New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1908-09-13

A peculiarly mean theft has just been dis
covered at FrankfOrtOn-t the Main. In the regis
ter preserved at the local registrars office OF
the most cherished items has been the record
of Goethe's birth This has been cut by
I some rasCdly cuTiO hunter, when and how no
body knows, as people have been allowed to in
spect the register without hindrance in return
| for a fee.
The first volume in the Romance Of History"
series, which we announced some time ago. is to
appear within a short time. Major Martin
Hume, the editor of the series, writes this initial
| book He calls it Two English Queens and
Philip, and in it he tells from contemporary
records, the story of the desperate attempts
made by Philip III of Spain to save his country
and his cause from ruin by obtaining control of
English policy under the two Tudor Queens Tho
theme is one to bring out his best efforts. There
! is no historian living to-day who writes
Major Hume writes about the historic relations
OF England and Spain.
There is an exhilaratfng suggestion in the ttIs
of the book by Mr. Richard de Barry which is
now in the press of Longmans, Green & Co We
commend to the pessmist THE Land of Prom
Use, an Account of the Material and Spiritual
Unity of America" Yet may it not be that Mr.
de Barry is one of our cynical and satirical
critics?
We are glad to record the fact that there IS
more or less constant demand in this country
for at least two of the volumes of J. A. Sy-
monds's Renaissance in Italy'-those on the
Fine Arts and The Revival of Learning"
The Holts are engaged in reprinting these vol
uInes for the seventh time.
The second Dickens exhibition arranged by
the Dickens Fellowship has just been opened in
London. Among its noteworthy features Is an
interesting collection of original drawings made
by the chief illustrators of the novelsts books.
portrait of him painted by an unknown arts.
during his first visit to this country suggests {.
question as to the identity of the painter. Does
anybody know anything about this portrait OK
Dickens as a young man? There is complete
plagiarisms and combinations of the unfinished:
| novel Edwin brood" Another item is the
staring little wooden nlidshipmte mentioned in
'Dombey and Son"
A book which promises to be of interest to
readers engaged in studying conditions in the
Orient is DR.. ]. G. Wishards Twenty Years ia
Persia announced by Revell The author has
been director of the American Presbyterian
Hospital at Teheran during the reigns of three
Shahs.
Miss Jessie Clay an English woman who died
the other day, was perhaps the last friend of
Wordsworth and of COeridge who survived to
repeat the literary recollections of her youth.
She was ninety-fou years old and was to the
last vigorous and energetic. 1t in her al
bum that Wordsworth wrote these rather Obyi-
Gus lines:
Small service is true service while it lasts:
The daisy by the shade it casts !
A study of George Cruikshank by Mr., W. II.
Chesson is coming out in England. The mans
ugly but powerful work had influence worth
that which followed. Mr.. Chesson has been
engaged for long time upon this book
Mr. Robert Hichen,'s new book on Egypt and
its monuments is to be issued by the Century
Company next month. Only portion of the
matter it is to contain has been printed serially
in the magazine of that company. The text is
to be accompanied by reproductions Of twenty
paintings by Mr.. Jules Guerin and of forty pho
tographS
DR. W. Osler, Of Johns Hopkins Uni
versity ReSius professor of medicine at
Oxford-and the author of observation re-
speeding the useful age of man which man does
not forget-is about to publish volume of his
occasional addresses. The greater portion OF the
book it is stated. viii deal with aspects Of tho
life of physicians in this country, and Americans
will read with pride DR.. Osler's opinion that in
no age and in land have the Hippocratic
ideals been more fully realized than in some OF
the lives which he portrays- Oliver Wendell
Holmes is one of the physicians to whom hd
devotes a chapter.
Colonel Stow" is the title of a novel which
Mr.. II. c Bailey-whOse work is becoming pop
ular in this country, we'll rs in EnGldnd-is
about to publish.
suggestion for nOvelists comes from India
in the story of a treasure long hidden in old
fort among, the hills of Amarkanatak, in tho
Central Provinces. In this fort of Raint
BakaOli" says The London Globe tradition
locates a vast store of jewels, the t-casur" 1T
dead ra jaIs An admirable point for the story
writer is the statement that for ages the fort
has stood in a vast tract of impossible mud,
1Ig hon how in in