Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 10.djvu/465

 ii B.X. DEC. 5, mi.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

459

the most emphatic among them) were inclined to scold, him for the piscatory innovation, taking over-seriously what was in reality a change of mise en scene and decoration rather than ot nature or general purport. Modern criticism would probably assail him from another quarter, and complain that he had failed to throw himself with sufficient energy and directness into a line of imagination which had other merits than that of constituting a change from shepherding.

\Ve are glad to have this little book, and to recommend it to the attention of those for whom it is designed. The present war presses, perhaps, on none more heavily than on the man of letters, who can follow all too vividly in thought the events which are happening at the front, and grievously enough to himself is unable to take a hand. The more remote a book is from the pre- occupations of the moment and from modern conditions, the more effective may be the hour or so of relief and distraction it can provide, and all the happier if it incite to pleasant criticism and join itself to beloved and inveterate associations. There must, we think, be many English scholars who will be glad to make, or to renew, theii acquaintance with Sannazaro in the attractive form in which Prof. Mustard here offers them his best-known work.

The Fellowship of the Mystery : being the Bishop Paddock Lectures delivered at the General Theo- logical Seminary, New York, during Lent, 1013. By John Neville Figgis. (Longmans & Co., 5*. net.)

THIS book has all the characteristics with which those who are wont to attend to and admire the work of Dr. Figgis are already familiar. His main view of Christianity as the central response, given from without, to an indefeasible human need was first expressed in such a way as to attract a large circle of readers in the Hulsean Lectures for 1908-9 ' The Gospel and Human Needs.' In the lectures now before us this view, with its numerous and far-reaching implications, is brought to bear upon the existence, constitution, and functions of the Catholic Church. Dr. Figgis keep-, himself strenuously within the full current of modern thought, and all the philosophical speculations, the fresh literary and scholastic and artistic activities with which the air was rife last year, are reflected in these pages. In an Appendix on ' Modernism versus Modernity' the writer offers a contribution to one division of the Kikuyu controversy. In the Preface, dated 3 Oct., he effectively applies to the attitude of Germany as a whole in the present war those explanations, based on a theory of group-hypnot- ism, \\-hich German savants have put forward to account for the growth of Christianity. We notice in this book, as we have in more than one of Dr. Figgis's works, a certain failure here and tin-re to get the last clinch ; but the suggestive- ness, the breadth of sympathy, and (if we may so call it) the accuracy of intent are as striking and attractive as ever. If we do not enter upon his subject-matter and his dealing with it, it is Mec.-ui.se neither devotional writings as such nor religious controversy come within the scope of 1 N. <fc Q.' We may, however, mention as of high interest, from more than one point of view, the first Appendix (reprinted from The English Church Review) on Newman. It is, to our thinking,

one of the best if not the best of the shorter appreciations of Newman that have ever appeared.

.4 Picture Book of British Hislnri/. Vol. I.

(Cambridge University Press, 3*. Qd. net.) THE BOARD OP Entic vnox has recently drawn attention to the importance of pictorial illustra- tion in the teaching of history, and has sug- gested that " portraits of eminent persons, reproductions of old prints, documents, and other

famous records will often form the b?st

means of representing social life and customs, pageants and battles, the apparatus of husbandry, trade, and war." The Cambridge Press in response is issuing this Picture Book.

The aim of this volume and those which are to succeed it is in part the ideal set forth in the preface to the illustrated edition of Green's. ' Short History of tho English People,' viz., that of interpreting and illustrating history " by pictures which should tell us how men and things- appeared to the lookers-on of their own day, and how contemporary observers aimed at represent- ing them." With this end in view, archaeological relics, coins, seals, brasses, and manuscripts have been freely used. The grouping is chronological, excepting in the section on Architecture, where the wealth of material is so great that it seemed best to devote a page to each of the periods, a summary of the ecclesiastical styles, and some examples of domestic architecture, being added towards the end of the book.

This first volume takes us down to 1485, the last illustration being the portrait of Richard III. On the same page is a specimen of Caxton's printing, showing a portion of ' The Canterbury- Tales,' to which a page of illustrations is devoted. Among the illustrations we may mention the war- ship of Roman times from the sculpture in the Vatican, and the remains of a Roman boat dis- covered during excavations in London in 1911.

Each of the 184 illustrations has a very short note, the aim being to give the minimum which will render the illustrations intelligible, and encourage the student to turn with increased interest to his textbook, and it is hoped that the book may find its way to the shelves of those " to whom the study of the teaching of history is a recreation rather than a task." Mr. S. C. Roberts has evidently bestowed much care and pains in selecting the illustrations, and his brief notes are always to the point. The volume is a handsome folio, and the low price should command a large sale.

The Berks, Bucks, and OxonArchceologicxl Journal : October. (Reading, Slaughter & Son ; London, Elliot Stock, I*.

MB. CHARLES E. KEY.SER continues his notes on the churches of Staiil'or,l-in-the-\*ale, twelve full- p<vgs illustrations of Shellingford Church being supplied ; and Mi-s Mary Sharp continues her history of the parish of Beenham. The church at Beenham was restored in IS.").:. After the funds for the work had been raised the churchwarden refused to allow his large square, deal - boarded pew to be interfered with, and it was with diffi- culty that his consent to its removal was ob- tained. A similar difficulty had occurred in ;i neighbouring village, when the chief man in tho p.u-i<h had his pew in a gallery which was to be