BOOK NOTICES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2399, 22 February 1900, Page 65

BOOK NOTICES.

BLACKWOOD'S " LITERATURE READERS." Edited by John Adams, M.A., B.Sc, F.C.P. I Edinburgh and London : William Black- ! wood and Sons. j The " Literature Readers " fulfil a double purpose. They constitute extra leading | books for the schools, and besides they give outlines of the woxld's literatuie, all i the principal authors of the pas.l having been gleaned from. The ' : et consists of four volumes, published at prices ranging between Is and Is 6d. In order to mcci the capacity of youthful readers the selections in the first number are adapted from tflie original in many cases — a capital arrangement, which helps to enlarge the liter- j ary outlook of young leaders. The open- i ing sketch, for iiif-tance, " The Donkey's, I Well," is adapted from a German tile hr | Rudolph Bauiiibaeh, and there are severa l ' translations from Cerman lolk-lore and '' fairy talcs. Fiench literature has also been ' exploited to compile the Itordcif, uhich' ought to prove invaluable in the school, . seeing Una the lilcivry know lev o,a ol sdio >\ childien is generally exdtnie.y moi-m- ' scribed, it i<- ju-a, the kind o* n uiin£, too, that children will devour with nitd'ed. | Wo have still a lively remembrance of our i own experiences .in tkat line vruen at scliool.

Happening upon on old volume entitled " Half Hours vlth the Best Authors," every tale, sketch and poem in the volume was devoured greedily, opening up new vistas to the youthful mind undreamed of in ordinaiy school books. 131'tckwoods " Literature 'Reudeis '" aie a kind of extra edition ot the old volume i\ c refer to, and as, such v> ill afford entertaining reading for young and old, being liismiclivo at the same tmii. Amongst the English authors drawn upon in the first book viu have but to enumerate C.uules and iJfirj Lamb, Kmm:i-,0.', Chaucer, Oliver * Wendell Holme*. Coleridge, Moore, "Word-worth, Go.d'-mitii, Shakespeare. Ajtoun, Browning. Dickens, Spenser,* Ba.iyan. and Mrs Hemans to "-how how v/ule is the rield covered. Homer and ilie '" Arabian Nights " take che yonihiul re.t'Jer into yet other untxploied fields Voluminous notes and exercises {ire appended to each book, including spelling and questions upon the leading fe times of Ul2 lessons. To give examples of the subjects dealt with in Book I we have but to note selections from Chaucer's ' Canterbury Tales "' and other writings, done into modern English, with quotations in the English of Chaucer ; " Polyphemus. 1 ' adapted" fi\ m Homer; Hep o" My 'Jlmmb. " u-oin (lie Fvench of Charle* Penauit; "AH Baba," 1 from the' "Arabian Xights"; "A Pireei Two Hundred Years Ago," by Defoe ; " St. Ueorge and the Drngcu; 1 " by Edmund Spcnse°; " The White Ship,"' from Dickens' s " Child's History of England; and "The Castle of Giant Despair. ' from Bunyan. Book II canks the youthful reader a' step forward, and widens his acquaintance with more authors, m addition "to tho.se met with ia Book I. Cov.lcy. Hood, Kinssley, Ivcats, Michael Drayton, Samuel Rogers, T. L. Peacock, Gilbert White: Thomas' Gray, Longfellow, Swift, Macauky. Scott, and others are passed in review befoie the re.ider The leading acquire--- a 31103 c mat-ter-of-f:tct character in Book LI, fair- tales giving place to the real aitaiivs of everyday life. "The Story of -Macbeth" giVe3 a glimpse of ear\v Scottish history fi'om Sir Walter Scott's "Tales of a Grandfather." " Gold Fish. ' from Gilbeit Whire's " Natural History of Selbonie," gives the hhtory of the«e interesting little creatures in a, concise form. "A Queer Search ' is- an excerpt from Swift's " Gullivei\ Travels." Amongst the excellently .selected poatrv we note Macaukn 's "Horatius, ' Dickens' s '" Ivy Green,' 1 and Browning's "A Hero." The exercises at the end of tac volume are much nrjre extensive, witii immermis .examples of word building, prefixes, ailixes. and elementary grammar. In Books 111 and IV a still wider selection is mxde. and the exercises and grammar appended amplified. Book IV is a good-sized, volume of 375 pages, and mo.-t.of its cop tents have been gleaned from mod-rn author.-? The first piece is ' Tom-, Fir,.l Hnlf." from "The Mill on the Fk-s,'' b\ George Eliot, which, author is also drawn upon for "The rn,re<holci of Life, from " Romol.i." " The Legend of the Lorelei" is from Mark Twain's "A Tramp Abroad; " Poetry in the Green State" is ffom '' The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table," by Oliver Wendell Holmes. Other pieces 'that we might mention are "Wonderful Eivers/' by Izaak Walton ; " Henry V at Harfieur," by Shakespeare : " The Story of Alexander Selkirk,", by Richard Steele ; "Joan of Arc," by De Quincey ; " The Voyage of Life.'' by I Dr Johnson ; "Alas, Poor Yorick !"' byLaw- | rence Sterne : " American Love of' Freedom. ' by Edmund Burke : and " The Death of Colonel Xewcombe," by 'J'hackeray. These are but a few of the s'elction* in the volume, which should be invaluable in the school, especially in the higher classy. The I poetry has also been excel'ently chosen, and 1 altogether Book IV is a capital volume for : general reading, whether at school or in the home, as it contains selections from authors many of whom must be whollyunknown 10 the average reader. The apj pendex contains exercises on compositior j and grammar, with Latin and 1-Jreek roots. I so that a careful study of the volume should ! prove of great advantage to a studr-nt preI paring for an examination in English. Whether the books will ever be inrroduced into, Nev Ze iland schools or not i:- a f(uesI tion we muH leave for the educational authorities to decide, but they are at least , well worthy of a place in the schools.

s — Ev<ryi:>odv in Paris will soon be running on w1k«;1«. There are in France — chiefly in Paris — ova- half a million reqi'tered bicyclists. TnTß9i Uio number v,a-> 203.026, and last year 483.414. Each one pay a tax and carrier a licens-e. The abo\ c number does not include motor-cveles and piotor-carp. which ore far more plentiful in France than in England. Motor-cycles are to be used by postmen for colecting letters in Paris.