A canker is in thy bud, thy leaf must decay. At midnight, at cockcrow, at morning, one certain day, Lo, the Bridegroom shall come and shall not delay: Watch thou and pray. Then I answered: Yea. Passing away, saith my God, passing away : New grapes on the vine, new figs on the tender spray : Though I tarry, wait for Me, trust Me, watch and pray. Sour Louise de la Miséricorde. I have desired, and I have been desired; Now dust and dying embers mock my fire; Longing and love, pangs of a perished pleasure, And memory a bottomless gulf of mire, Oh vanity of vanities, desire! Now from my heart, love's deathbed, trickles, trickles, Drop by drop slowly, drop by drop of fire, The dross of life, of love, of spent desire; Alas, my rose of life gone all to prickles, Oh vanity of vanities, desire! Oh vanity of vanities, desire; Stunting my hope which might have strained up higher, Oh death-struck love, oh disenkindled fire, Monna Innominata. 'Amor, che ne la mente mi ragiona.'-DANTE. If there be any one can take my place And make you happy whom I grieve to grieve, I do commend you to that nobler grace, That I should grudge you some one dear delight; But since the heart is yours that was mine own, Your pleasure is my pleasure, right my right, Your honourable freedom makes me free, And you companioned I am not alone. There is a Life of Christina Rossetti by Mackenzie Bell (1898), containing excerpts from her letters; and essays on her works by Edmund Gosse (Critical Kit-Kats, 1896), Arthur Symons (Studies in Two Literatures, 1897), A. C. Benson (in the National Review, February 1895), and Mrs Meynell (in the New Review, February 1895). WALTER RALEIGH. Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1833-98), beloved by English children as 'Lewis Carroll,' was the son of the vicar of Daresbury in Runcorn parish, Cheshire; and, passing from Rugby to Christ Church, Oxford, he graduated B.A. in 1854 with a first-class in mathematics. Elected a student of his college, he took orders in 1861, and from 1855 to 1881 was mathematical lecturer. In his own name he published a series of useful and even important mathematical works, begun with books on algebraical geometry and trigonometry in 1860, and continued in 1867-96 by works on Determinants, Euclid and his Modern Rivals, Curiasa Mathematica, and Symbolic Logic. Traces of a mathematical mind may also be found in the wonderfully different half of his literary activity credited to 'Lewis Carroll.' He was extremely punctilious in preserving the distinction between Dodgson the mathematical college don and the 'Lewis Carroll' whose works overflowed with fun, nonsense, humour, and the imaginary creations dear to children. 'Lewis Carroll' never quite equalled again the genial creator of Alice, his first triumph; Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865), with its continuation Through the Lookingglass (1872), and its illustrations by Tenniel, has become a nursery classic, and been translated into most of the languages of Europe. To the 'Lewis Carroll' series belong also Phantasmagoria (1869), Hunting of the Snark (1876), Doublets (1879), Rhyme? and Reason? (1883; new ed. 1897), A Tangled Tale (1886), Game of Logic (1887), and Sylvie and Bruno (1889-93)-the latter in places positively tedious. Mr S. D. Collingwood published his Life and Letters in 1898, and The Lewis Carroll Picture Book in 1899. Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-92), born at Kelvedon in Essex, in 1849 became usher in a school at Newmarket, and in 1854 pastor of the New Park Street Chapel, London. The vast Metropolitan Tabernacle was erected for him in 1859-61; with it were connected almshouses, a pastor's college, and an orphanage, over all of which he exercised and maintained effective supervision. He had a unique gift as an orator, and enlivened his fervour with quaint humour; his voice was of marvellous clearness and reach, and he wielded his mother-tongue with native vigour. His theological acquirements were slender and his commentaries uncritical. With the newer criticism he had no sympathy; and four years before his death he withdrew from the Baptist Union because no action was taken against persons charged with what he and conservative divines regarded as fundamental errors. His sermons, issued weekly from 1855, showed enormous energy of productivity, and continued to be surprisingly fresh; they had an average issue of 30,000, and were translated into several foreign tongues. He published over a hundred volumes, including The Saint and his Saviour (1867), John Ploughman's Talk (1868), The Treasury of David (a commentary on the Psalms, 1865-80), Interpreter (1874), Sermons in Candles (1891), and Messages to the Multitude (1892). A collection of Spurgeon's speeches was edited by Pike (1878); there are short Lives by Pike, Ellis, and Shindler (1891-92), and the authoritative autobiography in four volumes was compiled by his wife and Mr Harland (1897-98). Sir John Robert Seeley (1834-95) was the third son of Mr Seeley the publisher. He was educated at the City of London School and at Christ's College, Cambridge, was bracketed with three others as senior classic in 1857, and next year was elected a Fellow of his college. In 1863 he became Professor of Latin in University College, London, in 1869 of Modern History at Cambridge, and there to the end of his industrious life he remained. Ecce Homo had appeared anonymously in 1865, and excited an extraordinary commotion in the religious world. It was denounced with vehemence by many evangelicals like Lord Shaftesbury as subverting the foundation of Christian faith and hope; on the other hand, its reverent tone and literary charm commended the book to many orthodox minds. For while it deliberately excluded consideration of the supernatural and insisted on Christ's human work as the founder of a Church of humanity, it did not profess to deal with all the aspects of Christ's missionsome even expected it to be followed by an Ecce Deus, which was no part of Seeley's plan. The work certainly produced no little influence on contemporary thought. Strictly anonymous at first, it was soon pretty confidently referred to the Cambridge historian, and was ultimately acknowledged by him as his. Natural Religion (1882), also anonymously published, was perhaps an even more effective presentation of the author's view of the essence of Christianity; but as an eirenicon between science and faith, it persuaded neither the Christian nor the Agnostic. For it posited a non-supernatural Christianity, and contented itself with a religion which was practically the pursuit of the ideal in life. Seeley's Life and Times of Stein (1879) was the best history of the creator of modern Germany, but, written without enthusiasm, it was generally pronounced tedious. His Short Life of Napoleon the First (1885) insisted on treating that portentous phenomenon as a clever and unscrupulous condottiere merely, and almost wholly ignored his power of political combination, his administrative sagacity, and his profound legislative achievement. In so far the historian showed himself liable to a prepossession. In his his torical work generally Seeley sought for the driest light and refused to appeal to the emotions; and his concern in history was with the State and its development, with public documents and diplomatics though he strove to find in past political consecutions answers to the pressing problems of the present. In one work he struck a chord in the public breast; his Expansion of England (1883) did much to build up British Imperialism, to show the significance of the struggle between France and Britain in the eighteenth century, and to emphasise the value of Britain's oversea inheritance. His Growth of British Policy, unfinished at his death, was an almost equally pregnant essay on our foreign policy, its conditioning causes, methods, and results, from the accession of Elizabeth down to the beginning of the eighteenth century; to this Professor Prothero prefixed a short Life of the author (1895). An Introduction to Political Science, published in 1896, comprises two series of lectures. Seeley's work on Goethe, a reissue of magazine articles, was sound and For sensible but not remarkably illuminative. his service to the national cause he was created K.C.M.G. in 1894. Lord de Tabley was the title, borne after his succession in 1887 to his father, the second baron, by the Hon. JOHN BYRNE LEICESTER WARREN (18351895), one of the truest poets of his time, though he never attained popularity with the public, and even to many lovers of poetry became well known only a few years before his death. Educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, he was for a time attached to the embassy at Constantinople under Sir Stratford de Redcliffe. In 1859 he was called to the Bar, and about the same time published, under a pseudonym, a volume of poems-his own, and not, as has been erroneously said, the joint work of himself and a dead friend. Other volumes of verse-including Ballads and Metrical Sketches, The Threshold of Atrides, Glimpses of Antiquity, Præterita, Eclogues and Monodramas, Studies in Verse followed in 1860-65; and two powerful dramas, Philoctetes (1866) and Orestes (1868), were Greek not in subject-matter alone. In 1868, too, the author (pseudonymous or anonymous as yet) made his only entry into English public life as candidate for Mid-Cheshire on the Liberal side. He was not elected, and soon after took up his residence in London, where he lived the life of a literary recluse in the society of a few warm friends. He was not a bookman merely, but an enthusiastic expert in botany, in book-plates, and in Greek coins. Fruits of these studies appeared in a work on book-plates (1880) and one on The Flora of Cheshire (1899). Rehearsals (1870) and Searching the Net (1873) were collections of poems; The Soldier's Fortune (1876) was a poetic tragedy. Poems, Dramatic and Lyrical (1893), comprised selections from past work with new pieces, and a supplementary volume appeared in 1895. At his death his fame was steadily growing; and a posthumous volume, Orpheus in Thrace, and other Poems, edited by the Hon. Lady Leighton Warren (1901), was universally greeted as a rare addition to the treasury of English poetry. Lord de Tabley's high-strung, too sensitive temperament is reflected in much of his verse-his noble melancholy, his all-but pessimistic outlook on a world of empty strife and vain ambition. And another and equally sensitive side of his character appears in the poems and passages which give rich and melodious utterance to the poet's heart-felt joy in the ineffable beauty of nature. See the Memoir by Sir M. E. Grant Duff prefixed to The Flora of Cheshire (1899); Mr Gosse's Critical Kit-Kats (1896); and the biographical sketch by Professor Hugh Walker (1903). Sir Walter Besant (1836-1901), born at Portsmouth, studied at King's College, London, and at Christ's College, Cambridge; and, having abandoned the idea of taking orders, was appointed to a professorship in Mauritius, where he found time to read largely in French literature. A succession of feverish attacks compelling him to resign this post, he returned to England, and in 1868 gladly accepted the office of secretary of the newly-founded Palestine Exploration Fund, an appointment he retained till his success as a writer of fiction made him independent of this staff (1885). His first work, Studies in French Poetry, appeared in 1868, and attracted much attention, rather by its interest and pleasant style than from its exhaustiveness. Three years later he began to collaborate in story-writing with James Rice (1844-82), who from Northampton came to Queen's at Cambridge, from law drifted into literature, had published one or two unimportant novels, and was now editor of Once a Week. Together they produced Readymoney Mortiboy (1872), My Little Girl, With Harp and Crown, This Son of Vulcan, The Golden Butterfly (1876, which greatly increased their popularity), The Monks of Thelema, By Celia's Arbour, The Chaplain of the Fleet, and The Seamy Side (1881). This literary partnership between two men of different gifts, comparable for intimacy with that of Beaumont and Fletcher or of Erckmann and Chatrian, continued unbrokenand with the happiest results-until the death of the younger collaborateur. Thenceforward Besant continued to produce fiction wholly his own in invention and development, with unabated energy and fertility, though for the most part in a distinguishably different manner, sending forth in succession All Sorts and Conditions of Men (1882), All in a Garden Fair, Dorothy Forster, Children of Gibeon, Armorel of Lyonesse, The Ivory Gate, Beyond the Dreams of Avarice, The Master Crafisman, The Rebel Queen, The Fourth Generation, The Lady of Lynn, and other stories. Ready-money Mortiboy (drafted by Rice and partly written before the partnership began) and The Golden Butterfly are probably the best-known of all the books associated with Besant's name; and though it be admitted that the books produced by the collaborateurs are richer in humour, more vivid in characterisation, fresher and more entertaining altogether, this does not prove that these features were wholly or mainly Mr Rice's contribution, but that Besant grew older. Unquestionably the later novels were many of them somewhat incredible and factitious, didactic and overweighted with detail, as well apt to repeat ideas and situations. Perhaps Besant was right in regarding Dorothy Forster, a story of the Earl of Derwentwater and the Rebellion of 1815, as his best tale. All Sorts and Conditions of Men, on the other hand, was the most notable of a series which produced a marked and unexpected influence on the public heart and conscience; they stimulated and guided the philanthropic (and fashionable) movement that led to the establishment of the People's Palace in the east end of London. Another series of Sir Walter's literary enterprises concerned the topography and history of London. It was his ambition to be the Stow of nineteenthcentury London; and he projected a vast scheme in which he was to have the help of experts, retaining for his own share the general history of London from the earliest times to the end of the nineteenth century. This he seems ever to have regarded as his magnum opus, and to it he devoted the continuous labour of five years. To this plan, unfinished at his death, belonged the pleasant volumes on Westminster, London, South London, and East London (written by him with some assistance), and the more ambitious work on London in the Eighteenth Century, thoroughly characteristic of the man, and published in 1902. From the Autobiography published in the same year it appeared that he had completed a history of London from the beginning as far as the end of the eighteenth century. His attitude towards religious and theological problems was frankly expounded in the same book, and was by no means conservative. His relations with Mr Rice (who, it should be added, wrote a well-known history of the British Turf) money Mortiboy was dramatised by the author. As We are and as We may be was a collection of miscellanies, posthumously published in 1903. Thomas Hill Green (1836-82) was born at the rectory of Birkin in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and educated at Rugby and Balliol College, Oxford, where he took a first in classics, and later a third in law and modern history. He was elected and re-elected a Balliol Fellow, became the first SIR WALTER BESANT. From a Photograph by Russell & Sons. he had explained in a preface to the library edition of Ready-money Mortiboy in 1887. As secretary of the Palestine Exploration Fund Besant edited or wrote works on Jerusalem, Palestine, and the survey; and as first chairman of the Society of Authors he laboured strenuously to secure, especially to inexperienced writers for the press, as full a share as possible of the profits accruing from their labours. His zeal in their behalf, testified to by a great expenditure of time and work, led him ultimately to be unduly suspicious and not a little unfair to one of the two partners in the business of publishing books. Further French studies were a work on the French humourists (1873) and small works on Rabelais, Montaigne, and Coligny; he wrote also Lives of Professor Palmer and Richard Jefferies; and there were opuscules from his hand on Whittington, Captain Cook, and King Alfred. Ready lay tutor of the college, and, under Jowett, the main influence in Balliol. He married a sister of J. HA Symonds in 1871, and became in 1877 Whyte's Professor of Moral Philosophy. Green's noble character, contagious enthusiasm, philosophical independence and profundity, and strong interest in social questions gathered around him many of the best men at Oxford. Popular education and temperance lay near his heart, and he gave himself with great earnestness to School - Board work and political reform. He was the Mr Gray' of Robert Elsmere. In 1874 he contributed his masterly intro duction to the Clarendon Press edition of Hume's Treatise on Human Nature, subjecting Hume's philosophy in detail to searching and hostile. analysis from an idealist point of view. His own philosophy, which sprang from the sympathetic study of Kant and Hegel, was largely a polemic against current empiricism as stultifying philosophy and rendering the ethical standard nugatory; he was a trenchant critic of British empirical philosophy, whether that of Hume or of Lewes or of Herbert Spencer. His Prolegomena to Ethics, left incomplete at his death, was edited in the following year by Mr A. C. Bradley; and two addresses or lay-sermons to his pupils were issued with an unfinished preface by Arnold Toynbee. His condemnation of Hume and scattered essays in Mind and elsewhere were edited by R. L. Nettleship (1885-88), the third volume containing a Memoir. John Richard Green * (1837-83) was the son of an Oxford tradesman, and was educated at Magdalen College School till the age of fifteen, when he was sent to complete his education under the charge of a private tutor. In 1854 he competed successfully for an open scholarship at Jesus College, Oxford, and was matriculated at the end of 1855. The choice of a college was probably unfortunate; the members of Jesus College were mostly Welshmen, and they were rather isolated from the rest of the university. Green made few intimate friends during his undergraduate days, refused to throw himself into the normal current of Oxford studies, and was content with a pass degree in 1859. That his time had not been wholy wasted, and that his early taste for reading had led him into the direction of his later work, is proved by some brilliant papers on the history of Oxford which he contributed during his last year of residence to the Oxford Chronicle. In 1860 he took orders and accepted a curacy in London at St Barnabas, Goswell Road. For a few months in 1863 he had charge of a parish in Hoxton, but was compelled by ill-health to resign it. After another short period as a curate at Notting Hill, he received from Bishop Tait the curacy-in-charge of St Philip's, Stepney, which he held for five years. He discharged his clerical duties with rare fidelity and devotion; but his sympathies were always with the Broad Church party, and as time went on he became more and more reluctant to bind himself to any definite religious dogmas. He had always been delicate, and the arduous labour of a clergyman in the east end of London overtaxed his strength. When he resigned his charge at Stepney in 1869, he gave up all active clerical work. English History, Edward Augustus Freeman and Green's intention, when he abandoned the During his life in London Green had managed to find time for literary work. Whenever he could get away from his parish, he spent his time in the British Museum studying the authorities for early English history. He had plans for a history of Somersetshire, and a history of the English Church in connection with the lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury; but his favourite scheme was a history of England under the Angevin kings, a task which has since been performed by his disciple, Miss Kate Norgate. A paper which Green read before the Somersetshire Archæological Society led to an intimate friendship with Freeman, by whom he was induced to become a contributor, and after a time a frequent contributor, to the Saturday Review. Through Freeman he became acquainted with Stubbs, who was at the time Lambeth Librarian, an office in which Green succeeded him, and was also engaged in editing some of the most important volumes in the Rolls Series. The encouragement which he received from these two older students was of immense value to Green, and he recognised his obligation when in 1878 he dedicated his History of the English People 'to two dear friends, my masters in the study of |