NOTES AND NEWS

Alphonse Wauters, perhaps the most eminent of Belgian historians, died in Brussels on May 2, at the age of eighty-one. His publications, almost all of which bore directly on Belgian history, were very numerous. The most important were: Histoire de la Ville de Bruxelles, by him and A. Henne (1843-1845); Géographie et Histoire des Communes Belges (1869-1873); Les Libertés Communales en Belgique (1869-1878); and the first nine volumes of the Table Chronologique des Chartes et Diplômes imprimés concernant l'Histoire de la Belgique (1866–1896).

Dr. Karl Knies, professor of political science in the University of Heidelberg, died in that city on August 3, at the age of seventy-seven. He was one of the most prominent representatives of the historical school among German economists. His most famous work, Die Politische Oekonomie vom Standpunkte der geschichtlichen Methode, appeared in 1853. In 1892, after a long series of economic works, he published for the Historical Commission of Baden, Der briefliche Verkehr Carl Friedrichs von Baden mit Mirabeau und Du Pont.

Dr. Georg Moritz Ebers, the Egyptologist, died near Munich on August 8, at the age of sixty-one. Though best known by his historical novels, the scene of which was laid in Egypt, he was professor of Egyptology at Leipzig from 1870 to 1893, and had acquired scientific repute by various erudite publications, the most extensive of which was an edition of the important papyrus which he discovered in Egypt in his journey of 1872-1873 and which was called by his name.

Hon. Thomas M. Cooley, formerly chief-justice of Michigan and at a later time head of the Inter-state Commerce Commission, died on September 10, at the age of seventy-four. He was chiefly noted as a jurist and as a writer on constitutional law, but in 1885 published a volume on the history of Michigan in the "American Commonwealths'' series.

Mr. William Kelby, formerly librarian of the New York Historical Society, and for many years officially connected with that organization, died in Brooklyn on July 27.

Professor W. J. Ashley of Harvard University will be absent in Europe during the coming academic year. Dr. William Cunningham of Trinity College, Cambridge, will lecture in his stead.

Miss Lucy M. Salmon, professor of history in Vassar College, will spend the coming academic year in study in Europe. Mr. Theodore Clarke Smith will act as her substitute.

Mr. Allen Johnson has been elected professor of history in Iowa College, in the place of Professor Leonard F. Parker, resigned.

At the meeting of the International Congress of Diplomatic History which was held at the Hague during the past month, on the occasion of the enthronement of Queen Wilhelmina, there was distributed to the members a" Projet provisoire de Statuts " providing for similar international historical congresses to recur in the future, at intervals of two years, the next to be held at Paris in 1900. The scheme contemplates sessions similar to those of other international congresses of savants, arranged for by a committee of the country in which the meetings are held, and under the honorary presidency of its minister of foreign affairs or of education; an organization into sections for ancient, medieval, modern and recent history respectively, with sub-divisions; and even the election of "vingt hautes personnalités de la science" as a permanent, self-perpetuating "Académie Internationale de l'Histoire." Details will be dis

cussed at Paris in 1900.

Upon the model of Iwan von Müller's Handbuch der klassischen Wissenschaften, a co-operative historical work of great extent entitled Handbuch der mittelalterlichen und neueren Geschichte is being prepared in Germany, under Drs. Georg von Below and Freidrich Meinecke as editors. It is to be published by R. Oldenbourg in Munich, and is to consist of five chief divisions; general, the auxiliary sciences, constitutional-legaleconomic, political history, and antiquities, each to consist of several treatises.

Beginning in January 1899 the firm of Hettler, of Leipzig, will publish, under the title Bibliotheca Historica, a monthly repertory of references to historical articles in current journals.

The announcements now made for the "Foreign Statesmen Series " include volumes on: Louis XI., by Professor G. W. Prothero; Ferdinand of Aragon, by E. Armstrong; Mazarin, by Arthur Hassall; Louis XIV., by H. O. Wakeman; Catharine II., by J. Bury; and Cavour, by the Countess Cesaresco.

ANCIENT HISTORY.

At the beginning of the year 1899 the house of B. G. Teubner, of Leipzig, will begin the publication of an Archiv für Papyrusforschung und verwandte Gebiete, edited by Dr. Ulrich Wilken, of Breslau, with assistant editors in various countries. The object of the new journal is the publication of articles relating to or derived from the material contained in the thousands of papyri discovered in recent times, or concerning the history of Hellenism in Egypt; texts also, occasionally, and news interesting to those engaged in this special branch of inquiry.

The Oxford University Press is about to issue for the Egypt Exploration Fund the first volume of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, edited by Messrs. B. P. Grenfell and A. S. Hunt. The volume will contain 158

texts, a few of which are literary, while a majority are official and private documents, dating from the first to the seventh century of our era.

Professor Ettore Pais of the University of Pisa has published another instalment of his extensive scheme of a general history of ancient Italy. His project comprises two divisions, each of three volumes: a history of Sicily and Magna Graecia, of which the first volume was published in 1894, and a Storia di Roma, both to be carried down through the Punic wars, to the time when Italy was unified under Roman rule. Of the second section he has now published Vol. I., Part I., Critica della Tradizione sino alla Caduta del Decemvirato (Turin, Carlo Clausen, pp. 629).

Dr. William Fairley's edition of the Monumentum Ancyranum, in the series of Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History, published by the University of Pennsylvania, presents the Latin and Greek texts, an English translation, an excellent introduction, and a bibliography. It should do much toward making this fundamental text more widely known among our students.

Mr. Furneaux's edition of the Agricola of Tacitus (Oxford, Clarendon Press) is edited with so unusual a degree of attention to the historical, archaeological and topographical problems connected with that treatise as to demand notice of the book in a historical journal.

Professor Dill of Queen's College, Belfast, is completing a work on Social Life during the last Century of the Roman Empire of the West, which is to be published before long by Messrs. Macmillan. The volume will deal with such topics as the force and manifestations of pagan sentiment; the moral tone of Roman society; the fiscal administration ; the decay of the middle class; the expectations as to the future of the Empire; the relations of Romans with barbarians; and the condition of literary culture and education in the fifth century.

Noteworthy articles in periodicals: G. Maspero, Anciens Testaments Égyptiens (Nouvelle Revue Historique de Droit, 1898, 3); The Babylonian Discoveries (Edinburgh Review, April); E. W. Hopkins, Ancient and Modern Hindu Gilds, II. (Yale Review, August); G. W. Botsford, The Trial of the Alcmaeonidae and the Cleisthenean Constitutional Reforms (Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, VIII.); U. Köhler, Die Eroberung Asiens durch Alexander den Grossen und der korinthische Bund (Sitzungsberichte der Berliner Akademie, 1898, 6 and 7); B. W. Henderson, The Campaign of the Metaurus, I. (English Historical Review, July); E. Beaudouin, Les grands Domaines dans l'Empire Romain, V. (Nouvelle Revue Historique de Droit, 1898, 3); G. Magliari, Il Patriziato Romano dal secolo IV. al VIII. (Studi e Documenti di Storia e Diritto, XVIII. 3-4).

EARLY CHURCH HISTORY.

Dr. Cheetham, archdeacon of Rochester, is writing a history of the church from the Reformation to our own times, conceived upon the

model of his own History of the Early Church, and of the late Archdeacon Hardwick's books on the church history of the Middle Ages and of the period of the Reformation. The four volumes will thus form a series chronologically complete. Dr. Cheetham's book will be published by Messrs. Macmillan.

The Rev. S. Baring-Gould's new edition of his Lives of the Saints (London, J. C. Nimmo), has now been completed by the addition of the sixteenth volume, containing valuable indexes to the whole series.

Noteworthy articles in periodicals: M. F. Hassett, Primitive Episcopal Elections, II. (Catholic University Bulletin, July); L. Traube, Die Regula Sancti Benedicti; Geschichte des Textes (Abhandlungen der K. Bayerischen Akademie, hist. Cl., XXI. 3); A. Ehrhard, Symeon Metaphrastes und die griechische Hagiographie (Römische Quartalschrift, XI.).

MEDIEVAL HISTORY.

M. Paul Sabatier, the biographer of St. Francis of Assisi, has undertaken the publication of a collection of documents for the religious and literary history of the Middle Ages. The first volume makes a valuable beginning by putting forth an edition of the Speculum Perfectionis seu Sancti Francisci Assisiensis Legenda Antiquissima auctore fratre Leone.

Father Conrad Eubel has published (Rome, the Vatican press, pp. xlii, 643) the fifth volume of his official Bullarium Franciscanum, sive Romanorum Pontificum Constitutiones, Epistolae, Diplomata tribus ordinibus. . . concessa. It covers the years of Benedict XI., Clement V. and John XXII. For the former two pontificates, we are told, the work was not of great difficulty, most of the documents being already in print; but the reign of John XXII. required the examination of sixty thousand documents in the papal archives.

Messrs. Chapman and Hall have in hand a volume entitled Medical Works of the Fourteenth Century, transcribed from four manuscripts of that period, edited by Professor Henslow, with introduction and notes by Professor W. W. Skeat.

Mr. M. Macauliffe, formerly of the Indian civil service, sends out a circular letter, originally addressed to the Sikhs, relating to the translation into English of their sacred book, the Granth Sahib, the laborious task upon which he has been for several years engaged, lately under special commission from the Khalsa Diwan. The work is of much importance, not only to the history of a most interesting religion, but incidentally also to portions of the medieval history of India. Mr. Macauliffe's circular is accompanied by a specimen translation of the Japji of Guru Nanak, the morning hymn of the Sikhs, submitted for suggestions. His address is 2. Cantonments, Amritsar, India.

Noteworthy articles in periodicals: G. Seeliger, Volksrecht und Königsrecht (Historische Vierteljahrschrift, 1898, 3); E. Bernheim, Das Verhältnis der Vita Caroli Magni zu den sogen. Annales Einhardi (His

torische Vierteljahrschrift, 1898, 2); K. Zeumer, Zur Geschichte der Reichssteuern im früheren Mittelalter (Historische Zeitschrift, LXXXI. 1); C. Neumann, Die byzantinische Marine, ihre Verfassung und ihr Verfall (Historische Zeitschrift, LXXXI. 1); R. Holtzmann, Die Wahl Friedrichs I. zum deutschen König (Historische Vierteljahrschrift, 1898, 2); P. Fournier, Deux Controverses sur les Origines du Décret de Gratien (Revue d'Histoire et de Littérature Religieuse, III. 2, 3).

GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.

The recent record publications of the British government include Vol. II. (1313-1317) of the Patent Rolls of Edward II.; Vol. IV. (1338– 1340) of the Patent Rolls of Edward III.; Vol. I. (1547-1563) of the Calendars of State Papers relating to Scotland and Mary Queen of Scots, edited by Joseph Bain; Vol. XVII. (1588–1589) of the Acts of the Privy Council, edited by Mr. John R. Dasent; a new volume (1690-1691) of the Calendars of State Papers, Domestic, of the reign of William and Mary, edited by William J. Hardy; and a list, compiled from documents in the Public Record Office, of the sheriffs of England and Wales from the earliest times to 1831.

In the Revue des Questions Historiques for July, M. Alfred Spont reviews recent English historical publications, including a few of those of the United States. M. Charles Bémont has a survey of the recent official archive-publications of the United Kingdom in the September number of the Revue Historique.

The Publishing Section of the American Library Association proposes to issue a series of catalogue cards for new books in English history, with annotations prepared by Mr. W. Dawson Johnston indicating briefly the character, scope, sources and value of the books, and referring to important reviews of them. An edition in pamphlet form will also be The address of the Section is 101⁄2 Beacon Street, Boston.

issued.

Hon. John W. Fortescue, of the Public Record Office, is writing a History of the British Army, of which the first volume will probably be published by Messrs. Macmillan before the end of the present year.

The Society of Gray's Inn intends preparing for publication a portion of its records.

In view of the approaching millennial commemoration of King Alfred, the Clarendon Press intends to publish a new edition of Asser's life of the king, by Mr. W. H. Stevenson.

Mr. H. Thurston has published (Burns and Oates, pp. 680) a Life of St. Hugh of Lincoln, translated from the French Carthusian life, and edited with large additions from other sources.

Mr. A. F. Leach has recently completed for the Surtees Society a volume on Beverley Minster, the text of which will be a transcript of the act-book or minute-book of the chapter of Beverley, chiefly relating to the years from 1304 to 1325. Mr. Leach's contributions as editor will include much information respecting the minster and its grammar school.