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ordered him to send me James's Powder and he has sent me some other,' and ordered the genuine article direct from Newbery's shop. Was it this Hawes or another who tried to appropriate the medicine for himself in James's latter days, claiming that he had prepared them, and who met James's affidavit to the contrary by arguing that he was insane? It must not be imagined that James was a vulgar quack. 'No man,' said Dr. Johnson, 'brings more mind to his profession.' In those liberal days it was proper for a reputable doctor to sell his own nostrums. With an eye to the benefit of 'millions yet unborn,' as Kit Smart phrased it, the old man spent his last years in laying up a magazine of the preparation, to protect the property against the swarm of substitutes that would appear on the market after his death. It was this stock, no doubt, that made John Newbery's son a landed proprietor and sheriff of his county.

We have felt it just to place this remedy in the forefront because it was Newbery's chief means to prosperity in this world, and (if we may judge from his epitaph), his highest claim to consideration in the next:

Stay, Passenger, and contemplate
Virtues, which arose on this spot:

Urbanity that adorned society,

Knowledge that instructed it,

Industry that raised a family to affluence,
Sagacity that discerned, and

Skill that introduced

The most powerful discovery

In the annals of medicine.

The humble wisdom that taught

And still teaches, Moral lessons

To the rising generation.

Lament!

That a Breath inspired with such Virtues is sunk in dust.

Rejoice!

That through Christ, it is immortal!'

Newbery's second claim, it will be seen, to the consideration of posterity lies in his work for the 'rising generation.' He was indeed the pioneer of the vast mass of children's books which have now risen to such a pitch of skill that they are enjoyed by adults if not by the children. In a woodcut of the period the shop in St. Paul's Churchyard is depicted with Æsop carved in relief above the door, while a small boy eagerly drags his mother in to join the children who are already ransacking the 'Juvenile Library.' The good Doctor Primrose, whose pamphlet on the Whistonian controversy was published by Newbery, tells how his necessity was relieved at a wayside inn by "The philanthropic bookseller in St. Paul's Churchyard, who has written so many little books for children. He called himself their friend, but he was the friend of all mankind. He was no sooner alighted, but he was in haste to begone, for he was ever on business of the utmost importance and was at the time actually compiling materials for the history of one Mr. Thomas Trip.' Not only Thomas Trip, but Tom Thumb, and Goody Two Shoes, Giles Gingerbread, and Jack the Giant Killer are characters that we owe to John Newbery himself and the dexterous pens at his command. Some may remember that one of Canning's early writings was an elaborate comparison between Tom Thumb and the Odyssey of Homer. In this field Newbery was a great emancipator-for nothing could be more dreary or revolting than the earlier books intended for children. It is true that Dr. James's powders and other properties of Newbery would pop out in the most unexpected places in these tales; nevertheless they did tell a story, and a story that was a 'respectable instance of the accommodation of superior talents to the feeble intellects of infantine felicity.' From George III downwards, the children of the period were brought up on Newbery's books and Newbery's doses.1

Newbery is best remembered as the friend and almoner of Oliver Goldsmith, and, on occasion, of Samuel Johnson. For years he and Goldsmith lived under the same roof at Canonbury Tower.

1An award, called after Newbery, is now given yearly by an American society to the best children's story. This year the winner is Hendrik van Loon.

There the sweet bard of Auburn sat and turn'd
The plaintive moanings of his village dirge;
There learned Chambers treasur'd lore for men
And Newbery there his A, B, C's for babes.

It is indeed a question whether it was not he who introduced Goldsmith to Johnson. In the catalogue of Newbery's publications there are twenty-two titles under the name of Oliver Goldsmith, ranging from a life of Beau Nash to the Vicar of Wakefield, and it has been argued that Goody Two Shoes should be added to the number. There are few better-known literary anecdotes than the tale of Goldsmith's arrest for debt by his landlady, of his cry for help to Johnson, and of the manuscript Vicar of Wakefield that fetched £60 from the Newberys, and relieved his necessity. But is the story accurate? Did Boswell forget? I have no means of unravelling the mystery. But it is certain that, while the book was not published till 1766, it was sold on October 28th, 1762. Either it was sold before it was written, in which case Boswell's story is shaken, or there was an unconscionable delay, perhaps for business reasons, in publishing it.

This kindly, indefatigable man died at fifty-four. If the epitaph composed for him savours of the affectation of the age, a little charade of Goldsmith's shows the esteem of those who knew him best.

What we say of a thing which is just come in fashion,
And that which we do with the dead,

Is the name of the honestest man in creation;

What more of a man can be said?

The business was divided between his step-son, his nephew, and his son Francis. The latter was an accomplished dilettante, to whom Dr. Johnson spoke a word in season. 'Young man, give the fiddle to the first beggar man you meet, or you will never be a scholar.' Francis did not throw away the fiddle, but had the sense to prefer a good income from the Powders to the precarious life of a physician, and died a country gentleman. This artistic strain persisted in the family. His grandson went sketching and studying antiquities in Italy, fell in love with a young Italian girl in a nunnery, and married her at 15. In middle life he removed with his

large family to Canada, and there he gave lessons in painting to a future President of the Canadian Academy. Family traits are lasting things. Is it only imagination that I trace in one of his children the kindliness and eagerness of John Newbery?

XANTHIAS.

CURRENT EVENTS

Europe in 1922.

There is still but one European question-the Treaty of Versailles. It was the offspring of two motives, a high idealism and a natural human rancour. Which has been the more disastrous it would be hard to conjecture, even if each did not at every turn frustrate the other. President Wilson's cry of self-determination has in practice resulted in a brood of small nations, most of them destitute of political wisdom and possessed by an insensate nationalism. So far the creation of new nationalities has increased the sum of hatred, not dispelled it. In time we may hope they will make the economic accords necessary for their own preservation and for the life of Europe. There are signs that the process has begun, but at the present day the Customs lines are cords of strangulation, and the army of petty officials who swarm in the new States are a drain on their vitality. On the other hand, the punitive clauses of the Versailles Treaty, as every disinterested man now sees, mark the second stage in the decline of European civilization. It was natural and even pardonable that they should have been inserted, pardonable, that is, if expert opinion to the contrary had not been at the service of the treaty-makers. In the exalted days of victory few, and those not always men whose motives were above suspicion, saw that the victors were putting a knife to their own throats. It was certain that the Germans would do all in their power to evade paying and there was more than a doubt in the last few years whether a powerful ring in Germany, for purposes of private gain, were not forcing down the value of the mark. To-day the value of the mark is beyond their control and perhaps beyond ours.

The murder of Dr. Rathenau may mark a turning-point in German history. It was recognized by those who knew Germany best that the Republican Government, though weak, was on the whole well meaning. But the Royalists held them in the hollow of their hands and might when it pleased them

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