is not so. He shows in his essays the inevitable historic conflict between science and religion, the gains of the former over the latter; the discrediting of theology in the intellectual advancement of the race; and the validity of the modern. sceptic's position. Few will deny the logical clearness, the candor and the sweet spirit of reasonableness that pervade the argument, which is, in the author's plan the successive re-statement of a few principles. The papers are refreshingly free from the theologic odium pertaining to the religious polemic as such. To the affirmative religionist Mr. Burroughs's mistake will be that he does not give due place to that side of man's nature which makes faith as authentic as the processes of reasoning. Yet perhaps this would be hardly fair to the author, for again and again in his treatment he emphasizes the importance of this tap-root of the religious instinct; and the lovely and familiar poem of his own, with which he introduces his book, plainly declares that he too hopes, even against reason. [Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 12mo, $1.50.]

One of the most picturesque chapters in the history of the winning of the West is dealt with in Eva Emery Dye's McLoughlin and Old Oregon, for, while the famous governor of the Hudson's Bay Company west of the Rockies is its central figure, the book deals largely with the first Americans who ventured into that wilderness and saved it for the Union, foremost among them Dr. Whitman, whose famous ride across the continent to secure the country for the United States is retold here. The book is not a history, but rather a series of sketches of the condition of the country, the life at the Hudson's Bay posts and of the hunters and settlers, of the hardships the emigrants endured on the long trip from the East, of the Indians and the work of the missionaries around them. It is vivid and attractively

written, in the style of the reminiscences of an eye witness of it all; indeed, it is very well possible that the author obtained her information from contemporaries of McLoughlin and Whitman, as well as from documents and books. [A. C. McClurg & Co., 12mo, $1.50.]

Attractively printed and bound, Mr. Leon H. Vincent's little volume on the origin of the French salon, Hôtel Rambouillet, deserves the attention of students of French literature. It is little more than a sketch, but here and there in its pages we get glimpses of so thorough a knowledge of the times, the literary lights and conditions of seventeenth-century France, that we are willingly, gladly even, led to the conclusion that Mr. Vincent is preparing to follow up this introductory study of a fascinating subject with a more extended work. That he is thoroughly equipped for the task is evident from his little volume, for, when he drops for a moment the main thread of his narrative to draw the picture of one of the characters in its throng, he at once arrests our attention and holds it. The Marquise de Rambouillet ranks with the many women who have shaped French intellectual life. She was the first to practice which is preaching by example -the equality of brains and achievement with birth and blood. Only a grande dame could do it in her day; only a woman of note can do it in ours. The study is not confined to the Hôtel de Rambouillet, but includes also a clear review of the salons that succeeded it-those of the Précieuses; and here again we are struck by the thoroughness of treatment, the remarkable usefulness to the student of these pages. They will find their way unaided into the hands of the small circle of those to whom they appeal. The publishers have been most felicitous in giving the book a daintily appropriate dress. [Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 16mo, $1.00.]

MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM iii. 1.

488.-Will you please inform me where Winston Churchill, author of "Richard Carvel," was born? As I understand it, there are two Winston Churchills-one an American and the other an Englishman. Will you please tell me which of the two is the author of "Richard Carvel," and what are his parents' names? L. P. W.

The author of "Richard Carvel" was born in St. Louis, Mo., in 1871, and was graduated at the United States Naval Academy in 1894. We do not know his parents' names. The other Winston Churchill, whose second name is Spencer, is a son of the late Lord Randolph Churchill. His mother was Miss Jerome, of New York, and has just become Mrs. George Cornwallis West. He has been in South Africa as a war correspondent.

"The grandam of my grandam was the Lyre[O the blue below the little fisher-huts!] That the stealer stooping beach ward filled with fire, Till she bore my iron head and ringing guts!" These lines are omitted in the subscription edition (New York, 1899) and the following are substituted:

"Of the driven dust of speech I make a flame,

And a scourge of broken withes that men let fall; For the words that had no honour till I cameLo I raise them into honour over all!"

Can you tell me who made this change, why it was made, and what the new verse means?

O. S. H.

The change could have been made by no one but Mr. Kipling himself. It is very common for poets to make changes (sometimes radical ones) in successive editions of their work.

490.-Who wrote the lines:

But he who stems a stream with sand, And fetters flame with flaxen band, Has yet a harder task to prove

By firm resolve to conquer love!

F. S.

They are from Scott's " Lady of the Lake," Canto III.

491.-I am going to ask what I feel sure you will consider a very foolish question. If a lady enter into a literary partnership with a man who is a writer as well as herself, would it be believed by the readers of their joint novel, that there was an intimate friendship between the writers, or would it be regarded merely as a business partnership, like any other? Are literary partnerships of this kind formed with no particular friendly relations between the parties, and where they could not be except in a business way?

M. K. B.

Such partnerships have been formed on business principles, as where one writer was strong in construction of plot, and the other in delineation of character; but it is hardly conceivable that one could exist without some measure of friendship and sympathy. No such mechanical combination as would tan a hide and construct from it a pair of boots could be relied upon for producing literary work.

492. Referring to Stevenson's "Vailima Letters," a correspondent asks me to give the pronunciation of Vailima" and tell what language it comes from. I have endeavored to get this information from the books themselves, but have not been successful. I judge that the name belongs to the Samoan language, whatever that may be but I would like exact information, and especially how the vowels are sounded and how the syllables are accented. A. T. H. B.

The word is pronounced, as nearly as the sound can be indicated by letters: Vahy-lee-ma, in three syllables. The vowel sound in the first syllable is a little broader than "vi."