Review of Reviev-s, iO/3/08. 



The Reviews Reviewed, 



3" 



THE INDEPENDENT REVIEW. 



The February number is exceptionally good. Four 

 out of the eight articles have claimed separate notice. 



Miss Alice Lindeell remarks on the curious fact 

 that the Greeks, who live in a land of flowers and 

 love what is lovely, should write about flowers not 

 much and not enthusiastically. She offers the follow- 

 ing suggestion : — 



Flowers, let us saj', belong' to the gods. Man, regarding 

 them as a symbol of god-like beauty, lias a share in them, 

 it would seem, only when certain functions, or chances of 

 life, bring him into close connection with the gods. 



Algar Thorold treats of Maeterlinck as a moralist, 

 and calls attention to a conception which he cannot 

 but call mystical, a backgi'ound to the autonomous 

 morality on which he insists, the conception, namely, 

 of "the dynamic unity of the universal human soul.' 

 Apart from such mysticism, " all justice, mercy, 

 beauty and truth are so many secretions of human 

 consciousness, as silk is of the silkworm." 



G. L. Strachey contributes a warm eulogy of Sir 

 Thomas Browne, whom he places on one of the very 

 highest peaks af Parnassus. His magnificently classic 

 stjde has as its most fitting environment some univer- 

 sity which still smiles on antiquity and has learned 

 the habit of repose. 



Mr. G. LfOwes Dickinson writes his observations on 

 the General Election in the light of Shelley re-read 

 last summer in Switzerland. He urges that society 

 is wrongly arranged, and must be re-adjusted by 

 means of poetry and religion. " Utopian schemes are 

 the only real politics, and only when City men see 

 that shall we really begin to move." There ought 

 to be no disagreement on the point that we want to 

 revolutionise our society, only as to how it can be 

 done. 



The Editor finds the three great forces which 

 wrought the overturn of the General Election in — (1) 

 the nation's disgust at the late Ministry : (2) its at- 

 tachment to Free-trade ; (3) the demand for social 

 reform. 



THE PALL MALL MAGAZINE. 



The i'uU Mali Magazine for February is called a 

 General Election Number. 



The first article, by Mr. Alfred Kinner, takes us 

 behind the scenes at a General Election, and shows 

 us the fonnalities of the different stages in the mak- 

 ing of a new Pai-liament, the Dissolution, the issuing 

 of writs for the election of new members, the nomina- 

 tion of candidates, the collection and storage of the 

 polling-books and ballot-papers, etc. 



Margaret Cotter Morrison contributes an article on 

 William Pitt, who died a hundred j^ears ago, on 

 January 23, 1806. Pitt was a readv-made orator. 

 Within a month of his first taking his seat in the 

 House of Commons he was called upon, somewhat un- 

 expectedly, to reply for his own side. When he sat 

 down his reputation was won, and Burke remarked, 

 '' He was not a chip of the old block — he was the old 

 block itself." It is a remarkable fact that a man 

 with such wide interest»s never visited Scotland or 

 Ireland, while he knew little of England north of 

 Cambridge. His only experienc-e of the Continent 

 was a short visit to France in 1783, when he was out 

 of office. 



In the article on Sport on the Roof of the World, 

 Major P. L. Kennion describes his adventures when 

 stalking for wild sheep, poli. in the Pamir country. 

 The poli ram has gigantic horns, and their great 

 weight handicaps him when he is pursued by any of 

 his foes. 



^tTHE MONTHLY REVIEW. 



The Monthly Review for February is literary rather 

 than political — a refreshing change. Mr. John Mur- 

 ray replies to the charges against the House of Mur- 

 ray made by Lord Lovelace in his recent, much- 

 talked-of book on Lord Byron, " Astarte." "Lord 

 Randolph Churchill's Life " is reviewed favourably as 

 " a noble monument to a father " by a son; Mr. Her- 

 bert Paul's " Life of Froude " affords the text for an 

 article on " Froude and Freeman " by Ronald 

 McNeill; and a very interesting paper, "A Forgotten 

 Princess," by Reginald Lucas, deals with the sad, 

 short life (fourteen years) of Elizabeth, daughter of 

 Charles I. Whoever is thinking of visiting Caris- 

 hrooke Castle should consult this article. The Presi- 

 dent of Magdalen's address to the Modern Language 

 Association in December last on "" Ancient and Modern 

 Classics as Instruments of Education," is reprinted, 

 its point being that to be completely educated — a 

 literary education — one must stucfy both ; each helps 

 one to understand and appreciate the other. 



THE FASCINATION OF PARLIAMENT. 

 The opening paper, by Mr. Michael MacDonagh, 

 seeks to analyse the fascination which, in Macaulay's 

 words, attracts men 



who could sit over their tea and tneir book in their own 

 cool, quiet room, to breathe bad air, hear bad speeches, 

 lounge up and down the long gallery, and doze uneasily on 

 the green benches till three in the morning. 



There is a silver lining even to the Parliamentary 

 cloud. Still, the tribulations of an M.P. are many. 

 To begin with, there are the torments of the post-- 

 begging-letters, the epistles of all the Jeremy Did- 

 dlers, of all the place-huntei-s, of all the subscription- 

 hunters, to say nothing of Blue-books, reports, etc. 

 The M.P. is, of course, expected at social functions 

 of every kind, and is even occasionally expected to 

 throw oil on troubled domestic waters. One letter is 

 really too delicious not to quote. Pitj* the poor M.P. 

 who received it ! : — 



HONOXJRED Sir,— 

 I hear that Mr. Balfour is not a married man. Some- 

 thing tells me that I would make the riglit sort of wile 

 for him. I am coming to London to-morrow, and will can 

 at the House of Commons to see you, hoping you will get 

 me an introduction to the honourable gentleman. I am 

 only thirty years of age, and can do cooking and waali- 

 ing. AGNES MfrtoN. 



P. S.— Perhaps if Mr. Balfour would not have me. yon 

 would say a word for me to one of the policemen at the 

 House. 



Mr. A^hcroft, member for Oldham, recently said 

 that it needed a roll of paper nearly twenty feet long 

 to contain the names of applications for his subscrip- 

 tions since he became M.P., and that in the first year 

 after his election ho was asked to give no less than 

 £27,000. 



Yet, in .spite of these and many more ills to which 

 Parliamentarv ilesli is heir, Mr. MacDonagh says a 

 remarkably large number of men are in the House of 

 Commons not because they are socially or politically 

 ambitious, but, for their health's sake. To old men, 

 especially if retired from business, it sometimes means 

 salvation. "' They .seem to grow younger every day of 

 their Parliamentary life . . . Old men find the foun- 

 tain of youth in the halls of i'arliament." Its fas- 

 cination, in fact, seems irresistible if once felt. A 

 most amusing papei-, like all Mr. MacDonagh's work. 



Alaska is not onlv rich in gold ; it abounds also in 

 many other minerals, copper especially. Mr. W. M. 

 Brewer in the Engineering Magazine gives a long and 

 interesting description of mining in that portion of 

 it which was but recently in dispute between the 

 Canadian and United St-ates Governments. 



