anticipated from his rare faculty of historical analysis and the
beautiful transparency of his style.

* * * * *

THE REV. ROBERT ARMITAGE, a rector in Shropshire, is the author of
"Dr. Hookwell," and "Dr. Johnson, his Religious Life and his Death."
In this last work, the _Quarterly Review_ observes, "Johnson's name is
made the peg on which to hang up--or rather the line on which to hang
out--much hackneyed sentimentality, and some borrowed learning, with
an awful and overpowering quantity of twaddle and rigmarole." The
writer concludes his reviewal: "We are sorry to have had to make such
an exposure of a man, who, apart from the morbid excess of vanity
which has evidently led him into this scrape, may be, for aught we
know, worthy and amiable. His exposure, however, is on his own
head: he has ostentatiously and pertinaciously forced his ignorance,
conceit, and effrontery on public notice." We quite agree with the
_Quarterly_.

* * * * *

JOHN MILLS--"John St. Hugh Mills," it was written then--was familiarly
known in the printing offices of Ann street in this city a dozen
years ago; he assisted General Morris in editing the Mirror, and wrote
paragraphs of foreign gossip for other journals. A good-natured aunt
died in England, leaving him a few thousand a year, and he returned
to spend his income upon a stud and pack and printing office, sending
from the latter two or three volumes of pleasant-enough mediocrity
every season. His last work, with the imprint of Colburn, is called
"Our Country."