Essays and Nature Studies. By W. J. C. Miller. Edited,
with Introduction, by H. Kirke Swann. (Elliot Stock.)—Mr. Miller occupied for twenty years the post of Registrar to the Medical Council, and for a very considerable time edited the mathematical section which is an important feature in the Educa- tional Times. Ill-health has compelled him to give up both employments. The volume now published has no connection with these occupations. It is the outcome of his leisure, spent, as it has been, in the observation of Nature and the study of literature. The first is represented by various essays on scenery - and bird life, the second by papers, some of which have been delivered as lectures, on such subjects as Ibsen, the English drama, James Thomson (of the "Seasons"), Ingoldsby, and Lord Byron. For the "Nature Studies" we have nothing but praise. From the literary judgments we find ourselves often dissenting. Mr. Miller is an enthusiastic admirer of Ibsen as a great ex- ponent of human nature. Ibsen is great, no doubt, in one way but all his exposition is of the pathological kind.
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