TASMANIA.-Messrs. J. Walch and Sons, the well-known booksellers and stationers of Hobart Town and Launceston, Tasmania, have admitted their manager at the latter place into partnership, as far as their Launceston business is concerned. The Hobart Town business will be still conducted under the name of J. Walch and Sons, and the Launceston firm will be Walch Brothers and Birchall. Messrs. Walch have carried on business in Tasmania for twenty-one years, and the name of the firm is familiar to most of the leading houses in the trade through their London representatives, Messrs. Joseph M. Holworthy and Co., of 30, Great St. Helens, E.C.

UTRECHT.-Mr. J. L. Beyers informs us that "In the course of March he intends to sell by anction, at his house, Hoogt, G 161, a great collection of autographs and manuscripts of princes, eminent persons, etc.; further, a collection of books and pamphlets, among which is the very scarce pamphlet: The Apology of the Prince of Orange," 1581, 4to., etc.; also a great collection of engravings, portraits, and historical prints; in this collection is a series relating to the French revolution 1787-1805 of the greatest importance, containing more than 1,000 prints and portraits, collected in ten great portfolios, etc., etc."

MANCHESTER-Mr. Henry H. Tubbs, formerly of the firm of Fletcher and Tubbs, has re-commenced business at 21A, King Street, in this city.

Mr. J.

THE MANCHESTER SWINDLERS. Froggart Beck is not defunct; his present address is 38, Robert Street, Ardwick, Manchester.

Considerable dissatisfaction is being caused by the determination of the principal railway companies to collect heavy goods for the country at an earlier hour than heretofore, yet this seems but reasonable. Most letters from the country are delivered in London soon after eight o'clock, am., and arrangements could easily be made to have them opened and attended to before ten, so that books might be collected in good time for sending off the same day. To some persons it is

not easy to forget the good old coaching days, but to a newer generation familiar with steam and electricity, late hours are an abomination.

A CORRECTION.-In the notice of Mr. Percy Hudson's Arithmetic in the last number of the BOOKSELLER, the publishers' names were wrongly given for Longman and Co. read Cassell, Petter,

and Galpin.

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Admirers of Charles Lamb will be glad to hear that Messrs. Bell and Daldy, in republishing the 'Essays of Elia," have restored many important passages which were suppressed in previous editions. We hope they will also add some of those charming essays which have not hitherto appeared in his collected works, but which are well known to collectors of Eliana. We may mention that this new edition, which will be the most complete one extant, is published by arrangement with Messrs. Moxon & Co., the proprietors of the copyrights of Lamb's several works. Mr. Hotten announces "The Collector,' volume of essays on books, newspapers, authors, pictures, inns, &c., &c., by Mr. H. T. Tuckerman, an American, with a preface by Dr. Doran. There will be an exquisite little vignette of a collector, which any one acquainted with the quays of Paris will have no difficulty in recognising. Mr. Hotten informs us that "he has just added Roderick Random,' 'The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table,' 'Fortunes of Nigel,' 'Heart of Mid-Lothian,' and the 'Bride of Lammermoor,' to his popular Library of WorldWide Authors,' complete and unabridged, at sixpence each."

in the trade in connection with Messrs. Besley's Mr. Charles Keymer, a gentleman well-known (now Reed and Fox's) type foundry, has trans

elegant form for private "Fournier's

THE RIVAL "COOPERS."-We have before us rival series of the tales of Fenimore Cooper, the American novelist. Both are printed in small octavo, in double columns, and both are published at the same price-sixpence, for a 'complete" tale. The series issued by Messrs. Routledge is entitled an "Author's Unabridged Edition," and each tale is nicely produced on toned paper, in an attractive wrapper; the other series is issued from a Glasgow printing-office, and bears the name of Messrs. Warne and Co. as publishers. It is stated to be a "revised edition,” and that it is complete. Being greatly inferior to their usual productions in the matter of paper and print, we are inclined to believe that Messrs. Warne are not its originators, but simply the London agents of the Scottish printers. Be this as it may, we may fairly compare the two editions, and try if we can discover what kind of "revision" the Glasgow issue has undergone. A slight examination of one volume of the series, by each publisher, will suffice. In Messrs. Routledge's "Pathfinder" we have Cooper's original preface intact; in the Scotch "Pathfinder" the preface is absent. Now, as the preface contains the author's reasons for writing the tale, an intimation that in its pages will be found several anachronisms, which are then and there explained, as well as that the reader will recognise an old friend in the "Pathfinder," we cannot think the omission of Cooper's preface renders the book more "complete.' Next, we discover that all the chapters of Cooper's novel were headed by poetical quotations, which quotations are properly given in Messrs. Routledge's book. In the Glasgow edition all the quotations at the beginnings of the chapters are "revised away-another method of making the work "complete." Again, on comparing a single chapter, of one book with the same chapter in the other, we perceive that words and lines, and sometimes whole sentences and paragraphs have disappeared from the Scotch issue, while they are found in their integrity in the English one. For instance, chapter xi. of Messrs. Routledge's edition commences with the words-"It is not often that

lated and printed, in an circulation, the introduction to Treatise on Typography." It consists of an Essay on the Origin and Progress of the Art. that in some cases when books reported have BOOKS WANTED.-Complaints have reached us been ordered, they have not been in the condition represented. It may be considered smart practice to report a book, obtain the money for it, and let the buyer find it dirty or defective in the binding, or in some way different to what he was led to expect; but it is nearly allied to that kind of smartness which goes by the name of

dishonesty.

Those readers who are interested in the English Essayists, especially of the periodicals

the first quarter of the eighteenth century, are referred to "Books Wanted," where they will

literature of that time.

of Cooper's writing, in addition to the quotation

B

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from the "Mirror for Magistrates," have been improved clean away. Going farther on in the same chapter, we discover other "improvements" of like character; and so at last we get at the secret of the "revision." The two editions are printed in the same sized type, on pages of exactly similar length and width. Messrs. Routledge's "Pathfinder" makes 188 pages; the Scottish Pathfinder,” 172: therefore, in order to save sixteen pages of type and a sheet of paper, Mr. Fenimore Cooper's beauties are ruthlessly extirpated, and the reading public shamelessly deceived. This may be Scottish economy, but we can hardly think it literary honesty. By what right does any publisher or printer emasculate an American author? Surely, the reason lately given by the publisher of a popular periodical, that "alterations were necessary to fit the story for English readers," does not apply to Cooper; for, with the single exception of Washington Irving, a more pure and classic writer than he America has not produced. We do not for an instant believe that Messrs. Warne are aware of these facts, or that they would be guilty of the shabby trick of announcing an American reprint as 'complete," when, in fact, it was-as we find the Pathfinder". -a mere deception!

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The librarian of the Crystal Palace is putting forth an appeal to publishers for donations of books to replace those destroyed by the recent fire; he says that he is prepared to accept any contributions of standard works for this purpose. So, we believe, was his predecessor, but donors are fully entitled to ask why the books they presented were not properly insured.

RARE ENGRAVINGS.-At the sale-rooms of Messrs. Wilkinson & Sotheby, the sum of £1180 was given for a rare engraving of Rembrandt's, called the "Hundred Guilder Piece," unique in this condition. It is stated that another impression of the same plate, some years ago, fetched £600 £400 was given for an impression of the "Pax," of Finiguerra, and £315 for a print of the "Lord's Supper," by Morghen.

Visitors to Paris-and we suppose that every one will now be rushing thither will do well to secure a copy of the new part of the People's Magazine, which contains a coloured sketch-map of Paris-the best small map we have seen. Every visitor to that city knows how difficult it is to find his way about; but by means of this little map all difficulty disappears. The People's Magazine improves as it progresses; the new part contains well-selected and interesting papers, suitable for any leisure moment, and the work bids fair to become one of the most popular of our magazines.

At

In France the printers' "readers"-or as they are there called "correcteurs"-appear to be held in greater esteem than are their brethren here; they form a Society, and meet once a year. the last assemblée générale an interesting speech was delivered by M. Ambroise Didot, in which he passed in review the names of a number of learned men whose modesty and whose occupation caused them to be almost unknown, one of whom is said to have refused the Greek chair at Cambridge, preferring to remain a corrector for Plantin's press. M. Didot, himself no mean scholar, thought it no discredit to say that much of the credit given to the learned publications issued by himself and relations was due to his confrères. He then passed on to some interesting matter connected with the history of words in the French language.

WHAT IS THIS MYSTERY?-Four years a there appeared in the Halfpenny Journal, a week periodical published by Messrs Ward and Lock. sensational story called "The Black Band This story was stated to be written by "La Caroline Lascelles;" but there is no La Caroline connected with the Harewood famil and the Earl of Harewood's is the only no house which bears the family name of Lascelle Indeed, it was said at the time that the re author was Miss Braddon. Some months ag Mr. Johnson, of the London Journal, purchas a serial tale called 66 Diavola," which is no being published in that periodical, and is a nounced as by the "author of the Black Band. It seems that proof or advance sheets of this stor were sold to the proprietors of a New York Mag zine called the Sunday Mercury, and are bein issued by them as "Nobody's Daughter; or, th Ballad-singer of Wapping, by Miss Braddon, the queen of sensational romance." The "Black Band" had been previously published by Messr Hilton, of New York, as "What is this Mystery? and that, too, was announced as by Miss Brad don. The lady indignantly denies the author ship of both stories, while the proprietors of the Sunday Mercury as positively assert that she certainly wrote "Diavola," which they renamed " Nobody's Daughter," and that they paid £250 for the privilege of obtaining the ad vance sheets and the use of her name. In this conflict of assertion we do not presume to hazard an opinion, though the circumstances are certainly curious; as, if Miss Braddon was really the author of the "Black Band," there seems reason to believe that she also is responsible for "Diavola." It would clear up the mystery, perhaps, were Lady Caroline Lascelles to appear.

The Paris correspondent of a daily contemporary refers to the squabble just now ripe among the littérateurs of France concerning Voltaire, whose memory is being rather roughly handled. It has been remarked-and not without reason, says our correspondent— that, "whilst the French Theatre religiously keeps the anniversary of the death of Molière, that of Corneille, and that of Racine, it ignores that of the author of "Mérope," whose splendid statue by Houdon occupies the post of honour in the foyer. Now, the French Theatre owes something more to Voltaire than his pieces; his pen was the means of driving fast young men and elderly swells from the stage, which, when Voltaire's plays were first performed, was so often crowded by nobles, and persons with a fine air,' that no room was left for the actors. Every personage in those days either lolled on a bench or ensconced himself in a chair upon the boards, and laughed and talked, whilst the working classes standing in the pit endeavoured to hear the performance. Molière denounced this custom in his "Facheux," attacking the evil in his usual gallant style. The reform which Molière attempted, Voltaire carried out.

CHESS.-Sometime during the Exhibition in Paris a chess meeting will be held in apartments provided in the building; and the French players propose an international tournament, with prizes for the winners. It is said that the Emperor, who is himself a chess player, has proposed the collec tion and exhibition of copies of the books and periodicals in various languages which constitute the literature of the game.

Mr. Charles Lever, the well-known Irish novelist, has been promoted from the Consulate of Spezzia to that of Trieste.