tavern brawls; nor was he ever, like Marston and Chapman, threatened with the penalty of having his ears lopped and his nose slit." So great an enthusiast is Dr. Furness, and so much are we given to admiring his zeal and capacity, that we hesitate to point out that this sanguine estimate rests only on presumption, and that we have no reason beyond sentiment for holding that the participator in the wit-combats at the " Mermaid," and the associate of Jonson and Drayton, was incapable of an occasional carouse, and of a consequent brawl with some of his associates. Still we love the Doctor's sunny optimism, which we would not disturb. We are fain to believe that Shakespeare's "life was so gentle and so clear in the sight of man and of Heaven that no record of it has come down to us,' and if we do not quite share the fervent aspiration that no future year may reveal even the faintest peep through the divinity which doth hedge this king," it is because the shaping such a wish seems to imply some vague mistrust that the revelation thus deprecated might after all show shortcomings for which we are unprepared. It is useless for us to suppress a wish, on the contrary, for all the light we can get, since this would not avail. Whatever fact concerning Shakespeare the assiduous industry of explorers can unearth will at once be given to the world, and Dr. Furness himself would be the last to withhold, did he possess it, the information of which he speaks. 66 ور reader, but their specific value for the specialist in symbolism." Apropos of tree worship, recollections of which survive in many English festivals, the significance of which is fully recognized, Sir George quotes in his introduction from Charles Vallancy, the antiquary, a curious origin for the word "lambswool": The first day of November was dedicated to the angel [i.e., resuscitated Pomona] presiding over fruits and seeds, and was, therefore, named La Mas Ubhal, that is the day of the apple fruit, and being pronounced Lamasool, the English have corrupted the name to Lambs-wool. Mrs. Murray - Aynsley speaks (p. 16) of a remnant of sun worship prevailing in Tipperary, where the sun is supposed to dance for joy of the Resurrection in the water placed outside the door in a bucket on Easter morning. For the sun dancing at Easter the pages of N. & Q.' may be consulted. We have ourselves watched the so-called dancing, to which references in our literature are abundant. The explanation advanced at the above reference, though doubtless accurate, is scarcely adequate. Conditions of space forbid us from quoting the folk information à propos of the Svastika given (p. 60) of the significance of pieces of hoop iron of a similar class on the external walls of houses in Herefordshire and Gloucestershire. Chap. v., on the connecting link between the Tau of Egypt, the cross as a heathen and a Christian symbol, and the hammer of the Scandinavian god Thor, repays We may not go afresh through the arrangement study, though the treatment is at times rather of the text, which is the same precisely as in the timid. See also what is said concerning the secret many previous volumes with which we have dealt, rites still occasionally performed by childless nor even commend the value of the criticisms and women in Brittany in connexion with the dolmens. the wonderfully helpful nature of the information Mrs. Murray-Aynsley's book abounds with odd and supplied. We can but congratulate the Shake-out-of-the-way information with regard to amulets, spearian upon procuring in the best edition yet talismans, and the like. How far the inforaccessible the text of yet one more play of Shake- mation is in all cases trustworthy we may not speare, award our congratulations to the editor, say. At any rate, the work is full of suggestion. and cheer him in the prosecution of a task the Its plates are well executed and valuable, and the accomplishment of which the younger among us whole should occupy a place on the shelves of every alone may hope to witness. antiquary and folk-lorist. Symbolism of the East and West. By Mrs. Murray- DURING the course of twenty-one years' wandering The Spenser Anthology. 1548-1591 A.D. Edited by wrote Able to make Apollo's self to dote. Giles Fletcher the elder finds a place, and the bucolic muse of Thomas Tusser supplies a few lines reminding one of The Seed Cake, the Pasties, the Furmenty Pot. Poor, disreputable Nicholas Udall brings his offering. Thomas Sackville, Earl of Dorset, is, of course, represented by extracts from The Mirror of Magistrates.' Barnaby Googe's praise of money is happily answered by Turberville. Among the anonymous poems is the spirited story of the "brave bonny lass, Mary Ambree." All these and more, including Queen Elizabeth, "come thronging," and the volume is up to the high level of its prede cessors. 66 Jacob at Bethel: an Essay on Comparative Religion. By A. Smythe Palmer, D.D. (Nutt.) THE second volume of the series of "Studies in Biblical Subjects" is by the same author as the first, to which it is in some respects complementary, Dr. Smythe Palmer is one of our most accomplished Assyriologists, and an authority on folk-etymology. His studies on Babylonic influence upon the Hebrew Scriptures are of extreme value, throwing light as they do on the manner in which, out of the superstitions of pagan creeds, the Hebrews shaped and formulated a creed by which the world has subsequently been influenced. In his present work Dr. Smythe Palmer gives the interpretation of the vision of Jacob at Bethel, where upon the golden ladder, at the top of which was Jahveh, or God, he saw the bright - haruessed angels" ascend and descend. Each feature in this vision is illustrative of some form of Babylonian creed, and so is linked with the origin of primitive culture. A ladder, the base of which is on earth while the summit is in the skies, is scarcely more easily realized than the beanstalk which connected with fairyland the domain of nursery fiction. The word translated "ladder " is in the Hebrew sullam, which, as Dr. Smythe Palmer shows, probably meant a terraced mound answering to the Babylonian Ziggurat, a symbol of the worship and local presence of the heavenly power. These Ziggurats, a famous historical instance of which is the Tower of Babel, consisted of seven diminishing stages, and were surmounted by the shrine of a deity to which the edifice was erected. The origin of the construction is to be found in the primitive worship of the Akkadians. Once the explanation is received, the rest is simple. The Deity was seen by Jacob on the spot where he was to be expected, in the shrine or sanctuary he was intended to inhabit. Other features in the vision fit no less easily into primitive belief, and the whole is thus linked with the latest discoveries of Biblical science. Quite impossible is it for us to point out the means by which Dr. Smythe Palmer arrives at his results or justifies his conclusions. Adequately to do this requires a knowledge on Oriental subjects to which we put in no claim. It would, moreover, be to interfere with the delight of the student, to whom the volume must necessarily commend itself. Dr. Smythe Palmer's authority will not be questioned, and the work, like his previous book, is a model of sound theory and well-applied erudition. It is a little confusing to us to learn that Jacob at the time was not a youth, but a man of over seventy, or, as some will have it, ninety years. Useful Arts and Handicrafts. By Charles Godfrey Leland. Parts 1.-IX. (Dawbarn & Ward.) WE have received various numbers of a series, edited by Mr. Leland, intended to teach students and amateurs the minor arts, and instruct them how to make homes artistic and tasteful. One hundred numbers, intended to be bound into volumes, are to be issued. Among the subjects already treated are Designing and Drawing, 'Wood-Carving,' Picture Frames,' Dyes,' 'Stains,' 'Inks,' &c., Decorated Wood-Work,' 'Pyrography,' &c. The illustrations are numerous and excellent, and a capital idea seems in the way of being satisfactorily carried out. THE leading contributions in the latest number of Folk-Lore are Mr. Jevons's article on the place of Col. R. C. Temple's account of the folk-lore in the totemism in the evolution of religion, and Lieut.legends of the Punjab. Another interesting paper, which is placed under the heading Miscellanea,' consists of a collection of popular superstitions made in Dorset in 1897. The English counties are evidently still mines of wealth for those who devote themselves to anthropology and the allied sciences, though it is to be feared that in a few short years the information which might yet be stored, were there only sufficient collectors to preserve it, will be almost entirely lost. It is only the elderly people who still cling to ancient conceptions and timehallowed traditions. The young are often too deeply tinctured with modernism to attention to the out-of-date theories of their preserious pay decessors. The unquestioning faith which gives vitality to a belief is already waning, and all the folk-lore which is not actually doomed to extinction is at least becoming rapidly modified to suit the requirements of the present time. THE recent numbers of the Intermédiaire keep up to the standard of the past, and offer to their readers a varied supply of notes and observations. Feudal castles, the titles of French feudal princes, chimneys in churches, the origin of the phrase "Datum inter leones," and the ornamental plaques on the harness of mules, are among the subjects dealt with. The pedigree of the head of the Transvaal army is also discussed, for French genealogists are naturally far from ill pleased to think that General Joubert and his subordinates owe a share of their fighting blood to Gallic ancestry. Notices to Correspondents. notices: We must call special attention to the following and address of the sender, not necessarily for pubON all communications must be written the name lication, but as a guarantee of good faith. WE cannot undertake to answer queries privately. To secure insertion of communications correspondents must observe the following rules. Let each note, query, or reply be written on a separate slip of paper, with the signature of the writer and such address as he wishes to appear. When answering queries, or making notes with regard to previous entries in the paper, contributors are requested to put in parentheses, immediately after the exact heading, the series, volume, and page or pages to which they refer. 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In his volume of sea songs we find the qualities which must secure its success.” CHATTO & WINDUS, 111, St. Martin's Lane, W.C. |