PROF. JEBBS' NEW SOPHOCLES.

The fact that Prof. Jebb, of Glasgow University, will deliver the oration before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at its regular annual meeting next Thursday, lends especial interest to his new edition of Sophocles, of which the first volume, containing the Oedipus Tyrannus, is already out. This edition, which is to be completed in eight volumes, one for each play, with an additional volume devoted to the fragments and supplementary matter, is the result of a long cherished design on the part of the editor, to embody in a single work all that is necessary for a study of his author. Prof. Jebb's purpose, as stated in his preface, is to show fully how the work of Sophocles is understood by him, both in its larger aspects and at every particular point, and also to induce educated readers generally to read for themselves the works of the greatest tragedy writer of Athens. For this purpose is introduced the special feature of this edition and the one that will do most to make it is value to the general student,-the translation on the page opposite the text. The day of using the best works of the finest authors as a mere medium for conveying rules of grammar to the reader has passed and the public is rapidly coming to regard the works of ancient writers as living literatures. This result is largely due to the reaction of the times against mere machine work, and to the numerous productions of plays in the original language at various universities, among the first of which was the rendering of this play, the Oedipus Tyrannus, at Harvard, in the spring of 1881. Of the Harvard production, Prof. Jebb speaks in terms of the highest praise, both in his introduction and a supplementary note in his appendix, in which he says that Mr. Norman's account of the play "must always have a place of its own in the literature of the Oedipus Tyrannus." Throughout the work references are constantly made to Mr. Norman's book, and also to our own Professor, J. W. White, whose work on "Rythmic and Metric" is the basis of Mr. Jebb's metrical criticisms. In the appendix are notes on the Harvard performance of the play of which Mr. Jebb says "The thorough scholarship, the archeological knowledge and the artistic skill which presided over that performance invest the record of it with a permanent value for every student of the play." The thorough scholarship and the peculiar interest of this volume to Harvard men should make it a popular one here. The need of a library edition of the Greek tragedians has long been felt, and as we close the volume we can but hope that it is but the first of a series of similar volumes on all the plays of Sophocles, Aeschylus and Euripides.