thing. It proves that men acquiesce in the great change which is taking place, and are willing to let womenas individuals, and not only in great gangs-do men's work and stand upon a working equality with themselves. Whether they regard the change as an emergency measure, or whether it is something to which they have for long been making up their minds, is doubtful. It seems as if they were sorry to let the old notion of their own complete supremacy in the world outside their The Spectator.

Mary Allette Ayer has compiled a small but well selected anthology entitled, "Our Mothers" and containing more than three hundred of the tributes paid by poets and other leaders of men to those to whom they owe the fondest care and their sweetest memories. Some are gay, some pathetic, some whimsical, but the general burden of all is tender reverence for the most potent teacher of love, hope, and faith that living man can ever know. The publishers have used a Copeland picture of a dear, old-fashioned mother as a frontispiece, and have bound the volume in gold and gray, boxing it for use as a gift book. Among its contents are poems by two of the Tennysons, Christina Rossetti, Mrs. Mulock-Craik, Swinburne, Bayard Taylor, Lover, Mrs. Browning, Longfellow, Bryant, Holmes, Ian Maclaren, and Emily Huntington Miller, and the prose selections come from sources as widely scattered. Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Co.

When the American of limited vocabulary desires to express his admiration of anything, be it book, picture, or poem, that enlarges his views, he calls it an eye-opener, and thus will he nominate Professor John C. Van Dyke's "The Mountain." "Renewed Studies

in Impressions and Appearances," its second title, gives an inadequate idea of its variety and of the vast scientific field which it covers. Color, geology, history, astronomy, zoology, botany, ornithology, and entomology, are a few of the great matters upon which it touches. Meteorology, art-criticism, rapturous praise of the joys of riding through mountains and deserts, occupy the interspaces. The newest theory of the universe is carefully and succinctly stated, and the thrice-told tale of glacier and avalanche is once more rehearsed, with all the newest supplements, and everything is done in an easy, graceful style, half-concealing the weight of knowledge with which the book is laden. Tyndall and Bagehot never made science more pleasing. Ruskin was never more enthusiastic. Charles Scribner's Sons.

It is refreshing and inspiring to read such a novel as "The Proof of the Pudding" by Meredith Nicholson and to be assured of possible goodness and loyalty in human nature, and of the "thirst after righteousness" which is just as much a fact as the tendency to follow the line of least resistance. Here, among other characters, are a man and woman separated by the man's

loose standards and malicious misrepresentations, who are brought together again by a second man who loves the woman but who recognizes her undying affection and loyalty to her divorced husband. The heroine, Nan Farley, develops wonderfully in character as the story progresses, losing none of her charm and piquancy in the process and gaining a clearsighted, large-hearted womanhood. Jerry Amidon is an extraordinary creation, typically American in his crudeness, his adaptability, his desire to play the game straight, and his high ideals. These five characters work out a plot which has enough of mystery to add the necessary thrill to the charm and distinction of anything which Meredith Nicholson writes. The book ranks in excellence with the author's earlier work and is surpassed in spirit by no contemporary American novel. Houghton Mifflin Company.

"Seven Miles to Arden" by Ruth Sawyer, is a bewitching title, for Rosalind's forest is even more delightsome than that through which Puck led the Athenian lovers, and Patricia O'Connell, actress, peacemaker, excellent vagabond companion, and perfect cook, is a heroine formed to win masculine hearts, and to be forgiven by her sister women, for is she not shabby and unfashionable? And ten years of probable shabbiness lie before her when the book closes all too soon for the readers' contentment. Patricia is Irish, when she is not contradicting her nature by speaking good English or French, but the soul of her is Catholic Irish, although she professes to be able to find something good in meetinghouses and synagogues, and she practises good Christianity in her dealings with the world, especially with little children, whose willing servant she is in the matter of story-telling and of tender ministration. The hero, a young man

of great possessions, is a skilful tinker, and far more clever than she in managing and mystifying his fellow creatures, no matter upon what plane encountered, and the adventures of the pair are amazing, and, taken together, absurd, serious, or painful they make as pleasant a chronicle of sylvan life as could be desired. The story would make a brilliant little play for a small company. Harper & Brothers.

The "cases" mentioned in the title of "The Strange Cases of Mason Brant," by Nevil Monroe Hopkins, are three in number: "The Mystery in the North Case," "The Moyett Case," and "The Investigation at Holman Square," and each of them asks the reader to use his best powers of divination, before it is explained. Mr. Hopkins has made the latest scientific discoveries serve his purpose of baffling curiosity, and an excuse for new conjecture is amiably proffered on every page, but true solution of the enigma is postponed to the latest possible instant. Each story has a little fibre of love-interest running through its tissue of crime, but its real course is not too soon made apparent. Lastly, the perfectly transparent disguise of a well-known Boston police officer will be penetrated by everyone acquainted with the force, and many a Bostonian will whisper to himself, "I, too, am a detective." The longest story is by far the best of the three, both in conception and arrangement, so that the book forms a climax, but all the "cases" are excellent, and their villains are execrable. Like nearly all detective stories, these should be read in solitude, but their discussion will afford at least as much amusement as can be extracted from the schemes of real criminals. The volume has four colored illustrations by Gayle Hoskins. J. B. Lippincott Com

pany.