The “captains of industry,” who constitute in our day so distinct and notable a class of worthies, are doubtless as well entitled to have their achievements recorded and their fame sounded throughout the lands as were the doughty men of war who of old were deemed the only fitting heroes of chronicle and epic.  Few of them, however, can hope to have their deeds commemorated by a “veray parfit, gentle knight”—­of the quill, not of the sword, albeit the letters which he writes after his name would once have indicated the possession of military rank and distinction.  Sir Arthur Helps is not a man of few words or of a very stern or passionate temperament.  It is the graces of chivalry, not its fiery ardor, that he cultivates and reflects, and though “arms and the man” have often been his theme, the soft and delicate strain was ever more suggestive of the pastoral pipe than of the bardic lyre.  Essayist, historian, biographer, novelist, he is always intent to smooth away the asperities of his subject, and, like some stately grandame enthroned in high-backed chair, he remembers that his simple auditors are to be not merely entertained by the matter of his discourse, but impressed by the suave tones and high-bred prolixity of the speaker.  With a dignified courtesy unknown in these latter times—­when biographers and historians do not scruple to take liberties with their heroes to the extent even of designating them by nicknames—­the subject of the present memoir is introduced to us as Mr.  Brassey, a form not only adopted on the title-page, but preserved in the body of the work, where we read that “Mr. Brassey was born November 7, 1805,” that “Mr. Brassey, at twelve years of age, went to a school at Chester,” and that, being afterward articled to a surveyor, “Mr. Brassey was permitted by his master” to assist in making certain surveys.  It is only from a side whisper to the American public, which is honored with a preface all to itself, that we are permitted to learn that the great contractor owned to the Christian name of Thomas.  Besides the two prefaces there is a dedication to the queen, an introduction telling how Sir Arthur Helps made the acquaintance of Mr. Brassey and what impressions he received from the interview, and a preliminary chapter containing a brief outline of Mr. Brassey’s character as “a man of business;” so that we get at the substance of the book by a process like that which in a well-conducted household precedes the carving and distribution of a Christmas cake, any eagerness we might feel to “put in a thumb and pull out a plum” being kept in check by a proper amount of ceremony and tissue-paper.