"As the holiday season draws to a close, the publishers' announcements of 'new books' fill column after column of the organs chosen from these special _communiqués_. But there is one work which is not entered in these lists, though for years scholars, and many people who are not scholars, have been looking for it with an eagerness which has left far behind the ordinary curiosity which is bestowed on the greatest of contributions to current literature. And to-day the chosen few who are in possession of the volume in question are examining it with an interest proportionate to the long toil which has been bestowed on its preparation. We refer to Captain Burton's translation of the 'Arabian Nights' Entertainments,' now entitled 'The Book of the thousand Nights and a Night,' of which the first tome has just been issued. There will be ten in all, so that it must be well on for two years before the entire series can be in the hands of those who have subscribed for it. For the book is not published. It is even questionable whether a copy will be in the British Museum or the Bodleian, unless those institutions have entered their names in advance. It is printed 'by the Kamashastra Society of Benares for private subscribers only,' and Captain Burton, in a circular sent with the first volume, earnestly begs that it will not be permitted to fall into the hands of any save scholars and students of Moslem manners. For years and years the 'Arabian Nights' have been a sort of nursery companion. But it is, perhaps, unnecessary to tell any one acquainted in the slightest degree with Oriental romances that the 'Alf Laylah wa Laylah' in its unabridged form is, despite the popularity which it enjoys as a 'child's book,' emphatically not for the entertainment of boys and girls. Hitherto, however, all of the editions have been imperfect and more or less colourless versions of the original. They have been prepared for the drawing-room, and even Mr. Payne inserted a Latin word here and there rather than search Captain Grose's 'Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue' for its equivalent. Captain Burton scorns any such namby-pambyism. In the Arabic a spade is usually called a spade, and in the latest English translation it is never designated an agricultural implement. Moreover, the endless footnotes which the editor appends, speak with much freedom of many things usually avoided as themes for conversation in polite society, though they throw a flood of light on hundreds of features of Oriental life on which, since travellers have been compelled to write for 'refined' audiences, the student has failed to be informed.