Since the investigations of Konráð Gíslason, Bernhard Kahle and Hjalmar Falk nothing has appeared on Skaldic rime usage. Later authors on Old Germanic, and specifically Old Norse, verse technique add virtually nothing on this aspect of Skaldic art. Indeed, as in anatomy, little seems left to do here. The present study was suggested by an intensive reading of Einar Helgason's Vellekla, preparatory to translating it; when the observation obtruded itself that a remarkable use of interlinear hendings is made in this poem. In his commentary on it, Finnur Jónsson has this to say:

Like the Old English poem 74 on metempsychosis, which will soon be discussed in another article, the present poem 39 has puzzled Anglo-Saxon scholars ever since Dietrich in 1859 suggested the solution Day. Later proposals, Time and Moon, are hardly more convincing than the first. In presenting here the solution Hypostasis Death I wish to say that I consider it to be supported not only by the contents of the poem, but also by historical material, from which it may be concluded that during the early Middle Ages speculative theologians inclined towards the belief in the reality of death.

The romance of Partonopeus de Blois, though widely read and much admired in the Middle Ages, has not aroused a comparable interest among modern scholars. No edition of the French text has been published since 1834, and no exhaustive investigation of its literary sources has yet appeared. The story is usually explained as a medievalized version of the legend of Cupid and Psyche, with the roles of hero and heroine reversed under the influence of Breton lais of the fairy mistress type. Since critical discussions have tended to emphasize—perhaps overemphasize—the indebtedness of Partonopeus to the classical legend and its folk tale analogues, the connections with the Breton lais and the matière de Bretagne have been explored only in a general and rather tentative way. A more specific study of these connections based on the available French edition may help us to reach a clearer understanding of the materials which compose this charming romance, although a comprehensive analysis must await a critical edition of the text.

In the Library of Congress there is a micro-film of the cod. germ. quart-414, Berlin, Preussische Staatsbibliothek, a manuscript valuable for those interested in the study of Meistergesang. It contains Meisterlieder which Hans Sachs had collected and includes forty which he wrote himself. Begun in July, 1517, the copying was probably completed by the end of the next year, since none of the poems carry a date later than 1518. For this article a detailed account of the history of the manuscript is not essential. Various scholars have described it briefly, and Goedeke noted its contents, to a certain extent, in his Grundriß. The manuscript is a long one, 459 leaves in addition to a Preface and twenty folios of Index. It is hoped that the following analysis may prove of assistance to those who, like myself, might want to investigate particular problems.

Scholars and students interested in doing research work in Meistergesang will find Berlin 414 an important MS for this genre. In content, for example, it has more to offer even than the famed Kolmar MS or the Dresden M 13.

True, the Kolmar MS is in the lead numerically, as it lists more poems or Lieder than the Berlin 414, but in handling the Karl Bartsch edition of the MS, the author frequently felt that it was unsatisfactory and had many limitations when the checking of the contents was concerned, since there are but 203 Lieder completely printed out of the 940 poems. In the Berlin MS we find just about every one of the 398 poems given in their entirety.

Francisco de Hollanda has been assured a modest paragraph in the ledger of history for three principal merits: he was a competent miniaturist, he was one of Portugal's most enthusiastic humanists, and he was a friend of Michelangelo Buonarroti. Curiously enough, it was this latter acquaintanceship which constituted his chief claim to fame. In the month of October, 1538, Francisco was present at three conversations on art and aesthetics in which participated, among others, Michelangelo and his good friend Vittoria Colonna. Francisco recorded these conversations for posterity. Together with a fourth dialogue in which Michelangelo does not figure, these Dialogos em Roma form the latter half of Francisco's Da pintura antigua, published at Lisbon in 1548.

A recent editor of Shakespeare describes Measure for Measure as “strange and puzzling,” “the despair of commentators.” No play, it would seem, has met with estimates more conflicting. Even common sense (in the person of Samuel Johnson) has voiced disapproval; and the insight of Coleridge, which so often probes deeper, has registered here a pained dislike. Complaints against either the play's subject, its plot, its hero, or its heroine have been heard from critics as eminent as Hazlitt, Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, and Sir Edmund Chambers. In opposition to the disparagers, however, there has appeared within the last century a strain of favorable criticism, lately almost enthusiastic. The rehabilitation may be said to have begun when certain Victorian commentators proclaimed Isabella a sweetly noble heroine, defying Mrs. Lennox's judgment of her as a “mere Vixen.” Yet these same Victorians disapproved the Duke; so that the recent and brilliant apology for the Duke by G. Wilson Knight, comparing the Duke's words and deeds with those of Jesus Christ, has come as a remarkable advance in the reappreciation of the play. At the same time W. W. Lawrence, by his study of medieval custom and analogue, has helped recommend the play's action and enhance its theatrical plausibility. Despite these defenses there are critics who continue to read Measure for Measure as a portrait of disillusionment,‘ negation, and the playwright's supposed cynicism. But two recent Annual Lectures before the British Academy take up boldly the opposite view. C. J. Sisson declares that “Far from being rotten, the play is sound to the core, and profoundly Christian in spirit”; and the late R. W. Chambers acclaims it as embodying a philosophy “more definitely Christian than that of The Tempest.” Appearing the same year as Professor Chambers’ spirited essay is C. J. Reimer's Marburg dissertation, in which we find repeated with emphasis Louis Albrecht's earlier high estimate of the play: it reveals, say these German scholars, the “Hauptzüge der Shakespeareschen Weltanschauung”—namely, a Christian faith not dogmatic or ecclesiastical but Biblical and evangelical. Finally, there has been in recent months a flurry of essays exploring the play's ethical nature. D. A. Traversi calls Measure for Measure “uncompromisingly moral”; F. R. Leavis finds in it a “fineness of ethical and poetic sensibility” which makes it “one of the very greatest of the plays”; and Miss M. C. Bradbrook offers the suggestion to regard it as “something resembling the medieval Morality.” Out of this welter of criticism one truth clearly emerges: that in this instance Shakespeare's work has abundantly justified its teasing title by becoming a “measure” for critics.

Wer von der alten Universitätsstadt Besançon den Doubs stromaufwärts verfolgt bis da, wo er die bezeichnende Schleife bildet, die dem Departement Form und Namen gegeben hat, trifft kurz vor der Krümmung einen linken Nebenfluß, die Alaine, deren malerisches Tal von dem alten Städtchen Montbéliard beherrscht wird. Zur Römerzeit als Mons Peligardi schon ein strategisch wichtiger Punkt, erreichte Montbéliard in der Geschichte Europas seine Hauptbedeutung als Bollwerk und Zufluchtsort des Protestantismus. Das hing mit seiner Regierung zusammen. Gegen Ende des vierzehnten Jahrhunderts, als das Grafengeschlecht Montbéliard in der männlichen Linie ausgestorben war, kam es infolge eines Familienvertrags an die Herzoge von Württemberg. Schon in ihrer gräflichen Zeit hatte die württembergische Dynastie im linksrheinischen Gebiet Interessen begründet, indem Graf Ulrich der Dritte 1324 Schloß und Herrschaft Horbourg im Elsaß kaufte. Später kamen dann Schloß und Herrschaft Riquewihr und die Grafschaft Montbéliard hinzu. Diese linksrheinischen Enklaven, die seitdem auf deutscher Seite regelmäßig mit den deutschen Namen Horburg, Reichenweier und Mömpelgard bezw. Mompelgard, Mompelgart, Monpelgart, bezeichnet werden, dienten durchweg jüngeren Mitgliedern des regierenden Hauses und verwitweten Fürstinnen zum Aufenthalt, waren auch in Zeiten der Not ein willkommenes Refugium. Als Herzog Ulrich 1519 vom Schwäbischen Bund aus Stuttgart vertrieben wurde, wandte er sich nach Mömpelgard, um erst fünfzehn Jahre später in sein Herzogtum zurückzukehren und es als Lehen vom Kaiser Ferdinand zurückzuempfangen. Während dieses Mömpelgarder Aufenthalts war er mit dem schweizerischen Reformator Guillaume Farel bekannt geworden und hatte unter seinem Einfluß in der Grafschaft die neue Religion eingeführt. Seitdem blieb Montbéliard eine Hochburg des Protestantismus. Ihre Bedeutung in Glaubenssachen trat in ein besonders helles Licht, als im Verlauf des Jahrhunderts Graf Friedrich von Württemberg-Montbéliard zwei berühmte Theologen, den Nachfolger Calvins Theodor Beza und den rührigen Jakob Andreae, dahin einlud um in Gegenwart vornehmer weltlicher und geistlicher Zeugen die Vorzüge des Kalvinismus und des Luthertums gegeneinander abzugrenzen.

In view of the long-recognized influence of Thomas Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry upon Johann Gottfried Herder's literary theory, especially upon his “Sturm und Drang” essays and Volkslieder, it comes as a surprise to note that Herder's Lieder der Liebe (1778), containing his German translation of the Biblical Song of Songs as well as his commentary thereon, omits all reference to Percy's earlier English translation and commentary, The Song of Solomon, Newly Translated from the Original Hebrew (1764). To be sure, Percy's work (like Herder's own) appeared anonymously. But in the eighteenth century there were ways of discovering the identity of anonymous writers, as both Percy and Herder knew to their chagrin. Yet in none of Herder's works is there any reference to Percy's Song of Solomon, and in none of his published letters is there any mention of the little book. When one considers Herder's usual scholarly habit of documentation and his willingness to acknowledge sources, one must conclude that he was ignorant of Percy's work. One can speak, naturally, of a permeating influence of the Reliques on this work of Herder's, as one can speak of such an influence on any of his writings. In fact, the thesis of the following pages is that this very influence, fused with a few others having the common denominator of folk-poetry, led Herder to a conception of the Song of Songs quite different from that reached by Percy himself and strikingly similar to Percy's theory in one point only: a negative attitude toward the theory of J. D. Michaelis, which was known to both. The contrast between Herder's and Percy's views of the supposedly Solomonic Song of Songs throws an interesting light upon the critical approach of Herder to a document that could fit perfectly into his definition of poetry as “eine Welt- und Völkergabe” and illustrates the peculiar use he made of the Reliques (along with some other, later works) in the support of his original theory of poetry, which differed so remarkably from that of Percy.

Swift's influence on Keats has gone unrecognized although Keats refers to Swift in several of his letters, imitates his style on occasion, and, I believe, incorporates reminiscences of Swift's work in at least five of his poems. The evidence to be given seeks to explain several hitherto unexplained references in Keats's letters, to clarify a much-debated passage in I Stood Tip-toe, and to show the persistence in Keats's mind of a favorite image. Incidentally it reveals something about Keats's methods of composition; and it shows how Swift was regarded by Hazlitt, Keats, and their circle, calls attention to Keats's early and long-continued interest in Homer (whose work he first knew in Pope's translation), and indicates in Keats a catholicity of taste and an interest in satire to which perhaps more attention might be paid.

The development of French literature about animals has been studied up to the year 1800. In the nineteenth century its character changed. Until then the story was chiefly one of philosophical debates about the souls of beasts, about animal behavior—whether it be mechanical, instinctive, intelligent, sentimental,— the virtue and vice of animals, their inferiority to or superiority over man. The second half of the 18th century saw the final defeat of animal mechanism and the general acceptance of the idea that animals suffer. Then a sentimental humanitarianism developed which denounced hunting, meat-eating, vivisection, and any form of cruelty to animals. The idea that animals are the friends and servants of man became popular and with it the opinion that man owed them kindness and gratitude. Finally, cruelty to animals came to be looked upon as a menace to human society, and pleas were heard for legislation for the protection of animals. The approach to the subject was philosophical, didactic, sentimental. The great and original contribution of the 18th century was the formulation and wide support of an ethical principle.

Two schools of thought exist today concerning the Byronic attitude revealed in Espronceda's works: the traditional school declares that it is a reflection of the rebellious, irreligious, Bohemian character of the poet, while the new school believes that Espronceda deliberately acted and wrote in such a way as to make the public think that he was a dangerous rebel, merely to cast an aura of romanticism about his own person. According to the latter critics, Espronceda was playing a part or maintaining a pose. They claim that his friends knowingly contributed to the false portrait and that their accounts of Espronceda's disdain for conventionality—which are taken quite literally by the traditional school—are but fabrications intended to foster a legend. Hence the new critics give no credence to Ferrer del Río's statement that Espronceda was depicting himself in the hero of El estudiante de Salamanca or Escosura's implication that Byron's romantic adventures and disordered existence influenced profoundly Espronceda's fiery soul, “not less naturally rebellious against the common rules of life.”

Thomas Hardy's plots often introduce an outsider into a tranquil current of events to project a disturbing force into the story. This outsider turns the current and sometimes continues to deflect it to a tragic end. Critics have called the outsiders “invaders” or “human ‘apples of discord’,” but they have not considered what light may be thrown on the nature of these invaders if they are studied in terms that Hardy himself suggests. In speaking of reddlemen, the class to which the invader Diggory Venn belongs, Hardy uses the term “Mephistophelian visitants.” This term is not inapt, I think, to describe a series of invaders, three of them dressed in red and all presented in a background of suggestions that they are preternatural.

Whenever Ferenc Molnar, the Hungarian playwright, is discussed, his name is associated with bons mots, a mondaine psychology, and a kind of sentimentality in which wistfulness and artificial fantasy mingle with love-making rather than with love. The discriminating miss breadth and depth in his plays; they miss the divine law of which Alexander Pope speaks that is “at once the source and end and the test of art.” In the boom years of his greatest popularity in Hungary, it was a criterion of savoir vivre to attend his plays. At times he was severely criticized, but his suavity, his unhampered manner of expression helped the expansion of the theatrical area of Hungary, though he imposed no obligations of deep thinking upon his audiences. His acclaim abroad, of which much was sound and fury, required a re-definition of his place in Hungarian stage-literature with reference to the native drama. The pro and con remarks warrant the conclusion that his universal success was not justified on purely aesthetic grounds. On the other hand, despite his overused technique, it is apparent that by discarding inherited patterns he supplied the theatre of his native land with devices of dramatic expression that were amusing, incalculable, and sometimes artistic. He was unswerving in his theatrical aims, he discovered a new range of possibilities. Hungary never had a Restoration period similar to that of England; however, in some respect, Molnar could be considered a striking example of the polished, dexterous and frivolous violation of patriotic and romantic conventions of the Hungarian stage. As critics pointed out, he himself created a theatrical convention affected by Oscar Wilde, Henri Bataille, Tristan Bernard, Alfred Capus and other western European playwrights, but he also transcended the qualities of his western models and differed from them. In matters of taste the socio-economic stratum that Molnar represented was the upper bourgeoisie, notwithstanding his alleged and true sympathies for underpaid wage earners, or for former human beings, as Maxim Gorkij called homeless vagrants. The quality of his attainments substantiates this classification. Seen against the theatrical horizon of Hungary he differs from traditional playwrights by having his plays built around characters whose main interest was determined by carnal love in its sentimental and ironic aspect, urbanity, cynicism, that is by a carpe diem philosophy in which individual gratifications were the basic impetus of action, and not national, social, or cosmic responsibilities. Molnar had the makings of a cosmopolitan; in fact, the local color of most of his plays is not of decisive importance, though, as Aurel Karpati, the Hungarian critic stated in a panegyric article, Molnar and Budapest develóped at the same time.

On se souvient de la visite que, dans Vol de Nuit, la femme de Fabien, pilote disparu, fait à Rivière, directeur de la Compagnie de Navigation aérienne: