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thrown in almost casually, yet with real significance :

"Waked to the proper life of his proud soul." The incidents of the fight are splendidly imagined. Stripped of the investiture of imagery, they are found in an attack by Herakles, with the aid of a goring bull, upon the lion, which he topples over a cliff. Then the man and beast confront each other warily, moving in vast circles, until Herakles, missing his footing, falls into a deep ravine. He recovers himself in the

them while aiming at their enemies.
Mr. Moore has, so far as we know, in-
vented this version of the incident, and
he turns it to admirable account. It is
a part of the gradual humanizing of Her-
akles, which inevitably leads him into
destruction of the tie which binds man
to the beast. The strife and the burial
of the centaurs leave Herakles alone,
with the words of Keiron in his ears:-
"Golden youth,

Touched gloriously with some far-off doom,
Thou, thou art lineal to our energies,
And in thy statue earth is humanized!

night which follows, contrives a gigantic Be thine to be a vision of sole strength,

bow and arrows, and with these kills the lion.

"No touch of triumph to the hero came.

On its gray, faded eyes, that yet were filled With ruined visions, like the twilight west, He gazed, and for a moment would recall Their savage splendor into throbbing life." The first book is occupied with this theme, and although a careful reading is required of one or two passages, which are so rich in decoration as to confuse the mind for a moment, the story is told with great impressiveness. One feels the mist of an early antiquity about it, in the absence of other figures than that of Herakles and the brutes, while the forms of nature have scarcely yet lost their personal realism.

To follow the course of the poem would be to follow the hero through adventures which add at each stroke new characteristics of humanity. He strives with Helios, the sun god, drives him off victoriously, and receives a visit from Keiron, who recites the incident of the strangling of serpents in his cradle. "Come with us," cries the centaur king, "and be our fellow through futurity!" He accompanies the centaurs, and yet this first comradeship, in which he rises from the animal into a half-completed humanity, carries with it dim forebodings. It is the sense of a conflict yet to come between him and his companions, for at the feast given by Pirithous, when the centaurs are slain, Herakles is the one who is fated to slay

A simple virtue of sufficiency,

Mid the mad, mist-abused, and star-nurled
Changes and doubts and dreamings of the world."

This is the prophecy of the life of Herakles, and perhaps it may be taken as the key to the conception of the character, but in the unfolding of the poem there are still fuller disclosures of the growth of the soul of man. Mr. Moore disregards the story of the labors, but takes his hero's career up again at the quarrel with Eurytus, and so brings Omphale upon the scene, binds Herakles in her chains, and through the power of womanhood lifts him to a higher plane. Then Herakles makes a descent into hell, and finally, at the end of his life, is visited by Hermes with a promise of the life of a god. He refuses, and has a vision of life, death, immortality, in which he is left alone by men and gods, returns as it were to Nature, and ends his days in her arms.

"Grown one with nature's growths, he knew
Here was his home, here was his horizon,
And for him, baring her mysterious limbs,
Nature's self saw he waiting. Suddenly
His heroic frame, fulfilled of all desire,
Crashed backward in the arms of his sole mate."

In our hurried synopsis of the contents of the poem, we have half put our own interpretation on the poem, half followed the author's lead. It is a poem so well worth studying that we have wished rather to hint at its richness than to attempt a full exposition. The thought, if we have discovered it,

is essentially pagan, but so is the theme, and we like better the dramatic paganism of Mr. Moore than the confused mingling of modern paganism with old forms which confronts one so constantly in the work of the English school of Hellenistic poets.

We have lingered so long over Herakles that we shall dismiss the rest of the volume with no other words than such as may apply to the first poem also: namely, that Mr. Moore seems at his best in the antique; that he has a rich, powerful imagination; that he is often reckless in his speech and careless in his measure. He does not always succeed in making his meaning clear, and he is misled by the fertility of his imagination into a prodigality which often destroys one's pleasure in the verse. That he should sometimes recall Keats or Shelley is not strange, nor is it necessarily to his discredit. The poet who has studied models carefully is not there

fore unlikely to create models in time. His book can scarcely command popularity, but it ought to excite the liveliest interest of all who are watching for the development of poetry in America.

Thus, though we were half disposed at first to join in the self-commiseration over the paucity of poetic ventures, we are not sure but the season may be called a somewhat notable one, which brings to pass the publication of four books so individually interesting and worthy as those which we have had in review. Mr. Whittier keeps in our memory the treasures we already had; Mr. Thompson lights the horizon with a bright flush; Mr. Story helps us to recognize the facile grace which poetry may lend to our worldly life; and Mr. Moore comes with his large, forcible verse to show that art and poetry have not yet taken leave of imagination and surrendered themselves to the lighter chains of fancy.

THE CONTRIBUTORS' CLUB.

THERE is a curious form of semi-religious perhaps I should say irreligious speech whose genesis it would be interesting to trace. When you resolve upon any act or course of conduct which appears to your friends particularly venturesome and unsafe, are you not sure to be met with the intelligence that you are "tempting Providence"? If you stop to consider the phrase as an expression of piety, it strikes you that the piety is most perilously involved, and that the rôle which it assigns to Providence is far from creditable to the patronized deity. This Providence, you are persuaded, must have a close relationship with the old-fashioned Ate, who used to wander about invisible, and bring to pass all the unguarded prayers

and imprecations of mortals; or you think of the mischievous Scandinavian god Loki, or of any other impish spirit ever held in fearful esteem, and represented as hovering or prowling, on the lookout for an opportunity to do despite to the helpless human race. Providence, the current warning seems to say, will do you a bad turn as often as possible, and is never so gratified as when occasion offers in which to "come up" with you for your unbecoming display of pride or bravery. Beware of Providence. Do not, in the thunderstorm, stand under a tall tree, lest Providence perceive you, and mow you down with a crooked lightning sharpened for that purpose. Do not walk under the precipice, for Providence is just above, wait

ing to drop a stone to crush your foolhardy little person. Do not pitch your tent on that low, malarious ground; for Providence, having to make some disposition of the gifts in his left hand, will quarter with you fever and ague, and megrims unnumbered. Providence may have had affairs which took him to the remotest parts of the universe; but on your offering him a pleasing chance to torment you, he returns in a trice, and has in working order his engines of torture and devastation. It would not require a very sagacious eye to see behind such Providence a "smiling face," though not the smile which devout Cowper saw, but one of sardonic malice and triumphant cruelty. Nevertheless, since this bad Providence is dependent upon our indiscretion for his opportunity, being otherwise inoperative and harmless, whom but ourselves can we reasonably blame for the ills that befall us? Indeed, some such plea might be made in his behalf as medieval apologists offered for the arch-adversary, when they declared him to be not so culpable as the meddlesome mortals (witches, magicians, and the like) who invited him to acts of malevolence. Perhaps the phrase in question owes its origin to a strategic disposition in mankind to "get on the right side" of the prime mischief-worker, by conferring upon him the title of 'Providence;" for cleverness, this ruse would compare favorably with that employed by the seaman, who addressed his prayers to the "good Lord, or good devil." Or the phrase may have originated with some scrupulous but shortsighted individual, who, fearing he might be thought atheistical if he spoke of "tempting fate," hit upon the plan of substituting for the objectionable substantive a word whose orthodoxy could not be questioned. Certain philosophers would have us believe that in every instance the idea of God is drawn in the likeness of the believer. It would be uncharitable to apply this theory in the

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case of the many good people who speak of "tempting Providence." Happily, they do not resemble the sly, disingenuous deity, of whose dangerous character they are so prompt to give warning.

There

Is there not some comfort to be derived from studying the etymological affinities of the word fault? It appears that nothing of criminal activity and stubborn evil-mindedness is implied in this word, but rather an unlucky failing to be or to do something prescribed, a mere passive falling from the plane of ideal perfectness. Among the invol untary faults of our human nature are, weakness, the failing of strength; age, the failing of youth; and, grand fault of all, death, the failing of life. is also, I think, a euphemistic way of treating the more voluntary faults of our nature, as to say that procrastination is a failing to be prompt; babbling, a failing to be discreet; mendacity, a failing to be truthful; and so on through the list of mortality's failings and fallings. Perhaps I put up with my own faults, if not with others', a little more easily for having indulged in the foregoing sophistries. So much in the field of etymology; if there is any comfort in analogy, I have that also. I am pleased to learn from geologists that the innocent and irresponsible old earth has her faults, namely, upheavals in the geologic column and dislocations of strata. Very like these are our faults,

unexpected juxtapositions in the column of character, more or less regrettable departures from balance and symmetry. Our very faults, it sometimes seems, might be counted to us for virtues, could they be made to take their proper place in the stratification. Could we but change foibles, now and then, with some other poor wayfaring creature, the transaction might prove to be of mutual benefit. Our fault transplanted to his soil, as his to ours, might flourish as a kindly, wholesome plant, where now

it is escaped from the garden, and become wild and poisonous. What a happy discovery in moral science, to find that a transfusion of qualities was possible! Then, one by nature rash and defiant would give the overplus of his hardihood to the shrinking and irresolute; the meek and lowly in spirit would make over to the harsh and scornful that which now tempts the oppressor to cruelty. The flush hand would bestow something upon the over-frugal hand, the over-frugal restrain the flush; a wise temperateness and a wise generosity resulting.

There are faults and faults. The whole matter of their discrimination depends upon the degree of gracefulness with which they are worn, and upon the taste or distaste of the censor. You and I, who so well perceive the various imperfections of our mutual friends, would yet never agree as to which of these imperfections is the lightest, which the most serious. The faults you find venial, and even with something of amenity in them, are, likely enough, the very ones to which I can give no quarter. Do you know what are the generous faults, the lovable, the admirable faults? They are those which come from abroad, and which, our temperament forbidding, will never be illustrated by us. Let us claim it as a strain of nobleness in ourselves that home faults are not the admirable ones, in our eyes. Such as bear this strong family likeness would better try some other tribunal, if they hope to get off with a light judgment: hereabouts, they are too well known. There is nothing piquant or engaging in that image of our little vices unconsciously thrown back by others. Yet we are invited to special sympathy with those whose imperfections have the same brand as our own, to the end that they may bear with us and we with them, unprofitable reciprocity! This counsel tastes insipid. Better to form our closest alliance with those who will VOL. LII. — NO. 314.

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not bear with our faults, but who will use strenuous means to bear us out of them. Lucky are we if we find one who will play Brutus to our Cassius; who stoutly persists, "I do not love your faults." Not improbably, we shall come across others who will assure us that our faults as well as our virtues can command their love. In truth, I fear it cannot be promised that, if we will pluck ourselves away from our besetting sin, we shall be rewarded with sweeter and warmer friendships. If our friendships be taken as the signature of our worth, not always will the worthiest enjoy the highest appraisal, since it is not always the choicest of spirits that gathers to itself the "friends of noble touch." History has its instances, but we need not go back of the current record for illustration of how a huge bulk of selfishness, because it happens to be traversed by a little vein of gayety, fancy, or tenderness, can manage to adorn itself with the most illustrious friendships.

Faults have their uses. If we cannot or will not part with ours, why such desperate pains to conceal them? Let them hang aloft, exposed to the wind and weather, a warning to all the neighbors: only in this way can we requite the similar service they have rendered us. But alas, when it is our dearest friends' life and story that point a moral of the cautionary sort, showing what error of judgment or weakness of will we are to avoid! This print hurts our eyes. If we must be instructed, let it be by the faults of those to whom we are indifferent.

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the origin of the expression "tick," for credit, which I have always taken to be quite modern slang. It seems, on the contrary, that it is as old as the seventeenth century, and is corrupted from ticket, as a tradesman's bill was then commonly called. On tick was on ticket.

"Humble pie" refers to the days when the English forests were stocked with deer, and venison pasty was commonly seen on the tables of the wealthy. The inferior and refuse portions of the deer, termed the "umbles," were generally appropriated to the poor, who made them into a pie; hence "umblepie" became suggestive of poverty, and afterwards was applied to degradations of other kinds.

"A wild-goose chase" was a sort of racing, resembling the flying of wild geese, in which, after one horse had gotten the lead, the other was obliged to follow after. As the second horse generally exhausted himself in vain efforts to overtake the first, this mode of racing was finally discontinued.

The expression "a feather in his cap "did not signify merely the right to decorate one's self with some token of success, but referred to an ancient custom among the people of Hungary, of which mention is made in the Lansdowne Manuscripts in the British Mu

seum.

None but he who had killed a Turk was permitted to adorn himself in this fashion, or to "shew the number of his slaine enemys, by the number of fethers in his cappe." It occurs to me to question whether the similar phrase, to "plume himself," has not its source in the same tradition.

"Chouse is a Persian word, spelt properly kiaus or chiaus, meaning intelligent, astute, and as applied to public agents an honorary title. In 1609, a certain Sir Robert Shirley sent before him to England a messenger, or chiaus, as his agent from the Grand Signior and the Sophy, he himself following at

his leisure. The agent chiaused the Persian and Turkish merchants in Eng land of four thousand pounds, and fled before Sir Robert arrived.

These sayings I have never heard the origin of before. There are some others which I remember to have learned, and afterwards forgotten, and which I may as well give here for the benefit of those who may not have been able to trace them out.

A "baker's dozen" was originally the devil's dozen, thirteen being the number of witches supposed to sit down together at their great meetings or sabbaths.

Hence the superstition about sitting thirteen at table. The baker was an unpopular character, and became substitute for the devil. (Query, Why was the baker unpopular?)

The explanation of the proverbial saying about "Hobson's choice" is given by Steele in the Spectator, No. 509. Hobson kept a livery stable, his stalls being ranged one behind another, counting from the door: each customer was obliged to take the horse which happened to be in the stall nearest the door, this chance fashion of serving being thought to secure perfect impartiality.

-Who can tell why the working of tapestry has gone out of fashion? It would be so much more satisfactory than the endless procession of tidies and pincushions and sofa-pillows, each with its little design, if some fair needlewoman would give her spare time and thought to a larger piece of work. It might be done in small separate squares, so that there would be no objection to the clumsy roll of canvas, which could not be moved about or looked upon as fancy-work; and it would be so picturesque and full of the spirit of romance to see a lovely lady with her colored crewels and her quaint designs, and know that she was stitch by stitch achieving a great work which would keep her memory bright for years to come. No

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