Many Oxford men and women, and many people of all
ranks and callings up and down the country, will welcome the memoir, by his widow, of Arthur Lionel Smith, Master of Balliol (1916-1924), which Mr. Murray has just published (15s.). " A.L.," as undergraduates called him, was the best lecturer on history and political science that Oxford possessed in the thirty years before the War, and in his later years he strove mightily to promote the ideals of good citizenship and industrial peace by his speeches and addresses. Mrs. Smith's book is discursive and intimate, and reveals aspects of " A.L." which were known to but few of his pupils and hearers. She recalls very vividly the Oxford society of the years after 1879, when she married the young Balliol tutor and went to live in "the Parks system" which has now grown gigantic. " A.L." was an old Bluecoat boy, and made his way by sheer brilliancy and industry. He had a gruff manner, but he was the soul of generosity and kindness, and on this head his widow does not say a word too much.
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