Part 31

From the chapter on the author’s library, which is full of priceless literary treasures, the reader can appreciate the appropriate surroundings amid which this book was compiled.

ANTHONY TROLLOPE: HIS WORK, ASSOCIATES AND ORIGINALS. By T. H. S. Escott. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

⁂ The author of this book has not solely relied for his materials on a personal intimacy with its subject, during the most active years of Trollope’s life, but from an equal intimacy with Trollope’s contemporaries and from those who had seen his early life. He has derived, and here sets forth, in chronological order, a series of personal incidents and experiences that could not be gained but for the author’s exceptional opportunities. These incidents have never before appeared in print, but that are absolutely essential for a right understanding of the opinions—social, political, and religious—of which Trollope’s writings became the medium, as well as of the chief personages in his stories, from the “Macdermots of Ballycloran” (1847) to the posthumous “Land Leaguers” (1883). All lifelike pictures, whether of place, individual, character of incident, are painted from life. The entirely fresh light now thrown on the intellectual and spiritual forces, chiefly felt by the novelist during his childhood, youth and early manhood, helped to place within his reach the originals of his long portrait gallery, and had their further result in the opinions, as well as the estimates of events and men in which his writings abound, and which, whether they cause agreement or dissent, always reveal life, nature, and stimulate thought. The man, who had for his Harrow schoolfellows Sidney Herbert and Sir William Gregory, was subsequently brought into the closest relations with the first State officials of his time, was himself one of the most active agents in making penny postage a national and imperial success, and when he planted the first pillar-box in the Channel Islands, accomplished on his own initiative a great postal reform. A life so active, varied and full, gave him a greater diversity of friends throughout the British Isles than belonged to any other nineteenth century worker, literary or official. Hence the unique interest of Trollope’s course, and therefore this, its record.

THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH PATRIOTISM. By Esmé C Wingfield Stratford, Fellow King’s College, Cambridge. In 2 vols. Demy 8vo. With a Frontispiece to each volume, (1,300 pages). 25s. net.

⁂ This work compresses into about HALF A MILLION WORDS the substance of EIGHT YEARS of uninterrupted labour.

The book has been read and enthusiastically commended by the leading experts in the principal subjects embraced in this encyclopædic survey of English History.

When this work was first announced under the above title, the publisher suggested calling it “A New History of England.” Indeed it is both. Mr. Wingfield Stratford endeavours to show how everything of value that nations in general, and the English nation in particular, have at any time achieved has been the direct outcome of the common feeling upon which patriotism is built. He sees, and makes his readers see, the manifold development of England as one connected whole with no more branch of continuity than a living body or a perfect work of art.

The author may fairly claim to have accomplished what few previous historians have so much as attempted. He has woven together the threads of religion, politics, war, philosophy, literature, painting, architecture, law and commerce, into a narrative of unbroken and absorbing interest.

The book is a world-book. Scholars will reconstruct their ideas from it, economics examine the gradual fruition of trade, statesmen devise fresh creative plans, and the general reader will feel he is no insignificant unit, but the splendid symbol of a splendid world.

CHARLES CONDER: HIS LIFE AND WORK. By Frank Gibson. With a Catalogue of the Lithographs and Etchings by Campbell Dodgson, M.S., Keeper of Prints and Drawings, British Museum. With about 100 reproductions of Conder’s work, 12 of which are in colour. Demy 4to. 21s. net.

⁂ With the exception of one or two articles in English Art Magazines, and one or two in French, German, and American periodicals, no book up to the present has appeared fully to record the life and work of Charles Condor, by whose death English Art has lost one of its most original personalities. Consequently it has been felt that a book dealing with Conder’s life so full of interest, and his work so full of charm and beauty, illustrated by characteristic examples of his Art both in colour and in black and white, would be welcome to the already great and increasing number of his admirers.

The author of this book, Mr. Frank Gibson, who knew Conder in his early days in Australia and afterwards in England during the rest of the artist’s life, is enabled in consequence to do full justice, not only to the delightful character of Conder as a friend, but is also able to appreciate his remarkable talent.

The interest and value of this work will be greatly increased by the addition of a complete catalogue of Conder’s lithographs and engravings, compiled by Mr. Campbell Dodgson, M.A., Keeper of the Print-Room of the British Museum.

PHILIP DUKE OF WHARTON. By Lewis Melville. Illustrated. Demy 8vo. 21s. net.

⁂ A character more interesting than Philip, Duke of Wharton, does not often fall to the lot of a biographer, yet, by some strange chance, though nearly two hundred years have passed since that wayward genius passed away, the present work is the first that gives a comprehensive account of his life. A man of unusual parts and unusual charm, he at once delighted and disgusted his contemporaries. Unstable as water, he was like Dryden’s Zimri, “Everything by starts and nothing long.” He was poet and pamphleteer, wit, statesman, buffoon, and amorist. The son of one of the most stalwart supporters of the Hanoverian dynasty, he went abroad and joined the Pretender, who created him a duke. He then returned to England, renounced the Stuarts, and was by George I. also promoted to a dukedom—while he was yet a minor. He was the friend of Attenbury and the President of the Hell-Fire Club. At one time he was leading Spanish troops against his countrymen, at another seeking consolation in a monastery. It is said that he was the original of Richardson’s Lovelace.

THE LIFE OF MADAME TALLIEN NOTRE DAME DE THERMIDOR (A Queen of Shreds and Patches.) From the last days of the French Revolution, until her death as Princess Chimay in 1885. By L. Gastine. Translated from the French by J. Lewis May. With a Photogravure Frontispiece and 16 other Illustrations Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

⁂ There is no one in the history of the French Revolution who has been more eagerly canonised than Madame Tallien; yet according to M. Gastine, there is no one in that history who merited canonisation so little. He has therefore set himself the task of dissipating the mass of legend and sentiment that has gathered round the memory of “La Belle Tallien” and of presenting her to our eyes as she really was. The result of his labour is a volume, which combines the scrupulous exactness of conscientious research with the richness and glamour of a romance. In the place of the beautiful heroic but purely imaginary figure of popular tradition, we behold a woman, dowered indeed with incomparable loveliness, but utterly unmoral, devoid alike of heart and soul, who readily and repeatedly prostituted her personal charms for the advancement of her selfish and ignoble aims. Though Madame Tallien is the central figure of the book, the reader is introduced to many other personages who played famous or infamous roles in the contemporary social or political arena, and the volume, which is enriched by a number of interesting portraits, throws a new and valuable light on this stormy and perennially fascinating period of French history.

MINIATURES: A Series of Reproductions in Photogravure of Ninety-Six Miniatures of Distinguished Personages, including Queen Alexandra, the Queen of Norway, the Princess Royal, and the Princess Victoria. Painted by Charles Turrell. (Folio.) The Edition is limited to One Hundred Copies for sale in England and America, and Twenty-Five Copies for Presentation, Review, and the Museums. Each will be Numbered and Signed by the Artist. 15 guineas net.

RECOLLECTIONS OF GUY DE MAUPASSANT. By his Valet François. Translated from the French by Maurice Reynold. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

THE WIFE OF GENERAL BONAPARTE. By Joseph Turquan. Author of “The Love Affairs of Napoleon,” etc. Translated from the French by Miss Violette Montagu. With a Photogravure Frontispiece and 16 other Illustrations. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

⁂ Although much has been written concerning the Empress Josephine, we know comparatively little about the veuve Beauharnais and the citoyenne Bonaparte, whose inconsiderate conduct during her husband’s absence caused him so much anguish. We are so accustomed to consider Josephine as the innocent victim of a cold and calculating tyrant who allowed nothing, neither human lives nor natural affections, to stand in the way of his all-conquering will, that this volume will come to us rather as a surprise. Modern historians are over-fond of blaming Napoleon for having divorced the companion of his early years; but after having read the above work, the reader will be constrained to admire General Bonaparte’s forbearance and will wonder how he ever came to allow her to play the Queen at the Tuileries.

THE JOURNAL OF A SPORTING NOMAD. By J. T. STUDLEY. With a Portrait and 32 other Illustrations, principally from Photographs by the Author. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

⁂ “Not for a long time have we read such straightforward, entertaining accounts of wild sport and adventure.”—Manchester Guardian.

⁂ “His adventures have the whole world for their theatre. There is a great deal of curious information and vivid narrative that will appeal to everybody.”—Standard.

SOPHIE DAWES, QUEEN OF CHANTILLY. By Violette M. Montagu. Author of “The Scottish College in Paris,” etc. With a Photogravure Frontispiece and 16 other Illustrations and Three Plans. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

⁂ Among the many queens of France, queens by right of marriage with the reigning sovereign, queens of beauty or of intrigue, the name of Sophie Dawes, the daughter of humble fisherfolk in the Isle of Wight, better known as “the notorious Mme. de Feucheres,” “The Queen of Chantilly” and “The Montespan de Saint Leu” in the land which she chose as a suitable sphere in which to exercise her talents for money-making and for getting on in the world, stand forth as a proof of what a woman’s will can accomplish when that will is accompanied with an uncommon share of intelligence.

MARGARET OF FRANCE DUCHESS OF SAVOY. 1523-1574. A Biography with Photogravure Frontispiece and 16 other Illustrations and Facsimile Reproductions of Hitherto Unpublished Letters. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

⁂ A time when the Italians are celebrating the Jubilee of the Italian Kingdom is perhaps no unfitting moment in which to glance back over the annals of that royal House of Savoy which has rendered Italian unity possible. Margaret of France may without exaggeration be counted among the builders of modern Italy. She married Emanuel Philibert, the founder of Savoyard greatness; and from the day of her marriage until the day of her death she laboured to advance the interests of her adopted land.