F

AM glad to be able to announce that the notice in our last number as to the probability of a successful establishment of a Baby Exchange is most likely to be justified by events. In the first place, the couple who wanted the brunette girl baby, although not yet suited, have had many offers of supernumerary children. That, however, is only a small thing. If the Baby Exchange is to be any good, it must begin with small things and gradually progress to greater ones. I have received several letters from people in various parts of the country, from people who want babies and from persons who have babies to dispose of. I will quote, suppressing all names and addresses-for these communications are strictly confidential-some sample letters from our baby correspondence.

BABIES WANTED.

For instance, here are some letters from those who want babies

"I beg to inform you that a young married couple, friends of mine, who have no children of their own, also wish one to adopt and bring up as their own, on the same conditions as stated in your REVIEW, with the exception that it may be either a boy or girl. It would have a comfortable home (although they are not wealthy people), and would be cared for as their own. Should you have more applications than required in answer to the article in your REVIEW for the parties who wish the child to adopt, I shall be glad if you will kindly let me know, on behalf of my friends, if you can do anything in compliance with their wishes. They will take it from birth or a few weeks old."

Another correspondent writes:

"We have no children and are never likely to have, and we are bitterly disappointed; but we have made up our minds to adopt one. I have got everything ready and am now anxious as soon as ever I can to get a baby. We want a little baby girl about four to six months old, or even younger, if we could be sure it was healthy. I should like a fair child if possible. I am sure I could make a little one so happy. My husband wishes it to be an orphan or illegitimate, so that we take it entirely. We can give you plenty of references and shall be pleased to answer any questions you like to ask us. All I want is a little baby that I can bring up and love as my own. Will you help us? I shall anxiously await your reply."

This lady was put into communication with a friend who was wishful to arrange for the disposal of an infant protégé of hers. But the applicant had in the meantime got her want otherwise supplied, as appears from her second letter:-

I am sorry I cannot help her [the lady mentioned above] by taking her little waif, but I heard of a baby to-day through a friend, and if all inquiries are successful, I have promised to take it. Should this one of my friend's prove unsuccessful I will write again if you will kindly help me then; but it seems, so far, in every way just what we wanted, and of course I am very happy about it. I shall always take an interest in any articles about babies being adopted that I see in your

paper.

BABIES TO DISPOSE OF.

The following are extracts from some of the letters I have received from those who have babies to dispose of:

A friend of mine writes me that he is trying to find a home for a little baby boy. "Age about six weeks. I would most willingly take the baby and adopt it myself, but I have already adopted two boys and a girl-fatherless and motherless children. If you have not already decided, or could assist me in finding a good home, I should esteem it a favour." I am given to understand that the baby is of good healthy parentage.

"I have lately had staying with me a little girl who, I think, might suit. The Rev. Mr. has had pity on her. We have already made application to Dr. Barnardo to take her in, but I think it would be much better for her to be adopted if possible. Her mother is dead, and her father has signed a paper relinquishing all claim over her. She is a healthy child, rather under than over two years I should think. Her hair is a nice brown, not very dark, but would get darker. She is not a very taking child at first, but very winning after a day or two. I have no claim over the child whatever, but were she to be accepted I should be sorry to think I should never be allowed to see her again."

"Having seen in the REVIEW OF REVIEWs that there is a little girl wanted, I have one. She is only six months old, inclined to be dark, and healthy. I have certificate of birth. It would be a great favour if any kind person did take my little one, as I am unable to keep it as I should like to. I am anxious to get my little girl a home."

"I have a little girl which was three years old last Nov. 18th, if she would be suitable for you. But unfortunately she is fair, and bright blue eyes, and is rather pretty and very healthy as myself. Always lived in country until recently. I have been anxious to place my child into a good home for ever since her birth, as her father died before her birth, and it is very hard on myself, which I have had to take a housekeeper's situation, which is very hard for me to keep both of us. I have been obliged to place my child out to nurse since her birth, so that I am anxious to hear of something, for I could get my doctor to examine her and he could send you certificate of her health, which I have no doubt will be satisfactory. I shall be heartily pleased to hear from you."

CONDITIONS OF TRANSFER.

Before undertaking to bring those who want babies and those who have them to spare into communication, certain conditions must be complied with. First, those who wish to adopt a child must send a letter formally undertaking to adopt a child as their own and engaging to bring it up in all respects as if it had been their child. If the Baby Exchange is to obtain any dimensions this document will have to be very carefully drawn up from a legal point of view, signed, sealed and attested. In the second place, references to two householders of good standing should be given, who will certify that the would-be adopters are in a position to maintain the child and of a character which would justify the expectation that they would rear it lovingly and well. Then those who have a child must furnish me with a document, duly signed and certified, setting forth what child they have to dispose of, and that they make it over absolutely to those who wish to adopt it, disclaiming all desire and intention of exercising any right or authority which they may have over the child in law. Secondly, a reference to one householder, by preference a minister or magistrate, who would certify to the character for trustworthiness held by those who wished to part with the child.

There is another question which is not important at present, but which will certainly come to the front if this business develops-that is, the cost of managing such a Baby Exchange. The mere correspondence between the various parties, the arranging of personal interviews, and opportunities of inspecting the babies on either side, will entail an amount of trouble and time that ought to be recognised in some way by those who invoke the intervention of this agency. At present everything is tentative; and I am perfectly willing to arrange the preliminaries in the case of the first few babies to be adopted. But the moment the work begins to develop so as to necessitate the creation of a department of its

own, with a staff, I should be compelled to charge some registration fee to cover the unavoidable expense. That, however, need not be discussed at present.

FRENCH OPINION ON THE IDEA.

The suggested Baby Exchange has, curiously enough, excited much more attention in Paris than it appears to have done in London. Two French papers of the first class, Le Temps and Le Dixneuvième Siècle, have deemed the subject of sufficient importance to be discussed at length in leading articles. The subject has also been referred to by the Français Quotidien. I give the translations of these articles, which may be of interest to my readers.

T. de Wyzewa, in the Temps, wrote as follows:

Mr. Stead, the editor of the REVIEW OF REVIEWS, has just had an inspiration, or rather he has had quite a series of inspirations, which he describes in the last number of his REVIEW. Since he left the Pall Mall Gazette at the end of the campaign about the London scandals, but more especially since he failed to found a new paper, a project which was one of his most extraordinary inventions, and which was to be directed in great part by the readers themselves, Mr. Stead has resigned himself to pouring into the REVIEW OF REVIEWS the fantastic torrent of his imagination. Every month, after having very conscientiously given his readers a resume of political events, an account of new books, and an analysis of the principal articles in the various reviews, he offers them as a kind of appendix his ideas for the month.

Mr. Stead's ideas deal with the most varied subjects, from the highest problems in metaphysics to the choice of a cook. At one time he has a plan for a new crusade or a new pilgrimage, always with detailed information as to the preparations to be made, the expenses to be met, and the train to catch, etc. The new crusade, for example, consists in a war against alcohol, and the new pilgrimage in a tour to places where great men have lived. Or at another time he invites his readers to send him, in order that he may reproduce them in the REVIEW, the photograph and the description of evildoers of whom they may have had reason to complain; or he collects all information relating to miracles, compiling thus a sort of monthly journal of the supernatural. Or yet again he treats his readers to a projected circulating library, the idea of which has occurred to him, or to a series, which he has just commenced, of small volumes, giving for one penny almost the complete works of each of the great English poets. One cannot imagine what ingenious details are attached to these memorable inventions of Mr. Stead. Take, for instance, this collection of " Penny Poets": not only has Mr. Stead taken all the pains in the world in order to found it, to bring it out and also to secure the written approbation of all the contemporary celebrities, but he has instituted competitions with all sorts of prizes for the scholars of English Elementary Schools, who having first bought the "Penny Poets," will then prove that they understand them. Each county, each district, will have separate competitions and its share of prizes.

But to-day I wish to indicate one of Mr. Stead's latest inventions. This extraordinary man is going to make a new use of his REVIEW; he is going to make it a central agency for the exchange of babies.

M. de Wyzewa quotes a summary of the scheme from the REVIEW, and continues:-Mr. Stead then relates how, through the intermediary of his REVIEW, he has already been able to assure the happiness of two families, one for which he has procured a child to adopt, and the other which he has relieved of the necessity of supporting a child. It has occurred to him to generalise a process which has succeeded so perfectly on a small scale. He commences by asking for a little girl of two years and a half, as dark as possible, for a working man's family in London, who wish to give a sister to a little boy of the same age. The parents-the first parentsof this child have only to agree to renounce her for ever, and never to try to communicate with her. In return, they are completely discharged from the trouble of her education.

One might think that under these conditions it would be still more advantageous to the parents to disembarrass themselves of the child in a more radical fashion, say, by hanging or drowning it. But those are customs of which the English law does not approve any more than our own, while the method proposed by Mr. Stead is at once convenient, and without danger. I have no doubt but that for the one little girl asked for, hundreds, all aged two and a half, and equally dark, will arrive at the offices of the REVIEW OF REVIEWS. Mr. Stead will then only need to publish their photographs in the next number of the REVIEW, and the Baby Exchange will be founded indeed.

But to speak seriously, I believe that this institution will have a much greater success in England than in our country. I would not say that English parents love their children less, but they love them more coldly. The children are reared in the nursery, scarcely seeing their parents a few moments in the day. Very early in life they are accustomed to believe themselves to be independent, and to rely upon no one but themselves. And as, besides, in England the fecundity is very great, and misery very severe, I believe that many parents, although having a proper affection for their children, will learn with joy that possibly owing to the generous initiative of Mr. Stead, they will be able to place their children with persons who will take great care of them. That will be, of course, on the condition that they do not further concern themselves about the children; but it is in the traditions of their race to trouble themselves as little as possible with children.

M. Paul Ginisty, taking M. de Wyzewa's article as his text, writes of the scheme as follows in the Dixneuvième Siècle:

M. de Wyzewa, who is very well informed about affairs on the other side of the Channel, gives a somewhat satirical account of a proposition, strange enough in truth, made by Mr. Stead, the editor of an English Review. Mr. Stead is, it seems, a man of ideas, and he seems to have more of them than Emile de Girardin, who had one every day, which amounted to three hundred and sixty-five at the end of the year. Mr. Stead's head boils, they tell us, with ideas which crowd one another so that he is forced to give expression to them.

Mr. Stead's latest idea is this. He has noticed, like many others who have made the same inquiries, but who have confined themselves to this, that families exist where there are many children, and others where, in spite of the willingness of their parents, there are none or too few for their capacity for affection.

This being established, is there not a means of equalising matters? Happiness, a wise man has said, consists in equilibrium. Mr. Stead has discovered a way which is quite simple, only one must understand it. He has imagined the creation of something like a "baby exchange." He explains the scheme in the columns of his Review. Is there a family with too numerous a progeny? It applies to Mr. Stead to rid it of the trouble of bringing up some of its children. On the other hand, a couple remain without children; they procure from Mr. Stead a "ready-made" child, which their co-operation has not been able to manufacture. Mr. Stead publishes the requests for and the offers of children. Matters are then arranged according to the table which contains the list of the babies exchangeable and that which sets forth the wishes of people who are willing to serve as parents to a child.

At the present moment, for instance, a family wants a little girl two and a half years old, who is to be as dark as possible. It is, however, necessary that the abandonment of the child should be complete, and that the parents agree never to inquire even as to the fate of the little girl" ceded" by them. This condition is harder than that which is imposed by L'Assistance Publique, which, after all, is not very tender to the girl-mothers who have confided to it the children which they could not rear. We think this is barbarous ! L'Assistance Publique curtly refuses to give them any details as to the little being, either about the place where it is living, or about the

people who are caring for it; but it at least tells her, once a month, if it is living-and this, in parenthesis, is the most afflicting "administrative" sight one can imagine.

Good Mr. Stead, we are assured, is delighted with his idea, and predicts a great future for it. He did not hesitate one moment because of the objection that it might be very painful to the parents, although embarrassed with heirs to whom they have nothing to leave, to sacrifice their children, in somewhat the same fashion as the parents of Petit Poucet, in Perrault's story, wished to rid themselves of his brothers and sisters. He assumes that their interest will prove stronger than their affection.

The proposal may be very ingenious, but it is repugnant to our feelings. This idea, although Mr. Stead puts it forth as being of universal application, is a little too English for us. Poor people in our country love their children even when they do not know how to find them food.

But is there not something which might be taken from this proposition, joined with conditions which we regard as rather paradoxical, and could we not transform it? Instead of a kind of market, is there not the material by which we might bind the classes more closely together?

Would it not be a good work to commence? But above all things let it proceed with discretion and with all the refinements of charity. It is undeniable that there is something cruel in the excessive burdens which weigh upon certain families having too many children. But between that and the bringing-up of those children there is an abyss. There are also empty houses, whose inhabitants do not find those opportunities for that expenditure of affection of which they are capable.

It is only a question of interesting well-to-do families, by a kind of parrainage, deprived of children, in those in which they are too numerous. It would not be necessary to tear the poor little ones from their homes. It would be charming if those more favoured by fate would agree to assist by a purely disinterested adoption some of those little ones which have come after many others without being wanted, and which for the poor aggravate the difficult problem of existence. It would be charming, and it would also be a good social precaution, if every family which had something to spare had its "godchild" among the disinherited; if it would choose a child without monopolising it, and support it throughout life. Many persons who find themselves very lonely may possibly have this desire without knowing how to realise it; but in order to guide them it is not necessary to have a brutal "agency" like that of expeditious Mr. Stead. What is wanted is a private association, encouraged and well advised, like those which already exist for other charitable objects.

Is it then utopian to hope that this may be done some daythis union of the rich and poor by means of the child of those who have not enough becoming the ward of those who have too much? Why should it not come to that? Why, with the help of time, should not this voluntary institution become a part of our habits? What a pleasing method it would be to diminish the struggle between the classes, the old bitter, and alas, almost legitimate hatred of the miserable against those who possess !

Thus understood, thus stripped of its brutality, only making an appeal to generous sentiments, the project of Mr. Stead, at which one must smile for its extreme simplicity, will be a good and a beautiful thing. It imposes the law of ransom for happiness and fortune. It belongs to one of the moral ideas of these times, destined to make the greatest progress under whatever form it may take. Will not this direct protection accorded to infancy be one of its most touching forms?

A writer in the Français Quotidien remarks that the scheme will give quite a singular appearance to the office of THE REVIEW OF REVIEWS, where the editorial tables which usually furnish the offices of newspapers will be replaced by files of large nurses. The late Emile de Girardin, who boasted that he had an idea a day, never had so extraordinary an imagination as that which has germinated in Mr. Stead's head. Next year, if the baby exchange succeeds, one might annex to it a matrimonial agency, and perhaps also a conjugal exchange agency...

Certainly the doctrinaire and solemn journalists of 1830 would have been astonished if they had been able to foresee that their profession would come to render such services to the public! But we should very much like Mr. Stead to explain to us if the children which he furnishes are guaranteed for a number of years, like Geneva watches.

In any case those who exchange babies will do well to inquire about the character of the child which is made over to them, and to study the genealogical table of the family in order to ascertain whether there have not been any madmen, drunkards, or galley-slaves among its ancestors.

Meanwhile, I have no wish to run where I am not wanted, or to undertake the duty of distributing the surplus babies among families which are childless. There is a distinct need for the work, and if any philanthropist would undertake to run the Baby Exchange, I would very gladly make over to him the idea, and the benefit of such publicity as I have already given it. Certainly, I can suggest few methods of doing good that would be sooriginal and so interesting to a philanthropist as this proposal.

...number, to

DEAR MR. SMURTHWAYT: In spite of this being,

so to speak, an "off month" with publishersthough July is worse-I have a fair number of interesting books to send you; and I have not forgotten your hint, to include, for holiday reading, plenty of novels, a class of literature with which I have certainly been rather chary recently. But before I say anything about what you will find in the box, I must give you the usual list of books which, during the month just passed, have been selling most steadily. Here it is:

Trilby. By George du Maurier. 6s.

The Ameer Abdur Rahman. By Stephen Wheeler, F.R.G.S. 3s. 6d.

The Alps from End to End. By Sir William Martin Conway. 21s. net.

A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Deuteronomy. By the Rev. S. R. Driver.

12s.

The Story of Bessie Costrell. By Mrs. Humphry Ward. 2s. Peter Steele, the Cricketer. By Horace G. Hutchinson. 3s. 6d.

Sister-Songs: an Offering to Two Sisters. By Francis Thompson. 5s. net.

It is interesting to see that Mr. du Maurier's "Trilby (Osgood, 6s.) stands at the head. A number of people must have postponed its purchase until they could get it with all the illustrations which made its serial publication so pleasant, but which were omitted from the threevolume edition, expensive though it was. No doubt it is the visit of Nasrullah Khan, combined with the reawakening of the debate on the "forward" policy on our North-West Indian frontier, which has sold Mr. Wheeler's excellent "Life of the Ameer" (Bliss, 3s. 6d.) so well. Mr. Jeyes was lucky to lead off his Public Men of To-day Series so opportunely. Sir William Martin Conway's "The Alps from End to End" (Constable, 21s.), besides receiving a fillip from the fact that its author has been knighted, of course appeals to every climber, Alpine or otherwise, and to every ordinary reader who has felt the charm of Switzerland. Mr. McCormick's illustrations, too, add peculiarly to the interest of the book, one of the very finest and most valuable of its kind I have seen, even in a day devoted to the chronicling of climbing feats and scenes. The next book, the Rev. S. R. Driver's "A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Deuteronomy" (T. and T. Clark, Edinburgh, 12s.), is of a somewhat different sort and value; and the appearance on the list of Mrs. Humphry Ward's "The Story of Bessie Costrell" (Smith and Elder, 2s.) one is of course prepared for. Some people are thanking their stars that it is not so lengthy as "David Grieve" or "Marcella"; others are lamenting its brevity, for it is only the length of a novelette. But anyhow, it has not, as yet, made very much stir. Tremendous sums are said to have been paid for it to Mrs. Ward by the publishers, but one is generally safe in disbelieving such stories. Of one thing, however, one is certain: that as Messrs. Smith, Elder and Co. must follow the fashion and have a Novel Series, they could not have commenced better than with a story by the authoress of "Robert Elsmere." Mr. Hutchinson's "Peter Steele, the Cricketer" (Arrowsmith, 3s. 6d.), I sent you, with warm commendation, last month. I hope you liked it, and your boys. With every one talking cricket, it is natural it should have a run, for there are some

capital descriptions of matches in the course of the story. Mr. Francis Thompson's new volume of verse, "SisterSongs: an Offering to Two Sisters" (Lane, 5s. net), must have a paragraph to itself. And yet it is not selling, I am told, as did its predecessor, "Poems." But that had an enormous success of its kind; and the truth is, as the friend who supplies me with my list of what has been selling best says, the "boom" in verse is just about played out. But still poetry of the kind that Mr. William Watson, Mr. John Davidson, and Mr. Francis Thompson, among the younger men, are able to give their readers is always sure of a welcome. "SisterSongs," however, is, to be frank, "a tangle of sweet rhymes," which is hardly likely to advance Mr. Thompson's popularity, at least with the general reader. Written about four years ago, at the same time as "The Hound of Heaven," and dedicated to two sisters, children, young goddesses whom the poet always keeps before him as he writes, the verse has all the qualities of obscurity and tumbled imagery which gave one of its chief distinctions to, even while it was one of the great drawbacks to the complete enjoyment of, "Poems." Mr. Thompson describes this book with admirable fitness:

"... this treasure galleon of my verse,

Fraught with its golden passion, oared with cadent rhyme, Set with a towering press of fantasies."

"A towering press of fantasies" pictures the two poems as whole pages of criticism could not. Times are when the fantasies are exquisitely successful, lightning flashes of inspiration: less seldom they fail altogether: more often they are good in themselves, but giving with the similar qualitied context, bespangled with strange, unknown words, an impression of mingled metaphor, of entangled thought. Yet "Sister-Songs is individual and robust, a book you must not miss reading, and reading carefully, if you wish to appreciate the best work of our younger poets. Not that Mr. Thompson is of a school. He stands rather by himself almost a Jacobean poet, a contemporary of Crashaw. Still, though he owes much to many of his predecessors, he is not unduly derivative; and his new books holds many beautiful passages in which the child stands out incarnate.

Of history and of historical biography, I send you quite a number of books. By far the most important is Judge Prowse's portly, serious-looking "History of Newfoundland from the English, Colonial, and Foreign Records" (Macmillan, 21s. net), an ambitious, admirably executed work which appears just in the nick of time. It describes how "England's first colony, Newfoundland, was founded and developed "; and shows the influence of its discovery on the making of England. As far as possible, contemporary documents are cited, and contemporary prints and pictures are reproduced. Indeed, in its illustrations and maps and the general style of its "get up," I don't remember to have seen a more successful specimen of what a publisher can do. But one hardly sees the necessity for an introduction by Mr. Edward Gosse. Then you must look at the new volume of the Story of the Nations Series, Madame Ragozin's "Vedic India as Embodied in the Rig-Veda' (Unwin, 5s.), a book quite fascinating from the curious, unusual nature of its contents. The illustrations, too, are particularly likely to draw one to a study of the

text. A second volume in the same series, and from the same hand, will deal with Brahmanic India. The most ambitious historical biography is the work of an American-Miss Ruth Putnam's "William the Silent, Prince of Orange: the Moderate Man of the Sixteenth Century" (Putnam, 15s.), an elaborate, illustrated work, in two volumes, giving the story of the Prince's life as told in his own letters, in those of his friends and enemies, and from the official documents. Then for the Heroes of the Nations Series Mr. Arthur Hassall has written a volume, "Louis XIV. and the Zenith of the French Monarchy (Putnam, 5s.), which, like its predecessors, is of course profusely illustrated; and to the excellent English Men of Action Series has been added a biography of "Wolfe," by Mr. A. G. Bradley (Macmillan, 2s. 6d.).

دو

So much for the history of the rather remote past. To come nearer to our own times, you will be interested in reading "Lord John Russell" (Low, 3s. 6d.), a biography which Mr. Stuart J. Reid has written for his own series, the Queen's Prime Ministers; and Dr. Thornton's "Colonel Sir Robert Sandeman: His Life and Work on our Indian Frontier: a Memoir, with Selections from his Correspondence and Official Writings" (Murray, 18s.), is a work which you will at once cut open if you are at all interested in the, at present, very warm questions of Indian frontier defence. And writing of this reminds me that I inclose a little book, almost a pamphlet, in which Colonel Hanna, the author of "Can Russia Attack India?" delivers his soul of a bitter attack upon Lord Roberts. Its title is, "Lord Roberts in War: a Study for the Day" (Simpkin, 1s. net.), and its object is so to discredit its subject in the eyes of the English public as to render less likely the general adoption of his views as to the future of Chitral in particular, and the "so-called 'forward' policy in Indian colonial affairs in general. Another little book I send-history of a sort, and so to be mentioned here— is Mr. J. N. Pentelow's " England v. Australia: the Story of the Test Matches" (Arrowsmith, Bristol, 1s.), a good and elaborate record of what will form an important chapter in the cricket history of the future.

Of biography of a personal rather than of an historical kind, the late Anna Carlotta Leffler, Duchess of Cajanello's "Sonya Kovalevsky: a Biography" (Unwin, 6s.), is by far the most interesting. The duchess was an intimate personal friend of Sonya's, and she has done her work exceedingly well. The book is another human document of a kind that should make you place it side by side with Marie Bashkirtseff's diary; and its interest is enhanced by the inclusion of the "Sisters Rajevsky," the story of her own life and of her sister's, under assumed names, which Sonya wrote some time before her death. The translation of both parts of the volume is excellent. There is another version in the market, but this is the authorised, and the best. Then another book of interest to you who know and care for Russia and its life is Canon Browne's "Memorials of a Short Life: a Biographical Sketch of W. F. A. Gaussen; with Essays on Russian Life and Literature" (Unwin, 6s.). I remember well Gaussen's excellent translation of Potapenko's "A Russian Priest," one of the best volumes in the whole of the Pseudonym Library; and it was not the only work of the kind he did, and did well. His was a life ill to spare, and deserving of memorial. Mr. Armstrong's "Henry William Crosskey, LL.D., F.G.S.: His life and Work" (Cornish Bros., Birmingham, 7s. 6d.) and the Rev. Harry Jones's "Fifty Years; or, Dead Leaves and Living Seeds," are volumes

of biography and reminiscence respectively. Mr. Jones's book is almost entirely clerical in its interest, but it is good of its sort.

I send you two books of a political interest. The first is a translation, with several important modifications and emendations by the author, of Professor Ugo Rabbeno's "The American Commercial Policy: Three Historical Essays" (Macmillan, 12s. net), a work far larger and more ambitious in its scope than its title would lead you to expect. Dr. Rabbeno is Professor of Political Economy at the University of Modena. The second, a very much smaller volume, is one of the series of Economic Classics, "Parallel Chapters from the First and Second Editions of An Essay on the Principle of Population,' by T. R. Malthus, 1798-1803" (Macmillan, 3s. net).

All the scientific literature of the month that I care to send you is comprised in two very popular little volumes, both belonging to the Library of Useful Stories-yet another enterprise owing its being to the energy of Mr. Newnes. But although popular in the extreme, both in intention and in fact, each book is the work of an authority. Mr. Grant Allen's" Story of the Plants" (1s.) gives what is really a very clear and succinct account of the principal phenomena of plant life, and the subject has the advantage of being treated philosophically, and as a means to further knowledge in other fields. Mr. Allen specially states that he has made "the study of plants a first introduction to the great modern principles of heredity, variation, natural selection, and adaptation to the environment." It is a far cry from "The Woman Who Did" to such a subject! Mr. Edward Clodd is responsible for the other volume, "The Story of Primitive' Man" (1s.). Both are well illustrated.

·

Mr. F. G..Jackson's "The Great Frozen Land (Bolshaia Zemelskija Tundra): Narrative of a Winter Journey across the Tundras, and a Sojourn among the Samoyads (Macmillan, 15s. net) is a volume of Arctic geography and travel whose value and interest is seldom equalled. Its author is the leader of the Jackson-Harmsworth Polar Expedition, and the journey he describes here was undertaken to test the equipment, clothing and food for that expedition under the most rigorous conditions possible-through a winter in the region which actually reveals the lowest temperature yet recorded in the whole of the Arctic basin. Mr. Jackson is now on the way, one hopes, to the North Pole, but his book was more or less arranged from his MS., and seen through the press, by Mr. Arthur Montefiore. Its illustrations are not its least interesting feature. J. A. Downer's "Down the Danube in an Open Boat" (J. Blackwood, 2s. 6d.) has good illustrations, and although unambitious in its scope, may serve to suggest to one or other of your friends what seems to be an enjoyable and novel method of spending a holiday. Mr. Lionel W. Lyde's "Man on the Earth: a Course in Geography" (Blackie, 2s.) I send because it seems to me to put very happily for young readers the salient facts of the science; and because its illustrations are good. Then I must mention Mr. E. S. Machell Smith's "Our Rambles in Old London" (Low, 2s. 6d.), a well illustrated and useful little book, of pocket size, descriptive of some six walks among the older churches and other buildings of the London of the past. Each walk has its special map.

Miss

I send four volumes of religious interest, and of these perhaps the one you will most care for is "Lectures on Preaching delivered before the Divinity School of Yale College in January and February, 1877," by the late Right Rev. Phillips Brooks, D.D. (Allenson, 5s.). "The