This is a work of considerable power, and may doubtless be read with profit by those to whom its teaching would be profitable, always supposing they have the heart and grace to profit by it. book on pre-eminently disagreeable subjects, and even in the hands of Dr. Macdonald it can hardly be pleasant reading.

But it is a

the

Dr. Macdonald has done good service in many ways by his thoughtful novels, "Alec Forbes," "David Elginbrod," and others, and by graver works, such as his "Unspoken Sermons ;" but his later combination of novels and sermons has produced a hybrid that mars the excellence of each. The hard lessons of the sermons are presented in the exaggerated and unreal framing of the novel; dramatis persona of the novel are made to preach, and put on a homiletical character which is all awry with their place in fiction. "Thomas Wingfold, Curate," dealt with the difficulties of doubt; now virtually rector of the parish, Thomas Wingfold bears his part in the present work. But the perils of too much thinking are exchanged for those of another and a coarser order. The story is an exhibition of deformities, a mental and moral anatomy of bad actions, and of worse motives for good deeds; a probing and dissection of unlovely things; an uncovering of the foul and leprous sores of sin-stricken humanity. In

the form of a sermon no congregation could sit it all out, or hear it in one another's presence. No novel reader, though seeking something of strong flavour, and relishing a sickening sensation, could put up with the large amount of excellent teaching that the book really conveys. If it fails as а sermon it will scarcely succeed as a novel. All the same a drastic compound may be very wholesome, though inexpressibly nauseous.

To acknowledge a fault, to confess it, and to expiate it, is a moral duty highly proper to be inculcated, time and place fitting; and so, again, leniency to the errors of others may be enforced by recalling our own; but when it takes such morbid proportions in practice as are here assigned to it, it becomes a grotesque caricature. The hero and the heroine of this tale commence their married life; Paul with an exaggerated ideal of woman's purity, or at least its necessity for the wife of Paul Faber, hears from Juliet the revelation of a former frailty. We do not care to quote it, but p. 241, Vol. II., thus goes on: "He started, walked with a great stride to his dressing room, entered, and closed the door. The wolves of despair were howling in her. But Paul was in the next room; there was only the door between them. She sprang from her bed and ran to a closet. The next moment she appeared in her husband's dressing room. She did not lift her eyes to his face, but sunk on her knees before him, hurriedly slipped her nightgown from her shoulders to her waist and over her head, bent towards the floor, held up to him a riding whip. Scarce anything is so utterly pathetic as the backthe human back! It is the other, the dark side of the human "Paul," said Juliet, "take it, strike me-whip me, and

moon

take me again," and so on. Then follows a somewhat brutal description, and flight, and a suicide only just prevented. Vol. III., however, brings the counterpart, p. 154: "What was he, Paul, to demand purity of any woman; had he not accepted, yea tempted, enticed from the woman who preceded Juliet the sacrifice of one of the wings of her soul on the altar of his selfishness, then driven her from him thus maimed and helpless to the mercy of the rude blasts of the world? Paul then finds his child, the offspring of the seduction, which is told in the form of his confession to a dissenting minister. He finds, too, Juliet, and (p. 280) "by degrees they come to a close understanding. The little Amanda called her father papa, and Juliet mamma, and always wrote her name 'Amanda Duck Faber."" The exigencies of the novel are thus provided for and satisfied in the last page of the third volume, with the due theological rendering of the ordinary happy-ending finale: "her husband knew her fault, that was enough; knew also his own immeasurably worse than hers, but when they folded each other to the heart they left their faults outside, as God does when he casts our sins behind His back in utter uncreation."

Apart from its jerky, spasmodic style and sensational situations, there is much in this work which will be held objectionable as a matter of taste, and on the ground of incongruity. But there are nevertheless many noble passages, and a bold pleading for realities unstayed by conventional notions. The four or five sermons and sermonettes delivered by Thomas Wingfold, which are on set subjects, and given textually, might each be studied with advantage as discourses upon ethics. There

is also much minute and subtle analysis of character, and he bearing circumstances have upon it in forming it, as exemplified on the one hand by Thomas Wingfold, curate, and on the other by Mr. Bevis, his rector. Nor is all this unrelieved by lighter touches, e.g., in the portraiture of Mrs. Bevis, who has no pet, dog or macaw, and has never been seen to hug a child. "She never reads poetry; I doubt if she knows more than the first line of How doth.' There she sits, smiling, knitting the sole knittable thing her nature seemed capable of, a muffetee. Never was sock seen on her needles; the turning of the heel was too much for her. That she had her virtues was plain; her servants stayed with her years; she never gave one true reason and kept back a truer possibly there

was not

room for two thoughts at once; in fact, she was a stuffed bag of virtue, but the bag was of no great size." (Vol. I., p. 146.)

We should not lay aside Paul Faber without noting that there are scattered through each volume some charming verses ; perhaps as verses a little rough or rugged, or even uncouth, but fraught with deep meaning, and embodying strong energetic feeling, though not always clearly articulated.

Sewage Poisoning: How to Avoid it in the Cheapest and Best Way. By E. T. Blake, M.D., M.R.C.S. London: Hardwicke and Bogue.

This pamphlet treats of "Domestic Sanitation," which is certainly one of the burning topics of the day, from a practical point of view. We hear of diphtheria and of typhoid fever being sown broadcast in North and West London by means of milk. Dr. Blake shows us what extreme care we take to introduce sewer air into

our dwellings by means of pipes, through which it is "laid on " just like our gas or our drinking-water systems. He shows this sewer gas to be a fertile cause of various diseases, as morning headache, nausea, indigestion, ulceration of the mouth, languor, throat affection, erysipelas, puerperal fever,

and disastrous vaccination-conditions often attributed to widely differing causes.

He shows the danger of allowing waste-pipes and overflows to pass from the house directly into the drains. He speaks in strong condemnation of the perilous practice -nearly invariable in the metropolis-of using the same cistern for domestic as for sanitary purposes.

The book is brought to a conclusion with upwards of twoscore excellent hygienic maxims, which the modern race of "jerry" builders would do well to lay to heart.

Amateurs are apt to prescribe specifics which have never been practically tested, and to imagine a perfection that looks charming on paper, but cannot be realised in clay. Dr. Blake's system requires a pattern of a disconnecting syphon arrangement, which is neither Potts's, Weaver's, Greenwood's, nor Buchan's; fortunately, however, the material for it can be found in Doulton's ordinary stoneware syphon.

Some may think that sewer gas poisoning is merely a fashionable panic, as the mad dog scare was forty years ago, when it was proposed that gentlemen should form themselves into armed bands for a canine battue. The fact that the dangerous gas, owing to the carbonic acid and nitrogen which it contains, is heavier than atmospheric air, and consequently unlikely to rise into a room as coal gas would if the tap were left turned on, may seem to support those who make light of the sup

posed intruder. But a moment's reflection will show that a gas heavier than air may, by several agencies, be introduced into an inhabited room. A hot fire, for instance, tends to make a vacuum in a room, which, if it cannot suck in a replenishment of fresh air through keyhole and under door and between the window frames, will turn to the sewer gas and drag it up perforce through so small an aperture as that at the bottom of an untrapped or imperfectly trapped lavatory basin. Again, even if the lavatory be kept cool, the rays of the sun will sometimes fall upon the pipe that runs up the side of the house, and the swelling gas will gently float up through the channel so cunningly prepared for it. Or, if the sun hide behind a cloud, and a thunderstorm comes on, and heavy rain, the flood water rushes into the cesspool or sewer, and forces the floating gas to find the best vent it can. Generally speaking, sewer gas would rise into a room during summer, or during the day, and fall in the pipes when there is no fire in the room, and no flood in the drains, during winter, and in the night. Dr. Blake's system may add something in the way of expense, but the danger is one that must be accounted with at any cost. His leading object may be described to be the setting up of an oscillating current in every drain pipe system, with the escape for the gas, either upwards or downwards, arranged to take place outside, not inside the house. are rather doubtful whether in such cases as when he recommends a discharge over a gully outside a house, instead of passage of waste by a continuous pipe, there would not result an odour to which some persons might prefer the actual and almost imperceptible poisoning by sewer gas itself.

We

Finally, we observe with some

surprise that Dr. Blake, having lucidly indicated so many perils to harrow the breast of the hapless British householder, fails to point out any practical redress. It does not appear to be generally known to the public that persons who are exercised about the state of their 'drains" have a simple and costless legal resource. If any bad odour be detected, or there be any bad health attributable apparently to defective sanitary arrangements, the tenant should take the following course. He merely posts a letter, making complaint, to

66

inserting in the blank line the name of the town, parish, or sub-district in which he resides. The inspector is bound by law to attend and to call to his aid, if necessary, the Medical Officer of Health. Neither can claim any fee. If there be a fault of construction the landlord can be dealt with summarily, failing to comply with Inspector's notice and order of Vestry or other Board.

If it be a fault of condition-i.e., want of cleanliness or ordinary care, the tenant is bound, of course, to rectify it.

A Survey of the Carriages at the Paris Exhibition, 1878. By G. N. Hooper. London: Wertheimer.

Technical education is of daily increasing importance. This is the republication of an article which first appeared in the Journal of Applied Science. It is in effect a catalogue raisonné of the various carriages exhibited at Paris, from drags and bicycles tricycles are unaccountably omitted-to children's nursery carriages-olim go-carts. The writer is himself a carriage-builder, a practical man, and, as Vice-President of the International Carriage Jury, at Paris, may be supposed to be an authority

on his subject. We the more regret that Mr. Hooper has not taken this opportunity to speak of the position of English-built carriages as compared with the American and the French. England was fully represented at Paris, and at a very recent time English carriages would have held their own; but it is pretty certain they no longer have at least any admitted superiority, except perhaps as to better axles, and possibly the best leather. On varnish in particular some remarks might have been here looked for. In varnish the French are behindhand, and this is not a little curious, considering their speciality in snuffboxes, where their applied varnish has never even been approached. For many

years the English had almost the monopoly of the varnish trade of the world; this is so no longer-the Americans have introduced their varnish into England, and largely also into France.

No trade perhaps employs workmen more skilled, and more nearly approaching also to some of the higher branches of art, than a carriage factory; technical training would be therefore well bestowed. Carriage building has, or might have, even a literature of its own of interest, as "The World upon Wheels," by Ezra M. Stratton, of New York, may serve to show. There is, too, the Worshipful London Coachmakers' Company offering prizes for "Essays on Carriage Making;" so that altogether the craft may be expected to be well looked up. We think this survey of the Paris Exhibition Carriages will be a contribution at least to that knowledge of what others are doing, which is a first requisite for knowing what it is expected we are ourselves to do.

Debrett's Peerage, and Titles of Courtesy. Debrett's Baronetage and

Knightage. Edited by Robert H. Mair, LL.D. London: Dean and

Son, Fleet-street, 1879.

If we could make ourselves believe that we were reading this

work for the first time-it is advancing towards its two hundredth year- we should find it full of interesting information. The theory of society is as exclusive as ever, however deteriorated in practice. For instance, after being informed of the exact order of precedence of Masters in Chancery and Masters in Lunacy, Eldest Sons of Knights Bachelor, and Younger Sons of the Younger Sons of Peers, we are told that "Divines, Naval and Military officers, members of the Legal and Medical Professions, Graduates of Universities, and Citizens and Burgesses, have no precedence assigned to them, either by statute or by any fixed principle." We are afterwards told that these hapless individuals "have among themselves a certain precedence, and relative rank; but such precedence and rank are peculiar to each class, and give no position in the general or social scale." In other words, they are outside the pale within which Daughters of Knights and Wives of the Younger Sons of Baronets know and keep their appointed place, which, like the laws of the Medes and Persians, alters not. With all respect to the timehonoured arrangements of courtly society, which are very necessary for the pleasant conduct of ceremonial, and no doubt prevent many possible heartburnings and jealousies, the picture presented of the small notabilities within, and the great poets, university dons, eminent divines, and undistinguished mass of honest citizens and burgesses without, irresistibly reminds us of Madame Tussaud's exhibition. Within the rails are the notabilities, large as life, with station well defined, and dignity

immovable; without, and out of their society, is the general living crowd. There seems to be a difference of opinion between the compilers of Peerages how far downwards social precedence extends; for in "Dod's," immediately after Younger Sons of Knights Bachelor, follow on Doctors of Divinity within the sacred pale; and the series only ends with the root of all real glory, the labourer. As these tables are founded on customs of old date, they contain curious anomalies and omissions, the rectification of which must be left to the Heralds, as the arbiters of propriety. While "Debrett" contends that Precedence ceases before Divines or Professional men are reached, in "Dod" it is stated that by some it is contended that Doctors of Universities are on a par even with Knights! Among the lower orders, ignored by Debrett,

there are also some curious anomalies; precedence in England being thus constituted as regards University degrees: Doctors of Divinity; of Law; of Medicine; of Music; while in Ireland their relative honour amongst men is first for Divinity, second for Medicine, and last for Laws.

The labour in keeping a work like this up to date in every small detail must be very great. It is rather singular, however, to find the date both of the birth and marriage of Lord Beaconsfield's brother, Mr. Ralph Disraeli, given as 18-. Can no one be got to supply the missing figures in the life of this retiring gentleman? In the Knightage, Sir Frederick Leighton, P.R.A., is named as the son of Septimus Leighton, M.D. If the editor will take the trouble to refer to the University Magazine for January of the present year, he will find that Sir Frederick Leighton's father bears the same prænomen as himself. Amongst