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a detailed account of how he vainly assailed the leading magazines with a short "Solution of the World-problem" in an essay of twenty pages (a beggarly allowance, truly, in light of the five hundred and fifty devoted to the Evolution of the Mind of Dr Crozier !), and how he was invariably worsted by the "dæmonic element." Then he bearded Carlyle, and found him "querulous, cantankerous, and altogether too critical and exacting for ordinary humanity"-too critical even for Dr Crozier, for the dyspeptic and sorely tried sage, parodying Jeffrey, closured our author's autobiographical confidences with a brusque "Na, na, that winna do."

And Carlyle was not the only victim of Dr Crozier's attentions. We confess that we have seldom read anything with more amusement than the story of his amiable persecution of authors, friends, and editors; and had there been only a little more of such sack and a less intolerable deal of stale bread, we could have found it possible to speak of this stately volume with enthusiasm. The keynote of Dr Crozier's mental life, if we mistake not, is struck very early in the volume, where he confesses that he once made "a serious attempt to subjugate the vanity and conceit which were now at their flowering-time with me, and which I already felt to be reptiles throwing a trail of slime and baseness over all of good that I thought or did; but after several ineffectual attempts to eradicate

the vice, I gave up the task as hopeless, and awaited a more propitious day." We shall be glad if we may in some degree hasten the advent of that propitious day, and we forgive much in My Inner Life' on account of the crowning horror which Dr Crozier has spared us. "In what other form," he asks, the autobiographical could I present my ideas unless indeed as a Novel, in which, however, for want of space, justice could only be done to a small division of the subject."

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It is with a distinct feeling of relief that we turn from the vainest of mortals to the greatest and most inscrutable immortal. While Dr Crozier "abides [nay, anticipates] our question," our Shakespeare still "is free knowledge even the knowledge possessed by Mr Sidney Lee. Were 'Maga' to "crown the best book of the past year, she would not hesitate to select Mr Lee's 'Life of William Shakespeare.' This masterly work is an honour to English scholarship, an almost perfect model of its kind, and it is matter for great national rejoicing that the standard life of Shakespeare has at last been "made in England." Rarely have we seen a book so wholly satisfying, so admirably planned, so skilfully executed. Mr Lee makes no attempt to offer us aesthetic criticism, and in this lies the great excellence of his plan, for we have hitherto had enough and to spare of "imaginative insight" and all too little of accurate and well - digested facts. Accordingly, it is im

speare. We emphatically repeat, however, that these questions do not enter into an estimate of the new Life of Shakespeare. Mr Lee modestly hopes that his work may be found "a complete and trustworthy guidebook," and it is assuredly that, and a great deal more. It is an absolutely indispensable handbook for every intelligent reader of the plays.

possible to rate too highly this Lee seems to us far more "guide-book to Shakespeare's cogent, and his interpretation life and work," which impresses of the Sonnets is the most the reader at once by its re- reasonable and most convincing markable width and accuracy that has yet been put forward. of learning, its marvellously But most of these points are lucid marshalling of intricate likely to remain for all time sub details, and the unfailing so- iudice, and we trust that their briety and modesty of its style. final settlement may be long The only portions of the book delayed, if for no other reason that are really open to criticism than to continue and stimulate are the few occasions on which our critical interest in ShakeMr Lee, departing somewhat from his original design, definitely enters the field of controversy; and though no one has a better right to be heard on these matters, we are inclined to think that it would have been better for Mr Lee to maintain consistently his role as the impartial historian of everything relating to Shakespeare. Dr Robertson Nicoll has recently been promulgating the very disputable theory that a critic should be set to catch a critic, and granting his theory -justly pluming himself on having elicited Professor Dowden's opinion of Mr Lee's achievement. The instance adduced does not inspire us with much confidence in the proposition, for, as might have been expected, the professor reviews only those portions of the book which are really extraneous to its real design, and pays but halting tribute to its total excellence. True, Mr Lee, while always ingenious, is not always convincing in his positive criticism, and his argument in favour of Barnabe Barnes affords no adequate reason for departing from Professor Minto's identification of Chapman with the "rival poet" of the Sonnets. On other disputed points, Mr

The industry of biographers has of late been pressing hardly on the memory of Robert Louis Stevenson, whom SO many writers persist in referring to as R. L. S. - an affectation which does not make for the dignity of letters. We hope and trust that, when the time comes, Mr Sidney Colvin may deal as faithfully by R. L. S. as Mr Sidney Lee has by W. S., or Mrs Ritchie by W. M. T. So far, however, we have little to be thankful for in the way of Stevensonian biography, if we except Mr Henley's very masterly and virile portrait in verse. Professor Raleigh, whom the reviewers, not without justice, term the Lyly of to-day, has discoursed in a vein of three-piled hyperbole, but the volume-remarkable chiefly for its wealth of mixed metaphor

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did not inspire us with confidence in the critical value of Victorian euphuism. Nor did the article in the Dictionary of National Biography' carry us further than an admiration for Mr Colvin's astuteness in stimulating a curiosity in the Great Work that is to come. Meanwhile Mrs Black and Miss Simpson have been busy. "For once," wrote Mr Frederic Harrison in the wisest and most stimulating utterance produced by the "Choice of Books" inquiry-"for once that we take down our Milton, and read a book of that 'voice,' as Wordsworth says, 'whose sound is like the sea,' we take up fifty times a magazine with something about Milton, or about Milton's grandmother, or a book stuffed with curious facts about the houses in which he lived, and the juvenile ailments of his first wife." And thus it is we now know positively that at the age of four Stevenson was gorgeously arrayed "in a blue merino pelisse trimmed with grey astrachan," and that the excellent Cummy was dissatisfied therewith, justly "indignant that such a bairn should be dressed in a remnant, however excellent the stuff." Says Miss Simpson, "How interesting it would have been to have had a photograph of these two mothers (Mrs Barrie and Mrs Stevenson) discussing their sons, their books, or their infantine ailments." We confess that we entertain no curiosity whatever on the subject; but should Miss Simpson see fit to give us a series of imaginary maternal conversations, we shall be glad to

hear something of what passed between Mrs Jonson and Mrs Shakespeare regarding the juvenile delinquencies of their distinguished sons. All this seems to us the reductio ad absurdum of biography; and it would be unworthy of the advertisement of reprobation, were it not that it represents an all too common tendency in present-day journalism-a tendency begotten of vulgar and irrelevant curiosity.

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Justice compels us to admit, however, that these efforts at biography have not been written in vain. They tell little, it is true, of their hero that is of any literary value, though they ascribe to him a measure of affectation which we hope is as exaggerated as is their praise; but their real achievement lies in the fact that, hopelessly dull themselves, they have driven Mr Sidney Colvin into a position of delightfully humorous absurdity. No sooner had Mrs Black's humble volume appeared than Mr Colvin thundered "Hands off!-let no one touch Stevenson while the chosen biographer perpends.' There is much that attracts us in this new Literary Game Law, with its close seasons and its ominous warnings to such as trespass. But it was surely ungallant of Mr Colvin to bully two very harmless ladies, who have done their work so poorly that we are prepared to be all the more lenient to his longannounced and much-vaunted masterpiece when it does come. Let it be accounted for righteousness to Mrs Black and Miss Simpson that they have maintained the "open door" against Mr Colvin's preposterous theory of protection.

ROMANCE OF THE MINES:

CALIFORNIAN GOLD DISCOVERIES.

NORTHERN AMERICA was founded on furs and built up with gold and silver. The fur companies and the the reckless trappers in their pay had scattered trading - posts over the Canadas, and roughly explored the inhospitable regions lying between the Missouri and the Pacific. Yet, to all appearance, the population and civilisation of the western territories appertaining to the Union might have been indefinitely deferred. The agricultural pioneers had been slowly pushing westward across the prairies; but it was a perilous venture, and by no means remunerative. The fertility of the deep black loam had been recognised; but the rude cultivation was carried on under difficulties, and there were no local markets. The costs of transport knocked off the profits. The Santa Fé trade received a considerable impulse on the annexation of Mexico; but it was never likely to attain very lucrative proportions, so long as it lay across an unpeopled wilderness, raided by the Indians whom the caravans attracted. The States had been annexing to the south and on the western seaboard; but they could not digest the territories they had swallowed, and the western movement was virtually at a deadlock. Yet their statesmen cherished vague dreams of expansion, possibly to be real

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ised in the distant future. Clarke and Lewis made their wonderful expedition in 1804, starting from St Louis, which was then the outlying tradingpost on the Missouri. It was undertaken chiefly from political curiosity, and in the interests of geographical science. After eighteen months of incredible endurance, the explorers reached the shores of the Pacific. It was nearly forty years before that expedition was followed up, and the second and more important exploration originated in haphazard and a love romance. By something like a providence, Fremont was predestined to prepare a way for the impending rush of gold-seekers. The man who won, and well deserved, the sobriquet of the Great Pathfinder was a young officer of Engineers when he engaged himself to the pretty daughter of Benton, the senator from Missouri. The lieutenant was poor, and had no prospects, so the stern parent would not hear of the match. He used his influence at Washington to send the youth on the perilous adventure of examining the Des Moines river.

It was a new version of the old story of labours imposed on lovers, when the gods or fairies come to their help. To the senator's surprise and disgust, the successful surveyor was back within the year. As his bride was still

withheld, he married her sec- plored Alaska, was wrecked on

retly, and, by way of making provision for the future, planned a geographical survey of the western territory of the States. His record was good, and the Government gave him employment. He was charged to investigate the Rockies, with special regard to discovering a pass which should give tolerably easy communication with the Pacific. He struck out the South Pass, and it remained the chief route of travel until the treasure-seekers found capital to lay down the railways. On a subsequent expedition in 1843, and in the beginning of a severe winter, he was lost among the tributaries of the Columbia, in the chaos of barren mountains. Famine was staring the party in the face suggestions of cannibalism had been freely broached, when Kit Carson, the redoubtable scout and guide, stepped forward to accept the responsibility of extricating it from what seemed a hopeless cul de sac. And, sure enough, Kit's instincts guided them to Sutter's Fort on the Sacramento, where the ragged company of skeletons received a warm welcome.

the return voyage in the Bay of San Francisco, and as he liked the look of the country on which he had been cast, there he resolved to settle down. Getting a grant of land from the Mexican Government, he established his settlement of New Helvetia on the site of Sacramento. The Mexicans appreciated him so highly that they made him Governor of Northern California, and when that country was ceded by treaty to America, he was confirmed in the post under a different title. Everything prospered under his hand. He initiated enterprise after enterprise, and was a generous employer of labour. His munificence was proverbial: for hospitality he was famed far and wide: he seemed to be reaping the rich reward of his good works. He took to spinning woollens and distilling spirits; he was enlarging the sawmills, which were doing a smart stroke of business in the lumber trade; and these were but a few of his thriving industrial undertakings. Beneath the foundations of his buildings were buried treasures of which neither he nor any one else had a suspicion. The year 1848 was fateful for Sutter, as for kings and potentates in Continental Europe. In an evil hour he signed a contract to run up a new mill. Digging for the mill - race, strange sparkles were seen in the sands. On close examination they proved to be gold-dust. The discovery was an incentive to further researches. The

Sutter, whose name will always be associated with that of Fremont, had an even more romantic career, and its end is infinitely touching. It points a moral on the vicissitudes of life and the vanity of human aspirations. Born in Baden, he had served with some distinction in Switzerland. In 1834 he emigrated to America, and embarked in the Santa Fé trail of the dust was traced trade. He made money, ex- up to pockets, and then to

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