with regard to this too practical question. It is strictly professional and scientific, with nothing puritanical or faddish about its tone. This fine, readable volume indeed belongs to the New Library of Medicine, edited by Dr. C. W. Saleeby, and has no connexion with any association for Temperance reform which might be suspected of exaggeration in its statements.

preface says, "an attempt has been made to deal with the subject throughout in a strictly scientific spirit, and to present the whole question in a comprehensive series of authoritative chapters, each being written by a specially qualified medical expert." Some fourteen chapters by as many different writers, whose qualifications and medical appointments are mentioned after their names, discuss the evolution, pathology, psychology, and criminology of alcoholism, its medico-legal relations, and its relations to mental disease, public health, life assurance, and pauperism, and especially with regard to women and children. The position held by each of these writers makes him an authority on his special subject. We recognize at least one Irishman among them, the son of the very gifted Dr. W. K. Sullivan, Dr. Windle's most brilliant predecessor as President of Queen's College, Cork. A very full index adds immensely to the utility of this excellent work, which meets the requirements of the medical practitioner as well as of the intelligent layman.

10. Frequent and Daily Communion, according to the Recent Decrees of the Holy See. By the Rev. Arthur Devine, Passionist. London R. & T. Washbourne. (Price 2s.)

There have been already many articles and booklets published about the recent decrees of the Holy See regarding frequent and daily Communion; but Father Devine's treatise of 170 pages seems to be the fullest and most theological. The publishers have brought out the little book with their usual care and good taste.

II. We had seen and admired odd numbers of the Austral Light, a monthly magazine, published at Melbourne, under the auspices of the Archbishop, Dr. Carr; but we had not a proper idea of the high standard that our colonial contemporary has attained under its present management, until the volume for 1906 reached us, in its complete and perfect state. For printing and binding Melbourne might not fear to compete with Dublin or London. Why cannot Cape Town furnish the Catholic Magazine for South Africa with type and paper equally good? Australia has no Catholic man of letters as gifted and versatile as Dr. Kolbe, and no story-teller as pleasant as S. M. C.; but the seventh annual volume of the Austral Light is full of excellent literary matter. Its chief poets are a Jesuit and a Lazarist

Father Watson, S.J., and Father M. J. O'Reilly, C.M. The latter will hardly do anything better than "A Veteran of the Guard." Mr. Bowditch and others contribute a great variety of literary and miscellaneous essays. The Editor with our fullest approval has given a second existence to some pages of our early volumes; and we mention this circumstance only for the purpose of revealing that two writers thus honoured-C. M., the author of "Ethna's Dowry," and A. D., the author of Waiting '—are sisters. C. M. are the initials of Miss Clara Mulholland, and A. D. are the final letters of Rosa Mulholland. The use of these letters implies that the verses in question date back to Lady Gilbert's girlhood. Why is not the delightfully written and very edifying account of the late Father Farrelly of Kilmore assigned to Mr. J. Gavan Duffy in its own place, as it is in the index? It is worthy of the literary associations which cling round that name.

12. There is something grotesque in a modest monthly publication like ours criticising, however favourably, stately Quarterlies like the two which have just reached us at the same moment from the United States. The American Catholic Quarterly Review is the weightiest and most dignified of Catholic periodicals published in the English language, especially since Mr. Wilfrid Ward has admitted verse and other lighter elements into the grave old Dublin Review, transforming it into a higher sort of quarterly magazine. The other quarterly is of a lighter kind, and aims, no doubt, at soon becoming a monthly-it is No. 2 of the Child of Mary, published by the Sisters of Providence, St. Mary-of-the-Woods, Vigo County, Indiana. May it long deserve its name, and promote the honour of Our Lady directly and more frequently indirectly by such papers as that on Brownson-which indeed shows that strenuous man to have been a dutiful child of Mary. Is bless a misprint for praise in the last line of C. M.'s rhymed and well-written Sursum

Corda " ?

From Indiana to New South Wales is a long stretch of sea and land. The last Christmas Memoirs of Rosebank (Sydney) must be delightful reading for the initiated, since even mere outsiders far away have read it with keen interest.

13. No. 1 of the thirteenth volume of the Ulster Journal of Archæology (February, 1907) bears a new name as printers and publishers on the cover-no longer "M'Caw, Stevenson, and Company," but " Davidson and M'Cormick, the North Gate Printing Works, Belfast." It does the North Gate Press great credit. It is admirably printed, and the portraits of Aodh O'Neill and the other illustrations are well produced. The

Rev. W. T. Latimer is mistaken in thinking that David Baillie Warden was a member of the French Academy. There is a great gulf between Membre de l'Institut and l'un des Quarante. For instance, that excellent writer, Mr. J. E. C. Bodley, is a Member of the Institute, but certainly not an Academician.

14. Temperance Catechism and Manual of the Total Abstinence League of the Sacred Heart of Jesus for the use of Colleges, Schools, and Educational Establishments. By the Rev. J. A. Cullen, S.J. Dublin: Messenger Office, 5 Great Denmark Street.

(Price id.)

This penny booklet will help to save many a pound-and many a soul. In its sixty-four compact pages a vast amount of information is crushed together on all branches of the subject, drawn from the best authorities in England and Ireland. High authorities are quoted for all the statements. Evidently an enormous circulation is counted upon, otherwise such a book of 64 pages could not be offered for a penny. It will convert many a sinner, confirm many a waverer, and furnish solid substance to many a Temperance speech and sermon.

15. The tiny wee Lilliputian booklet of aspirations and prayers in verse which the Catholic Truth Society (69 Southwark Bridge Road, London, S.E.), published some years age for the universally popular penny, has reached its eleventh thousand, though its title page only says "Sixth Thousand." In statements of this kind publishers are more apt to err by excess than by defect. Many of these rhymed ejaculations might be got off by heart, and used with profit, even by "children of a larger growth."

16. Selected Poetry of Father Faber. By the Rev. John Fitzpatrick, O.M.I. London: Washbourne. (Price 2s. 6d. net.)

This is the latest proof of Father Fitzpatrick's devotion to the saintly and fascinating author of All for Jesus. In this very elegant little quarto, for which half-a-crown is a moderate price, he has gathered the most beautiful things from Father Faber's two large volumes of "Poems" and "Hymns," and also from "Sir Launcelot." In his graceful introduction he does not explain the principles which guided him in his choice. Probably he was glad to select fine things, which he thought would have for most readers a certain novelty. He omits what Cardinal Newman was certainly right in considering Faber's highest achievement, "Mother of Mercy! day by day." This anthology is another delightful memorial of one who surely deserves both the titles that Abraham Cowley bestowed on Crashaw-poet and saint.

17. Messrs. James Duffy & Son, Dublin, have issued, in a

neatly printed and neatly bound book of 120 pages, price only sixpence, A Manual of Religious Instruction, by the Rev. P. Power, who has practical experience as Lecturer in Christian Doctrine in the Waterford Training College. It has been compiled for use with the Catechism ordered by the National Synod of Maynooth." It contains a great deal of information clearly conveyed; and the parts that should be reserved for more advanced classes are marked off from what is necessary for a First Communion class of beginners. This little book will be found very useful.

18. Life of Pierre Olivaint, S.J., Martyr of the Paris Commune. Dublin: Messenger Office, 5 Great Denmark Street. (Price id.)

This is a most edifying and interesting little sketch of the most prominent among the men whom the Paris Commune on the eve of its defeat put to death in its mad rage. One of those who were shot with him was Alexis Clerc, with whom the present writer lived for two years under the same roof. They were all innocent and inoffensive, and their death was murder. Nemo repente fit turpissimus, and France has long been preparing for her present degradation.

19. The first volume has appeared of a very important work, -of which the publishers in Europe are Longmans, Green & Co., 39 Paternoster Row, London-The History of the Society of Jesus in North America, Colonial and Federal, by the Rev. Thomas Hughes, S.J., who has laboriously examined all the documents bearing on the subject to be found in twenty-eight depositaries in Europe, and twenty-two in America. These materials have never before been utilized. A second volume will give most of the documents on which this new narrative is founded. The volume now announced is only the beginning of an enterprise of great interest and importance.

20. Thoughts and Fancies. By F. C. Kolbe, D.D. London: Burns and Oates. (Price 2s. 6d.)

Though this dainty volume reaches us so late as April 19, we must at least announce it in our May number, for it begins with nine beautiful poems, For the Madonna." We have often congratulated Catholic South Africa in possessing a literary representative of such gifts and culture as Dr. Frederick Kolbe. These Thoughts and Fancies show the versatility of his genius and the wide range of his interests. Besides the carmina Mariana that are put first, we have sonnets, sacred thoughts, songs of patriotism, album verses, and translations. They are all fresh and graceful. We looked in vain for Dr. Kolbe's earliest publication, Minnie Coldwell and other Stories, in the

list of tales which the Publishers have appended to this book. Have they allowed it to drop out of print? Dr. Kolbe has great skill as a storyteller ; and a reprint of many of the stories he has contributed to the Catholic Magazine for South Africa would be a fine addition to our stores of Catholic fiction.

21. Messrs. M. H. Gill and Son show great activity in reproducing some of their publications that have stood the test of time. True Hearts' Trials, A Tale of Ireland and America, by T. O'Neill Russell, is issued as a bound volume of 250 pages for two shillings, and in paper covers for sixpence. A smaller but much more precious sixpenceworth is National and Other Poems, by Thomas Davis. It seems to be quite an adequate selection. John Fisher Murray's fine elegy ought to have been followed by Sir Samuel Ferguson's still finer poem in memory of Davis.

22. Benziger Brothers of New York have issued for three shillings a second volume of Round the World, with 103 illustrations. It is a most entertaining and instructive volume, describing a great many places and things in all parts of the world. It would be an excellent reading book, especially in American schools.

GOOD THINGS WELL SAID

1. Protestantism-which cuts off miracles at the end of Apostolic times-has committed suicide; by making unique events of its basic phenomena it has made continued belief in them impossible.-J. Arthur Hill.

2. Once a few men wrote books, and everybody read them; now everybody writes books and nobody reads them.-Saturday Review.

3. A little child's day is longer than a man's week.-Rev. David Bearne, S.J.

4. We do not mourn what we do not miss, and we do not miss what we have not known.-The Same.