Saintsbury, written in imitation of the essayists of the eighteenth century, associates the wines in a cellar with the loves and friendships of their owner. To others the vinous treasures would be "good wine and nothing more"; to their present owner they are "a casket of magic liquors," a museum in which he lives over again "the vanished life of the past." The true French bookless _bourgeois_ often calls his cellar his _bibliothèque_, meaning that he values its lore as preferable to that of scholarship; but Mr. Saintsbury's Falernianus associates his wines with sentiment rather than with knowledge. On the whole, the literature in the first number of THE YELLOW BOOK is adequately representative of the modern English literary mind, both in the observation of reality and in style. It is, as I say, really literature and not letterpress. I rather regret, for my own part, the general brevity of the pieces which restricts them to the limits of the sketch, especially as the stories cannot be continued after the too long interval of three months. As to this, the publishers know their own business best, and are probably aware that the attention of the general public, though easily attracted, is even more easily fatigued. II--The Illustrations On being asked to undertake the second part of this critical article, I accepted because one has so rarely an opportunity of saying anything about works of art to which the reader can quite easily refer. To review an exhibition of pictures in London or Paris is satisfactory only when the writer imagines himself to be addressing readers who have visited it, and are likely to visit it again. When an illustration appears in one of the art periodicals, it may be accompanied by a note that adds something to its interest, but no one expects such a note to be really critical. In the present instance, on the contrary, we are asked to say what we think, without reserve, and as we have had nothing to do with the choice of the contributors, and have not any interest in the sale of the periodical, there is no reason why we should not.