20 FEBRUARY 1926, Page 22

Rambles in Old London (Bodley Head. 15s.) is frankly , "

popular " in treatment. Nevertheless,- Dr. George Byron Gordon (a Canadian) has given. Us quite the niO.st fascinating, book on London we have read. He quotes from a Puritan- writer a description of the women of London in the days of Queen Elizabeth. They were not content to coIour their faces ■ dye their hair, and bedeck ihanselvei in "silk, velvet, gro- _ gram, tallatie, saten, or scarlet," but " when they have- attired themselves in the midst of their pride, it is a world to consider their coyness in gestures, their mintsednesain woords and speaches,- their gingerlyness in trippInge On toes like yong goats, their demure nicitie and babishness . . ." ; and withal, their hawtie stomackes and more than Cyclopicall countenances."