most
delightful productions. It presents an exceedingly pretty picture of the
bright external side of ancient Greek life, and tells how a handsome
young Tanagrian left his home for the sake of art, and returned to it for
love's sake--an old story, no doubt, but one which gains a new charm from
its new setting. The historical characters of the book, such as
Praxiteles and Phryne, seem somehow less real than those that are purely
imaginary, but this is usually the case in all novels that would recreate
the past for us, and is a form of penalty that Romance has often to pay
when she tries to blend fact with fancy, and to turn the great personages
of history into puppets for a little play. The translation, which is
from the pen of the Baroness von Lauer, reads very pleasantly, and some
of the illustrations are good, though it is impossible to reproduce by
any process the delicate and exquisite charm of the Tanagra figurines.

M. Paul Stapfer in his book Moliere et Shakespeare shows very clearly
that the French have not yet forgiven Schlegel for having threatened
that, as a reprisal for the atrocities committed by Napoleon, he would
prove that Moliere was no poet. Indeed, M. Stapfer, while admitting that
one should be fair 'envers tout le monde, meme envers les Allemands,'
charges down upon the German critics with the brilliancy and dash of a
French cuirassier, and mocks at them for their dulness, at the very
moment that he is annexing their erudition, an achievement for which the
French genius is justly renowned. As for the relative merits of Moliere
and Shakespeare, M. Stapfer has no hesitation in placing the author of Le
Misanthrope by the side of the author of Hamlet. Shakespeare's comedies
seem to him somewhat wilful and fantastic; he prefers Orgon and Tartuffe
to Oberon and Titania, and can hardly forgive Beatrice for having been
'born to speak all mirth, and no matter.'

Perhaps he hardly realises that it is as a poet, not as a playwright,
that we love Shakespeare in England, and that Ariel singing by the yellow
sands, or fairies hiding in a wood near Athens, may be as real as Alceste
in his wooing of Celimene, and as true as Harpagon weeping for his money-
box; still, his book is full of interesting suggestion, many of his
remarks on literature are quite excellent, and his style has the
qualities of grace, distinction, and ease of movement.

Not so much can be said for Annals of the Life of Shakespeare, which