shallow little fool whom the author compels David to marry in order to punish him and discipline him into acceptance of the vague religion of Amiel's Diary. The basis of the book, in fact, as it was of Robert Elsmere, seems to be Amiel. A religion is sought, a lasting conception of Christianity. This search is represented as being "like the unravelling of fine and ancient needle-work." It is a toil, and one is obliged to go round by Voltaire, and wade through all the scepticism of the eighteenth century and the agnosticism of the nineteenth, to get at the "eternal meaning of Jesus." And yet Dorathe simple-minded Dora of this historyhad this conception without the least difficulty, and showed the best fruits of it in an unselfish life. She does not need to read David Grieve.

V.

The old and well-worn adage that "truth is stranger than fiction" receives a severe blow in Mr. George Meredith's The Tragic Comedians. The romance of Helene von Dönniges and Ferdinand Lasalle has often been told in the newspapers, and the heroine has herself set it forth. Indeed, the introduction to this volume, by Mr. Clement Shorter, gives the story in clear outline, accompanied by the portraits of the leading lady and gentleman. We are thus seated in front of the curtain, fully possessed of the reality of the persons who are to perform. But when the curtain rises, we straightway lose all sense of reality, and are in the presence of a palpable world of fic tion, an artificial creation of the stage. By constantly turning back to the argument," we are enabled to follow the story, but the illusion of reality is gone. This is a very considerable achievement, and lends a new interest to the somewhat wearisome discussion of realism. It has been supposed on all sides that the novelist who could set forth invented characters and situations with such literary verity as to make them seem actual happenings and human beings had touched the height of art. But here comes a master of his craft, and introduces confusion into the discussion by transforming real persons and admitted adventures into fantastic images and stage spectacles, so that we are thrown back into the unwelcome notion that fiction is stranger than truth. The necromancer who accom

VOL. LXXXV.-No. 505.-16

plishes this, one of the subtlest living students of the human heart, effects it by a method purely his own. By a certain artful collocation of words, he creates an atmosphere by which nature is made to seem as fantastical as he likes to conceive her, and in this strange world his personages, now become phantoms of his pen, taking their cue from the author in the prompter's box, hurl epigrams at each other, interspersed with dots and dashes which represent emotions beyond the reach of even epigrams to express. It is not necessary to inquire whether real people in a drawing-room or under the lindens ever talk in this way. The author has produced his effect, and no other sort of conversation would be accepted by the reader as sufficiently unreal for the world into which he is introduced. But having accepted this situation, in which reality becomes fiction, the reader has not at all finished with the author. Mr. Meredith is profoundly versed in the subtle workings and contradictions of the human heart, and his description of the mental processes of Alvan (Lasalle) and Clotilde (Helene) when they are separated, simply as an abstract study, is one of the subtlest, and, on the whole, truest, things in modern fiction. The elusive coquetry of Clotilde and the masterful egoism of Alvan are studied by a masterhand, done with a delicate firmness that commands the reader's admiration even when he is struggling in the meshes of the author's wilful diction.

So impressive are Mr. Meredith's great qualities, even in this minor work, that it is natural to regret that he does not reach a wider audience. The English introduction is of great assistance to the reader, but we believe it would pay an enterprising publisher to have The Tragic Comedians translated.

VI.

Among the most pleasing occupations of our literary times has been the hunt for "local color." It has been a matter of faith. Everybody has believed in it as something you could buy, like paint, in quantities needed for your palette. It has been frankly admitted that local color is a thing indispensable, especially in a novel, and to some extent in an essay in biography. Indeed, there is scarcely any mixture that is not improved by it. This is so well understood that when a

In Venezuela a revolutionary movement was inaugurated March 15th, with ex-President Joaquin Crespo at its head.

Despatches from Brazil announced that a revolution was in progress in the state of Matto-Grosso, having for its object the overthrow of the present Governor. The dissatisfaction in Rio Grande do Sul had partially subsided with the accession of a new Governor, but a movement for the formation of an independent republic was reported as imminent. On the 2d of April the government of the Argentine Republic, apprehending a revolt, proclaimed the entire country in a state of siege.

mense damage was done to property, and more than fifty lives were lost. There were also severe storms in Nebraska, Texas, and Illinois, destroying both property and lives.

April 11th.-Destructive floods in Mississippi caused much injury, especially in the valley of the Tombigbee River. More than seventy-five persons were drowned.

OBITUARY.

March 16th.-At Alicante, Spain, Edward A. Freeman, of England, historian, aged sixty-nine years. March 19th.-In Boston, Massachusetts, Daniel Lothrop, publisher, aged sixty-two years.

March 22d.-In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, David Hayes Agnew, physician, aged seventy-four years.

March 26th.-In Camden, New Jersey, Walt Whitman, poet, aged seventy-three years. April 2d.-In London, England, John Murray, publisher, aged eighty-four years.

UST on the other side of Ninth Street, outside of my office window, is the stand of Old Sue, the "tugmule" that pulls the green car around the curve from Main Street to Ninth and up the hill to Broad. Between her and the young bow-legged negro that hitches her on, drives her up, and fetches her back down the hill for the next car there has always existed a peculiar friendship. He used to hold long conversations with her, generally upbraiding her in that complaining tone with opprobrious terms the negroes employ, which she used to take meekly. At times he petted her with his arm around her neck, or teased her, punching her in her ribs, and walking about around her

quarters, ostentatiously disregardful of her switching stump of a tail and uplifted foot, and threatening her with all sorts of direful punishment if she "jis darred to tetch" him. "Kick me -heah, kick me; I jis dyah you to lay you' foot 'g'inst me," he would say, standing defiantly against her as she appeared about to let fly at him. Then he would seize her with a guffaw. Or at times, coming down the hill, he would haul off and hit her, and "take out" with her at his heels, her long furry ears backed, and her mouth wide open as if she would tear him to pieces; and just as she nearly caught him he would come to a stand and wheel around, and she would stop dead, and then walk on by him as sedately as if she were in a harrow. In all the years of their association she never failed him; and she never failed to fling herself on the collar rounding the sharp curve at Ninth, and to get the car up the difficult turn.

Last fall, however, the road passed into new hands, and the management changed the old mules on the line, and put on a lot of new and green horses. It happened to be a dreary rainy day in November when the first new team was put in. They came along about three o'clock. Old Sue had been standing out in the pouring rain all day with her head bowed, and her stubby tail tucked in, and her black back dripping. She had never failed nor faltered. The tug-boy, in an old rubber suit and battered tarpauling hat, had been out also, his coat shining with the wet. He and Old Sue appeared to mind it astonishingly little. The gutters were running brimming full, and the cobble-stones were wet and slippery. The street cars were crowded inside and out, the wretched people on the platforms vainly trying to shield themselves with um

brellas held sideways. It was late in the afternoon when I first observed that there was trouble at the corner. I thought at first that there was an accident, but soon found that it was due to a pair of new balking horses in a car. Old Sue was hitched to the tug, and was doing her part faithfully; finally she threw her weight on the collar, and by sheer strength bodily dragged the car, horses and all, around the curve and on up the straight track, until the horses, finding themselves moving, went off with a rush. I saw the tug-boy shake his head with pride, and heard him give a whoop of triumph. The next car went up all right; but the next had a new team, and the same thing occurred. The streets were like glass; the new horses got to slipping and balking, and Old Sue had to drag them up as she did before. From this time it went from bad to worse; the rain changed to sleet, and the curve at Ninth became a stalling-place for every car. Finally, just at dark, there was a block there, and the cars piled up. I intended to have taken a car on my way home, but finding it stalled, I stepped into Polk Miller's drug store, just on the corner, to get a cigar and to keep warm. I could see through the blurred glass of the door the commotion going on just outside, and could hear the shouts of the driver and of the tug-boy mingled with the clatter of horses' feet as they reared and jumped, and the cracks of the tug-boy's whip as he called to Sue, "Git up, Sue; git up, Sue." Presently I heard a sort of shout, and then the tones changed, and things got quieter.

A few minutes afterwards the door slowly opened, and the tug-boy came in limping, his old hat pushed back on his head, and one leg of his wet trousers rolled up to his knee, showing about four inches of black ashy skin, which he leant over and rubbed as he walked. His wet face wore a scowl, half pain, half anger. “Mist' Miller, kin I use yo' 'phone?" he asked, surlily.

"Yes; there 'tis."

The company had the privilege of using it by courtesy. He limped up, and still rubbing his leg with one hand, took the 'phone off the hook with the other and put it to his ear.

Dat

done try ev'ything. I done whup her mos' to death. She ain' got no reason. She oon do nuttin. She done haul off, an' leetle mo' knock my brains out; she done kick me right 'pon meh laig—'pon my right_laig." (He stooped over and rubbed it again at the reflection.) "Done bark it all up. Suh? Yas, sub. Tell nine o'clock; yas, suh; reckon so; 'll try it leetle longer. Yas, suh; yas, suh. Good night-good by !"

He hung the 'phone back on the hook, stooped and rubbed his leg. "Thankee, Mist' Miller! Good-night."

He limped to the door, and still stooping over and rubbing his leg, opened it. As he passed out, without turning his head, he said, as if to himself, but to be heard by us, “I wish I had a hundred an' twenty-five dollars. I boun' I'd buy dat durned ole mule, an' cut her doggoned th'oat." THOMAS NELSON PAGE.

'N' when I ast him "What's the joke?" he looked almighty flat.

"It don't prognosticate," says he. "That ain't the pint!" says I.

"What I'm a-astin' you is will the blame thing prophesy ?"

'N' then he turned the pages quick, 'n' showed me lots o' stuff

About Egyptians, and a squib about an Earl named

Duff.

But when I ast him if it told a cure for tater bugs,

He said it didn't, but it had a history of rugs!

'Nd I'll be derned if that there book he said would tell so much

She

Had anything on any page I'd ever care to touch; then-haw! haw!-I chucked that pert young swindler from the place

So

quick he hadn't time to take his smile down off his face;

'Nd after him I threw his bag 'n' twelve - part Cyclopee

My great-grandfather's almanac's still good enough

TERRY AND HIS REVERENCE.

A CERTAIN Irish village character, noted alike for his habitual indolence, immoderate indulgence, and ready wit, was once approached by the parish priest, who desired a day's work done in his garden.

"Terry," said he, "if you work steady for me all day and drink nothing, I'll give you a glass at six o'clock as well as the pay."

"Done, yer riverence," returned the other. "I know ye're a man of yer worrud, an', plase the pigs, I'll be wan too!"

He performed the day's work accordingly, and when he went to the kitchen door at sundown, received his pay and a small wine glass, which his reverend employer handed him already filled with whiskey.

After tossing off the thimbleful, he held the tiny vessel up quizzically and remarked, "An' how do they make them, yer riverence?"

"Why, they blow them, Terry," answered the unsuspecting cleric.

"Faix, thin, yer riverence," replied Terry, with a twinkle, "I'm thinkin' the man that blew that was short o' breath!"

Aware that he had had the worst of the encounter, the worthy priest bargained with his ne'er-do-weel parishioner for a second day's work, with the stipulation that on this occasion he should hold an empty tumbler and "say when" himself at the pouring out of the beverage.

Gradually the decanter grew depleted and the goblet full, but no word escaped Terry. His reverence paused of his own accord, and severely regarding his laborer, remarked,

"Don't you know, Terry, that every drop of this is a nail in your coffin?"

"Troth, thin, yer riverence," responded the unabashed one, "while ye have the hammer in yer han' ye may as well put in wan or two more!"

A CLEVER MOTTO.

IT is not common to find keen and brilliant scholarship in men devoted to business pursuits. The occasional examples of this, especially when that scholarship flowers into wit, are worth noting. A New York gentleman, who had retained and cultivated his devotion to classical studies, had an intimate friend, who was, and maybe is to-day, a rector in New Jersey. The clergyman was a great smoker, and his friend a few years ago sent him a Christmas remembrance of choice tobacco and cigars. Accompanying the box was this motto:

Λαβὲ δώρημα τὸ βακχικόν· σὲ γὰρ φιλέω, or, as it might be rapidly read, "Labe dorema tobaccicon, segar phileo." Englished this becomes the affectionate greeting, "Accept this Bacchic gift, for I love you." Porson was famous for his Græco-English epigrams and jokes, but he never made a more delightful pun of its class than the one we have cited.