The Boston _Commonwealth_ (what satire there is in that name!) is a nice paper, but its editor has not smiled for forty years; and all of his little writers carry so much culture that they are round-shouldered, flat-chested, bow-legged and near-sighted. They belong to the large class that invariably miss the point of things and use dignity for a mask to hide their lack of a sense of fun. The _Commonwealth_ accuses us of being envious of the _Chip-Munk_; of being violently prejudiced against Mr. Cudahy’s book, and of speaking irreverently of Boston. Go to thou old granny _Commonwealth_, why sit you like your grandsire carved in alabaster and creep into the jaundice by being peevish? * * * * * The _Book-Peddler_ is doing great service in promotion of what passes for literature in the paper and ink stores. I cannot but think what a similar publication devoted to literature, not trade, could do to save the valuable time of the reading public. Since Solomon’s time a good many things have changed, but in one there is no improvement. “Of the making of many books there is no end,” and that is a heap sadder than the lamentation of Maud Muller and His Honor. * * * * * Concerning Mr. Grant Allen’s book and the manner in which its title has been made the basis of several others more or less reminiscent, my most valued correspondent writes me that the novelists are missing much by not calling a story _The Woman Who Is Simply Dying To_. In my well known philanthropic way I throw out this suggestion hoping that somebody may make many dollars by the adoption of the title for a decadent tale. * * * * * The Vanastorbilts are really under great obligations to Mrs. Rorer’s _Household News_ for the simple daily menus for poor folks which are a feature. There’s nothing so cheap as good living—in a magazine. When bread sticks and banana chutney and peaches and rice and cantaloupe can be mowed away by a poor man before the seven o’clock whistle blows no hard worker ought to lack muscle for his daily toil. We have printed assurance of Mrs. Bellow that “These menus have been arranged on a scientific plan, are thoroughly hygienic, and contain all that is necessary for proper living.” It is luck after all that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the hygienic mouth aforesaid. * * * * * Messrs. Lo & Behold, publishers of works on moral pathology, Boston, are making great efforts to club the _Arena_. I understand they propose offering season tickets to museums of morbid anatomy as prizes. * * * * *