Bed and White Heather. By Robert Buchanan. (Chatto and Windus.)—This
is a volume of "North Country Tales and Ballads," four of each. The first tale, "A Highland Princess," is published for the first time. No one can complain of its being wanting in actuality. No one can doubt who is the original of "Professor Glenfinlas," the enthusiastic discoverer of poets, while some of the circumstances in the life of Walter Syme point not obszurely to Alexander Smith. The Professor is not quite fairly treated. Otherwise the tale is powerful, and teaches, if such things could be taught, a salutary truth. Few follies are worse than that which takes an artisan from an honest employment and turns him into a man of letters. "Jean's Love Story" is a dismal tragedy, written many years ago, but tragical enough to suit the present taste for horrors. In "Sandie Macpherson" we have a very clever sketch. Here, again," Thomas Ercildoune" is Carlyle, though Sandie is probably a happy invention of Mr. Buchanan's. The humour of the "Legend of the Mysterious Piper" is too "North Country" for us to appreciate. The quality of Mr. Buchanan's poetry is well known, and there is no occasion to appreciate the four specimens here given beyond saying that they are not unworthy of him.
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