61 
THE CHRISTMAS CAROL. 
(A Recrrat.) 
By Mr. JOEN HARWOOD, 2nd December, 1902. 

The Recital, which comprised the scenes of ‘‘ Marley’s Ghost,”’ 
and the visitations to Scrooge of the Ghosts of Christmas past 
and present, and of Christmas yet to come, was given entirely 
from memory and with much dramatic power and effect. 

ROBERT BROWNING’S MESSAGE. 
By FRED H. HILL. 9th December, 1902, 

What strikes the careful student of Browning is the bigness of 
his intellect. I can find no other word for it—the inexpressible 
comprehension of his grasp of things finite and infinite, his 
almost unlimited power, his piercing insight into the soul of 
man ; in fact a great man, who deals greatly with great subjects. 
He gives us the impression of being such a complete man, with 
sympathies stretching in so many different directions. All his 
senses were wide awake; all his instincts were quick and keen; 
he was a living soul, a soul that drank in music through the ear, 
beauty through the eye, truth through the intellect, and love 
through the heart. And this strenuous soul, in its entirety, is put 
into his poems; they pulsate with vitality, they vibrate to every 
faculty and emotion of human nature, and constitute a world of 
exhaustless interest ; and yet, with all their variety, we may de- 
scribe them as unfolding the book of life. The real life of man, 
behind the transient show, that is what they reveal. Popes and 
kings, saints and criminals, learned scholars and ignorant 
