CURRENT LITERATURE.
GIFT BOOKS.
The Book Lover's Enchiridion ; Thoughts on the Solace and Com- panionship of Books. By Alexauder Ireland. (Simpkin, Marshall, and Co.)—This is a delightful work. Both as touching contents and outward appearance, the " Enchiridion " can hardly fail to please the general reader as much as it will undoubtedly please the lover of books, and everything relating thereto. Mr. Ireland's book con- sists of sayings about books, garnered, as he tells us, from writers
ef every age, for the help and betterment of all readers. The extracts have been most judiciously selected, and are evidently the result of years cf careful reading and close observation. It is impossible to open the " Enchiridion " anywhere without finding some wise, witty, or pleasant saying; and the highest commendation we can give it is to say that the compiler's object, as described by himself in the preface to this (the third) edition, has been fully achieved. "My object," he says, " has been to bring together, from the reading of a lifetime, a body of thought, old and new, which cannot fail to be welcome to those who find their purest and highest enjoyment in studious con- templation; who love to retire from the fretful stir unprofitable, and the fever of the world,' and dwell fora time in the heaven revealed to meditation ;' and who feel their inner life sustained and refreshed, by a knowledge of the consolations which the most gifted minds have ever found in books."
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