British Country Life in Spring and Summer. Edited by Edward
Thomas. With Coloured Illustrations. (Hodder and Stoughton. 8s. 6d. net.)—This is an entirely novel book about the open-air world, and is made up of a collection of forty-six essays by well- known writers on Nature and natural history. Mr. Thomas has succeeded in collecting contributions from a variety of sources on the most varied subjects. We do not know who is responsible for the ridiculous open-air diary at the commence- ment of the volume which begins with the astounding statement on April 1st : "Red-backed shrikes appear." But the rest of the book must not be judged by this. We have papers by well-known writers like Mr. W. Warde Fowler, Mr. Edward Clodd, Mr. W. H. Hudson, and Mr. G. A. B. Dewar. Mr. A. W. Rees and Mr. J. C. Tregarthen write on mammals, Canon Vaughan on botany, Mr. Walter M. Gallichan on fishing, Mr. A. H. Patterson and Mr. J. Walpole Bond on birds. The illus- trations consist of very tasteful coloured photographs and charm- ing water-colours by Mr. Frank Southgate and Mr. Tatton Winter. It was an unfortunate idea to mount them on large grey paper pages. The effect is bad, and the book made needlessly unwieldy. Nevertheless, this is a most excellent kind of book to give as a present to any lover of the country.
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