From" Out-of-Doors with Tennyson." (Copyright, 1890, by D. Lothrop Company.)

of quiet Somerby has Tennyson found inspiration. The happy villages of Kent, the crags of Cornwall, the Isle of Wight, and every spot he has visited live in his poems as well as the low dunes of Lincolnshire. It is this ability to make dear to others the hills, the woods, the streams and the fields among which his long life has been spent that places Alfred Tennyson in the first rank of English poets, and makes him loved by young and old men and women utterly incapable of understanding the fine mechanism of his versification. Extracts relating to "out-of-doors" have been made from thirty-three of Tennyson's best known poems, and these have been interspersed with many illustrations, making a large book bound in an original cover decorated in imitation of a church window. The frontispiece pictures the lines from "Enone:"

"On either hand

The lawns and meadow ledges mid-way down
Hang rich in flowers, and far below the warms
The long brook falling thro' the cloven ravine
In cataract after cataract to the sea."

Mr. Brooks' introduction, which is partly biographical,, is interspersed with pictures of the birthplace of Tennyson, the old grammar school house at Louth, and several decorative bits of drawing. Specially pretty pictures are shown of "the mill pond" described in "The Miller's Daughter" of Maplethorpe, from "The Ode to Memory," of the May Queen, of the scene of "Tears, Idle Tears," that exquisite selection from "The Princess," and of the words that inspired "Maud."

The idea of the book is a very pretty one indeed, and should appeal to all lovers of Tennyson and of "out-of-doors."

Certain Sonnets by Sir Philip Sidney.

SIR PHILIP SIDNEY has left a name that will always be quoted when one desires an instance of that noble ideal, the English gentleman. Hero and idol of his day, "the jewel of the dominions" of Queen Elizabeth, “the greatest king that ever ruled in England," the nephew of the royal favorite, Earl of Leicester, he remained great and pure in his life, beautiful and elevated in his thoughts, with a reputation for learning, wisdom, valor and true knighthood that has remained untarnished through upwards of three centuries of discovery and investigation. He hated anything that was sordid and mean; his very faults we identify with the true, open sunshine character of the man. His brave father had taught two sons to love God and truth first, and then to be cheerful, saying to them, "You degenerate from your father if you find not yourself most able in wit and body to do anything when you be most merry." For many years one of the most conspicuous figures at court, Sir Philip had but little time in his short life of thirty-two years to devote to literary work. His mind and heart were always full of poetic fancy. He wrote many occasional poems of great beauty, but the works by which he is best known were not published until after his death. He has added to English literature a large body of sonnets, and may almost be held the inventor of that form of poesy.

In 1580, when twenty-six years of age, he had the temerity to speak against the projected marriage of Queen Elizabeth with the Duke of Anjou, and retired from the court in consequence. During the next few years he executed most of his literary work, and left many writings that prove him one of the truest of English poets. His work has been neglected of late years, partly because his fame as statesman,

soldier and courtier has appealed more strongly to the world than his merit as a singer.

Sir Philip Sidney and his much-loved sister, the Countess of Pembroke, spent the next few years on the countess' estate in Wilton. In the princely gardens they made a translation of the Psalms of David which has earned the praise of Ruskin; and here, after that work was finished, Sidney still lingered, and wrote for his sister the "Arcadia," on which his fame as writer chiefly rests. He wrote it on loose sheets, seldom stopping to review them. They were handed to his sister, who mislaid some and lost some, as neither brother no sister ever planned to have them made into a book. It was four years after his death before the Arcadia was published; and some one has said that Sidney was not loved and admired for his '' Arcadia" so much as the book was loved and admired for its author. It is a prose romance of high-flown sentiment and intricate adventure. The scene is laid in Greece. Innumerable characters act and speak in this great poetic land, but the buoyancy of freshness of Sidney's style give a certain air of reality even to its most artificial scenes, The prose is interlaced with many pretty songs full of the rhythm and music for which the young poet was so justly celebrated, even among the many sweet singers of his time.

A selection of these verses from the "Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia" has been made by the Burrows Brothers as the text for their holiday book this season. George Wharton Edwards has made an accompaniment of drawings which have been reproduced in colored and tinted photogravures, and has also supplied many decorative bits and pretty head and tail pieces as settings for Sir Philip Sidney's gems.

Some Dainty Books

From "French Ballads" (Copy right, 1890, by G

P.Putnam's Sons.)

pilation of bright, pithy sayings from the literary fields of the past and present, which comes to us under the name of In and Out of Book and Journal." It is difficult to decide which to admire the most, the cleverness with which Dr. Roberts has culled his aphorisms, or the skill

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with which Mr. S. W. Van Schaick has illustrated them. The designs, run in with the text in the French style, are unusually spirited and strongly individual. (Lippincott.)

The blue and gold uniform of that established favorite, The Knickerbocker Nuggets Series (Putnam), is displayed on several new volumes. "Love Poems of Three Centuries" (2 v.), compiled by Jessie F. O'Donnell, and covering the period from 1590 to 1890, comprises specimens of the love poetry of all nations, and is especially rich in exquisitely tender sonnets the early English poets knew so well how to write. "Representative Irish Stories" (2 v.) is a selection of the prose tales of modern Irish life. W. B. Yeats, who is the editor and also the writer of the interesting introductions and notes which accompany each tale, says, “If you would know Ireland, body and soul, you must read its poems and stories." A part of this literature is offered in these two little books. "French Ballads," printed in the original text, and edited by Prof. T. F. Crane, furnishes many piquant specimens of the much-admired Chansons Populaires de la France. The second series of Literary Gems (Putnam)-tiny books bound in flexible covers of full morocco, and each with a tiny photogravure frontispiece-embraces a half-dozen brief literary classics, namely: The Nibelungen Lied," by Thomas Carlyle; "The King of the Golden River," by John Ruskin; "The Science of History," by James Anthony Froude; "Sonnets { from the Portuguese," by Elizabeth B. Browning; "The School for Scandal," by Richard Brinsley Sheridan; and "Nothing to Wear." by William Allen Butler. In line with this collection, but in paper covers and of more modest pretensions, is a very tasteful series,

Liliput Classics, (Houghton), ten little volumes, including the best and most widely popular stories, essays and poems of ten famous authors-as, for instance, Dickens' "Christmas Carol," Shakespeare's "Sonnets," Goldsmith's "Deserted Village," and so on.

The success won by Lucile," the initial volume of the Vignette Series (Stokes), will not be forfeited by the additions to the series. Tenneyson's "Princess," Goethe's "Faust". (in Anster's translation), and Moore's "Lalla Rookh," offer quite a latitude of choice. Any one of the beautiful little volumes ought to please the most fastidious taste, either from a literary or an artistic standpoint. The half-tone engravings which adorn them are after designs made expressly for the works by McIlvaine, Charles Howard Johnson and others. They are gen. erally set in the text in French style, and are of various sizes and of many odd shapes. "Legends and Lyrics," from the poetic works of John

Greenleaf Whittier, and "Pastorals, Lyrics and Sonnets," from Wordsworth, are new volumes in the White and Gold Series (Houghton). They are artistically printed, and delicately pretty in smooth cloth bindings. The popular style of the selection of the contents of the books of this series has found for them a wide appreciation as Christmas gifts.