Of all the stirring romances hitherto published by Mrs. Bray, the _true_ history before us is assuredly the most stirring and the most romantic. The single story of Jean Cavalier, the baker's boy of Anduze, contains the elements of a dozen romances. From his first appearance on the stage of history to do his allotted work, to his final sinking into honourable obscurity when his work was done, Jean Cavalier shines out as the true and gallant soldier of the cross, the faithful defender of the right, the constant avenger of the wrong. He was a youth of seventeen, the eldest of three sons of a shepherd of Anduze. 'Altogether,' says Mrs. Bray, 'he was such as we may fancy him to have been, who, armed with the shepherd's sling in the cause of the Lord, overcame the giant Philistine.' None could have thought that such a one could have been chosen to avenge the iniquitous Edict of Nantes, issued by the greatest monarch of Europe, at the instigation of the wisest woman of her day. The boy had been apprenticed to a baker at Anduze, and this circumstance was in itself a fund of amusement at the court of Versailles, where the '_Petit Maître_' and the '_Garçon Boulanger_' served as whetstones to the wit of the courtiers at the _petit lever_ and _grand coucher_ of the king. But the baker's boy had been endowed by heaven with the strangest and most mysterious of gifts--a military genius untaught, and frank as nature's self--which ere long caused the boldest of the Great Monarch's generals to tremble and turn pale at even the mention of his name. No other account of this extraordinary talent has been given than that during his shepherd life he would love to spend whole hours on the Garden watching the manoeuvres of the soldiers, who at that time were stationed in the country in order to force the Protestants into adoption of the Catholic faith. No other lesson in military science had he ever taken, and yet he defeated the boldest troops and ablest generals of the proudest army in the world! The mysterious nature of his mission, reminds one strongly of Joan of Arc. At nineteen years of age he quitted France for ever, leaving behind him the memory of his glory and the grateful affection of the Protestants of the Cevennes, by whom his name is revered and cherished to this very day. Mrs. Bray has performed her task of biographer of Jean Cavalier in the most satisfactory and conscientious manner, with all the stedfastness of the historian and the enthusiasm of the romance writer. 'The Revolt in the Cevennes' is a charming book, and should be placed in the hands of every Protestant boy and girl throughout the world. _The Correspondence of the Right Honourable William Wickham, from the year_ 1794. Edited, with Notes, by his Grandson, WILLIAM WICKHAM, M.A. Two vols. 8vo. London. 1870.