LITERARY NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2201, 7 May 1896, Page 42

LITERARY NOTES.

' . " A Walt Whitman cult has arisen in Boston to compete with the Browning cult. *.' The United States Book Company, whose failure involved in loss several leading British authors, is about to be reorganised.

' . ' Magazines for the blind are now being published ; Recreation and Playtime are the titles, and further particulars can be obtained of tbe British and Foreign Blind Association, 33 Cambridge Square, Hyde Park, W.

* . ' Mr Alfred Austin is among the latest additions to Madame Tassaud's exhibition. The Poet Laureate's " The Garden that I Love "-has just reached its seventh thousand, and a fourth edition of " Sogland's Darling " is in. active preparation. "

• . • A new volume in the -Westminster Gszstte library will be " In the Evening of His Days : A Study of Mr Gladstone in Retirement, with Some Account of St. Deiniol's Library and Hostel." It will be issued uniform with the "Homes and Haunts of Thomas Oarlyle."

• . • A new novel by Miss N. O. Lorimer, entitled "A Sweet Disorder," is just published. Great interest attaches to its production, because a leading publishing house, on being shown the manuscript, at once bought 3000 copies for exportation to the colonies.

• . • A new novel is promised from the pen of Mrs Burnett— the first she has written •inoe " Through One Administration." It is to be entitled " A Lady of Quality," and the movement of the story takes place in the time of Qaeen Anns. M«s»rs Warne and Co. will publish it.

' . * A companion volume to " Twelve Bad Men," reoantly published, will be "Twelve Bad Women," which Mr T. Fisher Unwin will issue shortly. The famous (or infamous) " Moll Cutpurse," Barbara Villiers, and Mr* Brownrigg will figure in this now feminine rogues* gallery.

* . ■ Among the many editions of Barns which are to be published this season is one which will appear in Messrs Blis«, Sands, and Foster's " Cheapest Books in the World " series. It is intended to be one of the most complete yet issued, and consists of 578 demy Bvo pp. The poems and songs are in single columns, in large readable type, and there la a portrait of the author.

■ . ' Mr Heinemann announces for publication in the spring two volumes of diplomatic despatches and memoirs to be called " The Paget Papers." These volumeß deal with the earlier Napoleonic war?, and throw a new light on almost every phase of tbat most vital period of European history. The volumes will be edited by Sir Arthur Paget's sou, the Right Hon. Sir Augustus Paget, G. 0.8., late her Majesty's Ambassador at Vienna, and illustrated with numerous portraits of the chief contemporary figures of the time.

'.'lt is 15 years since the sale of "Buskin's Letters to the Clergy on the Lord's Prayer and the Ohuroh " was brought to an abrupt standstill. . The editor, Ray. T. ■ A, Hallesou, to whom the copyright belof ga, has arranged to entrust-, to Mr George Alien the publication of a third edition, which will comprise the new features of a number of interesting and' characteristic letters from Mr Ruskin to the editor, while at the same time the letters of clergy and laity will be considerably abridged. ■ -

' . * The firm of Micmillan and Co. was registered as a limited company on January 31, the capital being stated at £240,000, divided into 1400 6 par cent., preference shares and 1000 ordinary shares of £100 each. The first directors are - Messrs G. L. Oraik, F. O. MacmilUn, Q. A. Maomillrtn, and IS.. C. Macmillan, with a qualification of £5000 each and their remuneration 20 per cent, of the net profits divisible after pstytog the preference dividend. No Bhares are, we believe, offered to the public.

*.' An Interesting contribution from a correspondent at Brisbane appears in the Literary World about Mr J. H. Nicholson, who, at the age of 60, awoke to find himself famous throughout the antipodes for his book, " The Adventures , of Halak.J' The book, it is said, was written under the iDfluenoe of a strange spiritual afflatus. He was liviog in the solitude of the Queensland busb, ' and . though he bad previously attempted no literary work, he was seized with a desire to write. Tbe book is said to teem with "graphic illustrations of the heart's tragedies, its weird parables, and philosophic aphorisms."

• . •We hasten to congratulate Lloyd's News upon scaling the million, and thus making a record circulation. It has not only scaled tbe million, but gone 4506 copies beyond it. Mr Catling and the proprietors who have so ably co-operated with him may well be proud of the unique achievement, We believe it has been attained without any of the tricks of offering prizes and premiums that are resorted to by so many of it weekly contemporaries. We have not ventured to work oat the average per households in the United Kingdom, but it must be nearly one in seven that takes in Lloyd's. • . • Messrs G. P. Putnam's Sons publish this week a new story by Mr B. W. Chamberp, the author of " The King in Yellow " and one or two other successful books. It is entitled " The Bad Republic ; a Romance of the Commune." Mr Chambers has, of course, got his " local colouring " on the spot, and historical faots from a great many persons who w«re of the Commune or merely spectators of it. His "revolutionary friends," as he calls them, in Belleville, Montmartre, and Bt, Antointv have given him thai*

reminiscences. He has also had access td' the official records of the Commune.

*.■ Following Mr Barry Pain, Mr Grant Allen, and Mr Zangarill, the next volume of 11 The Breezy Library * will be a novelette by Mr Joseph Hattoa, entitled "A World Afloat." It is in the lighter vein of the author's style, of which we have a good example in "Tom Chester*! Sweetheart," a somewhat farcical treatment, by the way, 61 tha kind of proprietary and editorial quarrel recently developed over a certain an evening paper Mr Hatton'i original title for this story was " The Editor "; it is a tale of the press; while "A World Afloat" it a atoryof an ocean voyage not altogether unconnected with journalism and foreign correspondence. •.-Mr Sherard's "Notes from Paris" ia tha Author are always worth reading. Ia the current number he saya somethteg on ths subject of "Sorrowful Endings," whjjoh may help authors to understand the popular aversion to them : "Itis a good thiug always ' to avoid painful impressions. I believe tbat these leave on the mind cicatrices,' if not bleeding wound*, the effect of which is f«lb all through life.- 1 remember holding forth on this subject by the side of the guillotine one night in Paris to a fresh young American who had oome for the awful spectacle of a o&pital execution. He was very excited, ancUaosred keen interest. I told him he would regret it. ' The memory of the bid«ous thing would haunt him, coming to him in happy, ,quiat moments to disturb — to appal. He laughed at me then ; but since he has written to me. * You were quite right,' he said ; ' I wish I had ' never seen that horrid thing. It comes upon me at the strangest times, nnd always makes me miserable.' Ia the same way, I now ' always avoid painful books. Oaehasa burden of sorrow ample enough to bear without adding to it the woes of imaginary people. Ido wfrh now that I had never made the scquain- ' tance of little Donab&y or of the child in ' Misunderstood ' or of the hundred-and-one pale p«ta-drawn phantoms *rho haunt bib," -

* . *Mr Andrew Lang discourses on " Widowo " In the Morning. As to ths influence of widows on literature, he remarks, " one oould write a chapter." Bat he restricts himself to a brief note or two : " Inheriting her husband's papers, the widow *om«timeß publishes them indiscrimit;afaly and indiscreetly More probably she (taoUnes to allow any mortal even to look at them (if of biographical interest), and then tell* them, en matse, to a ragman ; or her daughters tell them in total ignorance of their nature and value. Sometimes the womankind of the deceased hero burn, everything inrHneriml* nately at sight, as a maiden aunt (name unknown) burned all Sir Walter Scott's letters to his friend Ewkina. N ■•» most letters are the better for being burned at once by the recipient, but letters of great literary value and interest fare ill at the hands of widown and the daughters of widows. To the fire, the ragman, or the auction of autographs, they usually take their way, and the biographer becomes a confirmed misogynist." Another effVcfe of thewMow in literature Is s her aptitude to rise in arms when an essayist writes anything about her dear lost husband : "H«r ory goes keening on 'the gale, and- 1 veed not say that there is no use 'in arguing wi,sh a widow. The wisdom'of the Brahmins devised the remedy which EnglUh rule has, perhap* inconsiderately, abolished."