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NOTES AND QUERIES. [ii s. v. MAY 4, 1912.

The life of its author was as uneventful as are the lives of most men of letters of his time, and its chief extraneous interest lies in the memories of Carlyle and Emerson interwoven with it. How far removed his day was from ours may be gauged by the story of a visit Emerson once paid to a Miss Barland, who had a private school at Glasgow, ^vhich visit so alarmed the parents of the pupils a person acquainted with Emerson being not orthodox enough to teach their children that they promptly took them all away.

Stirling's character would have appeared both more clearly and in a more attractive light if his biographer had refrained more strictly from un- necessary laudation. Nevertheless, any one who can discount this, and overcome some im- patience, will not go unrewarded. An intellect so severe, strenuous, and independent must always be interesting to trace through the different phases of its development; while the account of the young doctor's single-handed fight with the cholera in the forties in South Wales, and 'his own vivid description of his fearless saunters through Paris in the angry days following Napoleon III.'s coup d'etat, as well as occasional incidents in which the philosopher is seen grappling with the affairs of ordinary life, help to give some- thing of colour and warmth to a portrait that might easily otherwise have been felt to be too cold.

Dombey and Son. By Charles Dickens. (Chap- man & Hall and H. Frowde. )

THIS edition, from the Oxford Press, is an attrac- tive one : both paper and print are good, and it contains the forty original illustrations by Phiz, coloured. The volume is cheap at 3s. 6d.

1 The Queen ' Newspaper Book of Travel : a Guide to Home and Foreign Resorts. Ninth Year of Issue. (Horace Cox.)

THIS little book, compiled by the Travel Editor of The Queen, M. Hornsby, will be found to be most useful, and the alphabetical arrangement of places, makes it easy of reference. The informa- tion, where we have tested it, is accurate, and given in a concise form; there are numerous maps and illustrations, and the entire plan of the volume is excellent. It is a good book for the traveller to have on the library shelves.

Ix this month's Fortnightly Review we would -draw attention in particular to Mr. John Pollock's .article on the Censorship, which he declares to be .a more important question than the Coal Strike or Home Rule, seeing that it touches directly the moral and intellectual life of the nation. Whether or no one agrees with him as to that, the resum6 he gives of the history and the work- ing of the Censorship is well worth careful reading by any one who has not yet mastered the facts. Mr. Maurice Hewlett's ' Lai of Gobertz ' is strong and charming, yet it lacks something, however slight, to serve as connecting-link between the proud Tibors, who " to clip nor to kiss had talent, and the girl who suffered herself to be betrayed; as it stands, one cannot believe in both pictures. Mr. Alfred Noyes, in his verses ' For the Centenary of Robert Browning,' seems to us hardly to have risen to the occasion; though his poem has some half- dozen lines and phrases that are noble. Mr. Minchin on ' Browning and Wordsworth,' we

confess, we found dull. There are two instal- ments of gossip one old and dreary, so that, in spite of its being a recent find, even Mr. Francis Gribble's sprightly pen cannot make it interesting ' Talma and Pauline Bonaparte '; the other modern and lively and lurid enough Mr. Mac- donald's ' Life Story of Madame Steinheil.' Prof. Gerothwohl's study of ' English and French Attitudes towards Poetry ' is a pleasant and suggestive piece of work, which we should like to have seen extended to more modern examples.

WE cannot congratulate Mr. A. C. Benson on his ' Realism in Fiction ' in the May Cornhill. It says little in a great multitude of words, and that little is surely already well known to every grown person who reads at all. Sir Laurence Gomme who quotes ' N. & Q.' two or three times has an interesting paper on ' The Songs of Labour.' We should greatly have welcomed examples from other languages than our own. Perhaps he will furnish such at some later day. Miss Ella Sykes's ' At a Woman's Hostel in Canada ' is not only entertaining, but valuable for its information. Sir Henry Lucy ' Sixty Years in the Wilderness ' tells us about Parlia mentary Whips, and about what he saw of Arab\ Pasha and Boulanger, adding a chapter ' Me- mories,' full of anecdotes, some of which have more sting in them than usual. The last is a pretty story of Queen Victoria and ' The Wearing of the Green.'

WE learn that a ' History of the Family of Surtees : its Descents and Alliances.' is in course of preparation by Col. H. C. Surtees, of Mains- forth, and Mr. H. R. Leighton. The authors request us to make known that they will be pleased to receive any information or any letters, &c., likely to be of interest. Communications kindly to be addressed to Mr. S. Dodds, Publisher, 61, Quayside, Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

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We must call special attention to the following notices :

Ox all communications must be written the name ind address of the sender, not necessarily for pub- lication, but as a guarantee of good faith.

EDITORIAL communications should be addressed to "The Editor of 'Notes and Queries'" Adver- tisements and Business Letters to " The Pub- lishers " at the Office, Bream's Buildirsrs, Chancery Lane, E.G.

CORRESPONDENTS who send letters to be for- warded to other contributors should put on the top left-hand corner of their envelopes the number of the page of 'N. & Q.' to which their letters refer, so that the contributor may be readily identified. Otherwise much time has to be spent in tracing the querist.

R. S. C. (" Flags on Church Steeples"). See 6 S. ii. 310; 8 S. ix. 328, 394, 472, 499; x. 16, 83, 259, 481; xii. 117, 210, 231, 277; 9 S. v. 414, 440, 457, 478; Supplement 30 June, 1900; ix. 485; x. 94, 118.

DR. S. D. CLIPPING DALE. Forwarded.