Part 30

⁂ Hitherto all books on the old gardens of Italy have been large, costly, and incomplete, and designed for the library rather than for the traveller. Mrs. Aubrey Le Blond, during the course of a series of visits to all parts of Italy, has compiled a volume that garden lovers can carry with them, enabling them to decide which gardens are worth visiting, where they are situated, how they may be reached, if special permission to see them is required, and how this may be obtained. Though the book is practical and technical, the artistic element is supplied by the illustrations, one at least of which is given for each of the 71 gardens described. Mrs. Aubrey Le Blond was the illustrator of the monumental work by H. Inigo Triggs on “The Art of Garden Design in Italy,” and has since taken three special journeys to that country to collect material for her “The Old Gardens of Italy.”

The illustrations have been beautifully reproduced by a new process which enables them to be printed on a rough light paper, instead of the highly glazed and weighty paper necessitated by half-tone blocks. Thus not only are the illustrations delightful to look at, but the book is a pleasure to handle instead of a dead weight.

DOWN THE MACKENZIE AND UP THE YUKON. By E. Stewart. With 30 Illustrations and a Map. Crown 8vo. 5s. net.

⁂ Mr. Stewart was former Inspector of Forestry to the Government of Canada, and the experience he thus gained, supplemented by a really remarkable journey, will prove of great value to those who are interested in the commercial growth of Canada. The latter portion of his book deals with the various peoples, animals, industries, etc., of the Dominion; while the story of the journey he accomplished provides excellent reading in Part I. Some of the difficulties he encountered appeared insurmountable, and a description of his perilous voyage in a native canoe with Indians is quite haunting. There are many interesting illustrations of the places of which he writes.

AMERICAN SOCIALISM OF THE PRESENT DAY. By Jessie Wallace Hughan. With an Introduction by John Spargo. Crown 8vo. 5s. net.

⁂ All who are interested in the multitudinous political problems brought about by the changing conditions of the present day should read this book, irrespective of personal bias. The applications of Socialism throughout the world are so many and varied that the book is of peculiar importance to English Socialists.

THE STRUGGLE FOR BREAD. By “A Rifleman” Crown 8vo. 5s. net.

⁂ This book is a reply to Mr. Norman Angell’s well-known work, “The Great Illusion” and also an enquiry into the present economic state of Europe. The author, examining the phenomenon of the high food-prices at present ruling in all great civilized states, proves by statistics that these are caused by a relative decline in the production of food-stuffs as compared with the increase in general commerce and the production of manufactured-articles, and that consequently there has ensued a rise in the exchange-values of manufactured-articles, which with our system of society can have no other effect than of producing high food-prices and low wages. The author proves, moreover, that this is no temporary fluctuation of prices, but the inevitable outcome of an economic movement, which whilst seen at its fullest development during the last few years has been slowly germinating for the last quarter-century. Therefore, food-prices must continue to rise whilst wages must continue to fall.

THE LAND OF TECK & ITS SURROUNDINGS. By Rev. S. Baring-Gould. With numerous Illustrations (including several in Colour) reproduced from unique originals. Demy 8vo. 10s. 6d. net.

GATES OF THE DOLOMITES. By L. Marion Davidson. With 32 Illustrations from Photographs and a Map. Crown 8vo. Second Edition. 5s. net.

⁂ Whilst many English books have appeared on the Lande Tirol, few have given more than a chapter on the fascinating Dolomite Land, and it is in the hope of helping other travellers to explore the mountain land with less trouble and inconvenience than fell to her lot that the author has penned these attractive pages. The object of this book is not to inform the traveller how to scale the apparently inaccessible peaks of the Dolomites, but rather how to find the roads, and thread the valleys, which lead him to the recesses of this most lovely part of the world’s face, and Miss Davidson conveys just the knowledge which is wanted for this purpose; especially will her map be appreciated by those who wish to make their own plans for a tour, as it shows at a glance the geography of the country.

KNOWLEDGE AND LIFE. By William Arkwright. Crown 8vo. 3s. 6d. net.

⁂ This is a remarkably written book—brilliant and vital. Mr. Arkwright illumines a number of subjects with jewelled flashes of word harmony and chisels them all with the keen edge of his wit. Art, Letters, and Religion of different appeals move before the reader in vari-coloured array, like the dazzling phantasmagoria of some Eastern dream.

CHANGING RUSSIA. A Tramp along the Black Sea Shore and in the Urals. By Stephen Graham. Author of “Undiscovered Russia,” “A Vagabond in the Caucasus,” etc. With Illustrations and a Map. Demy 8vo. 7s. 6d. net.

⁂ In “Changing Russia,” Mr. Stephen Graham describes a journey from Rostof-on-the-Don to Batum and a summer spent on the Ural Mountains. The author has traversed all the region which is to be developed by the new railway from Novo-rossisk to Poti. It is a tramping diary with notes and reflections. The book deals more with the commercial life of Russia than with that of the peasantry, and there are chapters on the Russia of the hour, the Russian town, life among the gold miners of the Urals, the bourgeois, Russian journalism, the intelligentsia, the election of the fourth Duma. An account is given of Russia at the seaside, and each of the watering places of the Black Sea shore is described in detail.

ROBERT FULTON ENGINEER AND ARTIST: HIS LIFE AND WORK. By H. W. Dickinson, A.M.I.Mech.E. Demy 8vo. 10s 6d. net.

⁂ No Biography dealing as a whole with the life-work of the celebrated Robert Fulton has appeared of late years, in spite of the fact that the introduction of steam navigation on a commercial scale, which was his greatest achievement has recently celebrated its centenary.

The author has been instrumental in bringing to light a mass of documentary matter relative to Fulton, and has thus been able to present the facts about him in an entirely new light. The interesting but little known episode of his career as an artist is for the first time fully dealt with. His stay in France and his experiments under the Directory and the Empire with the submarine and with the steamboat are elucidated with the aid of documents preserved in the Archives Nationales at Paris. His subsequent withdrawal from France and his employment by the British Cabinet to destroy the Boulogne flotilla that Napoleon had prepared in 1804 to invade England are gone into fully. The latter part of his career in the United States, spent in the introduction of steam navigation and in the construction of the first steam-propelled warship, is of the greatest interest. With the lapse of time facts assume naturally their true perspective. Fulton, instead of being represented, according to the English point of view, as a charlatan and even as a traitor, or from the Americans as a universal genius, is cleared from these charges, and his pretensions critically examined, with the result that he appears as a cosmopolitan, an earnest student, a painstaking experimenter and an enterprising engineer.

It is believed that practically nothing of moment in Fulton’s career has been omitted. The illustrations, which are numerous, are drawn in nearly every case from the original sources. It may confidently be expected, therefore, that this book will take its place as the authoritative biography which everyone interested in the subjects enumerated above will require to possess.

A STAINED GLASS TOUR IN ITALY. By Charles H. Sherrill. Author of “Stained Glass Tours in England,” “Stained Glass Tours in France,” etc. With 33 Illustrations. Demy 8vo. 7s. 6d. net.

⁂ Mr. Sherrill has already achieved success with his two previous books on the subject of stained glass. In Italy he finds a new field, which offers considerable scope for his researches. His present work will appeal not only to tourists, but to the craftsmen, because of the writer’s sympathy with the craft. Mr. Sherrill is not only an authority whose writing is clear in style and full of understanding for the requirements of the reader, but one whose accuracy and reliability are unquestionable. This is the most important book published on the subject with which it deals, and readers will find it worthy to occupy the position.

SCENES AND MEMORIES OF THE PAST. By the Honble. Stephen Coleridge. With numerous Illustrations. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. net.

⁂ Mr. Stephen Coleridge has seen much of the world in two hemispheres and has been able to count among his intimate personal friends many of those whose names have made the Victorian age illustrious.

Mr. Coleridge fortunately kept a diary for some years of his life and has religiously preserved the letters of his distinguished friends; and in this book the public are permitted to enjoy the perusal of much vitally interesting correspondence.

With a loving and appreciative hand the author sketches the characters of many great men as they were known to their intimate associates. Cardinals Manning and Newman, G. F. Watts, James Russell Lowell, Matthew Arnold, Sir Henry Irving, Goldwin Smith, Lewis Morris, Sir Stafford Northcote, Whistler, Oscar Wilde, Ruskin, and many others famous in the nineteenth century will be found sympathetically dealt with in this book.

During his visit to America as the guest of the American Bar in 1883, Lord Coleridge, the Chief Justice, and the author’s father wrote a series of letters, which have been carefully preserved, recounting his impressions of the United States and of the leading citizens whom he met.

Mr. Coleridge has incorporated portions of these letters from his father in the volume, and they will prove deeply interesting on both sides of the Atlantic.

Among the illustrations are many masterly portraits never before published.