The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1898-03-20

an incredulous world as to Shakes
peare's identity-that is, the identity
of the author Of the plays called
Shakespeare's - from Della Bacon all
the. way down to Ignatius Donnelly.
And with Homer have we not had q
hundred theories as to who that writer
Wasf But the strangest Of all these
ts the theory Samuel Butler. an Eng
l1sh Wh1ater, has now advanced in a
new book. the purpose Of which is to
show that the odyssey" was written
by woman. Some of the so-called
evidence presented Is futile enough:
but it has the merit of being curious.
For one thing, we are told that the
master mind in the poem Is woman;
hence woman writes the tale. For an
other, we are told that there Is no in
stance in 1T where q woman is laughed
at; hence, again, a woman wrote the
tale of Ulysses Wanderings" All
OF which goes to prove that Mr.. Butler
cannot conceive. Of a man Of Homer's
time, who would have exalted and
would have rendered homage to wom-
en-. Mr. Butler will have to write many
DOCKS to convince any one worth con-
vinc1ng that, his theory has any legs
to stand on-save legs of straw
We are about to have the final vol
u1ne of the new edition Of THE Diary
VI ldSi epyS, WHICH mas been
several years in preparation. ALI pre-
vious editions Of this work win be
surpassed in this-surpassed not only
in the material which the editor has
prepared in the way of notes and ap-
pendices, but in the amount Of matter
that Pepys himself wrote. Previous
editions have given only partial
amounts of the text Each succeeding
edition has contained more than its
predecessor; but it is only the present
edition which is worthy to be called
complete. Even now we are denied
some passages from the work; but
these are considered unfit for publica-
ton.
Pepys' Diary is one Of the greatest
curiosities in all literature. Written in
cipher solely for it's authors pleasure,
it lays bare the inner soul and thought
of q man in very nakedness. Never
again shall we see so clearly revealed
in q book the weaknesses and follies
of human nature. The reader is often
at loss to understand how a sane man
could have written as Pepys wrote. His
mental operations seem not infrequent-
ly to be those Of man unidentified;
a very child's mind appears to be at
work And yet we know that Pepys
in his time was a man of mark, a man
Of very considerable parts, rather bet
ter than his immediate environment.
Frank r. Stockton will soon have a
new work of fiction ready from the
press. His Great Stone of Sardis,"
published last, autumn, ranks not with
the most popular Of the days books;
but it is well represented on the list
And his readers are always Of the best
class. Stockton Is appreciated, by the
best minds. He appeals not exactly
to the crowd but still to a constitu-
ency any writer might be proud to
claim. Mr.. Stockton's new book is
called '@TG1ee Girl at Cobhurst. =" 1t will
be ready in a fortnight. ~
A new story OF the Revolution is an
nounced for this season. It is called
1.-THE Continental Dragoon;" it's author
is r. N. Stephens, who has already done
something in historical fiction and done
it well. The period he has now chosen
is the year 1777, and the scene of the
tale is that neutral territory which lay
between New York island and West
Point. After Washington returned
from New York and took up his stand
in the Highlands Of the Hudson, this
territory was neutral in the sense that