allusions, nor parodies; they are charges definite and direct, which amount to actual accusation. Mr. Burton finds the explanation in the fact, that Lyndsay "was but repeating what the authorities of the realm asserted, and the Church itself mournfully confessed. Anything might be said to this purport if he who said it were so skilful as to avoid points of heresy," &c.* I wish I could believe it; and that history did not prove that where the Church could show her hand and crush the free-spoken man, she did not usually do so; and that in Scotland, in that very age, she did not burn friar Kyller, and tried to do her very worst to George Buchanan, for their satires. Moreover, what was confessed by the Church was confessed in the conclave: it was not openly mourned over before the laity. What mattered that confession when public opinion attacked and ridiculed those same things? Was it likely that men, so proud of the privileges of their order, would humbly cry Peccavimus! There is nothing we all bridle up at quicker, and forgive slower, than an exposure of our known vices and faults: we cannot deny them, and instinctively strike at the exposer; and we may be quite sure, therefore, that the Latimers and the Lyndsays of those days, unless under royal protection or in high position, and whether there was definable heresy in the satire or not, were certainly silenced. Has not our very pleasant censor, Mr. Punch, had experiences, especially across the Channel, which show how far this is true, even in our own day? Some other reason, therefore, than Mr. Burton's must be found for Lyndsay's immunity from everyone of the forms of persecution. Mr. Laing does not hazard one. One thing is clear, that Lyndsay was no trimmer. He openly acknowledged himself as the author of his Satires; and if anecdote is to be trusted, he was as sharp at times with his tongue as with his pen. He was not a religious reformer, however; although, as Mr. Laing remarks, had he survived for a few years longer, we need scarcely doubt he would have joined himself to the Lords of the Congregation. As to that, we may but guess: as he was, we cannot but admire his boldness, and count him the bravest, clearest-seeing man of his him the name of a great poet; as a satirist, he far surpasses any one of the early Scots poets. Enough if my readers have a clearer conception of the scenes and circumstances amidst which John Knox grew to manhood, and which immediately preceded his dauntlessly patriotic career; and if they are thus better able to judge of the men, whoever they were, who brought about and wrought out the Reformation in Scotland. From The Pall Mall Gazette. AN EASTERN CONFEDERATION. A NEW pamphlet, said to be "semiofficial," has just appeared at Belgrade, proposing the formation of a Confederacy of States in Eastern Europe. The author, referring to the tendency to the centralization which has for some time been manifesting itself among the European races, observes that centralization may be beneficial when all the nationalities which belong to any particular race desire it, but that as regards the Slavonic nationalities no union would be possible except on the federal principle. He therefore entirely repudiates the idea of Panslavism, whose effect would only be "to force the Slavo nians of the South to become Russians, and to degrade their countries to the position of Russian provinces." Austria and Turkey must, he thinks, soon fall to pieces, and their nationalities (of course excepting the Germans, who would join the German Empire) should then form themselves into an international confederacy, which "would energetically resist the German element, advancing eastward under the pretext of promoting civilization, and also any aggressive tendencies that might be displayed by Russia." This confederacy, which would be called "the Eastern Confederation," would consist of the following States: "1. Servia, as the head of the confederacy, comprising the Turkish provinces of Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Old Servia, and the Austro-Hungarian provinces of Croatia and Dalmatia, all but a strip of land on the coast, which would fall to Montenegro; 2. Bulgaria; 3. Montenegro; 4. Roumania, with the AustroHungarian provinces of Transylvania and Bukovina; 5. Hungary; and 6. Illyria, consisting of Carniola, Istria, and part of Southern Styria." "The only neighbour Servia has to fear," proceeds the author of the pamphlet, "is Hungary. In proportion as natural tendencies, mental and material development, and modern pro- | Slavonic districts of Hungary every year. gress shall become predominant at Bel- Servia," he concludes, "will fulfil her grade or Agram, one of these places will mission, and the surest guarantee of her become the inevitable point of attraction doing so lies, on the one hand, in the round which the remaining South Slavon-patriotic and wise conduct of her dynasty ian peoples will group themselves, and fortunately for us the Government at Pesth does not seem as yet to understand or appreciate the decisive importance of this irrefutable axiom. It is for the Servian Government, therefore, to take advantage of this favourable moment, and to obtain such a start in the race as to make any subsequent efforts of its rival useless." The writer next points out that "Servia is already in a position to offer greater advantages to the Southern Slavonian, so far as legislation and administration are concerned, than Hungary, with her incessant dissensions;" and that education in Hungary is so inferior to that afforded at Belgrade that the university in that town receives more and more students from the and her statesmen, and on the other, in the errors of her rivals." It is reported from Belgrade that a few days after the publication of the above pamphlet, which has been distributed in a limited number of copies among the most influential men in the capital, the newly appointed Roumanian agent was received at a Court dinner by the Prince of Servia, the members of the Regency, aud several of the Ministers, and that the Prince, in drinking to the prosperity of his "dear brother, Prince Charles, and the Roumanian people,” said that Roumania "may be called upon to act, perhaps in a short time, hand in hand with Servia for the purpose of carrying out the regeneration of Eastern Europe." two DISPERSION OF SEEDS BY THE WIND.-A. | Diptera, Hymenoptera, and Coleoptera, which, Kerner, of Innsbruck, reprints a very interesting paper on this subject, from the Zeitschrift des Deutschen Alpenvereins. In order to ascertain the extent to which seeds are carried by currents of air, the author made a careful investigation of the flora of the glacier-moraines, and of the see is found on the surface of the glaciers themselves, believing that these must indicate accurately the species whose seeds are dispersed by the agency of the wind. Of the former description he was able to identify, on five different moraines, 124 species of plants; and a careful examination of the substances gathered from the surface of the glacier showed seeds belonging to thirty-six species which could be recognized with certainty. The two lists agreed entirely in general character, and to a considerable extent also specifically, belonging, with scarcely an exception, to plants found on the declivities and mountain valleys in the immediate vicinity of the glacier scarcely in a single instance even to the inhabitants of the more southern Alps. M. Kerner's conclusion is that the distance to which seeds can be carried by the wind, even when provided with special apparatus for floating in the air, has generally been greatly over-estimated; and this is very much in accordance with the view advanced by Mr. Bentham, in his anniversary address to the Linnean Society in 1869. Along with the seeds M. Kerner found, on the surface of the glacier, more or less perfect remains of a number of insects belonging to the orders Lepidoptera, | remains. like the seeds, belonged almost exclusively to No. 1447.-March 2, 1872. CONTENTS. 1. THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF JOHN HOOKHAM FRERE, Quarterly Review, 2. THE STRANGE ADVENTURES OF A PHAETON. William Black. Part II., 3. LACE-MAKING AS A FINE ART, By Macmillan's Magazine, Edinburgh Review, Cornhill Magazine, 515 533 541 551 6. IMPORTANT DISCOVERIES DURING THE LATE ECLIPSE, Spectator, 7. A MINING ADVENTURE, 8. AN OLD HIMALAYAN Town,. 9. THE DUC DE PERSIGNY, MISCELLANY, Pall Mall Gazette, NUMBERS OF THE LIVING AGE WANTED. The publishers are in want of Nos. 1179 and 1180 (dated respectively Jan. 5th and Jan. 12th, 1867) of THE LIVING AGE. To subscribers, or others, who will do us the favor to send us either or both of those numbers, we will return an equivalent, either in our publications or in cash, until our wants are supplied. PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY BY LITTELL & GAY, BOSTON. FOR EIGHT DOLLARS, remitted directly to the Publishers. the LIVING AGE will be punctually forwarded for a year, free of postage. But we do not prepay postage on less than a year, nor where we have to pay commission for forwarding the money. Price of the First Series, in Cloth, 36 volumes, 90 dollars. Any Volume Bound, 3 dollars; Unbound, 2 dollars. The sets, or volumes, will be sent at the expense of the publishers. PREMIUMS FOR CLUBS. For 5 new subscribers ($40.), a sixth copy; or a set of HORNE'S INTRODUCTION TO THE BIBLE. unabridged, in 4 large volumes, cloth, price $10; or any 5 of the back volumes of the LIVING AGE, in numbers, price $10. From The Dublin University. BEYOND all discord of this noisy world, H. P, THE birds have flown: Their barren nests are left alone, A SONG OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY. Clinging to leafless bush or wind-tossed tree, BY JEAN INGELOW. THE city, he saith, is fairer far Than one which stood of old; It gleams in the light all crimson bright I see in no sod the paths they trod, On the domes they spread, the roofs they reared, My fathers lie low, and their sons outgrow It plays with man's endeavour, They carved these names grown strange, Mementoes mute of spring-time's blue and From The Quarterly Review. THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF JOHN HOOKHAM FRERE.* Frere's public and private life, with a brief account of his principal writings.* We do this the more willingly, as Mr. Frere was one of the distinguished men who co-operated with the late Mr. Murray in establishing the "Quarterly Review." John Hookham Frere was born in London on the 21st of May, 1769, the year which witnessed the birth of Napoleon and Wellington. Both his father and mother possessed rare intellectual gifts. His father, John Frere, a country gentleman of an old family settled in the eastern counties for many generations, lived on his estate of Roydon Hall, near Diss, in Norfolk. He had contended with Paley for the honours of Senior Wrangler in 1763, and was placed second in the list. He was High Sheriff of Suffolk in 1776, when he composed a High Tory sermon, which his chaplain preached for the edification of a Whig judge. It was pronounced to be "an excellent sermon, much better than judges usually got from High Sheriffs' Chaplains." Mr. John Frere represented Norwich in 1799; but he did not neglect literature or science. "He was an active member of the Royal Society, and of the principal scientific and antiquarian associations in London, and occasionally contributed a paper to their transactions, or to the Gentleman's Magazine,' then the usual vehicle for publishing the less formal and elaborate class of scientific or literary compositions." MR. JOHN HOOKHAM FRERE may be regarded as a type of a remarkable class of men, of whom we have hardly any representatives in the present day. Of ancient lineage, a fine classical scholar, well read in English literature, with a keen and polished wit, and early brought into Parliament and official life, he combined a practical knowledge of the world with that love of letters and refinement which distinguished the statesmen of the last generation. His literary abilities were of the highest order. He was one of the chief writers in the "Anti-Jacobin;" his poem of Whistlecraft was the model upon which Lord Byron framed "Beppo" and "Don Juan;" and his translation of the plays of Aristophanes is a real work of genius, being, perhaps, the most perfect representation of any ancient poet in a modern language. He was the friend of Pitt and Canning; and the high estimation in which he was held by Scott, Byron, Coleridge, and his other illustrious contemporaries, appears from the Memoirs and literature of the period, in which his name constantly occurs. But to the present generation he is comparatively unknown. To this several causes have contributed. During the last twenty-five years of his life he lived in retirement at Malta. He was never ambitious of literary fame; he cared only for the appreciation of cultivated judges; and his circumstances dispensed with the necessity of appealing to the favour of the multitude. Most of his works were privately printed, and were difficult and almost impossible to procure, while others had never been printed at all. Under these circumstances we congratulate his nephews, Mr. W. E. Frere and Sir Bartle Frere, upon the good ser-books which he drew up for the young vice they have rendered to literature, by making a complete collection of the works of their uncle. They have prefixed an interesting biography, which will enable us to present to our readers a sketch of Mr. The Works of John Hookham Frere in Verse and Prose, now first collected, with a Prefatory Memoir, by his Nephews, W. E. and Sir Bartle Frere. 2 vols. 8vo. London, 1872. Mr. Frere's mother was the only child of Mr. John Hookham, a rich London merchant. "Her own reading in early life had been directed by Mr. William Stevens, the intimate friend of Bishop Horne, and of Jones of Nayland, a ripe Greek and Hebrew scholar, and one of the most learned laymen of his day. The catalogue of heiress, and which she seems, from her note-book, to have carefully read and studied, would probably astonish the promoters of modern ladies' colleges by the * We learn from the Preface that we are indebted to Mr. W. E. Frere for the collection and preparation for the press of his uncle's works, and to Sir Bartle Frere for the biographical sketch prefixed to them. |