REVIEWS OF RECENT BOOKS 211 



There is a great development of steam power in the Upper branches 

 now, but the best way still to see the glories and the dangers of this 

 mighty river is to travel in a native boat — and the descriptions in 

 this volume are seen as from the deck of a "Kwadza." This book 

 deals with the voyage up country with Ichang as the starting place, 

 just a 1,000 miles from the sea. Think of it ! What distances ! 

 Leaving Ichang the traveller soon enters a gorge 16 miles long, "full 

 of beautiful scenery and which will gladden the heart of a lover of 

 nature, he is alone with the glories of nature." 



"The panorama that slowly unfolds itself as the traveller sails is 

 grand indeed. The river still and deep, flowing majestically between 

 precipitous cliffs of which the summits at every turn are crowned with, 

 enormous and fantastic rocks or peaks, looking like the battlements of 

 mediaeval castles, etc., whose wall-like sides — in some places covered 

 with brushwood and vegetation — produce on a sunny day a veritable 

 coloured kaleidoscope of glorious scenery, and yet this grand gorge is 

 by no means the grandest of the gorges." 



"At one- place the river is flanked on either side by huge piles of 

 boulders, long jagged reefs, and intervening bays of sand and rubble 

 resembling the rugged shores of a sea coast. "At the head is the 

 Niu kan mei fei hsih — the magnificent portals of which are called 

 Tung Ling Hsia. At their foot amidst scenery, grand, weird and 

 wild lie the much dreaded Kang Ling Rocks." This is a sample of 

 the fascinating things in this little volume. It is full of beautiful 

 descriptions of a famous district. It is much illustrated by Ivon 

 A. Donnelly, and the price is only four and a half dollars. 



A Chinese Idol. By Carroll Lunt. London : John Lane. 



This has nothing to do with sinology or theology. It is a novel 

 with a continuation. The continuation follows the disappearance of 

 the two leading characters, that is to say, Neville and a young Chinese 

 girl with whom he lived, and between whom there was such affection 

 that he decides to make her his legal wife and blight his career. 

 But before this comes to pass he is knocked senseless by a friend, and 

 she is fatally stabbed. How may be seen in the book itself. After 

 this denouement the remaining characters continue the story. 



The author may have certain ideas to present in this slightly 

 constructed plot but they are not very clear. We do not think it 

 is a very healthy story and it has no very great merits to atone for 

 the smell of liquor and the presentation of the seamy side of life. 



M. 



