BIRDS, BEASTS AND FLOWERS.
Pan's People : the Lure of Little Beasts. By the Hon. Gilbert Coleridge. (T. Fisher Unwin. 9s. net.)
It is often the case that the descendant of a great man will become, by a kind of unconscious, inherited sympathy, the exponent and the illustration of one facet of his ancestor's inspiration. And, as the publisher says on the wrapper, the beautiful words from The Ancient Mariner, " He prayeth well who loveth well both man and bird and beast," very aptly sum up this book by Coleridge's descendant. Mr. Coleridge loves the creatures for themselves, not because they are good sport or good food nor because he owns them.
i He is one of the few Londoners who know the fascination of Kensington Gardens in the early morning, when, beneath the soft murmur of the tree-tops, companioned by the water- birds, bewitched by the deep voices of the wood-pigeons, one is no more in London, but in some charmed fragment of elfin woodland which has floated up, intact and secret, out of a remote -world, whither it will return at the milkman's, plaintive cry. The most interesting chapters are those on animal attractions and telepathy. It is a very charming book.
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