Tarenne. By H. M. Hozier. (Chapman an d Hall.)—This is
the third of a series of Military Biographies which are being issued by Messrs. Chapman and Hall. Colonel Hozier has done his work so carefully that we hardly like to say a disparaging word concerning it. Yet after a careful perusal of the great French General's life, as he sets it forth, there remains iu our mind a feeling of dissatisfaction, not with what he has done, but with what he has left undone. We presume that the term " military biography" is not used here in so restricted a sense as to confine the author merely to a critical study of Turenne's warlike achievements. They, indeed, must necessarily form the staple material of such a book ; and Colonel Hozier has dealt so carefully and skilfully with this that his biography is really an excellent epitome of French military and political history for the period over which the hero's life extended. We have all we can desire to know about the soldier ; we want more concerning the man himself. The digressions which the author makes have a direct relation to the main work in band. He has given us a detailed account of military tactics, and the state of the French army early in the seventeenth century, and has traced with admirable care the great improvements in strategical operations introduced by the Generals of Lewis XIV. In one or two places he lets us have, to put it in common parlance, a bit of his mind, as, for instance, when he says that conscription would make fewer "the little wars which are among us so popular, since they provide excitement for the multitude, and an active
circulation for our newspapers," or when he satirically remarks that " it cannot be expected that an adjutant-general of the present day should be sufficiently conversant with the French language as to have read the memoirs of Tnrenne." The book ought to be invaluable to soldiers ; and it has evidently been written specially for them. To all it will be interesting and instructive. It is illustrated with three good maps and a portrait of its subject.
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