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like those of dreaming passion, too often exhibited at the cost of our personal self-respect. Queen Mab delights in making us ridiculous, and exposing us to fancied public shame. People seem to come and go without the least warning, and one person is unaccountably exchanged for another, so that we address them wrongly, and tell them what ought not to be told. All this makes us feel very much ashamed of ourselves, but we cannot help it. The simplest plight, however, of conscious impotence is when in our dream we have something to say or to do, and find that we cannot open our lips, or move hand or foot. In this instance probably the motor nerves have been faintly stirred by a summons of the will, but not with sufficient energy to act upon the muscles.

An endless variety of absurd conditions might be related by a diligent historian of authentic dreaming experiences. In general, it may be owing to indigestion, or to some obstruction of the breathing or in the circulation of the blood, that dreams are pervaded by a vague anxiety which continually invents some fictitious blunder or disaster. There is always a propensity to conceive that something has gone wrong, because the overloaded stomach, or the brain overcharged with too much business and study, disturbs the spontaneous action of those faculties still allowed to play. Their dramatic representations, in which, from the unsleeping and absorbing egotistic consciousness, the dreamer himself is a chief performer, borrows from his bodily uneasiness a complexion of discomfort. He may not become in his sleep the murderer of his wife and children, but he will perpetrate grievous mistakes and hear sundry voices of rebuke and complaint. The subject of complaint, indeed, though it appeared a serious matter in the dream, may afford him a hearty laugh when his eyes open in the morning. A curious instance of this kind befell the present writer. He thought he was an undertaker, and reëntered his workshop after a brief absence. "Oh, sir," his journeyman or apprentice said to him, "that old gentleman you buried on Tuesday has been here again, to say his coffin is a very bad fit, three inches too short. He says he never had such an uncomfortable coffin in his life." Here was something wrong with a vengeance, and the dreamer felt sincerely sorry, as a good tradesman should be, that one of his customers was so badly served.

M. GUIZOT.

HAD M. Guizot died in 1847, after he had brought about the Spanish marriages, or in 1848, after he had pulled down the monarchy of Louis Philippe, the general judgment of his character would have been very different from what it is to-day. Men of the world, as well as stern moralists, would have said that he had heartlessly bound a young queen to a man whom she did not love, whom she could not love, and who was to be her husband only in name. They would have said that the austere professor of a Puritanic creed and the pattern of domestic virtues had been guilty of a crime which even the cynicism of the world itself does not condone. They would have said that so base an intrigue could not serve France in the long-run, and that events would yet prove Guizot to have been as short-sighted as he had been unscrupulous. A different class of censors would have uttered an equally emphatic condemnation after the Revolution of 1848. How, they would have asked, could Guizot have believed that a constitutional monarchy, the most delicate of all political machines, could be supported in France, the most volcanic of all countries, on so limited a suffrage as to constitute the bourgeoisie a new aristocracy, and by the aid of what was substantially a vast system of bribes ? How could so able a man have persuaded himself that he could resist the demand for an extension of the suffrage? How could so profound a student of the British constitution and of English history have taught himself that a king whose title came from an Act of Parliament could rely on a mingled system of corruption and main force?

Louis Philippe, it would have been said, might have died on the throne but for the infatuation of his minister, and Guizot might have placed the monarchy beyond the dread of revolution if his great intellect had not been blinded by his ungovernable pride.

In the main, we think, these denunciations would have been just; but they would have left out of sight a large part of Guizot's life, and the best part of his character. Happily the Revolution of 1848 banished him forever from office, and forced him to live in the solitude of Val Richer for a quarter of a century. Few men have been better fitted by nature and by training to enjoy a country life, and the solitude of his Normandy home not only brought out all that was best in Guizot's character, but softened the memory of his political errors. It enabled his enemies to see how great a man he remained, even after justice had assailed him with a stern indictment. English people, in particular, soon forgot the questionable part of his career. They had always found good reason to like him. He had studied our history as deeply and as reverentially as if he had been an Englishman, and he had written books of permanent value on the men of our greatest revolution. Our form of government, and the temper in which we usually conduct political disputes, had been the subject of his admiration. He was never tired of telling his own countrymen that they must strive to acquire the political fairness of the English. Such admiration, coming from such a man, was the most powerful of all flattery, and it is no wonder, then, that the English public admired M. Guizot in turn. He had also other attractions of almost equally great force. He was a Protestant, and he was proud of his creed. Calumny had never dared to whisper a syllable against his private life, and all knew it to be stainless. M. Guizot had displayed all these good qualities when he had lived in London as the ambassador of Louis Philippe, and they could not be forgotten when he lived as an exile in BrompHe was likewise fond of English ways, the English language, and English people. He himself was a master of our tongue, although he never lost the French accent, and his family spoke English as well as if they had been natives of these islands.

ton.

During his later years, the old statesman drew many English visitors to Val Richer, and they were charmed by the simplicity and the beauty of his life. His studious habits, his walks with his grandchildren, his cheerfulness, the affection and respect which he inspired, the daily reading of the Bible in the midst of his family, the worship in which he took part with patriarchal fervor, and the freshness of the interest with which he studied and discussed the daily events of his own afflicted country,- all made up a beautiful picture of a green and great old age. During his visits to Paris he showed more of his old restless self. The drawing-room of his daughter, Madame de Witt, in which he received his friends, was the scene, if not of intrigue, at least of political talk at once animated and fervidly Royal; and at the age of eighty-four, or even of eighty-six, Guizot flung himself into the conversation as eagerly as the youngest of the throng. Little more than two years ago, on one of these occasions, the present writer found the old philosopher as erect, as lively, and seemingly as vigorous as men of half his age. The grasp of his hand had almost the strength and the firmness of youth, and his voice had a ring and a steady power which suggested that he might still have won honors in the tribune.

His immense fund of energy found vent in the deliberations of the French Academy, to which he went oftener than many of the younger members. He was ever ready to take part in discussions on philology or style; and M. Cuvillier-Fleury tells us that only a few weeks ago the wonderful old man vigorously debated literary and grammatical questions. And he domineered in the Academy as much as he had once domineered in the Senate. ruled that body with a rod of iron. His word could exclude a candidate or make a prayer for admission certain to succeed. It was he who a few months ago raised the tempest respecting the reception of M. Emile Ollivier. He would not permit the political trifler who had made

He

war against Germany with a "light heart" to praise the man of Sedan in the theatre of the Palais Mazarin, and he stigmatized M. Ollivier to his face, with some of the angry contempt which had once flung forth the famous retort, "Montez, messieurs, montez! vous n'arriverez jamais à la hauteur de mon dédain." His capacity for discharging the bitterest and most Olympian scorn could be easily credited by any person who had even once seen his intense and eager expression, his finely-chiselled features, his high but retreating brow, his pale and emaciated face, and those lines of the lips which seemed to imply everlasting determination. No one could wonder that such a man could debate a point of philology as fiercely as he could argue a question of state. And the Protestant Consistory felt his power as much as the French Academy. He was not only a Protestant, but a Protestant of the oldest and most biblical orthodoxy. He was, perhaps, the only man of our time whose intellect was first-rate, whose philosophical perceptions were of European extent, and yet whose theological creed was that of the sixteenth century. He seems to have absolutely hated the Latitudinarian party. Hence all the attempts of M. Cocquerel fils, and the other representatives of French Latitudinarianism, to expand the compass of the old Huguenot belief, and to soften the austerity of its dogmatic deliverances, found in Guizot the most implacable of foes. He seems to have regarded these Unitarians as almost wicked; and he was the leader of the party who, during a memorable debate in the Consistory two years ago, defeated the attempt to include the Unitarians within the legal bounds of Protestant belief. His enemies styled him " Pope Guizot," and he merited the title. A more Hildebrandine personality has not been cast into the strifes of this century.

Guizot lived so long, and did European work so early, that it is not difficult to guess the place which he will hold in the estimation of posterity. As a statesman, he cannot be accounted great, if the proof of greatness be success. His political career was a splendid disaster, and it was such because he knew books better than men. He boasted that he was a doctrinaire, but he meant that he was a philosophic statesman. In reality he had so begirt himself with the armor of pedantry, that he could not move freely among the shifting throng of the world. He fancied that he could import the British constitution, and what he did import was a constitutional rock on which the monarchical ship went to pieces. Had he been less of a professor, had he been more teachable, or had he not regarded his fellow-beings with infinite disdain, France might still have been a monarchy, with Louis Philippe II. as her king. Guizot was mainly responsible for the ruin of his own party. But it would be a mistake to deny the claim of greatness to all statesmen who have missed the main object of their life; and it is difficult to withhold such a title from Guizot, when we look more closely at his career.

In his youth, before he entered the Chamber of Deputies, he was for years the mainspring of the Ministry of the Interior. As Minister of Public Instruction, he effected a greater change in the educational system of his country than any of his successors. For eight years he was in fact, if not in name, Prime Minister of France, and during all that time he was, on the whole, the first of European statesmen. His immense knowledge of political facts, his faculty for work, his vigorous pen, his splendid powers of debate, his iron will, and the strength of his personality, enabled him to crush a host of foes, and to hold the chief place in a country which is more difficult to rule than any other. Nor did he hold his place by playing upon the affections or the vanity of the men whom he managed. He never condescended to flatter or troubled himself to please. He lectured King Louis Philippe, the vainest of men, and therefore the most impatient of dictation. He lectured the Chamber of Deputies, the most turbulent body in Europe. He lectured his subordinates. We suspect that he tried to lecture Lord Palmerston, and he certainly attempted to browbeat Lord Aberdeen. The habitual attitude was that of a lecturer to the whole human race, and hence he stirred up a host of enemies. Yet he held the front place in

France, in spite of M. Thiers, in spite of the satirists, in spite of his Protestantism, and in spite of the fact that he was feared rather than loved even by his followers. Such a man was surely great in force of character.

His literary work can be spoken of with more comfort. Guizot was not a great writer in the same sense as our own Carlyle, for neither his thought nor his style was so distinctive or so moving as to constitute a landmark in literary effort. His reflections tended to become thin, and his rhetoric lacked the incomparable simplicity, brevity, and easy flow of the best French prose. He has written no book that has made a marked change in the current of opinion, nor has he left a single page of classic style. If we look at the quality of his writing, we should call him eminent rather than great. And yet it is, again, difficult to deny the title of "great" to a man who in his youth wrote the works on the Civilization of Europe and of France, and who in later years so powerfully told the story of our own Puritan revolution. His philosophical writing stands, at all events, on a high plane. It is free from the slightest tinge of provincialism, and is, indeed, addressed to the whole of educated Europe. He would have left a high name in literature, even if he had written nothing more than his books on the philosophy of civilization.

There is one damning blot on his character, and that is the share which he took in the negotiation of the Spanish marriages. It was he who must be held responsible for that foul transaction. In vain do his friends plead that the selfish ambition of Louis Philippe was the cause of the intrigue; for Guizot could have left office rather than have lent his genius to the perpetration of such an infamy, and the truth is that he flung himself into the grimy business with amazing zeal. Equally in vain is it to say that the rival diplomatists were not a whit more high-minded. That is not true of Lord Aberdeen, and if it is true of the others, it furnishes no excuse to the Puritanic Guizot. He ought to have risen above so base a thing. It would seem that essentially theological natures, when they plunge into intrigue, are peculiarly apt to blur the plain lines of morality by the subtlety of their manipulation. No nest of secular intrigue is so gross as an ecclesiastical synod, and Guizot seems to have carried a dangerous habit of casuistry into the Council-chamber and the Senate. He was one of those high-minded men whose subtlety often leads them to do acts which shock even the rough moral sense of the crowd. Nor, when laboriously telling the miserable story in his own memoirs, does he betray any perception of the fact that he had been sinning against an elementary law of human nature. He forgets every other consideration in the desire to show that he had preëminently served his master and France. But in reality he had injured both, while he had brought woe to Spain. Let it be added, however, that the negotiation of the Spanish marriages is the one sinister record of his career, and that the purity of his private life was as marked as the fatal flaw in his public. On the whole, he was a great if erring man; great in the intensity of his ambition, and the force of his will, and the domineering strength of his character; great in his freedom from the frailties of our nature; great in the place which he has carved for himself in European history; and his greatness was softened into something like beauty by the serene evening of his long and illustrious life.

FOREIGN NOTES.

TENNYSON has a habit which is exasperating to the reader, and must be particularly exasperating to his publishers that of rearranging and adding to each new edition of his old poems, thereby rendering the previous editions incomplete. The forthcoming volume of the (London) Cabinet Edition of the Laureate's works will contain two new pieces, "In the Garden at Swainton," and "The Voice and the Peak."

EVERY SATURDAY.

MESSRS. HENRY S. KING & Co. announce
from the pen of Mr. H. Curwen, in which the main idea
a volume
has been to select the most typical examples of Literary
Strugglers in the chief countries of the world. The writers
treated of are: Novalis, as representing Germany; Henri
Murger and André Chénier, France; Edgar Allan Poe,
America; Alexander Petöfi, Hungary; Chatterton, Eng-
land; and Tannahill, Scotland.

THERE has been discovered at the Castello di Malpaga, near Bergamo, a fresco which is attributed to Titian, representing the visit of Christian I., King of Denmark, in 1454, to the famous condottiere Bartolomeo Colleoni, who had retired and held his court there in his old age, after having successively served the Visconti against Venice, Venice against the Visconti, Milan against the Duke of Saxony, and Florence against the Duke of Urbino.

[OCTOBER 17, Metz, as Trochu and Ducrot at Paris, as Bourbaki and President of the Republic;' and the whole letter is full of Clinchant in the East. He forgot all that when he became urally assailed with a peculiar bitterness, to which he may similar insults or innuendoes. The Duc d'Aumale is natbe more or less reconciled when he reads the glowing eulogy passed on Marshal Leboeuf. The letter is utterly without historical value, except as an exhibition of a very coarse and vulgar character."

IN consequence of the great development in other cities of Germany of the special branches of industry, as watch and toy-making, of which Nürnberg at one time enjoyed, if not the monopoly, at any rate the principal share, the Bavarian Government has determined, by the establishment of more efficient local schools of art, to give the Nürnberg A PERFORMANCE for the benefit of Mlle. Déjazet, who' artisans the opportunity of recovering their lost prestige. at the conclusion of a long career, is in need of assistance, wholly cheap toys, playthings, and fancy articles of inferior Of late years the specialties of Nürnberg have been almost is being arranged in Paris. M. Sardou has contributed a play, and the companies of the Vaudeville, the Variétés, quality; in olden times, however, the reputation of the and the Palais Royal have promised their assistance. town was of a very different character, and there is significant comment upon the uncertain tenure of theatrical A scarcely an art collection in any part of Germany that is prosperity is afforded in this demand in favor of an actress without evidence of the skill of the Nürnbergers of past who has enjoyed an amount of popularity almost unprecages. Every art connoisseur is familiar with the drinkingedented. cups, goblets, christening-mugs, silver and gold plate, and while in the city itself the memorials of its past artistic all the clocks, watches, and other ingenious inventions for which the place was specially famed in the Middle Ages; excellence and ingenuity meet one at every turn. In it is to reawaken its lost sense of the beauty and the excelthe present day, however, Nürnberg no longer gives evidence of artistic proficiency in any branch of industry, and lence of its old works of art, that the Government has opened new schools of art and an art museum, which is to be in connection with the older local art schools.

THE influence of forests on the rainfall has long been the subject of discussion. MM. Fautrat and Sartiaux have recently communicated to the Academy of Sciences of France the result of some large experiments which appear to determine the question. In various parts of the forest of Halatte, they fixed rain-gauges and other instruments. Similar instruments were fixed by them over open ground. The result of six months' observations has been to show that in the forest 192.50 mm. of rain fell, and in the open ground 177 mm., a difference of 15.50, in favor of the forest. Hence, they consider that forests are a provision to secure an increased rainfall.

THERE is at last good official evidence, apparently, of the existence of a cuttle-fish of not less portentous dimensions than that described by Victor Hugo. It was seen in Conception Bay, off Newfoundland, last October, and the intelligence was communicated by Lord Kimberley to Mr. Frank Buckland, but the correspondence only appeared in Land and Water last week. Two fishermen, out in a small punt, saw what they supposed to be a large sail or the débris of a wreck. On striking it, it raised a parrot-like beak as big as a six-gallon keg, and began to twine two huge, livid arms about the boat. Happily for their lives,

and also for their credibility, they instantly cut off the arms with an axe, whereon the creature moved off, bleeding ink which darkened the water for two or three hundred yards, while it raised a tail some ten feet broad. They estimate the octopus to have been sixty feet long and five in diameter, and one of the arms, now in St. John's Museum, sustains the marvellous tale. It measures nineteen feet, is of a pale pink color, and entirely cartilaginous. The Sea Serpent will, no doubt, next pay with part of his person. THE Spectator says: "M. Bazaine has not improved his position by his appeal to the editor of the New York Herald. The Atlantic has been somewhere described as a vast Lethe, for those who cross it, as regards the people whom they meet on the other side; but American opinion has not as yet much influence in rehabilitating those who conceive themselves wronged by European tribunals; and the New York Herald itself is hardly regarded as a true conduit to the highest and most equitable region of American opinion. Russian opinion is indeed that of which M. Bazaine himself, apparently, most values the testimony. He says, 'Its appreciation, of which I am very sensible, has often brought me precious consolation.' One act of justice, at least, must, he says, be rendered to M. Bazaine. It is that I have imitated the conduct of the Emperor; that I have never accused any one, or sought to cast responsibility on others.' In the very next paragraph he says, MacMahon was as unfortunate at Sedan as I at

THE FUCHSIA.

WITHIN the mountain lodge we sat
At night, and watched the slanted snow
Blown headlong over hill and moor,

And heard, from dell and tarn below,
The loosened torrents thundering slow.
'T was such a night as drowns the stars,
And blots the moon from out the sky;
We could not see our favorite larch,
Yet heard it rave incessantly,
As the white whirlwinds drifted by.

Sad thoughts were near; we might not bar
Their stern intrusion from the door;
Till you rose meekly, lamp in hand,
And, from an inner chamber, bore
A book renowned by sea and shore.

And, as you flung it open, lo!
Between the pictured leaflets lay-
Embalmed by processes of Time
A gift of mine, a fuchsia spray,
I gathered one glad holiday.

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EVERY SATURDAY:

A JOURNAL OF CHOICE READING, PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY H. O. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY, 219 WASHINGTON STREET, BOSTON:

NEW YORK: HURD AND HOUGHTON;
Cambridge: The Riverside Press.

Single Numbers, 10 cts.; Monthly Parts, 50 cts.; Yearly Subscription, $5.00. N. B. THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY and EVERY SATURDAY sent to one address for $8.00.

ILLUSTRATIONS NOW AND THEN.

As the holiday season draws near, we look for picturebooks as, confidently as we expect snow and ice; the season may be backward, it may be open or severe or whatever else a winter is, but a winter without any snow or ice would be as great an anomaly as a winter without some new picture-books. What the picture-books are to be the coming holidays, we will not now specify, but indulge ourselves in some of those "odorous comparisons " that find their parallel in the sort of talk one hears about the snow-drifts which used to block the country roads when "we that have children were children."

Looking back to the war-time and that immediately following it, we invite a comparison with the past year or two, and ask whether on the whole book illustration has advanced or not. In point of quantity the present time is behind the earlier period; there was a profusion of illus

trated books that is not to be found now, but the marked difference is in the fact that the earlier books were in the majority of cases illustrated from designs made by American artists, engraved on wood by American engravers, while now the illustrated books are mainly made from foreign electrotypes; and we think the practice has also grown of importing sheets of illustrated books to be bound in this country with American title-pages. One or two other facts are to be noted that steel-plate engraving has nearly died out, so far as illustrated books are concerned, and that the new heliotype is taking the place which it was supposed the photograph would in book illustrations, but which occupy the photograph never did really secure. There are reasons which, we think, adequately explain this change. In the matter of steel plate engravings, we may say not merely that the fashion has changed, but also that since the war the government and bank note companies have made such demand upon the engravers, and have paid such high prices, that publishers in general, with their desultory work, have not been able to compete for their service, and our paper money has thus something more to answer for. Besides, the higher class of steel-plate engraving supposes a high condition of art; it calls for artistic power, and means patience, the subjection of one's self to noble ends, the willingness to be poor. Are these qualities common in any art or calling?

With regard to engraving on wood there is a combination of causes at work. In the first place, the war and the subsequent high rate of exchange acted substantially as an embargo upon English books, and designers, engravers, printers, and publishers, stimulated also by the quick life that was flowing in the country, instinctively saw their opportunity and produced illustrated books which mark the high tide of book-making in this country. Many painters turned their attention to this work, and many young men who ought to have been studying found that they could sell their drawings on wood, and they sold them. But with the decline of gold and the higher cost of living, the expense of illustrating books has in

creased at the same time that the cost of importation has lessened, and English books have rushed in again, leading publishers who wished to make some show of publishing illustrated books, to buy foreign electrotypes and translate text, or adapt new text.

Again, engraving on wood is a slow process at its best. As in its sister art of engraving on steel, the best workmen are conscientious artists, and so every one who needs woodcuts tries his best to get the result of engraving without paying for the time and study which an engraver must give, and the result is a dozen different" processes," all claiming to contain the secret of getting engravings without engraving. These processes vary in their excellence, but all are cheap, cheap as dirt, one may say on looking at the result they produce. They all require first-class work, by the way, to start with. They ask to have a clear engraving given them, something that has had work and time put into it, and then they will copy it and do it cheaply.

We are not quarrelling with the processes. They serve to satisfy the demand for some picture or other, and there is little doubt that they admit of and will show improvement in quality; but it may as well be understood by everybody concerned that the quality in engraving on wood or in steel which is inseparable from the best results in those arts is a personal, spiritual quality, and not a chemical, mechanical one. The artist must disappear before slow, excellent engraving on wood disappears. Commercially speaking, engraving on wood for book illustration is not at its highest in America now, not nearly so high as ten years ago; but there is something in the nature of the work which will not suffer it to disappear from among the fine arts.

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- The leading publishers and dealers in books met recently at the Grand Central Hotel in New York for purpose of adopting measures for the protection of the trade. For years the sale of books has been encroached upon by fancy goods men, dealers in boots, shoes, dry goods, and other commodities outside of publications. In numerous instances such persons would add books to their retail stock and dispose of them at rates lower than the publisher could produce them, merely for the purpose of inducing other trade. The organization now formed will tend to obviate this evil, as it commits the publishers and book-jobbers to a certain policy, from which they cannot depart without violating every principle of mercantile honor and rectitude. The newly adopted constitution and by-laws are now the rules by which sellers and purchasers have to be guided, and any violation of the same will subject the offender to severe penalties. The convention was a most respectable and influential body. Nearly every publishing house of any note in the Eastern States was represented, either directly or indirectly. Following is the most important of the by-laws adopted: "The executive committee, after consultation with each publisher, shall recommend to the association a scale of maximum discounts to be given to booksellers by bookjobbers, and also a scale of maximum discounts to be given to ministers, teachers, schools, libraries, professional men generally, and other large buyers outside of the

trade, and, when adopted, shall cause the same to be printed for distribution among the members of this association only." In defining the term "booksellers," the organization decided that such are "dealers in books only, or principally books and stationery only, drugs, books, and stationery only, and news-dealers." The name of the new organization is the Central Booksellers' Association, and it includes among its members the publishers, jobbers, and dealers in New York and neighboring cities.

A correspondent of the New York Tribune proposes a monument to Father Marquette, the great missionary explorer of the Northwest, who died on the 16th May, 1675, near the Marquette River, on the east shore of Lake Michigan. "Two years after his death," says the writer, "in 1677, the Indians took up his remains and conveyed them to the Mission of Mackinac, situated on Point St.

now show twenty-four fine, healthy animals, all of Washoe growth. The camel may now be said to be thoroughly acclimated in Nevada. The owners of the herd find it no more difficult to breed and rear them than would be experienced with the same number of goats or donkeys. The ranch upon which they are kept is sandy and sterile in the extreme; yet the animals feast and grow fat on such prickly shrubs and bitter weeds as no other animal could touch. When left to themselves their great delight, after filling themselves with the coarse herbage of the desert, is to lie and roll in the hot sand. They are used in packing salt to the mills on the river, from the marshes lying in the desert, some sixty miles eastward.

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- The Bostoner Volksblatt comments thus upon the fact that the girls in the New York normal school have

Ignace. They were here buried, but the precise spot of lately shown by their choice a preference for the study of

interment is not now known. There is, however, here an ancient burying-ground on East Moran Bay, near the point, where his remains are supposed to lie. In 1821 a priest of Detroit visited the place at which he died, and erected there a rude cross. The most appropriate spot for the monument is on Point St. Ignace, being celebrated for its historic association, and within sight of both old Fort Mackinac and the Island of Mackinac." The readers of Francis Parkman's histories might be safely relied upon, if caught when reading certain passages, to contribute to the funds for the monument.

The opening of the college term at Harvard was signalized by an event of unusual importance to the student, breakfast in the great dining hall. Forty tables, each serving the needs of twelve students, were spread, and the students could take their oatmeal and consider their hardheaded ancestors, whose portraits cover the walls. We look upon this new feature in college life as a real addition to the educational privileges of Harvard. Why not let our rich men stop building libraries and laboratories for a while, and turn their attention to dining halls? If only our young men could be taught to eat dinner leisurely in a scholarly and cheerful manner!

-Two of "the Emperor's boys," as the Chinese students in New England are called, were lately admitted to Yale College Scientific Department, having passed a good examination. There are now sixty Chinese students in Massachusetts and Connecticut, all of whom are supported by their government. Thirty came to this country two years ago, thirty arrived one year ago, and thirty more are expected in about a fortnight. The students are placed at first in educated families, two in a place, that they may learn the English language, and each one spends from two to four weeks a year at the head-quarters of the Chinese

Educational Commission in Hartford, where he is examined as to his habits and progress. Praise is given to the uniform air of refinement and intelligence of these young men, and to the excellence of their habits. Their aptitude as well as their eagerness to acquire knowledge is surprising. The Emperor allows each one about $700 a year for expenses.

- Upon a ranch in Nevada, on the Carson River, there is a herd of twenty-six camels, all but two of which were bred and raised in Nevada. Some years ago nine or ten were imported into that State, but of these only two lived to become acclimated, and from this pair have been raised the twenty-four. The men who now have them are Frenchmen, who had formerly some experience with camels in Europe. They find no difficulty in rearing them, and can

German over French. Of 1150 students 918 chose German and 187 French. "Who would have looked," it says, "for such a result ten, or even five, years ago? French was then almost the only foreign tongue taught in the highest institutions for the education of young ladies. It was not studied thoroughly, but a little superficial parlor-talk was needful for 'good tone.' The mention of German would be greeted only with a gentle elevation of the nose. The change of sentiment is so great that it must be ascribed not only to the increased need of a knowledge of the German language in the daily social and business life of the land, but also to a greater liking for Germany and its rich literature. This option of the New York normal school is a favorable and remarkable sign for the future position and growth of the German element in this country."

Mr. Sidney Woollet opened a course of lectures in Boston by reading a new poem by Longfellow, "The Hanging of the Crane," which is to be published soon, with illustrations, by J. R. Osgood & Co. There is a French custom, akin to our house-warming, which consists in the hanging of a crane in the fire-place of a new house. A letter-writer reports that Longfellow's "Golden Legend" has been made the text for music by Liszt, who has dedicated his work to the poet.

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There is to be a statue of Daniel Webster in the

Central Park, given by Mr. Burnside. The statue is to be executed by Mr. Thomas Ball, whose equestrian statue of Washington rightly stands so well placed in the Public Garden in Boston. Mr. Ball was familiar with Webster's face, and was a personal friend, we think. Bostonians would meanwhile cheerfully lend the Central Park the statue of Webster that stands in front of the State House. great ex-pounder is there shown, with his pounding instrument in his hand, just after performing his professional feat. The only good word said for this statue, we believe, is bestowed on the trousers, which were carefully copied from nature.

The

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