One feature of Mr. Robert Blatchford's autobiography, My Eighty Years
(Cassell, 10s. 6d.), that will surprise many readers is the amount of space and fond recollection he gives to his term of service in the Army. It is upon his soldiering days that he dwells with most relish. Of the Clarion, which he helped to found and made a popular weekly of rare excellence, he says little. Of the Labour Movement which that paper did much to solidify, he says even less. He is as proud of his Daily Mail articles on the German Peril as of Merrie England, which sold to the number of something near a million copies and made countless converts to Socialism. And he is still the " old soldier " in all he says and thinks ; at least, that is the impression his book leaves on the mind. It is full of interest—perhaps for this reason all the more full. Mr. Blatchford has been a character of his age. He has always been true to himself. He has had a varied and eventful life. In old age he is as dashing, as provocative, as sympathetic to suffering of any kind as ever, and he mirrors himself truly in these pages. As a contribution to social history they also have their value.
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