NEWS AND NOTES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14235, 4 December 1909, Page 4 (Supplement)

NEWS AND NOTES.

No less than 92 new books have been added to the Auckland Free Public Library this week, ; 18 of them being boys' books. These are; now catalogued and ready for use. ■ "" '. ■:*' '. '■• ». i ;",'■■'• ' ' '

It is strange that almost on the day of Professor Lombroso's death there should appear ; a book by him N entitled, > After Death— The work, which Air. Unwin publishes, is a study of "spiritualistic phenomena and their interpretation.".;. " ;

A new book by the witty and wise author of "Elizabeth and Her German Garden" is announced. It is called "The Caravaners," it ' concerns a German baron and , his wife in ; England, and * it; will be published by Messrs.' Smith, Elder. -'-'

The Wedgwoods made a famous dinnerservice ■ for the Empress Catherine H. of Russia. The service got lost for., a long time, and generally has a romantic history. This history Mr. G. C. Williamson relates in a book entitled "The Imperial Russian Dinner Service," which Messrs. Bell are to publish. ■ '■' \ ':■ • '. ' - \ '■■ -* ■,"

f% What book of modern years has had the largest "sale? An easy question to put; one hard to answer. _ But is there any volume of our day that' : has surpassed the popularity of : Blackmore's "Lorna DooneV'.' A new issue- of it, the Dulverton edition, is announced by Messrs. \ Sampson Low. Counting this edition, no few than 720,000 copies ot " Lorna" will have been sold.

Shortly Mr. Murray is to publish another novel from the pen of Miss Elizabeth Robins. '-t. It is a love romance of a woman who belongs to the inner circle of the ultra rich in America. She is, however, distinguished by her gifts of mind, as well as by her millions. She has a soul, and when ' it', becomes unveiled' the; reader is at , the thick of a dramatic plot. V •

Some years ago Mr. Marriott Watson introduced us to a witty, impulsive, lighthearted young gentleman, called Lord Francis Charmian, second son of the Marquis of Auriol. He was of opinion that there was romance lurking everywhere, if you were only disposed to look for it. Further adventures by him, he having meanwhile become Baron de Lys, through succession in his mother's right, are told in a novel which Messrs. Hutchinson announce, "Romance at Random." -

An attempt, to induce Count Tolstoi to lecture in Berlin has come to . nothing, because the great novelist refuses to submit his lecture to the Prussian police before delivering it. Their demand that he should do so strikes one as ungrateful when one remembers how Tolstoi has set his face against all proposals that, Russia should work with France for the "revanche." Paul Deroulede. of the League of Patriots, once went to see him on the subject, but was dismissed, as the. vulgar say, with a flea in his ear. "The frontiers of kingdoms," Tolstoi told him, " should be determined, not by the sword and blood, but by the rational agreement of nations. And when there are no longer any people who do not understand this, then there will be no more wars." Having said which, Tolstoi emphasised his words by leaving- the room and slamming the door behind him.

' Colonel Patterson's * "Man Eaters of : Tsavo". has taken its place among the classics of Big-game shooting, and the new book I from his pen (and camera), which Messrs. Macmillan and Co. will shortly publish, is not likely to be behind its predecessor in interest for the modern Nimrod. In the Grip of the Nyika" is the account 'of two expeditions recently made by Co-, lonel Patterson in practically unknown regions of British East Africa, and is reported to be full of daring adventure and thrilling escapade. The second of the two • expeditions was not mainly sporting in character; it was undertaken with the object of discovering a natural eastern boundary," to the great 'northern preserve, and contains some remarkable records of the crossing of the Kaisoot Desert. -The photographs, which accompany and explain the letterpress, ' will be a principal feature of the book; they will reveal "the wild beast at home" with startling fidelity. . ". -,