BOOK NOTICES.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 21, 20 February 1891, Page 29

BOOK NOTICES.

" qfrß Golden Days,"— This is the College record published annually by the students of St. Jomph's College, Hunter's Hill, Sydney. The publication contains abundant evidence of a successful year's work. The students have distinguished tbsmselves at the University exam-inations-All who presented themselves passing, without exception, and •erenlof them taking honours. Oneof them, Mr. VV. T. J. Newton, we are further told, woo the Barker Scholarship, awarded every March to the best mathematical scholar of the year, and for which there is very keen competition. The annual contains a quantity of additional information relating to the college, and the manner in which studies and life in general are conducted there, all combining to make us acquainted with an admirably managed and most successful institution. The publication is well edited and neatly turned out. It is in every respect creditable to all who were engaged in its production.

" Our Alma Mater," annual of St. Ignatius' College, Sydney. — Thu publication, edited by students of the Jesuit Fathers, maintains itf high place among publications cf the kind— that is to say, if, in fact, there are any other such publications-for, to tell the truth, if there are we cannot exactly recall them. The annual contains not only a record of the year's work, but also several literary articles, notes of travel, and poems, and, though last not least, a scientific chapter, in which we are given details of the dissection of a terneat. The literary work is extremely gooi. But may we without impropriety remark on the acquirements of that rather portentous junior student, who seems to have been born and bred in a circulating library, an! to have taken in works of fiction through his feeding bottle. Sir Walter Scott, Thackeray, Lord Lytton — he has them and their romances at his fingers' ends, and can tell us more about their respective styles aud powers of delineating character than we should care to criticise — lest we should be detected in making mistakes, and put to open shame by babes and sucklings. The annual, however, gives every proof of being issued from an institution where the students are kept well abreast of the progress of the day, and prepared to take their part and hold their own in the inevitable battle of life. Some portraits of students distinguished as athletes or otherwise, make us acquainted with manly -looking fellows doing credit to the physical standing of their race, and promising well for the future of Australia. On the whole, " Our Alma Mater " is a publication on who3e tone and contents generally its editors and publishers may be sincerely congratulated.