Of the translations recommended by Mr. Raffety we should very much like to get a sight of the translation of Pindar by Calverley, of the joint translation of the same classic by Messrs. E. Myers and A. Lang, and of the joint translation of Thucydides “by Jowett and Rev. H. Dale, 2 vols.” Of Herodotus, of Æschylus, of Sophocles, of Pindar, of Polybius, of Demosthenes, what are, by general consent, esteemed the best translations are not so much as mentioned. Latin literature fares even worse in the hands of our guide. Mr. Raffety appears to know no more about Catullus than that he was a writer of epigrams. Such trifles as the _Attis_, the _Peleus and Thetis_, the Julia and Manlius marriage song, the _Coma Berenices_, the love lyrics and threnodies he does not condescend to notice. In “guiding” his readers to translations of Lucretius and Juvenal, Munro’s version of the first in prose and Gifford’s version of the second in verse--which Conington pronounced to be the best version of any Roman classic in our language--are not so much as referred to. Nor, again, in the case of Plautus and Terence, are the excellent versions of Thornton and Coleman noticed. Tacitus, who is oddly described as “the foremost man of the day,” an estimate which might have pleased but which would certainly have surprised him, chronicled, we are told, “the foundation of the Christian religion.” Mr. Raffety’s assurance on this point will probably disappoint inquisitive readers. Equally surprising are the portions of the work dealing with the modern literatures. In the course of these we learn that “the _Nibelungen Lied_ is the oldest drama in Europe”; that the _Areopagitica_ and the _Defence of the People of England_ are Milton’s best prose writings--Mr. Raffety apparently not being aware that the second work is in Latin, and that if he means the first _Defence_, it is anything but one of the best of Milton’s writings. We are also informed that Dryden was most valuable as a translator from the Greek and Latin; Dryden’s versions from the Greek begin and end with paraphrases of four Idylls of Theocritus, the first book of the _Iliad_ and the parting of Hector and Andromache from the sixth, and are notoriously the very worst things he ever did. Sometimes Mr. Raffety fairly takes our breath away, as when he informs us that Gray’s tomb can be seen in the little churchyard of Stoke Pogis “with the _Elegy_ written upon it.” Can Mr. Raffety be acquainted with the length of the _Elegy_ and with the proportions of a tombstone? Chaucer, we are informed, wrote some poems in Italian. We should very much like to see them, and so probably would Professor Skeat, for they appear to have escaped the notice of all Chaucer’s editors. Swift’s _Tale of a Tub_ was written, we are told, “against the teaching of Hobbes!”