his praises, the Emperor begged Ristori to join the troupe of the Comedie Francaise, and Rachel, with the strange narrow jealousy of her nature, trembled for her laurels.  Myrrha was followed by Marie Stuart, and Marie Stuart by Medea.  In the latter part Madame Ristori excited the greatest enthusiasm.  Ary Scheffer designed her costumes for her; and the Niobe that stands in the Uffizzi Gallery at Florence, suggested to Madame Ristori her famous pose in the scene with the children.  She would not consent, however, to remain in France, and we find her subsequently playing in almost every country in the world from Egypt to Mexico, from Denmark to Honolulu.  Her representations of classical plays seem to have been always immensely admired.  When she played at Athens, the King offered to arrange for a performance in the beautiful old theatre of Dionysos, and during her tour in Portugal she produced Medea before the University of Coimbra.  Her description of the latter engagement is extremely interesting.  On her arrival at the University, she was received by the entire body of the undergraduates, who still wear a costume almost mediaeval in character.  Some of them came on the stage in the course of the play as the handmaidens of Creusa, hiding their black beards beneath heavy veils, and as soon as they had finished their parts they took their places gravely among the audience, to Madame Ristori’s horror, still in their Greek dress, but with their veils thrown back, and smoking long cigars.  ‘Ce n’est pas la premiere fois,’ she says, ’que j’ai du empecher, par un effort de volonte, la tragedie de se terminer en farce.’  Very interesting, also, is her account of the production of Montanelli’s Camma, and she tells an amusing story of the arrest of the author by the French police on the charge of murder, in consequence of a telegram she sent to him in which the words ‘body of the victim’ occurred.  Indeed, the whole book is full of cleverly written stories, and admirable criticisms on dramatic art.  I have quoted from the French version, which happens to be the one that lies before me, but whether in French or Italian the book is one of the most fascinating autobiographies that has appeared for some time, even in an age like ours when literary egotism has been brought to such an exquisite pitch of perfection.

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The New Purgatory and Other Poems, by Miss E. R. Chapman, is, in some respects, a very remarkable little volume.  It used to be said that women were too poetical by nature to make great poets, too receptive to be really creative, too well satisfied with mere feeling to search after the marble splendour of form.  But we must not judge of woman’s poetic power by her achievements in days when education was denied to her, for where there is no faculty of expression no art is possible.  Mrs. Browning, the first great English poetess, was also an admirable scholar, though she may not have put the accents on her Greek, and even in those poems