The Reviews Reviewed. 



229 



)>olitical sagacity, without any triumph of state- 

 i-raft standing to his credit. Saint Xihal Singh df- 

 >cril)es the change in the status of ( )riental women ; 

 and Dr. Shipley contributes a study interesting to 

 I'.lizabetlian scholars on zoolog\ in the time of 

 Shakespeare. 



TllK VLARTERLY liEVIEW, 

 The July numl)T may l>e historically memorable 

 for the avowal of a Unionist jiolicy that would wel- 

 welcome Home Rule all round. The paper has been 

 separately noticed, along with four or five Others, 



Wll.AT IS DISTINCTIVE OF BROWNING. 



Mr. Henry James writes on " The Novel in ' The 



King anil the Book,' " and mirrors in almost Brown- 



ingesque pro-.!' the struggle of the constructive mind 



(o grasp the jnultitudinous and overwlu-lming mass 



<>( intellectual riches found in Browning's master- 



piei'e. This places Browning quite apart, making 



the re.st of o\ir [xx-tic record c<>m[iarativelv pale and 



.ihstract : - 



Shelley ami Swinburne- to tianie 'inl.v liie compeers- 

 ure. 1 iinow. a part of the rei-ord ; ijut tiie autlior of 

 ■' Men xiiii Women." of ■ Pippa Passea." of certain of the 

 Dramatic Lyrics and other scattered felicities, not only 

 expresses and refle<l» the matter; he l.iirly. he heatedly, 

 if I may use such a term, exudes and perspires it. Shelley. 

 let us Bay. in the connecti.jn i» a liKlit. and Swinburne, 

 let us say. a sound; Browning alone of tliem all is a tem- 

 perature. We feel it. we are in it :it a plunge, with the 

 \ery first pages of the thing before us. 



" The Ring and the Book '" gives us " in the rarest 

 manner three characters jbf the first importance," 

 ivhich are Ca|K>nsacchi, I'ompilia, and the Pope. 



MRS. HUMPHRV WARd"s IDEAS. 



The Rev. A. Kawkes divides novels into four 

 <-lasses, as they deal with romance, with life, with 

 ideas, or take the sha])e of a work of art. .\rt to- 

 day is represented by Mr. Hardy, romance by R. I.. 

 Stevenson, life by flrorge Meredith, and ideas liv 

 Mrs Humphry VV;ird. She is in the ai)0.stolic succes- 

 sion of her grandfather. .Arnold of Rugbv. and Mat- 

 thew .Arnold, h>r tinch-. He says: — " The distinc- 

 tive note of her thinking is sanity. She is progres- 

 sive, but distrustful of Liberalism; a feminist, 

 but an op|)f)nent of women's suffrage ; a Moderni.st, 

 hut in her latest utterance, 'Richard Mevnell,' an 

 upholder of the I-lstablished Church. " Her fear of 

 Socialism is, he thinks, excessive. Lil)eralism seems 

 lo her to have occult connection with want of prin- 

 ciple. Her ■' philosophy of religion " is likely to 

 be of more ix-rmanent value than her contribution to 

 |>olitical and economic scienci-. 



TO ENTER THE STOCK i:X( MANGE. 



Mr. Walter I.andells, who announces that high 

 commer<i;d morality is the goal aimed at by the 

 London Stock fCxchange, tells us the various way.> 

 in which m<-mlx-rship can be obtained. 



The faKji'ot Iml most oipensive Miclhod m to pay an 

 enlramc fee of 500 i:uin««n. and l« llnd three members 

 who will lie rra|>onaible for four years for the sum of 

 1500 eu<b. Ihn WiOn belnu forfeitable lo the enlale in 

 the event of the new niemlwr beinu "hammered" ilurinK 

 >he period In addition, the candidate mual buy three 

 .SUM'k Eichanifo shares, the price of which ai preront Is 

 alMiut i.190 for the i.lJ-pai<l shjiru. ind lie innai also pur- 



chase from some retiring member a nomination which 

 can be bought for about i.70. although, when nominations 

 were first cre;ite<i. one is known to have changed hands 

 for £700. 



Serving for four years as a clerk in the Stock 

 Exchange reduces the cost, and every year a fe\i 

 candidates are elected without nomination. But an 

 outsider who wants to come .straight into the Stock 

 Exchange as a member must be prepared to pay 

 alxiUt ;^i20o, of which about ,;^57o, the purchase 

 pncc of the shares, is reproductive. 



OTHER ARTICLES. 



Of the literary articles Mr. Joseph Conrad is 

 described as a Pole by birth, a naturalised English- 

 man, an author, and various other things, but most 

 of all at heart a .seaman, a master-mariner of the 

 British Merchant Ser\ice. Maurice Barres is de- 

 .scribed as a Romantic in the ranks of the classics, 

 or, rather, as a free lance fighting the battles of 

 idealism. The final judgment on the Banister v. 

 Thompson case leads the writer to say that excom- 

 inunic.ition is a very rare and sad necessity, will 

 never wholly disappear, but religion will not be 

 helped by its revival, as in that celebrated case. . 



THE HIBBEET JOURNAL. 



The two most distinctive papers of the Julv 

 number — those by Dr. Max Nordau and C. G. Mon- 

 tefiore— have been separately noticed. " The un- 

 godly organisation of society " is traced by the 

 Rev. A. W. F, Blunt to the facts— first, of the sub- 

 stitution of morality for spirituality, the drifting 

 more and more into a worship of works; and second, 

 the worship of autonomy and the dislike of discip- 

 line. 



The Bishop of Tasmania treats the Church, the 

 world, and the Kingdom as circles which must ulti- 

 mately become concentric, though now- Church and 

 world form only parts of the whole, which is the 

 Kingdom. .. He consider;, that the unity and con- 

 tinuity of the CathorJi* f^^iurch, its aiithoritv in 

 matters of faith and conducf, and a rich historic 

 symbolism, and the Protestant rights of the indivi- 

 dual, that each man is to be iVgarded as an end in 

 himself, are elements to be combined in the higher 

 synthesis of the Church that is to be. 



Mr. R. Kennard Davis finis that Christ is the 

 Truth in that the challenge, What would Jesiu 

 do? applies to every situation in the moral life. 

 Mr, B. A. G. Fuller offers r\ plea for the serious 

 consideration of the gods of. F.i)icurus. They re- 

 present the ideal, the life c^f God, as something 

 which can be thought of in the only terms and 

 r»^^lised under the only conditions which life, as we 

 know it, offers. 



In the department of .social ^irvice, Emma Mahler 

 calls attention to the hardships of .seamen's wives, 

 and urges the shipowners to ;iv.iil thems<>l\es of the 

 [lowers given by law to givr weekly or fortnightly 

 allotment notes to the wives' at home out of their 

 hilsb;iiiiK' wages. 



