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urging its pretensions to be admitted worthy and his pigs, Tom Faggus and

a regular member of his tail along with the greyhounds and terriers; but I remember him suffering another summer under the same sort of pertinacity on the part of an affectionate hen." In his later years Scott notes in his journal, as a sign that he must be growing old, that he has learnt to like gardening, and cats.

The Scotch liking for animals appears in somewhat unexpected places in the work of Scotch writers. No one would expect it in Lord Macaulay. Yet in the "Lays of Ancient Rome" his description of the black horse standing by his dead master Herminius, is natural and pathetic:-

The raven mane that daily
With pats and fond caresses

his mare "Winnie," all rank among the best work of its kind. The deputation of the ducks at Plovers Barrows, when their drake was in danger of drowning, being stuck in a swinging hurdle across a flooded brook, is, perhaps, the best farmyard scene ever penned, though too long for quotation here. The rescue of the flock from the snow. drift on the moor shows an equal knowledge of men, dogs, and sheep. "I heard a faint 'Ma-a-ah' coming through some ells of snow, like a last appeal. I shouted aloud to cheer him, for I knew what sheep it was, to wit, the most valiant of all the wethers, who had met me when I came home from London and had been so glad to see me. And then we fell to again and hauled him out. Watch' took charge

The young Herminia washed and combed, of him at once with an air of the no

And twined in even tresses,

And decked with colored ribbons
From her own gay attire,

Hung sadly o'er her father's corpse
In carnage and in mire.

The petting and attentions which the horse had received before the battle

from its master's daughters were probably suggested to Lord Macaulay by Virgil's description of the tame stag in Book VII. of the Æneid, which supplied much other material for the "Lays." These are the lines:

Cervus erat formâ præstanti et cornibus ingens,

blest patronage, lying on his frozen fleece and licking all his face and feet to restore his warmth to him. Then fighting "Tom' jumped up at once, and made a little butt at 'Watch,' as if nothing had ever ailed him, and then set off to a shallow place and looked for something to nibble at." The horses of the "Handley Cross Series," Mr. Sponge's "'Ercles," and "Multum in Parvo," and Mr. Jorrock's "Xerxes" and "Arterxerxes," shine in story, but the books in which they figure are hardly novels. Anthony Trollope's horses play a real part in the story,

Tyrrhidæ pueri quem matris ab ubere and are equally lifelike; the killing of

raptum

Major Caneback by "Jemima," in the

Nutribant, Tyrrheusque pater, cui regia "American Senator," is one of the

parent

Armenta, et late custodia credita campi. Adsuetum imperiis soror omni Silvia cura Mollibus intexens ornabat cornua sertis, Pectebatque ferum, puroque in fonte lavabat.

For simple observation of the ways of animals and its appropriate insertion in story Mr. R. D. Blackmore has few equals among modern novelists. "Lorna Doone," in the main a farmhouse story put into the mouth of a Western farmer, gave the right opportunity for its use. John Ridd's relations with his horses, Betty Mux

most graphic descriptions of an accident in the hunting-field to be found in fiction.

Thackeray seldom introduces animal characters. Even in "The Virginians," where they might have been expected to play some part, they are absent.

Dickens's animals are mainly comic. There is nothing funnier in all Leech's equestrian jokes than the incidents in the drive to Dingley Dell, and the behavior of Mr. Winkle's horse. The inmates of Poll Sweedlepipe's bird-shop, the performing goldfinch which drew water with frightful energy the mo

ment its owner's eye was fixed on it, and the raven in the happy family which reflected on the uselessness of dropping a guinea-pig's eye into Regent Street, have also their place among his comic animals. Barnaby Rudge's raven was a careful study. "He cares for nothing, and when the wind rolls him over in the dust, turns manfully to bite it." George Eliot is too serious to admit animals into the company of most of her characters,-though Mrs. Poyser's bantam-cock who "thought the sun got up to hear him crow" has become historical. But in spite of the loss of the mad bull the other animals are again taking their place in story. Mr. Rudyard Kipling is their chief patron, and in his story of "The White Cat," the fortunes of the characters hang mainly on the pluck of a polo-pony.

From The Illustrated London News.
THE TURNSTONE.

Your turnstone is a true cosmopolitan. There are few countries of the world on whose coasts he is not to be found at one time or another. But his tastes are curiously perverted; he prefers the seaside in winter to summer, and is only to be seen on our British shores in very early spring or very late autumn. The fact of it is, he is that chilly thing, a winter migrant. Now, everybody notices that certain conspicuous birds come back to us every summer; but only outdoor observant naturalists are aware how large a number of northern species seek the shelter of our isles in winter, just at the moment when the swallows and martins are gathering to leave us. The turnstone is one of these; he is by family a plover-in the wider sense of the word-and he lives and breeds in far northern Europe, among the higher Norse fiords and on the mossy expanses of the Arctic tundra. There food is plentiful in summer. But when his native moss-beds freeze hard, he diffuses himself impartially over all

shores of the world; he pays flying visits not only to Spain and Italy, but also to Natal or Melbourne, and to the American continent. On his return journey northward, he may sometimes be met with on the East Anglian mudflats and on the Devonshire coast; but his appearances in Britain are more frequent in autumn, when young birds, on their first southward trip, love to "break the journey" on the glistening tidal mud of our eastern rivers, where they may often be seen in confidential little groups, surveying the world with philosophic contemplation from a congenial bank of ooze and tanglewood.

The turnstone is a sandpiper, well on his way to become a plover; or else, if you prefer it, he is a plover who has only just escaped from the humble fate of being a mere sandpiper. He gets his name, of course, from his well-known habit of turning over small stones on the seashore by a dexterous twist of his stout, hard bill, in order to feed on the petty molluscs and crawling crustaceans that lurk beneath them. This is his natural habitat, for living in which he is admirably adapted. If you see a group of young turnstones on a uniform grey-brown mud-flat, you notice at once that they are tolerably conspicuous birds, with their handsome stripes of black, white, and chestnut; their color then bewrays them. But it is only the youthful and unwary among them that so expose themselves to danger; experienced adults stick to the shingly beach, where their bold belts of black, brown, and white harmonize so admirably with the light and shade on the sheeny wet pebbles that it is almost impossible to discriminate them while at rest on the foreshore. Only when they rise a dozen yards off or so does it become easy to detect their presence. This close protective resemblance to the environment—a result, of course, of natural selection-makes it a little difficult to satisfy oneself as to the reality of their alleged stone-turning propensities; but if you see one settle, and then follow him up with an opera-glass, you may be lucky enough to observe him actually engaged in his

strange task of smartly overturning the shingle and darting like lightning on the small things beneath it. In size the turnstone is rather large for a sandpiper, or rather small for a plover; he is also somewhat shorter on the legs than most of his congeners. Throughout the summer, in his far northern breedingplaces, he looks handsomer than with us, going in for a rich brown tone in many parts of his coat, while his legs and feet assume a brighter orange, But in autumn, when his soul bas ceased for the moment lightly to turn to thoughts of love, his plumage grows duller and his bearing less haughty. He confines himself at that season to the prosaic and practical business of crustacean-hunting.

Naturally, the turnstone, like every other well conducted bird, has a Latiu name-which happens in his case to be Strepsilas interpres. The strepsilas part of it, I need hardly say to a generation which has learnt Greek at Girton, refers to his ancestral habit of stone-turning; but he is called "interpreter" for a more curious reason. When he sees danger approach, he raises his piping voice in a shrill little cry of warning, which other birds accept as a signal to look out for intruders. The Scotch, with their usual quaint facility in inventing names which exactly echo some natural sound, call him accordingly the skirlcrake. It is curious, however, to note how almost universally the habit of turning stones has given a name to this interesting bird; for in France he is the tournepierre; in Spain, the revuelve-piedras; and in Italy, the volta-pietra; while in the remote north of Scotland he is commonly known as the stane-pecker. I ought to add that the allied ringed plover is even more noted among modern sportsmen as an alarm-giver than the turnstone. It is a very alert little bird, which acts unconsciously in the same way as sentinel to other species, and it is therefore much disliked by pursuers of wild fowl because of its tell-tale habits. It has a clever trick of sticking to the very ridge of the weather-beaten shingle,

where the breakers at high water have heaped up the pebbles in a sharp edge; and it runs along at a safe distance ahead, whistling perpetually as it goes, and so putting up the frightened sand-pipers and dunlins on the flats below, which fly out to sea as the murderous guns approach them.

GRANT ALLEN.

From The Academy.

GLADSTONE AS A BOOK COLLECTOR. Mr. Gladstone has been so good as to give us permission to publish the following letter which he has recently addressed to Mr. Quaritch. Those who are curious to see the calligraphy of this interesting document, which is written in a firm and bold hand, with hardly a correction, will find it reproduced in facsimile in Part VIII. of Mr. Bernard Quaritch's "Contributions Towards a Dictionary of English Book Collections."

"Hawarden: Sept. 9, 1896. "Dear Mr. Quaritch,-The regiment of book collectors stands in no need of recruits; and, even if the ranks were thin, I doubt if I am qualified to enlist. I have in my time been a purchaser to the extent of about thirty-five thousand volumes, and I might therefore abide a quantitative test; but, as I fear, no other. A book collector ought, as I conceive, to possess the following six qualifications: appetite, leisure, wealth, knowledge, discrimination, and perseverance. Of these I have only had two, the first and the last, and these are not the most important. Restricted visual power now imposes upon me a serious amount of disability; and, speaking generally, I have retired from the list of purchasers. I am gradually transferring the bulk of my library to the Institution of St. Deiniol's at this place, which I hope to succeed in founding; but I retain certain branches for use, and a few of what are to me treasures, though you would, I apprehend, refuse to most of them a place on your shelves.

"The oldest book I have, that is to

say the one longest in my possession, was presented to me personally by Mrs. Hannah More. It is a copy of her "Sacred Dramas," printed and given to me in 1815, eighty-one years ago; and was accompanied with a pretty introductory sentence, of which I remember only the first words. They were these: 'As you have just come into this world, and I am just going out of it, allow me,' and so forth.

"My purchases commenced a few years after that time, and I have a variety of books acquired at Eton. Among them is a copy of Mrs. Hallam's 'Constitutional History,' in quarto, presented to me by his son Arthur, the subject of 'In Memoriam,' and at that period my dearest friend.

"Book-buyers of the present day have immense advantages in the extended accessibility and cheapness of books which, whether in the ancient or modern languages, ought to be considered classical. I have a copy of "The Spectator' in eight volumes, 8vo., which cost me four pounds; and I hold Scott's poems in the small volumes at a somewhat larger price. These were both bought in the twenties.' The enormous development of the secondhand book trade, and the public spirit of many publishers, have also been greatly in favor of book-buyers. In one respect only they have lost ground, and that is in regard to bookbinding. It is (as a general rule; I am not complaining in my own case) much dearer than it was seventy and eighty years back, and, notwithstanding abolitions of duty and enlarged use of machinery, it is generally worse in that vitally important particular, the easy opening of a book. Our case contrasts very unfavorably with cases such as those of France and Italy. (Yet, as I know, good plain binding can still be had at reasonable prices.) I showed lately to a friend my copy of the original octavo edition of Scott's earlier novels (down to 'Quentin Durward') in half morocco, with gilt tops. He priced the binding for to-day at four shillings (I think rather too high), but (when at Oxford) the binder charged me two.

"As quantity has been my strongest point, I may without offence refer to it in comparison with quality. An able and learned person of our day bought for his own use twenty thousand volumes. They were examined and valued for sale (which never came off) in London, and it was predicted that he would nett from them eight thousand pounds, or a little over two shillings a volume. Nearly at the same time a library of somewhat over half the quantity, but rich in rarities, brought (not at auction) about six pounds a volume.

"Though, as I have said, a beggarly collector, I have had a few specialties. One I will mention. I accumulated more than thirty distinct rifacimenti of the Book of Common Prayer. Many of these had prefaces which commonly ran to this effect: "The Prayer Book is excellent. But it has some blemishes. Let them be removed, and it will find universal acceptance. Accordingly I have performed this operation; and I now give the Reformed Prayer Book to the world.' But I have never obtained, and have never seen, a second edition of any one of these productions. I greatly doubt whether they have usually paid their printer's bills.

"Book-collecting may have its quirks and eccentricities. But on the whole it is a vitalizing element in a society honeycombed by several sources of corruption. My apology for the poor part I have played in it is that it could only have the odds and ends, the dregs and leavings, of my time. And accordingly I am aware that the report which I send you is a very meagre one. To mend it a little, I give to this pursuit in all its walks, from the highest (with which you are of all men the most conversant) downwards, my heartiest good wishes. And that I may not be ungrateful I will apprise you that I still preserve among my most select possessions the beautiful copy on vellum of the LytteltonGladstone translations which you were so good as to present to me. "I remain, "Very faithfully yours, "W. E. GLADSTONE.

"B. Quaritch, Esq."

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466

IV. THE HON. MRS. NORTON AND HER WRIT-
INGS. By I. A. Taylor,

V. "NEVER THE LOTOS CLOSES."

and H. Heron,

VI. CATULLUS AND HIS FRIENDS,

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VII. THE LAND OF SUSPENSE: A STORY OF

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Longman's Magazine,

THE SEEN AND THE UNSEEN. Part. I., Blackwood's Magazine,

VIII. POLITICAL IDEALS AND REALITIES IN
SPAIN. By Emilio Castelar. Translated

for The Living Age by Jean Raymond
Bidwell,

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IX. THE CHARM OF LONDON,

X. A FEAST DAY IN THE CANARIES,

IMOGEN,

THE SKYLARK,

AD CINERARIUM,

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La Espana Moderna,
Spectator,
Good Words,

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READINGS FROM AMERICAN
MAGAZINES.

THE CZARINA'S CORONATION,

481

497

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THE END OF FEUDALISM IN EN

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THE DECADENCE OF DEMOCRACY,
MR. HOWELLS'S PESSIMISM,
OVER-WORKING USEFUL MEN,
UNDER ONE ROOF,

487

489

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490

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THE MAKING OF BIBLES,

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PHYSICIAN AND PATIENT,

496

PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY BY

THE LIVING AGE COMPANY, BOSTON.

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