12 MAY 1906, Page 27

CATHEDRALS ON THE RHINE.

Cathedrals on the Rhine. By Francis Miltoun. (Brimley Johnson and Ince. Os. net.)—We are much obliged to Mr. Miltoun for his book, dealing as it does with noble buildings which are not as well known as they deserve to be. Some of the Rhine Cathedrals have their proper fame, Cologne, for instance, and Strassburg ; but others certainly miss it. Mr. Miltoun is painstaking, but he does not always keep himself to the relevant. Surely, when there was so much to be said, more than a score of Cathedrals to be described, and many times more churches, why give a page to the story of Richard L's captivity ? And whence does the story come that the King was rescued by friends who overpowered the guard ? History relates that a very heavy ransom was paid for him. The illustrations are unequal. That of Metz, for instance, is quite useless. We do not want to see a landscape, "one of the widespread panoramas," to use Mr. Miltoun's own words, "which defy the artist or the photographer to repro- duce"; and the Cathedral, in the middle distance, has nothing to distinguish it from any other big church. Generally, the drawings want imagination and delicacy of touch.