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Lady Jane Grey and the daughters of Sir Anthony Cooke are familiar examples of learned women, and many English titled and gentlewomen were well versed in Greek and Latin, as well as in Spanish, Italian, and French. Macaulay reminded his readers that if an Englishwoman of that day did not read the classics she could read little, since the then existing books--outside the Italian--would fill a shelf but scantily. Thus English girls read Plato, and doubtless English women excelled Englishmen in their proficiency in foreign languages, as they do at present.

I had a friend who died not very long ago. He had in his younger days done a little administrative work; but he was wealthy, and at a comparatively early age he abandoned himself to leisure. He travelled, he read, he went much into society, he enjoyed the company of his friends. When he died he was spoken of as an amateur, and praised as a cricketer of some merit. Even his closest friends seemed to find it necessary to explain and make excuses; he was shy, he stammered, he was not suited to parliamentary life; but I can think of few people who did so much for his friends or who so radiated the simplest sort of happiness. To be welcomed by him, to be with him, put a little glow on life, because you felt instinctively that he was actively enjoying every hour of your company. I thought, I remember, at his death, how hopeless it was to assess a man's virtue and usefulness in the terms of his career. If he had entered Parliament, registered a silent vote, spent his time in social functions, letter-writing, lobby-gossip, he would have been acclaimed as a man of weight and influence; but as it was, though he had stood by friends in trouble, had helped lame dogs over stiles, had been the centre of good-will and mutual understanding to a dozen groups and circles, it seemed impossible to recognise that he had done anything in his generation. It is not to be claimed that his was a life of persistent benevolence or devoted energy; but I thought of a dozen men who had lived selfishly and comfortably, making money and amassing fortunes, without a touch of real kindness or fine tenderness about them, who would yet be held to have done well and to have deserved respect, when compared with this peace-maker!

RALPH, abbot of the Cistercian monastery of Coggeshall from 1207 to 1218, when he resigned because of illness, wrote a Chronicon Anglicanum (J. Stevenson, Rolls Series, 1875), which extends from 1066 to 1223. To 1186 the entries are brief annals: with 1187 the history becomes more full, but the writer's interest is chiefly in the crusade, of which important and interesting accounts are given from excellent sources; and comparatively little is recorded concerning the history of England proper before the accession of John. For the reign of John the book is one of our most important and trustworthy contemporary sources. Ralph was greatly interested in mythical tales, especially in wonderful occurrences in nature, and he records these at length as he heard of them, but this habit does not affect the character of his historical record proper. As a historian he is very well informed, though he gives but few documents; he saw clearly the essential point of things and had a sense of accuracy.

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