after all, rather as an ornamental possession of the New York _Herald_. The great traveler's good-nature to Mr. Bennett, as a voluntary correspondent and coadjutor by brevet with the journal, disarms and enchants him: beginning with a prejudice, he ends by saying, "I grant he is not an angel, but he approaches to that being as near as the nature of a living man will allow." In every trait Stanley shows himself whole-souled, ignorant of half measures, unscrupulous, cruel on occasion, driving, positive, and furnished with a sure instinct of success. The book, from its hasty construction, admits many inconsistencies, the worst of which is its long tirade against the Geographical Society, nullified finally by gracious thanks for their medal; but it has the energetic virtue of a book written while memory was fresh, and is often truly dramatic and pictorial. It is the garrulous appendage of a strange and solid achievement, the feather-end of the arrow, which advertises the hit of the steel. The Minnesinger of Germany. By A. E. Kroeger. New York: Hurd & Houghton. Mr. Kroeger appears to have an antiquarian's thoroughness in his subject, and he has made it an interesting one to Western readers. But he has not succeeded in his translations, partly because he does not respect the usage and associations of the English words he rivets incompatibly together, and partly because success, even for a more poetical translator, is impossible in the premises. The authors of the Minnelay, in their elaborate rhyme-caprice, must have remained harmonious and lyrical, which is not the case with a version like this: I look so Esau-like, perdu, My hair hangs rough and unkempt. Hu! Gentle Summer, where are you? Ah, were the world no more so dhu! Rather than bide in this purlieu, Longer to stay I'll say, Adieu! And go as monk to Toberlu. Or like this, which Mr. Kroeger, without the fear of _Maud's_ author before his eyes, compares to Tennyson: Rosy-colored meadows To shadows we see vanish everywhere, Wood-birds' warbling dieth, Sore-trieth them the snow of wintry year. Woe, woe! what red mouth's glow Hovers now o'er the valley? Ah, ah, the hours of woe! Lovers it doth rally No more; yet its caress seems cosy.