AN INCARNATION OF THE SNOW.
fiction of the 'original manuscript "—falls in no way below the level of its delightful predecessors. Indeed, we question whether the earlier hooks can show anything equal to the preface, whore the author tells of a walk in the Ghauts in the heat of the day, and of his siesta in the twilight, with its wonderful moon-worship and its strange exotic beauty of diction. As for the story, it is of the same type as the others, and yet by no means a repetition. Mr. Bain has discovered a now form of art, for he can weave fairy- tales which are so heavy with metaphysie that the imagination and the intellect of the reader are stimulated in an equal degree. Shiwa, sitting with Parwati on the crest of Himalaya, provokes her to a lovers' quarrel, so that she drops from the mountain to the dark blue lake Manua. There she finds a swan, who tells her the sad tale of the King who sought for the impossible. For the sins of his parents lie had been cursed with a longing for he knew not what, and no woman. in the world .would take him for her husband. At last he found in the jungle a beautiful girl who consented to be his Queen ; but they had not long been married before the malady revived. An old juggler piped to him, and in his madness he set out to look for a white maiden in the North, while his wife in her love accompanied him as his guide. How she died, and her husband was cured too late of his madness, is told in prose which has all the beauty and delicacy of poetry. The moral is not lost on Parwati, who is reconciled with her exacting lord. If any one wishes an example of Mr. Bain at his best, we recommend the wonderful passage where the old juggler sings of the Snow-born Maid.
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