It was at this period that the present school of French literature had its beginning; the spirit then so strongly manifested, the tendency to clearness, brightness, and high finish of style which then appeared among French writers, have since that time been the signs and tokens of the French mind and hand in literature. All that goes before is rude or fantastic or pedantic; then French literature rises in its splendor; we can hardly say its grandeur. Mr. Van Laun's first volume is full of interest which, however, is rather historical than literary; in the succeeding part of his work we may look for criticism more acceptable to the general reader. --We pass easily from this history of the earliest days of French literature to its very latest, and we may add, one of its most characteristic productions. Alphonse Daudet's novel, "Fromont Jeune et Risler Ainé," has suddenly attained one of those rare and brilliant successes which seem possible only in France. Within an incredibly short time sixty thousand copies of it were sold, and it was "crowned" by the French Academy; whatever that may mean, whether an actual crowning of either book or author, it certainly does imply the awarding of the highest honors by the most eminent literary tribunal in France. It has now been reproduced here in a translation which leaves nothing to be desired, whether as a transfusion of the French spirit of the book, or as an example of a fine English narrative style.[10] Indeed, it unites these two most important requisites of a good translation in a rare and remarkable manner. As to the book itself, although it is a very good novel, and carries upon its face the evidence that it is a careful study of a certain phase of French life, we are at a loss to account for its phenomenal success. It is all about Sidonie, who may be called its heroine, as Becky Sharp is the heroine of "Vanity Fair." Now Sidonie is a pretty, vulgar, vile-souled shop girl who uses her beauty to make her way to a certain sort of _bourgeois_ fashionable life, but who is really a far more infamous creature than many a common harlot. For she is not wanton; she is not merely venal; she is pitilessly selfish and fiendishly malicious. She has no honesty of any kind--of mind, heart, soul, or body. A baser, viler creature in female, and therefore in human form, it would be impossible to conceive. For to all grovelling, debasing vice she adds a monstrous, cold-hearted cruelty. With all this she is not remarkable for anything except a pretty, blooming face and a low cunning. What need to familiarize us with the life of such a creature? She ruins the happiness of two men, one of a noble soul and the other a weak-minded creature; she breaks up a family; she brings her principal victim to suicide; and all this not even for a grand passion, but that she may have fine dresses, diamonds, and a social success. This is very barren business. We do not care to