L'ABBE CONSTANTIN, la-ba kofestawn tan, the best of Halevy's works of fiction, has enjoyed an immense popularity in France and abroad. Published as a serial in the Revue des Deux Mondes in 1887 it did much to bring about the author's election to the French Acad emy two years later. The number of editions has run into the hundreds and the book is widely used as a text in the classroom. This unusual success is due largely to its sound moral tone and the worthy attitude toward the problems of life on the part of the principal characters. From the old country priest whose life has been one of self-sacrifice and charitable deeds, to the young American heiress who finally offers to marry the priest's godson, a modest artillery officer, all the characters show the same sense of honor combined with un affected virtue and sincerity of purpose. A touch of exotism due to the introduction of American characters and a lesson in patriotism drawn from events of the Franco-Prussian War, contributed in no small way to the great favor with which the book was received by the French public. Besides, it is written in a charmingly simple almost conversational style, admirably suited to the characters. The book contains a number of dramatic situations, and a play based upon it has been almost as popular as the novel itself. Many editions in the original French and in translations have been published.
Lows A. LOISEAUX.
legion. Edmond Rostand, having gained world-wide fame in 1897 by his romantic fantasy, (Cyrano de Bergerac,' en deavored to confirm that success in or (The Eaglet,' produced three years later by Sarah Bernhardt in France and by Maude Ad ams in America. The play is less charming and spontaneous than its predecessor, but more fully grounded on history, more ambitious as a study of character, and more elaborate as a spectacle. Napoleon's son, the Duke of Reich
stadt, known as The is kept under the watchful eye of Metternich at the Austrian court. But he is the hope of a Bonapartist plot, and though physically unfit to rule, and encom passed by enemies who will prevent his escape to France, he yearns to emulate his great father. His inheritance descends from the decadent Austrian house, however, rather than from the all-conquering Corsican. His environment, too, determines his fate; and after forteiting his one opportunity to evade the relentless Metternich, he recognizes his weakness. In his vision be fore dawn upon the battlefield of Wagram, he perceives that, in a sense, he must atone by his sufferings for all the blood that has been spilt to win his father's glory. He accepts his des tiny, a passive hero to the last, and dies a the atric death, lying beside his cradle, in the pres ence of the weeping Austrian court.
The six acts of the play present a few major characters, a host of those that merely come and go, and several striking scenes. Flambeau, the old grenadier of Napoleon, is the most al luring figure. Surprises and coincidences abound, and the atmosphere of the piece is dis tinctly romantic, although its careful detail and its central conception are almost naturalistic. Rostand's poetic imagination is sufficient to the task of making real here much that might oth erwise seem mechanical melodrama. (L'Aig Ion' has been translated into English by Louis N. Parker (1900).