first occur to him would be that against which Mr. Cook very properly warns him, "To make no distinction between the things of God and man." Mr. Cook, however, says nothing of pensi et moderati, though he explains pen.si elsewhere. Dean Merivale has a note, but it is not sufficient "weighed and measured," "considered and regulated."—In the
- "Elementary Classics," we have Select Fables of Phtedrus, by A. S. Walpole, M.A. (Macmillan.)—A distinctive feature of this little book is to be found in the exercises (English-Latin) which are founded on the text, and which will help the young reader to fix many of the phrases in his mind. This working together of " ex- position " and "composition "—to use two old.fashioned expres- sions—is a useful method. The notes are of a simple and really
elementary lend, as, indeed, they should be. We would suggest that the explanation of the construction of the participle and verb where the English has two co-ordinate verbs, might have been advantageously supplemented by the remark that the action expressed by the participles precedes in time the action expressed by the verb, a remark which might be made more instructive by an example or two in which this rule is not observed.—A Progressive Series of Inductive Lessons. By John Tetlow, A.M. (Ginn and Heath, Boston, U.S.)—This is an effort to base learning upon thought rather than memory. The scholar is to acquire the principles of syntax not by learning rules, but by observing the construction of passages pat before him. He will thus in the end get his rules by induction. The experiment has, it is true, been made before in one or another book ; but we welcome, thnugh without committing ourselves to an opinion on its practicability, this thoughtful attempt to carry it out. We ob- serve that the quantities are .marked. This is well ; but we can scarcely approve the principle on which this has been done. Would it not have been better to lay down rules, which could be very shortly done, for the quantity of final syllables P—School- masters will find Easy Latin and Greek Grammar Papers, pre- pared by H. R. Heathy, MA. (Rivingtons), a very useful little volume. It contains a number of grammar papers, graduated as regards difficulty. The book is to be put into the pupils' hands. This will supersede the necessity of printing, or of the use of the various multiplying processes,—serious demands on the purse or the time of the teacher. They can thus be used either for paper work or for viva roce.—First Lessons in Latin. By K. Macaulay Eick, B.A. (Macmillan.)—" This little book," says the author, in his preface, "has been written from the point of view of the pupil. It pre- supposes no knowledge on the part of the learner, beyond the ability to read, write, and understand ordinary English words." "Under- standing ordinary English words" is, perhaps, a good deal to take for granted. The writer's experience is that many boys do not understand such. But Mr. Eicke's principle is a sound one, and, as far as we can see, well carried out.—Of English "Readers" we have several to mention. From Messrs. Blackwood we have received the Infant Picture Reader and The Standard Reader. Books I. and II. Edited by Professor Meiklejohn.— The Elementary Science Reader, by Charles McRae (W. and R. Chambers), contains. perspicuous explanations of some ordinary scientific phenomena.-- For scholars somewhat more advanced, we have, under the title of "Classics for Children," Scott's Quentin Durward, edited by Char- lotte M. Yonge. (Ginn and Heath, Boston, U.S.)—The publishers are bringing out a series of standard books which are to cultivate the tastes for reading in the "Common Schools" of the States, think. ing, and rightly thinking (if we may judge of what happens there by what is certainly happening here), that there is more learning than reading in the schools, and that this latter habit especially needs to be cultivated. It is, of course, a doubtful point hove far gieat classics can be edited. It is easy to cry out against the audacity of those who would touch them. Still it is pretty clear that they sometimes, for at least some purposes, are the better for a little touching. Walter Scott, for instance, we- must acknowledge, if we will only "clear our minds of cant," some- times tries the patience of young readers by his lengthiness. Any- how, if anybody is to be trusted to edit him, it will be Miss Yonge. She has prefixed an excellent historical introduction, which greatly adds to the value of the book. Quentin Thu ward, with a proper notice of its departures from fact, is about as valuable an historical study as can well be found, not to speak of its singular interest as a story.—Messrs. Ginn and Heath also send us Hazen's Complete Spelling-Book, by N. W. Hazen, MA. We may note, as a valuable feature in this book, appendices with systematised lists of suffixes and prefixes.— Of French reading-books, we have the first part of Eloquence de la Chairs et de to Tribune Francaises. By Paul Blonet, B.A. Part I.—French Sacred Oratory. (Clarendon Press, Oxford.)— N.
Bloniit (it is an open secret that he is known to many readers under a pseudonym) has put together some famous passages from classical French preachers,—Bossuet, Boardaloue, Massillon,. Flechier, and Mascaron. This limitation was, we suppose, well-considered, though we could name more recent orators whose eloquence might have fairly claimed ad mission. And if we are to have Berryer, Thiers, Ledru-Rollin, and Gambetta in the Tribune, why not Adolphe Moped (not one whit inferior, we should say, in style to any of the classics, and more interest- ing in matter), and Lacordaire in the pulpit ? N. Blouet, who intends his book for advanced students, gives his notes in French. The volume is to be followed up by a second, which will give specimens of political oratory.—The Contes de Fees. Par Charles Pessault. With Notes and Complete Vocabulary, by G. Eugene Fasnacht (Macmillan), belongs to the series of "French and German Reading-books."—In Mathematics, we have A Treatise on Higher Trigonometry, by the Rev. I. B. Loch, M.A. (Macmillan) ; and Explanatory Arithmetic, by G. Eastcott Spickernell (Griffin, Portsmouth ; Sirnpkin and Marshall, London).
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