LITERARY AND ART NOTES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LVI, Issue 6498, 24 December 1881, Page 3

LITERARY AND ART NOTES.

The University presses of Oxford and Cambridge will shortly publish t hNow Testament with the Authorized and devised Torsion in parallel columns. Mr Swinburne’s new trag Hv, *' Qusen Mary,” the third part of the ’Mingy on tba life and death of the Scottish is now published. The Academy states that the glossary of " Anglo*lndian Words,” upon which Colonel Yale and Ur Burnell have been jointly engaged for the past tea years, and of which some specimen* have already anpeared in the Indian Antiquary, may bo expected shortly, A “People’s Edition" of Sir Theodore Martin's “ life of the Prince Consort'’ will shortly be published. The issue will be la five volumes, price fid each. Major Arthur Griffith*, who compiled the "Memorials of Millbank,” is preparing for publication chronicles of Newgate. He pro* poiet to give the history of the prison from the earliest time* to the present day, The Alheaaum states that in the "Q*rtenhaui,” of the Stein famUy, at Grots Koch berg, Saalfeld, in Thuringia, ha* been lately found the original manuscript of the great reorganisation project* for the Prussian State, 1807, by Freiherr von Stein. The new title of Scribner's Magazine will be the Century Scribner Monthly Magazine. The alteration takes place with the Aor ember issue, in which Mrs Frances Hodgson Barnett commences a new novel, entitled “Through one Administration.'’ The library of Paul and Alfred els Musset is about to he sold by public auction in Pam, It u said to contain many literary cariosities, among them being some rare romances. The King of the Belgians' prize of 25,000 f. will be granted for 1885 to the best work, to be published within four yean, on the mease to be employed and the measure* to be takes for popularising the study of geography and promoting the teaching of it in sctools of all kinds. The London correspondent of the Philadelphia Press, in a budget of literary news, says that Henry James, jan., bat just returned from Italy, where he bo* been at work on a new novel.

Tbs translation bj M. QolerJicbell of • mott interesting Egyptian hieratic papyrus, relating romantic adventure* in I’oot oar Somali, probably ia the thirteenth dj nasty, will appear shortly. They are as curious as those known as the “ Adventures of Sanch* and the predestined Prince.” The papers of the late Dean o! Westminster are left in charge of three literary executors —Canon Pearson of Windsor, Ur Theodors Walrond, 0.8, of the Civil Service Commission, and Mr George Grove, editor sf Macmillan's Magasioa and of the 11 Di#» lionary of Music.” Mr Edmond OTkmoran, the plucky correspondent of the London Daily AVer, who was recently a captive at Merr, is on his way sod wifi write a book about the Turcomans. It ia said the leading London publishers am bidding heavily against each other for tbs book, and that more for it has already been offered them Mr Stanley received for “ How 1 Found Livingstone.” M. Zola has made an original discovery in the ethics of literature, which he reveal* is his lost Figaro essay. He is prof jundly convinced that" realism ” purifies the heart, and that what is supposed to he a characteristic evil of French society can be traced directly to the baneful influence of Meal romances like George Sand’s “Indiana” and Octave Femllet's “ Somance of a Poor Young Man.” Mr Hepworth’s story with the exclamatory title is noticed by the Literary World in th* spirit of which it was named: Its title is “; t!" We will only add that we opened it with ? ? P, were contented to read it at.. skipped some $ § § which seemed rather stupid, found it marked with - - • and to he without i| ia recent literature, and are inclined to mark it Hi book which bdoap in (). It does not easily yield “ ” and hardly demands more than this We do not mean to east any *'■’ upon it, but whoever die down to read it through will hare to hw attention to the task.

Apropos of a recent poem by Ur Swinburne ia the AfLcturnsi, the Weekly Register publishes three unpleasant paragraphs concerning the late Daptain Trelawney. When a man is just dead it seems a pity to rake up stories which tell against him, even if—lika the story of the uncovering of Byton’a corpse —they happen to be true j but it is something, more thou a pity to perpetuate them when they are demonstrably false. “ Dickens,** says.the Weekly Register, “used to telle dreadful story, which, if we remember right, he had from Leigh Hunt, to the effect that when the heart [of Shelley} was found uneensamed, Trelawney and Byron played at football with it, by way of vaunting their dierespect for life, death, and humanity.” The Pall Moll Gazette does not core much for third-band hearsay biography, even when it* detail# sure less revolting than this } and it thinks a little “respect for death and humanity "would have suggested the suppression of this paragraph. The detailed accounts of the cremation of Shelley given by both Hunt and Trdawuey himself leave no doubt that this is a “ dreadful story ” only in the juvenile terse of the latter word. It woe the hind of Trelawney, eays the Gazette, that snatched from the Same the cor cowfiwrs whieh now lies at Boacombe, and to suppose that he would rescue the heart of his friend only to treat it with inhuman outrage ie incredible, quite apart from the abundant evidence which proves it to be false. The catalogue of the Binder land library has been completed so far os the letter C; this includes 8,000 volumes. The first half of the coUrctioo of 20,000 volumes will be sold this month, the remainder ia April. The especial features of this wonderful collection are the rare Bibles, the reformation tracts, and the editions of the classics, of which several of Horace and Cicero, on vellum, are unique A fall-length portrait of her Majestycopied, by permission of the Queen, front Winterhalter’* picture—ha* been purchased by Osptain Clark, for his Highness the Nisam of Hynrabad, by desire of the Minister, Sir Solar Jung. The Queen has placed at the disposal of Messrs Maolure and Macdonald the Chevalier Angeli's portrait ol the late Dean Stanley, recently exhibited at the Boyol Academy, to be reproduced by them at a print A statute to Lord Byron, which bos been erected at Missolonghi, will be formally inaugurated. A monument to the Belgian painter Wisrtx, whose gallery is one of the sights of Brussels, bos been unveiled at I idles, a suburban prolongation of Brussels. Ihe latest proposal for the erection of a statue come* from A quila, the ancient Amiternam. A committee has been formed to raise a statue to Sallust, the author of “ The Oonspirocyof Catiline,” who died about thirty years before the Christian era. The French Archeological Commission, who ore excavating in (bo neighbourhood of Olympus and Ddos, have discovered two life-iia* statues of Diana, which are believed to dato from the best age of Hellenic art. The Spanish paper* state that a discovery has been made m the Colonial Office at Madrid of a small picture in oils of Columbus, in a perfect state of preservation. It represents him ae about forty yean of age, with thick, dork bair { and a hooked none. XI bean the inscription, '* Columbus Lygur, navi orbit repertor,” and is thought to be a contemporary portrait.