In the second volume of _Shakspeare as Protestant, Politician, Psychologist and Poet_, by DR. ED. VEHSE—spoken of as being "even more uninteresting than the first," we find the two following extraordinary ideas. Firstly, that Shakspeare followed a theory of physical _temperaments_ in his characters—that Hamlet was a representative of the melancholy or nervous, Othello of the choleric, Romeo of the sanguine, and Falstaff of the phlegmatic. Secondly, that in Falstaff, Shakspeare parodied—himself! Or to give his own words, "We may suppose that Shakspeare’s physical constitution inclined to corpulence, and inspired in him the disposition to the life of a _bon vivant_. His intimacy with the Earl of Southampton may have favored this disposition, since they led for a long time a dissipated tavern-life, and were rivals in love matters!" The work is principally made up of extracts from Shakspeare’s plays, to every which extract we find appended "How admirable,"—"Excellent," and similar aids to those who are not familiar with the English bard. We commend to the attention of philologists Das _Gothische Runenalphabet_, (or The Gothic Runic Alphabet,) recently published by HERTZ of Berlin. "Before Wulfila, the Goths had an alphabet of twenty-five letters, formed according to the same principles, and bearing nearly the same names as the _Runes_ of the Anglo-Saxons and Northmen, and probably arranged in the same order of succession. _Wulfila_ adopted the Grecian alphabet, which through his modification was received by the Goths to the old twenty-five letters." This is the theory propounded in the work, which is not wanting, as we learn, in instructive information. In connection with this we may notice a book which has been deemed worthy of a modern English republication in elegant style, the often referred to _Scriptural Poems_ of CÆDMON, in Anglo-Saxon, an edition of which, by R. W. BOUTERWEK, with an Anglo-Saxon Glossary, has recently been published by Bædeher of Elberfeldt. The _Preussische Zeitung_ states that M. HANKE, a learned Bohemian, is publishing, in Prague, a _fac-simile_ of the Gospels on which the Kings of France have always been sworn at their coronation at Rheims. The manuscript volume is in the Slavonian language, and has been preserved at Rheims ever since the twelfth century, but it has only been lately discovered in what language it was written. The eleventh volume of the _Monumenta Germaniæ Historica_ inde ab anno Christi 500 usque ad annum 1500 auspiciis societ, aperiendis fontibus serum German medii ævi edid, G. H. PERTZ, has just made its appearance. This work is regarded as a stupendous effort of erudition and historical acumen, even in Germany.