14 DECEMBER 1918, Page 20

BOOKS OF REFERENCE.—Burdetes Hospitals and Charities, 1918, edited by Sir

Henry Burdett (Scientific Press, 12s. 6d. net), is now in its twenty-ninth year. The introduptory chapters, dealing with hospital problems in war time, with the remarkable growth of King Edward's Hospital Fund, and other topics, are of much interest. The editor confesses in his Preface that the book has been a labour of love to him for thirty years, and has sometimes been published at a loss which he made good, but that the time has come when he must find a successor, with the help of the institutions to which the book is devoted.—The Annual Charities Register and Digest (Longmans and Charity Organization Society, 5e. net) is now in its twenty- seventh year. The honoured name of Sir C. S. Loch no longer appears on the title-page, but his influence persists in this invaluable guide to innumerable charities, from which fraudulent societies are excluded "as far as possible."—Low's Handbook to the Charities of London (Sampson Low, Is. 6d. net) is an old-established and useful manual, now in its eighty-third year, which includes schools in its wide purview of twelve hundred institutions.—The Girls' School Year Book (Public Schools) (H. F. W. Deane, 6s. net) is the official reference-book of the Association of Head-Mistresses and has reached its thirteenth year. This well-edited book shows how much has been done in recent years for the secondary education of girls, though the field is still imperfectly covered, especially in London.