MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE AND ART. 335 



THE WORKS OP ROBERT BURNS. BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM. 



VOL. II. COCHRANE AND M'CRONE. 



THE second volume of this highly popular work contains the 

 poems chronologically arranged to the year 1787 the year when 

 bleak misfortune was about driving the Poet to drive slaves ; the me- 

 morable year, too, when, in lieu of herding " black cattle/' he became 

 the admired of all admirers in Edinburgh. The notes which are ap- 

 pended to each poem by the Editor, fully bear out our assertion that 

 he alone is the fittest to achieve the task he has undertaken. Com- 

 bining much that is original, and much that is skilfully selected from 

 the eminent men who have successively illustrated the works of Burns, 

 Mr. Cunningham has interwoven many excellent anecdotes, told in 

 his own racy manner. Take for example the following note to one of 

 Burns' serious pieces a somewhat inappropriate place for it by the 

 way: 



" It is related in our Scottish legends that a wayfaring Irishman took 

 shelter, one stormy night, in a farmer's house, just as the household struck 

 up the ninetieth psalm, some say the hundred and nineteenth in family 

 worship. The stranger, ignorant of the devotional turn of his host, ima- 

 gined the psalm to be sung in honour of his coming in short, a welcome. 

 He sat and heard it to an end, and then said, ' Merry be your heart good 

 man ; that's a long song, and a good song ; and, by way of requital, I shall 

 give you a touch of Brian O'Linn.' " 



Rich and varied as the new matter is, however, we are all impa- 

 tience to get Cunningham among the SONGS there he will be in his 

 glory. The sound of Scotland's thousand streams, the waving of her 

 woods, the roar of her cataracts, the pleasant stillness of her hills, the 

 fragrance of her harvest fields all come over our full heart as we 

 listen to the immortal strains of him whose name is now imperishably 

 linked with his native land. 



ROMANCE OF HISTORY. FRANCE. BY LEITCH RITCHIE. VOL I. 

 BULL AND CHURTON. 



IN mere reprints of books it is only necessary to notice their pub- 

 lication, and when the work is nearly got up to welcome it as it de- 

 serves. We have before spoken of the graceful manner in which 

 Messrs. Bull and Churton have brought the volumes of Mr. Neele's 

 "England," before the public. Leitch Ritchie's French romances 

 now follow, and are illustrated as beautifully as we could wish, by 

 Thomas Landseer. The merits of Mr. Ritchie are well known, and 

 years back we spoke of his labours warmly, and we are pleased, now 

 to think through the good opinion of the public that we did so justly. 



MEMORIALS OF A TOUR IN GREECE. BY A. M. MILNES. MASON. 

 MR. MILNES has ushered his name before the world, as a poetical 

 travellist, and seems to boast that he can give his feelings forth both 

 in prose and verse, with equal rapidity. We do not wonder at the 

 ease with which he writes for not allowing himself to be fettered in 



