CURRENT LITERATURE • The Little Things of Nature. By L.
H. Grindon. (Pitman.)—Mr. Grindon writes in a pleasant and rather sentimental way upon such sub- jects as the vitality of-seeds, the sleep of plants, the magic of chemistry, etc. He evidently takes delight in the little things of nature that he describes, and reaches at times a pitch of eloquence that is quite attractive. His moral lessons are brought in for the most part easily and gracefully, as when in the globules of quicksilver he sees an emblem of "the heavenly flock that in this present life is broken into particles innumerable . . . but which shall yet resolve into glorious and everlasting unity." Of course he is now and then tempted into an excess of fine writing, as when, in the midst of a discourse on plants, we come suddenly on a "mother's pride lifting up heaven into her face in small, sweet babe- smiles, that float like speech from lips yet speechless ; " but on the whole he writes rationally, and at the same time with a certain force and pic- turesqueness.
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