$4 HEVIEWS — THE CANADA BIU.^CTO£LT. 



witti equal abruptness. We have found our estimation of it increase" 

 as we acquired a more familiar acquaintance with its contents, and 

 with this commendation we now leaye its further study to ous' 

 readers,- G-. T. K. 



TJie Ccmada tyirecfory, for 1857-58. Montreal r John Lotell, 185 a 



In all ardinary conditisns of the studious mind, it must he confessed- 

 lihat a Directory or an Almanac^ ranks along with Dictionaries, Concord-- 

 ances. Cookery hooks. University Calendars, Library Catalogues, Law 

 Lists, Old Bailey p4,egisters, and the like highly useful compilations ; as s- 

 species 6f reading by no means too seductive or fascinating. Way-- 

 laid in a country inn on a rainy day, for lack of better, we have resorted- 

 to such reading, where choice was small ; and the associations of the- 

 book seem to chime in very harmoinously with our recollections of the 

 dreary drizzle, and dull monotonous plash from the dripping eaves, Hercy 

 however, comes before our editorial eye, a portly and well-conditioned 

 volume, and — ^spite of all memories of such association with older mem-- 

 bers of th*same worthy but prosaic family,^ — insists on its merits, claims-' 

 to be permitted an audience^ and S/Sserts rights that -will not be gainsayed.- 



And for a member of the aforesaitl family, it must be owned that the 

 Canadian Directory of 1857, has a wonderfully prepossessing manner 

 and appearance. Nor, on closer acquaintance, does it prove by any 

 means of so dull and commonplace a character as our enforced inter-- 

 sou.rse with some of the elder race of Directories had led us to anticipate ^ 

 but on the contrary it is full of information of a highly varied and- 

 useful kind ; and, albeit, like all its kith and kin, of an essentially 

 practical turn in the main^ it does not even refuse a little convenient 

 by-play of sarcastic humour at a time. 



The idea ordinarily attached to a Directory is one of those very con- 

 venient but ephemeral lists of names- and addresses which lie on the 

 desk of the Counting house for the year, and are then consigned to the 

 waste-basket as worthless, except for the paper on which they are 

 printed. Su.ch, h&wever, involves a very inadequate coneeption of this 

 handsome and bulky imperial octavo. It does, indeed, embody such 

 an index to places of business and private residences throughout the 

 province ; and, assuming the acciiracy, which we find on testing these 

 by a few known references, to be general throughout, this depart^ 



