[71] If Hazlitt conveyed some of his best mannerisms from Coleridge, not always transmuting them, surely the balance may be said to be even when one discovers later in Hartley Coleridge such an easy inherited use of Hazlitt’s “flail of gold” as is exemplified in this summary of Roger Ascham’s career. “There was a primitive honesty, a kindly innocence about this good old scholar, which gave a personal interest to the homeliest details of his life. He had the rare felicity of passing through the worst of times without persecution and without dishonor. He lived with princes and princesses, prelates and diplomatists, without offence as without ambition. Though he enjoyed the smiles of royalty, his heart was none the worse, and his fortunes little the better.” [72] The quotation is from Coleridge, and it was applied by him to Dryden. Hazlitt himself unconsciously expanded and spoiled it in his essay on _Burke_. “The wheels of his imagination did not catch fire from the rottenness of the material, but from the rapidity of their motion.” [73] The Rev. H. R. Haweis has another characterization of these breathing and burning pages: “long and tiresome essays by Hazlitt.” So they are, sure enough, if only you be endowed to think so! Hazlitt himself gives the diverting fact for what it is worth, that “three chimney-sweeps meeting three Chinese in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, they laughed at one another till they were ready to drop down.” MONSIEUR HENRI A Foot-note to French History. By LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY. With Portrait and Map. Small 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 00. A fascinating career, truly, and here most exquisitely chronicled. The little book, in its ardor of appreciation, vivacity of portraiture, and grace and spontaneity of style, is a masterpiece of concise narration, and by those who read it once will be sought with unfailing delight again and again.—_Boston Beacon._ Miss Guiney writes with a love for her subject which makes her fine discrimination all the finer, and shows an insight into history all the more admirable for the research which it has compelled. This tiny volume gives evidence of as thorough study as would fit out a post-octavo, as some authors understand the writing of history.—_Evangelist_, N. Y. Miss Guiney has written La Rochejaquelein’s life on a small scale, but with spirit and enthusiasm, and her little book is very interesting.—_N. Y. Tribune._ A spirited, vivid, and felicitously phrased account of that dramatic side-issue of the French Revolution, the Vendée War. . . . Miss Guiney’s literary touch is always admirable and, not infrequently, inspired.—_Hartford Courant._ ———— PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. [Illustration] _For sale by all booksellers, or will be sent by the publishers, postage prepaid, to any part of the United States, Canada, or Mexico, receipt of the price._ BY CONSTANCE F. WOOLSON. ————