A SWEDISH GENIUS.* WE owe the author, the translator, and the publisher our sincere and heartfelt thanks for the publication of this charming volume of short stories. They differ in quality, but all have a note of distinction and the aroma of a literature with a charm and a style all its own. "The Story of a Country House," the longest of the stories, occupies 132 pages, and the fourteen others have only 200 pages between them. But whether you read the long story or the short stories, you are arrested on every page by the genius of the authoress, which is quaint, mystical, pathetic. Some of the legendary

stories, although divorced from all Swedish setting, are simply perfect. Among them I would specially mention the story of Our Lord and St. Peter. The story tells how, when St. Peter was in Paradise, he was bitterly discontented at discovering that his old mother had not been admitted into heaven, as he thought she ought to have been, not for her own merits, but because, as he said, "I think I have deserved that she should come up here to me." Now the life of St. Peter's mother had not been such that she could enter heaven. She had never

extreme

thought about anything but of hoarding money, and, from her selfishness, would have been miserable in heaven. Nevertheless St. Peter insisted that she should be

brought up. So Our Lord commanded an angel to hasten down to hell, and fetch St. Peter's mother up from the abyss, and Peter, bending a little forward over the edge of a great rock, could see him as he flew right down into hell. He saw the angel grow smaller and smaller until he reached the abode of the damned, in which it was as if the bottom of the gulf consisted of nothing but bodies and heads. When they saw the angel, all the millions and millions of languishing souls sprang up with arms lifted, and besought him to carry them to Paradise. Their cries ascended even unto Our Lord and St. Peter, and their hearts trembled with grief at hearing them. As the angel flew backwards and forwards over the myriads of lost souls they all rushed after him, so that it looked as if they were being swept about by a storm wind. At last, in the midst of the immense multitude the angel discovered Peter's mother, swooped down upon her like a flash of lightning, and folding his arms round her, flew upwards. St. Peter was nearly crying for happiness because his mother was saved, and still greater joy filled him when he saw that however quick the angel had been, several the damned had been even quicker. There were about a dozen who had succeeded in clinging to her, who should be saved, and they hoped that they might be carried up to Paradise with her. St. Peter thought that it was a great honour for his mother that she should be able to save so many poor creatures from damnation. The angel did not seem in the least weighed down by his burden. He rose and rose, and stretched his wings as lightly as if it were only a little dead bird he carried up to heaven. But then St. Peter saw that his mother began to free herself from the doomed who were clinging to her. She seized their hands and loosened their grasp, so that one after the other fell back again into hell :—

of

St. Peter could hear how they begged and besought her, but she did not want any one to be saved besides herself. She freed herself from more and more of them, and flung them down into the precipice. And as they fell, the whole space was filled with cursings and wailings.

Then St. Peter cried to his mother that she should have pity, *"From a Swedish Homestead." By Selma Lagerlöf. Translated by Jessie Brochner. London: William Heinemann. 6s. 384 pages.

but she would not hear. And St. Peter saw that the angel flew more and more slowly the lighter his burden grew. St. Peter trembled so that he fell upon his knees.

At last there was only one left clinging to St. Peter's mother; he had clasped his arms round her neck, and begged and prayed in her ear that she would at least let him follow her into the blessed Paradise.

They had now risen so high that St. Peter had already stretched out his arms to receive his mother. But suddenly

the angel kept his wings quite still, and his face grew dark as night. For the old woman had put her hands behind her back, and seized hold of the arms of him who was hanging on to her neck, and she strove and strove, until she succeeded in loosening the grasp of his hands, so that she was freed from the last of them. The same moment the angel sank several fathoms down, and it looked as if he had not enough strength to lift his wings. He looked down upon the old woman with a look of deep sorrow, his grasp round her body was loosened as if in spite of himself, and he let her fall, as if she were far too heavy a burden for him to bear now she was alone. Then he swung himself with a single stroke of his wings into Paradise.

The story goes on to say that when St. Peter remained sobbing on the ground, Our Lord said to him: “This, you must know, St. Peter, that so long as men have not charity there will not be found, either in heaven or upon earth, a place where sorrow and pain cannot reach them."

"LYSBETH."

BY RIDER HAGGARD.

"LYSBETH" is a romance or melodrama which contains more sensational situations to the square foot than any story published for a long time. Mr. Haggard, deserting South Africa, which he has so often drenched with blood in the fields of contemporary romance, has made a bold incursion into the past, and gives us a lurid picture of love, adventure, torture and crime located in the Netherlands during the time when the Dutch were making their great world-famous struggle against Alva and the Spaniards. Some future Mr. Haggard will probably write a similar story up from, and find fitting incidents in, the present war of independence in South Africa. It is to be hoped, if he does, that he will not paint the English so uniformly black as he does the Spaniards. But after all Mr. Haggard is an artist of the lurid; red and yellow are the soberest colours on his pallet, and in "Lysbeth " there is very little that is grey. His Spanish villain is a devil incarnate, without a trace of redeeming white, while his Dutch heroes and heroines are of virtue and valour all compact. It is a pity that Mr. Haggard should have used his facile pen and lightning brush for the purpose of ministering to the passionate popular prejudices which still unfortunately divide Protestants and Catholics. It does not do to paint the perfect devil, and then to write underneath This is a Catholic "; neither is it good to paint hell, and inscribe it "The Roman Inquisition.” Such a method of handling difficult and delicate controversies is not calculated to help us much either in loving our enemies or in understanding the motives which sway men who, with all their faults, are nevertheless of like passions with ourselves, of like aspirations, as honestly desirous as ourselves of making this world better than it is.

IN Good Words for April Mr. James Scott's paper on picturesque eggs is especially noteworthy. There is exquisite beauty in many of the eggs of the humblest, not to say disreputable, creatures; perhaps the egg of the singing fly is the finest specimen shown, but Mr. Scott does not fear to present a picture-and a tasteful picture it is, too-of the eggs of the bed-bug.

"MONTES THE MATADOR." 99*

BY FRANK HARRIS.

IT is some years since Mr. Harris published his "Elder Conklin, and Other Stories," which stand out among the most vivid and masterly pieces of workmanship in that kind of writing that the English literature possesses. It was understood that Mr. Frank Harris had abandoned short story writing and was devoting his attention to a great work on Shakespeare, endeavouring to reconstruct the man from his works. Hence the pleasant surprise which I felt on receiving this new volume.

His

The new volume of stories embraces a wide range, beginning with the story of a Spanish buH-fighter, and ending with an ambitious attempt to portray the Russian Nihilist heroine, Sophie Peroffsky. Between these two there are shorter stories-one American, which revives reminiscences of the first volume of stories, and the other entitled "First Love-a Confession," while the shortest of all is entitled "The Interpreter: a Mere Episode." In all Mr. Frank Harris's stories, but especially in the first and the last, there is manifest power and capacity for vividly picturing stronglymarked characters in very dramatic situations. There is also a subtle analysis of human emotion. women are by no means divine. Sonia, to a certain extent, redeems the shortcomings of the others, but Mr. Harris has not yet given us his ideal heroine, for Sophie Peroffsky, or Sonia, as he calls her, although full of the vague longings and the vast aspirations of the Russian Nihilist, is a creature of disordered nerves, who charms us as much by her weakness as by her strength. The heroine in "Montes the Matador" is false to her lover, who takes his revenge upon her by causing the bull to kill his rival. Montes was engaged to be married to a woman who, unknown to him, was enciente by his friend, a rival, with whom he was living on terms of friendship. The woman was ambitious and insisted upon Montes obtaining for her lover the first place in the bull ring. Montes, whose suspicions were aroused, did so, knowing that his rival had not the nerve to face a really dangerous bull, and would certainly be killed. When the fatal day came, Montes stood by his rival, who was nervous, and said as the bull was ready for him :

"You will stand by me, won't you, Montes?"

And I asked with a smile: "Shall I stand by you as you stood by me?"

"Yes, of course, we have always been friends."

"I shall be as true to you as you have been to me," I said. And he moved to his right hand and watched the bull gore him to death. Then Montes went to the woman whom he was to have married, to glut his vengeance with the sight of her anguish.

As I closed the door and folded my arms and looked at her, she rose, and her stare grew wild with surprise and horror, and then almost without moving her lips she said

Holy Virgin, you did it! I see it in your face."

And my heart jumped against my arms for joy, and I said in the same slow whisper, imitating her

"Yes, I did it."

Then she swore, and cursed and struck her head with her fists, and asked how God-God-God could allow me to kill a man whose finger was worth a thousand lives such as mine. Then I laughed and said—

"You mistake. You killed him, you made him an espada." She fell face forward on the ground; next morning she died in premature child-birth.

"Montes the Matador, and Other Stories." By Frank Harris. 254 PP. London: Grant Richards. 6s.

That is powerful, although gruesome. The story of Sonia is in a much nobler key, and culminates in the story of the execution of the Nihilists.

66

Suddenly," says the eye-witness, we saw the two tumbrils; high upon the first, Rizakoff and Jelaboff, and in the next the other three, Sonia in the middle, the one divine thing in the world, with her smiling pale face and God-illumined eyes. . When they unbound them on the platform, I could see her walk about cheering each of them, kissing them, encouraging them, but no one could hear what she said for the noise of the drums. Yet her courage lifted the soul and made the place sacred! Then one after the other mounted the stool . . . I see her hanging still... As I came away everyone was crying, the soldiers and the people alike-everyone.

THE BAIRNS' BIBLE."

A NEW edition of my little penny book which is intended to be the introduction to "The Bairns' Bible" is in the press, and will be issued shortly. I am very glad to report that this excursion into a somewhat unfamiliar field has been kindly received by those into whose domains I made my incursion. I read with peculiar pleasure and not a little gratitude the following extremely kind notice of my little book from the pen of the Bishop of Rochester. It appears in the Rochester Diocesan Magazine over the initials E. R., and it is seldom that I have been so fortunate as to receive so unequivocal an episcopal benediction :—

"The Bairns' Bible"-a little pamphlet of some twenty-five pages of print, and as many more of illustrations-which Mr. Stead has included in his series of children's penny books, deserves careful attention. It is better described by its second title, "A Talk about the old Book." It is a vigorous attempt to put into a form intelligible to children the reasons why the Bible is to be valued and loved by us as by our forefathers, and to indicate in briefest form the pith of its message.

It is a journalist's incursion into the region of religious instruction; and the professional instructors will do well to give a cordial welcome to so brave and vigorous a free lance. It has a journalist's qualities, of course, such as familiarity, rapid generalisation, unconventional form, from which some will shrink; but it has also the journalist's force and skill in expression and arrangement, his powers of concentration, and illustration, and effect. The dynamic illustration, or analogy, of the storage battery with sun power behind it is strikingly forcible and instructive. What it has not is the journalist's detachment. It is written by a man intense in his purpose and devoted to his subject. Merely as illustrating how the Bible commends itself to one typically modern mind it would be sufficiently interesting. But it should contribute more directly than this to the work of Christian teaching. It does not speak the language of Christian doctrine (though it assumes baptism): it leaves to further teaching to define Who He is to whom it assigns the throne of humanity; it assumes the main positions of modern critical method. Hence opinions about it may naturally vary, and some may shrink from putting it directly into their children's hands. But even those who take this view can hardly fail to find in it some vigorous stimulus, and illustrative help, in their own attempts to do the same thing in a different way. The important thing is that this is a frank, earnest, manly effort to deal with a problem of Christian instruction which every parent or teacher will encounter, and which unfortunately, and to our great weakness, is often not so much as attempted.

I hope that it may be carefully read by many parents and many teachers, with the effort by God's grace to distil what may be available for them of the valuable help which I am sure that it contains.

A copy of this little book can be sent from the office for three-halfpence.

A COLONY OF MERCY.

THE author of "Cities and Citizens," which was reviewed as a book of the month the month before last, has republished in a shilling edition the useful and suggestive book, "A Colony of Mercy," which was published some years ago, and has for some time been out of print. It is a description of the marvellous philanthropic work which has been done by Pastor von Bodelschwingh at the Colony of Bethel, near Bielefeld in Germany. Pastor von Bodelschwingh is a man of philanthropic genius who has applied his energies to the helping of the epileptics who form one of the most perplexing and helpless classes in the community. The book, although primarily dealing with epileptics and the working of the colony, threw much light upon many social problems, and in the opinion of many Bodelschwingh has found a clue to their solution. The colony of Lingfield was founded in this country avowedly on the lines laid down in the German colony of Bethel. It is to be hoped that it will be the pioneer of many similar colonies in other parts of the country.

I am glad to note that the book "Cities and Citizens" has attracted a good deal of attention and is likely to attract still more. The following extracts from letters received by those who have read the book and have been stirred by its contents show that the book is one which every social reformer should make a point of procuring and studying. In my review of the book I only dealt with the opening chapters. Others which handled the land question, the drink question, and the housing of the poor, were not noticed by me, although they were well worthy of attention. It is to be regretted that the author has included in her survey of our social difficulties, and her suggestions as to the way out, criticisms more severe than just upon the operations of the Salvation Army. The best of all people have, however, their limitations, and the author of "Cities and Citizens" is not the first who has regarded with special affection the faults rather than the excellences of their work. I append some extracts from the letters which have been received since our last issue :

"Thank you for Cities and Citizens.' I will bring the subject before my people. I agree with you about its importance."-REV. R. F. HORTON, D.D.

"I write to thank you for your strenuous advocacy of the cause of the poor. . .With hopes for your success in the good work you are doing. I wish a fund could be raised to send a copy to every county councillor in the land."-ALFRED RUSSEL WALLACE.

"Many thanks for the book. It is a much-needed and powerful appeal. It ought to be read all over the land, and specially in this great city. If we could get our fellow-citizens to listen, they might then be persuaded to make this question of 'Homelessness' their next campaign.' REV. J. CLIFFORD, D.D.

"It is a splendid ideal. .It will come when we take Christ seriously, which we don't at present."-Rev. R. Westrope.

"I have been deeply interested. . .I don't remember being so held by any book. I have been simply fascinated from start to finish. How one longs that the book could find its way into the hands of every M.P., every county councillor, and every minister and Christian worker in our land; and not only those, it is a book for everybody who has the highest interests of the nation at heart. . .I thank you heartily for the book, which has taught me much, and I pray that it may be the means of awakening the people to a truer appreciation of the awful position we occupy as a nation-cursed by greed on the one hand and drink on the other."-S. E. BURROWS, Exeter Hall.

There is yet evidence that the question of housing is coming more and more to the front, not only in London, but in other great cities. Mr. Councillor Rutherford,

of Liverpool, proposed to the Liverpool City Council, that they should appoint a small committee to inquire into and report upon the conditions and circumstances of life, both social and sanitary, of the very poorest of the people of Liverpool and their children :

1. The character of work done (nature of employment) (a) by parents, (b) by children (extent of child work).

2. Means of getting to and from work to suitable shops, or to places of recreation (average distance of dwelling from present employment).

3. Social influences, such as facilities for instruction and recreation (schools, reading-rooms, playgrounds, baths, &c.).

4. The character and sanitary condition of the dwelling and environment (cost, cellar, sublet house), to increase also structural peculiarities, cleanliness, scavenging, lighting, &c.

5. Habits of life (to include sobriety, orderly conduct, personal cleanliness, care of offspring, &c.).

6. The nature of prevalent diseases and their relative incidence and mortality.

7. Miscellaneous: Any noteworthy or exceptional circum

stances.

Liverpool is not worse than other places, and, among other evidence of the public spirit of its citizens, the papers have been last month calling attention to the gift of a palatial building, covering 500 square yards. that has been built and presented to the people of Southern Liverpool, under the title of Aigburth's People's Hall.

Another sign of the times has been the general recognition of the philanthropic and public spirit of Mr. George Cadbury, who has begun a most interesting experiment in creating a model colony about four miles distant from Birmingham, in the neighbourhood of their chocolate works. His idea is to get the people back to the land by affording them cottage homes, each with about one-sixth of an acre of land which they can cultivate in their spare time. In this colony the tenant, for 6s. a week (including rates and taxes), can rent a cottage containing three rooms upstairs and three down, with a patent bath inside, a little piece of forecourt, and a substantial garden in the rear.

The operations of the Cadbury Trust can be extended to any part of the United Kingdom. It is not a prohibition colony, but the trustees must be unanimous before any licence is granted, and, what is much more important, they can only do so providing that the net profits are devoted to securing for the village community recreations and counter-attractions to the liquor trade as ordinarily conducted. With one thousand, or even one hundred, George Cadburys in various parts of the Kingdom, we might begin to hope that something serious would at last be effected in this matter of the housing of the people. Meantime, anyone who wishes to have the question considered earnestly cannot do better than read " Cities and Citizens," and, having read the book, send it on to the person who is the most likely to take the matter up in practical shape.

Another reassuring sign of the times is the appearance of the "Social Service Handbook for Ireland" which is issued by the Dublin Central Committee of the Social Service Union. The articles deal with such important subjects as industrial schools, housing of the poor, municipalities and the poor, Irish workhouses, the child and the State, old age pensions, and the drink question, including a most interesting account of the Scandinavian licensing system. The value of the book is much enhanced by the Bibliography at the end of each article, giving a list of the best books, pamphlets, magazine articles, Acts of Parliament, etc., bearing on that particular question, with price and publisher of each.

ESSAYS AND BIOGRAPHIES. Clelia (Charles Downing). The Messiahship of Shakespeare. med. 8vo. 104 PP.....

Harland, Marion.

cap. 8vo. 238 pp.

Harland, Marion. John Knox. (Literary Hearthstone Series.) 8vo. 270 pp.

Holmes, Richard R.

cap.

Mee, Arthur. Lord Salisbury. cr. 8vo. 156 pp.

..(Greening) 5/0 Hannah More. (Literary Hearthstone Series.) ..(Putnam) 5/0 (Putnam) 5/0 Queen Victoria, 1819-1901. 1. cr. 8vo. 330 pp. (Longmans) net 5/5 Johnson, Effie. Fact and Fable.... (Chapman and Hall) 6/0 Keary, a Wanderer. From the Papers of the late H. Ogram Matuce. cap. 8vo. 186 pp. .... (Brimley Johnson) net 3/6 Mathew, E. J. History of English Literature. cap. 8vo. 534 PP. (Macmillan) 4/6 (Hood, Douglas and Howard) 2/6 Mee, Arthur. Joseph Chamberlain; a Romance of Modern Politics. cr. 8vo. 160 pp. (Partridge and Co.) net 1/6 Paterson, William Romaine. The Eternal Conflict (Heinemann) Stillman, W. J. The Autobiography of a Journalist. 2 vols. med. 8vo. 316-304 PP. .... ..(Grant Richards) net 24/0 Stodart-Walker, Archibald. The Day-Book of John Stuart Blackie.

dy. 8vo. 198 PP.

The Eternal Conflict.

Herbert Bismarck. med. 8vo. 224-197 pp...

The Love Letters of Prince Bismarck.

6/0

(Grant Richards) (Heinemann) Edited by Prince .(Heinemann) net 20/0 ...(Arthur Sykes) 2/0

Tozer, Basil. Free-Lance Journalism; How to Embark upon it and How to make it Pay. paper. 166 pp.

FICTION. paper. paper.

236 pp.

Ballantyne, R. M. Ballantyne, R. M. Ballantyne, R. M. Boldrewood, Rolf.

The Coral Island. The Dog Crusoe.

Ungava. paper. 272 pp.
In Bad Company, and other

514 pp.

(Nelson and Sons) 0/6 211 pp. (Nelson and Sons) 0/6 (Nelson and Sons) 0/6 Stories. 1. cr. 8vo. (Macmillan) 60 Cleeve, Lucas. Plato's Handmaiden. cr. 8vo. 318 pp....(John Long) 6/0 Cross, Victoria. Anna Lombard. cr. 8vo. 313 PP. (John Long) Fletcher, J. S. The Three Days' Terror. cr. 8vo. 306 pp. Gerard, Dorothea. Sawdust. cr. 8vo. 361 pp. Haggard, H. Rider. Lysbeth. cr. 8vo. Hocking, S. K. The Fate of Endilloe. Kernahan, Coulson. Wise Men and a Fool.

cr. 8vo. (Marshall Bros.) 1/0 Edgeworth-Johnstone, Capt. W. Boxing: The Modern System of Glove Fighting. cr. 8vo. 168 PP. ..(Gale and Polden) net 2/6 Official Medals and Ribbons of the British Army, and Views of Sandhurst Royal Military College (Gale and Polden) net 2/6 and 1/0 Scott, David Wardlaw. Terra Firma. The Earth not a Planet, proved from Scripture, Reason, and Fact. 1. cr. 8vo. 288 pp. (Simpkin, Marshall)

THE Psychological Index, No. 7; a Bibliography of the Literature of Psychology for 1900, has just been issued in connection with the Psychological Review. It is compiled by Mr. Howard C. Warren, of Princeton University, and others, and forms the seventh annual bibliography of psychology and cognate subjects. Foreign works are included and classified, and the present volume runs up to 180 pages-an alarming quantity for one subject in one year.

A work of a different order is M. D. Jordell's "Répertoire Bibliographique de la Librairie Française pour l'année 1900." It forms a convenient catalogue of the French books of 1900, in continuation of the Lorenz Catalogue, the last volume of which included French books to the end of 1899. After a few years, the Lorenz Catalogue will, we hope, be resumed, and the annual volumes issued since 1899 be then re-arranged in one alphabet as before. The 1900 volume, just issued, appears to be only provisory.

I

HAVE before me the reports of two polyglot clubs, one in England and one in France, and both are interesting in different ways. The English report may be read by any who cares to send 2 d. to Mr. F. Dishley, 44, Meadow Street, Alexandra Park, Manchester, for Amicitia," so I need not particularise beyond saying that all who wish to know the difficulties belonging to the management of such societies should read the April number, with its amusing skit on the difficulties of four co-operating editors. The report of the Cercle Polyglotte of Roubaix is not so get-at-able. The club was started in 1897, and its aim is to be useful to the commerce and industry of the town of Roubaix: by helping towards the knowledge of foreign languages by means of conversation; by inspiring the youth of the town with a taste for this study, and for travel in other countries; and by uniting them more closely in the bonds of unity and friendship; to the end that they may be able to give and receive help in study and in the bettering of their social position. M. Duhamel is the founder of the club and its president, and in his report, speaking of his object in starting the club, he says Fifty years ago a business man had only his immediate neighbours as his rivals. But now things are altogether different, one's rivals are not local, but international, for science has multiplied the means of communication, and it behoves us to remember this and realise the great importance of the study of modern languages. Well! the boys in our schools have commenced such studies, some of them have been abroad to improve their knowledge; shall we then let them forget all they have learnt?" M. Duhamel then goes on to show the need of gathering the young men together by the attraction of games, concerts, excursions, etc., during the course of which, speech in the mother tongue is entirely prohibited. I cannot quote further, but will gladly lend the report to any one wishing to read it—it is in French, of course.

66

TWO CONTRASTING LESSONS.

We have been often accused of supposing that gramAnd mars are not necessary to the language student. quite untruly accused. An interesting proof of the necessity of diversity of methods is given by the experience of two teachers. The one has a class of children in a primary school. She teaches orally, using pictures, pointing to each object and giving its foreign name. The children have a doll which is dressed and undressed, each stage having its appropriate foreign phrases. They have toy shops, buy and sell. They learn verses in the foreign tongue and sing them. The second teacher has a class of adults and is teaching them Russian. The first lesson is devoted to the study of the alphabet. Each pupil has a Russian first reader, such as is used in Russian primary schools. The teacher sounds in rotation all the thirty-six letters of the Russian alphabet, the pupils repeating the sound many times, having the sign in front of them. The second lesson, the teacher reads aloud the short words, the pupils repeating. The home exercises are the writing down of these words. As soon as the printed and written characters are mastered, the grammatical forms of the variable Russian words are taught. All this time the Russian reader is in use, so that the explanation must be oral and given in the mother tongue. What a difference in these two methods, and yet how well calculated each to attain its end. The child must be imperceptibly led on-interested, kept alive; but the adult, who knows

the value of time, desires above all to acquire quickly, and has already grammatical knowledge as a foundation. THE READING CONGRESS.

It was an odd coincidence that the host and hostess of the French teachers assembled at Reading should be Mr. and Mrs. Bull. The gathering was a very interesting one. M. Cambon, the French ambassador, spoke of the good work done by the Société des Professeurs de Français; how necessary it is that the prejudice of nation against nation arising from ignorance the one of the other, should be dispelled, and how it is imperative for the progress of civilisation and humanity that the two countries should remain united. Professor York Powell of Oxford laid stress upon the fact that the advantage of a knowledge of modern languages is as apparent to people in the Universities as to people outside. He hoped that Oxford would soon be able to revive the professorship for the romance tongues, recommended the establishment of a school of modern languages there, and said that no University should permit persons to enter as students until they had a good knowledge of some modern tongue. Mr. Minssen, the president of the "Alliance Française,” and Mr. Maurice Rey of Reading College, made some interesting speeches. The congress closed on Saturday April 20th.

INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENCE.

Dr. Hartmann reports a, to us, somewhat comic incident. Dr. Hertel of Zwickau has ignored international correspondence. Not so his scholars. By some means one or two of them started the interchange of letters and soon others joined. (Exactly the same thing has taken place in England-but our rule has been always to request permission of parents or teachers when applications have come from pupils.) The correspondence in Zwickau flourishes-but one day a letter not nice in tone is received, and then Dr. Hertel is told. At once, he writes to the educational papers about the wickedness of the scholar's correspondence, quite failing to perceive that the fault was not in the exchange of letters, but in his refusal to interest himself in that which had become a real gain to his boys, but which from lack of supervision had suffered a mishap. Our teachers have not always inaugurated a correspondence, but they have never failed to respond when their pupils have shown a desire to try the plan.

NOTICES.

The editor of La Vita Internazionale, of Milan, will gladly facilitate correspondence between English and Italian people.

A Scotch lady is eager to exchange visits with a French lady.

Many Dutch boys seek English correspondents.

An elderly lady would like to meet with a younger lady who would help her to train to high ideals and teach a little grandson.

Several French male normal school students plead for young English lady correspondents because "they write such nice letters," but we cannot arrange this without the permission of the parent or guardian.

Adults are asked to send age and occupation, and one shilling towards expense of search.

Some of our readers wish for general information from many countries on many subjects; such would do well to join "Concordia." The yearly subscription is eight francs, and there is also an entrance fee. Address, 77, Rue Deufert-Rochereau, Paris.