_William Ware._--In March, 1836, there appeared in _The Knickerbocker Magazine_ the first of a series of “Letters from Palmyra,” which aroused much interest. They purported to be written by a young Roman noble who visited Palmyra in the reign of Zenobia. They vividly presented the everyday life of the Roman Empire and at once gave their author high rank as a classical scholar. William Ware (1797-1852) graduated from Harvard College in 1816 and became a Unitarian clergyman; for some years he edited _The Christian Examiner_. The “Letters from Palmyra” were published in book form in 1837; the book is now called “Zenobia,” from the title of the English reprint. It was followed in 1838 by a sequel, “Probus,” in which the last persecution of Roman Christians is ably and energetically described. The title of this book was afterward changed to “Aurelian.” His third novel, “Julian, or Scenes in Judea” (1841), narrated many episodes in the life of Jesus of Nazareth, the crucifixion forming a powerful climax to the story. _Mathews and Briggs._--A highly imaginative and somewhat absurd romance entitled “Behemoth, a Legend of the Mound-Builders” (1839) was the work of Cornelius Mathews (1817-89), a New York dramatist and magazine writer. His “Career of Puffer Hopkins” (1841) set forth some phases of contemporary political life; it first appeared serially in _Arcturus_, which Mathews edited in 1840-42. Another novel of his was “Moneypenny, or The Heart of the World” (1850), a story of city and country life. All of Mathews’ stories, however, have a journalistic flavour. In the same year with Mathews, Charles Frederick Briggs (1840-77), a New York journalist, entered the ranks of the novelists with his “Adventures of Harry Franco, a Tale of the Great Panic” (1839), following it with “The Haunted Merchant” (1843) and “The Trippings of Tom Pepper” (1847). All of his novels have a certain value as humorous pictures of New York City life; through them runs a vein of amusing satire. Briggs was later the first editor of _Putnam’s Monthly_.