effective, is weakened by the knowledge which the reader possesses, that Chariclea is all along aware of the secret of her own parentage, and that she has only to produce the fillet and ring in order to ensure her deliverance from the dreadful doom which appears to threaten her. The improbability of some of the incidents, and the awkward manner in which others are brought about, have been much objected to by modern critics, and it must be admitted that some better way might be found to dispose of personages whose agency was no longer needed, than to cut them off by sudden death, like Calasiris, or by the bite of a venemous serpent, like Thermuthis. But the mechanical art (as it may almost be called) of constructing a story was then in its infancy; and the violations of probability which have been laid to the charge of Heliodorus, are, after all, much less flagrant than those of Achilles Tatius, and infinitely less so than those of any of the other Greek writers of romance; nor would many of our modern novelists, perhaps, gain much by the comparison. The characters are of very different degrees of merit. Theagenes is as insipid and uninteresting as one of Walter Scott's well-behaved heroes; and his entreaties to Chariclea, in the final scene, no longer to delay making herself known to her parents, betray a most laudable instinct of self-preservation. The deeds of strength and valour which he is occasionally made to perform, seem rather to arise from the author's remembering that his hero must do something to support the character, than to result naturally from the situations in which he is placed, and his love of decorum is carried, on all occasions, to an absurd extent of prudery. "Le heros de la pièce est d'une sagesse qui a donné lieu à des railleries assez plaisantes," says Bayle; though the instance usually cited--a box on the ear, which he gives Chariclea, when she approaches him in her beggar's dress, under the walls of Memphis, and attempts to throw herself into his arms, is scarcely a fair one, as he does not at the time recognize his beloved under her unbecoming disguise. The character of Chariclea herself, however, makes ample amends for the defects of that of her lover; and this superiority of the heroine, it may be observed, is almost invariable in the early Greek romances. The masculine firmness and presence of mind which she evinces in situations of peril and difficulty, combined at all times with feminine delicacy, and the warmth and confiding simplicity of her love for Theagenes, attach to her a degree of interest which belongs to none of the other personages; and her spontaneous burst of grateful affection, on recognizing, at Meroë, the voice of her foster-father, Charicles, is expressed with exquisite tenderness. Of the subordinate characters little need be said. Charicles is a mere impersonation of benevolence and parental love; and Cnemon seems to have been introduced for little