13 NOVEMBER 1886, Page 23

Heroes of Industry. By Evan Rowland Jones. (Sampson Low and

Co.)—These sixteen sketches, each of them illustrated with a portrait of its subject, describe various persons who have made them- selves a name in commerce, manufacture, or other great industrial employments. Sir William Armstrong is the first on the list, and, curiously enough, another Newcastle man, Mr. Joseph Cowan, is the last. France is represented by M. de Lesseps ; Germany by Johann Georg Lohmann, Director of the North German Lloyd's Company ; and Italy by Signor Raffaele Rubattino, whose name was honourably connected with the mercantile marine of Italy. There is no more interesting sketch in the volume, nor one written more con amore, than that of Mr. Cowen. Mr. Jones might be described as a little too laudatory; but this, considering his subject, is not a serious fault.

He is certainly too combative ; why, for instance, mast he sneer at culture by saying that the distinguished names of the world include but a small per-centage of wranglers and "honours" men among them ?—a statement quite untrue. Bat his book is a good and readable one.