approaching exactness in definition, ever defining relationships to the last degree of nicety. For that reason, his sentences often seem cumbersome; he was unwilling to relinquish his effort at expression until he had reached the end of the ramifications of his thought. Together with this went a love of words as words and a wonderful patience in seeking the exact word and the right combination of words to convey his meaning with such emotional suggestiveness as he himself felt in connection with it.

THE CHILD IN THE HOUSE

Pp. 657 ff. The Child in the House is to some extent autobiographical. It was written in 1878 when Pater was thirty-nine years old and had been away twenty-five years from the Enfield home (about ten miles from London). In the house itself the Watteau picture probably represents one by Jean-Baptiste Pater, Watteau's contemporary, to whose stock the English Paters were supposed to belong. For a study of Watteau and Pater, see Pater's essay, A Prince of Court Painters. Undoubtedly Florian Deleal represents Pater's own attitude as evolved by home influences, just as Emerald Uthwart reflects his own life at Canterbury School and its effect upon him.

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

FRANÇOIS VILLON

Pp. 662 ff. Stevenson was exactly the man to write upon Villon; he was enough of a bohemian and enough of a poet to present with the utmost charity and clarity his sordid material. His interest in Villon appears further in his story, A Lodging for the Night, of which Villon is the hero.

The book upon which Stevenson bases most of his information is Longnon's Etude biographique sur François Villon, Paris, 1877; but he seems also to have consulted the Bourgeois de Paris (ed. Panthéon) and the Chronique Scandaleuse (ed. Panthéon), among other books. Further details and illustrative material about the life of Villon may be found in Champion's François Villon, Paris, 1913.

Stevenson's object is to reconstruct, out of the facts brought to light by research, the living image of a man. In this he succeeds admirably, partly by his sympathetic realization of what Villon must have meant to himself and to others, and partly by his clearness of presentation. An

other source of charm is, as always, his racy and delightful English.

P. 664 a. with specification of one work, etc. Stevenson here misses the point. The book in question, The Rommant du Pet au Deable, was Villon's first work, now lost, a mock romance relating the pranks of students at the University of Paris while Villon was there. The Pet au Deable was a stone which lay before the house of a pious old woman. It was moved by the students to their quarter, and a great deal of merrymaking and rioting grew out of the whole affair. Signs were also stolen from different parts of the city, and the doings finally led to a serious clash between the University and the city authorities. Without attempting to whitewash Villon or his lost poem, we may believe that his uncle might have received such a legacy without being insulted and still be a worthy ecclesiastic, but with a twinkle for the vagaries of students.

P. 668 a. a whole improper romance, etc. Stevenson omits the important point that this romance was Villon's lost composition referred to above. Tabary was a clerk, apparently a fellowstudent with Villon, who describes him, in this very connection, as “a real man” (homs veritable); but his later career scarcely bore out the compliment.

P. 672 a. Charles of Orleans. . . in the pages of the present volume, that is Familiar Studies of Men and Books, in which is printed also Stevenson's essay on Charles of Orleans. He was nephew and cousin to kings of France, was captured at Agincourt in 1415, and kept prisoner in England for twenty-five years. He had a pretty skill in lyric verse and was a great patron of poets.

P. 675 a. The date of the "Large Testament," etc. Since the essay was written, a few more facts have been discovered; but they are sordid details of two more arrests, the second ending in a sentence of death by hanging, which was afterward lightened to banishment from Paris for ten years. In this case, an unprovoked assault on a notary and his scribes, Villon seems to have been entirely innocent; but he was punished for being in bad company, and because his career was notorious. In 1463, then, he left Paris, and no more is known of him. He was broken in health, and without means of subsistence; and the sentence against him must have kept him continually exposed to danger. He was dead in 1489 when his works were first published.

TRANSLATIONS OF CLASSICAL AUTHORS

Every student of English poetry should have access to the chief Greek and Latin classics. As few can nowadays be expected to read the original texts, a brief list of cheap translations of the authors who have had the greatest influence upon English literature may be useful:

Iliad, translated by Pope (Astor ed., 50 cents); tr. Lang, Leaf, and Myers (prose), 80 cents.

Odyssey, tr. Paimer, 75 cents; tr. Butcher and Lang (prose), 80 cents.

Æschylus (Everyman's Library, 35 cents).

Sophocles (Everyman's Library, 35 cents). Euripides (2 vols., Everyman's Library, 35 cents each).

Plato, Five Dialogues on Poetic Inspiration (Everyman's Library, 35 cents).

Theocritus, Bion, and Moschus, tr. Lang (prose), 80 cents.

Vergil, tr. Conington (Astor ed. 50 cents); tr. Lonsdale and Lee (prose), $1.25.

Horace (Everyman's Library, 35 cents).

Ovid, the only accessible translation at present is that in Bohn's Library 3 vols., $1.50 each (of which Vol. II is the most valuable); but Mr. Dent promises that a translation will soon be included in Everyman's Library.

Editions of all the classical texts with translations are planned for the Loeb Classical Library (the Macmillan Company); many of them have already been published.