good taste, a correct ear for the melody of verse, and not a little original power as a writer. Mabel,' the first considerable poem, is cast in narrative form, and the scene is laid in America; it is a simple story, simply and unaffectedly told. Still better is 'Hector and Alice,' a tale of Brock's warfare on Queenston Heights. The shorter lyrics are marked by great facility of expression, and range in all manner of themes from grave to gay, from lively to severe.' As a specimen we quote the following:

Lo our fathers, martyrs, heroes, daily passing from our view,

From the world of false and fleeting, to the realins of bright and true.

From the deep unbroken forest, they have hewn our happy homes;

From the giants of the forest, they have reared our glittering domes.

Still we see the axe uplifted; still we hear the woodland ring;

See the thundering hemlocks falling prostrate to their sturdy king:

Still we hear their native chorus ling'ring, dying in the grove;

Sce the sickles strongly wielded; see the brawny muscles move.'

WHAT a leap to the front Canada

has taken in the arts connected with illustrated book manufacture, by the publication of this elaborate serial work which the enterprise of the Art Publishing Co., of Toronto, has projected for the delineation, by pen and pencil, of Canadian life and scenery. We employ no extravagant language when we say, that no publication of its kind has anywhere appeared of higher artistic merit, and that no undertaking promises to be of greater value to 'this Canada of ours,' or is likely to be more highly prized by every patriotic Canadian. At one stride we seem to have passed from the callow to the golden era

*Picturesque Canada: Our Country as it was and is, described by the best writers and artists,' edited by Principal Grant, D.D., Queen's University, Kingston, and illustrated under the supervision of Mr. L. R. O'Brien, President of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts; Mr. George F. Smith, chief of the Engraving department. Parts 1 & 2, 4to. Art Publishing Co., Toronto, Publishers. [First notice from advance sheets.]

of book illustrating, as any one will say who not only sees the initial parts of this magnificent work, about to be published, but who may have the good fortune to have a look at what the publishers have in preparation for subsequent issues of the book. Its publication, we do not hesitate to say, will mark a great artistic epoch in the intellectual progress of our people, which must have an immense influence upon the present and future of Canadian art and Canadian literature. The design of the work is two-fold first and mainly, to portray whatever is picturesque in the life, the industries, the sports, and other national characteristics of the Dominion, and of the wealth and variety of the beauty with which nature and art have invested it; and secondly and incidentally, to weave into the narrative whatever of historic lore is associated with the sights and scenes to be successively described in its pages. What scope all

this will give to both artist and writer few among us, it is feared, have any adequate notion. The truth is, that as the country is only now arriving at manhood, the individual Canadian is just beginning to have an appreciative sense of the grandeur of his inheritance, and of the potentialities that are now quickening into life in the womb of the nation. In this connection, the glowing words of Lord Dufferin will no doubt recur to many of our readers, and will the more readily be recalled as the superb pages of 'Picturesque Canada' are turned over and its many beauties arrest and delight the eye. 'Like a virgin goddess in a primeval world,' says his Excellency, Canada still walks in unconscious beauty among her golden woods and along the margin of her trackless streams, catching but broken glances of her radiant majesty, as mirrored on their surface, and scarcely dreams as yet of the glorious future awaiting her in the Olympus of nations.' And it is this virgin beauty of our fair Dominion, from the ancient domain of Acadie and the fishing waters of the early Normans, Bretons, and Basques, that first whitened their surface with the sails of their crafts, to the hither ocean on the west, whose tides have daily sported for eons in flowing up and down the estuaries and fiords of its wild and rugged coast, that the work before us is to depict, and to heighten the sense of possession in our fair heritage in the breast of every one who looks upon the beauties which art has gathered up for picture-posies to decorate our national literature and enrich our,national life. But it is not the natural scenery alone of the Dominion, as we have said, that Picturesque Canada' is to portray, but its growth in settlement and civilization, with all the features of its social, intellectual, and religious life, of the present and a bye-gone age. Summer with its husbandry and vintages, its traffic on land and river, and winter with the play and movement which it gives to the industry which has hitherto been its chief source of wealth-are all to find treatment, recounting the varied facts of their historical development and statistical increase, and portraying whatever picturesque features may belong to them.

To the execution of this great work, which would have been a huge undertaking for the nation itself to engage in, the publishers have manifestly brought

an amount of energy, a degree of art enthusiasm, and a command of resource, which are at once the inspiring forces in the prosecution of their enterprise and the best guarantee of its satisfactory fulfilment. In the literary direction of the work the publishers have had the good fortune to secure Principal Grant, of Queen's University, Kingston, as its Editor-in-Chief, a gentleman eminently fitted, by a rich endowment of gifts of intellect and temperament, to do justice to the duties that fall to him. Equally fortunate have they been in securing the services of Mr. L. R. O'Brien, President of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, and one of the most accomplished members of the profession, to undertake the supervision of the Art department ; and, as chief of the staff of engravers they have been similarly fortunate in enlisting in their service Mr. George F. Smith, a gentleman of high repute in metropolitan art circles for his technical skill and felicitous touch in the delicate art of wood-engraving. With these combined advantages, the projetors of 'Picturesque Canada' have begun their work, and are already far advanced with its execution. At the beginning of the year the first two numbers will appear, to be followed by monthly instalments thereafter, to the extent of some thirty-four or thirty-six parts-the price of which, we understand, is to be sixty cents each. The plan of the work, we learn, is first, to start with Quebec, whose historic past is summarized in a bright narrative by Principal Grant, and the modern topography of which is given by Miss Machar, of Kingston; secondly, two parts are to be devoted to describing, by a competent writer, French Canadian life and character, as depicted in village scenes on the St. Lawrence between Quebec and Montreal; then come descriptions of the latter, the commercial metropolis of Canada, and the route between that city and the capital of the Dominion, then the Capital itself, and the water-way above it to Mattawa, with an interesting description, and an elaborate embellishment, of lumbering operations on the Upper Ottawa. Following this, and proceeding by the old trapper's route to the Western Lakes, the artist and the writer will conduct the reader, via Lake Nipissing and the French River, to the Georgian Bay, thence to the Sault Ste Marie and the head of Lake Superior. From this point Manitoba, the

North-West territories, and the Mountain Province beyond are to be reached and described, with all that pen and pencil can catch of the vast, unfolding panorama en route. This, in all probability, will complete one section of the work, after which a return will be made to Ontario. Toronto will now be illustrated and described; then will follow the Niagara section, the Welland Canal and the shipping trade connected with it, the peach and vine growing districts, with Hamilton, and the series of towns, their industries, &c., situate in the peninsula of the Province. Following upon this, come descriptions of the Muskoka Lakes, those lying back of the frontier towns on the line of the Grand Trunk, the frontier towns themselves, the region of the Thousand Islands, and the run down the rapids by steamer to Montreal again, completing the second section of the work. The third and last will be devoted to the Eastern Townships, the Saguenay, the Lower St. Lawrence, and finally the Maritime Provinces, with illustrations of the mining operations and the fishing industries that pertain to the locality.

In our present notice we cannot do more than take a cursory glance at the opening number, deferring to a subsequent issue further criticism upon the work. The frontispiece consists of a fine steel engraving of Quebec, from the picture painted for Her Majesty by Mr. L. R. O'Brien, the Art Director of Picturesque Canada.' It is a faithful and painstaking study, with some fine light and shade effects, recalling, in its style and execution, the best specimens of the palmy days of English graphic art. The vignette title-page is a steel engraving of the bluffoverlooking the Ottawa, on which stand the Parliament Buildings and the buttressed rotunda of the library. This is from the pencil of Mr. F. B. Schell, an artist of rare ability, and one of the chief illustrators of the highest class of modern American periodical work well known in Canada. The first page of the work proper opens with a graceful head piece, giving a glimpse of the St. Lawrence at Quebec, with shipping in the foreground, and the 'great red rock' of the Citadel looming in the distance. This and the two following wood-cuts are from the drawings of Mr. L. R. O'Brien, and are typical examples of the high degree of art taste

and technical skill, in artist and engraver, secured by the publishers. The 'Arrival of Jacques Cartier at Stadacona' is a charming little study, full of poetic feeling, and effectively yet delicately rendered by the artist-engraver.

The Triumph of the Snow Plough' is one of those compositions, more suggested than realized, which puts the engraver's art to the test, in bringing out every line of the artist's pencil and, as it were, even the conception in his mind.

The other illustrations in the part, exclusive of a portrait of Champlain, consist of characteristic views of street scenes in the City of Quebec, two of which the view in front of the Church of Notre Dame des Victoires,' and 'At the Gate of Laval University,'- -are capital studies of the class of sight seers and loungers peculiar to the old historic Capital. A fine instance of Mr. F. B. Schell's light and dexterous touch appears in the picture, In the Gardens of the Ursuline Convent.' It is excellent both in subject and technique, and has been daintily engraved and admirably printed. Other picturesque scenes in and about the city complete the illustrations of the first number, the whole appearance of which is a favourable augury of the high excellence of that which is yet to come. We have left ourselves no room to speak of the literary character of the number, which, however, is of notable excellence, being in Dr. Grant's most felicitous vein. The narrative so far is bright and entertaining, with that dash of warm and ardent feeling, yet held in the check of good sense, which has won for the writer his high position among Canadian litterateurs. The paper and press-work deserve special commendation, the latter being an exceptionally good specimen of Canadian printing, so essential in a work of this character. The cover of the number is also specially noticeable, the design being chaste and effective, and the engraved medallions of the Marquis and Marchioness of Lorne being faithful portraits, and 'brought up' in excellent relief. We congratulate the country and all concerned in this undertaking on the spirited character of the enterprise, and on what it will accomplish in creating and diffusing a love of art, and an appreciation of its value as a means of national culture and refinement. On this ground alone it deserves well of the Canadian press and the Canadian people.

No greater proof could be given of

the recent wide-spread interest in art and art education, on both sides of the Atlantic, than the development of the prolific trade in Christmas Cards, and the impetus it has given to art designing in every branch of manufacture. The growth of a cultivated art taste in recent years is something quite unparalleled. It shows itself in a thousand departments of industry, sometimes, it is feared, in a too profuse display of uneducated and undisciplined effort, but on the whole, with a success and pleasure-giving effect which must exercise a refining influence on the coming generation. Elsewhere in the present number we have referred to a great native enterprise, in the publication of Picturesque Canada,' the production and dissemination of which, at home and abroad, must secure for Canadian literary and art culture a more than respectful consideration-we had almost said, an enthusiastic one. We could wish that in the department of Christmas Card designing and execution it were possible to show such results as Canada will have the credit of producing, in the work we have referred to, in the black and white effects of a wood engraver's block. But colour work is proverbially, we won't say, a higher achievement, but undoubtedly a more difficult one; and success in colourprinting, we must yet wait to see come to us in after years. However, if the execution of the work attempted in Canada in Christmas card production is not all that we would wish it to be, in its composition, drawing, and colouring, what has been produced is at least our own-and that is something-and, moreover, the subject of most of the work that has come under our observation is peculiarly and distinctively Canadian. Here again, however, there may be room for regret, as the conventional treatment of Canadian art subjects is apt to run exclusively into the old ruts of winter representation, with the concomitants of furs and sleighs. Nevertheless, they make pretty pictures, and suggest a

mas.

hearty social life, with unlimited opportunities for romantic love-making, and, in the skating and tobogganing scenes, for that physical development and healthfulness which the bracing atmosphere and active out-door exercise do much to secure. Another thing, moreover, in favour of our Canadian Christmas cards is this, that their designs are an agreeable change from the sickly medievalism, and the tiresome repetitions of religious art, of which we have long had a surfeit from the Old World. We may have gone, in this recoil, to the other extreme, and left out all the sig nificance which belongs to the season of Advent, and forgotten that a Christmas card should have some relation to ChristStill, for the purposes for which in the main they are used, viz., as tokens of remembrance and regard at a festive, holiday season, they fill the bill,' and as souvenirs from Canada to friends in the Mother land, their local colour is an especial charm and their picturesque scenes a wonder and delight. Of the cards of the present season that specially deserve notice, and that have had a most successful sale, the series published by Messrs. James Campbell & Son, of Toronto, from water-colour drawings by Canadian artists, may first be spoken of. They consist of some twelve designs, lithographed in colours, all but two of them representing Canada in winter. The two exceptions are autumn scenes, one of a sheet of water, with a back ground of trees in their autumnal foliage, the undulating line of some distant hills, and an Indian encampment in the foreground. The other is a spirited scene of a number of picturesquelydressed voyageurs in a bark canoe running the rapids. Two others deal with Niagara in winter one portraying the rapids above the Falls, and the other a moonlight scene of the Falls themselves-both of them artistic in execution, and faithfully depicting the scenes they represent. Four of the series are devoted to sleighing subjects, sugges ting happy drives to some family gath

ering, with the hearty welcome and bright cheer awaiting the guests in the frank hospitality of a Canadian home. The remainder of the series deal with the fascinating subjects of Canadian winter sports, a snow-shoe tramp, tobogganing, and skating. These are bright, picturesque compositions, well grouped, and fairly harmonious in colour. The series as a whole is exceedingly good, and indicates gratifying progress in Canadian enterprise. Of the figure drawing a word may be said, viz., that Canadians are not giants, nor are our people accustomed, to any great extent, to appear in the many-coloured blanket costumes depicted, no doubt for effect, by the fancy of the artists. It is time that people abroad should get the notion that our country is not an Arctic one, and that the everyday costume, in country and town, of Canadians does not differ much from that of old country people.

A series of larger designs, also exceedingly well executed, and produced in gold and colours, appears from the lithographic establishment of Messrs. Rolph, Smith & Co., of Toronto. In some respects the designs are more ambitious than those we have above dealt with, one of the cards introducing a grouping of the national emblems in a pretty and effective, though perhaps over-crowded, picture. The two we

like best are those representing the 'Crossing of the St. Lawrence at Quebec' in winter, with the little drawing, entitled 'Snowed up,' imposed in the setting of maple leaves in the corner; and the other represents a forest scene, also in winter, with a portion of a snake fence, some fir trees, and the gable end of a log house in the centre of the picture, and imposed on the side the figure of a woodman on snow-shoes, with his gun on his shoulder, making off no doubt for deer. The others we have seen of the series deal with tobogganing, snow-shoe tramping, and skating. These are bright, animated pictures, and have a pretty setting of leaves and evergreens.

Of

the host of imported Christmas cards, it is not our purpose here to speak, though the variety and richness of some of the designs might well be dwelt upon. Perhaps the finest series we have seen, of those from abroad, are the productions of Messrs. Thomas De La Rue & Co., of London and Paris, imported by the Canada Publishing Company of Toronto, and no doubt for sale by all booksellers. To our readers, let us quote, in this the closing issue of THE MONTHLY for 1881, the motto and wish inscribed on each of these pretty compositions of the Canadian artists' A Merry Christmas to you all!'

DR. HOLLAND'S LAST POEM.

[The recent death of Dr. J. G. Holland gives a new interest to his last poem.]

If life awake and will never cease
On the future's distant shore,

And the rose of love and the lily of peace
Shall bloom there forevermore,-

Let the world go round and round,
And the sun sink into the sea:

For, whether I'm on or under the ground,
Oh, what will it matter to me.

If old wine is good, is elder wine better-Vanity Fair.

It is the clean tablecloth that catches the early grease spots.

The maiden of thirty who paints and puffs herself to look like twenty is merely making up for lost time.

The farmer that ran rapidly through his property' wore a red shirt and had his brindled bull behind him.