English Ways. By Jack Hilton. kCape. ros. 6d.)
&loamy before the outbreak of war Mr. Hilton, accompanied by his wife, set out from his Lancashire home and walked to the south. Pushing their essential luggage in a pram, the Hiltons reached Epsom for the Derby, went as far westward as Bristol, and then returned home for Mr. Hilton to make this record of their journey. The author speaks as a working-man, with a keen and practical interest in wages, housing and conditions of employ- ment. English Ways is thus the antithesis of the usual travelogue. Where the conventional literary tourist keeps his eyes on the façade, Mr. Hilton gives us, as it were, a back-door view. On such a tour he is an excellent companion, outspoken without being either intemperate or doctrinaire, relieved at the passing of bad factory conditions, but also disturbed by the lifeless monotony of highly organised mass-production. English Ways is the sincere and authentic voice of the man in the factory coming up for air and surveying his native land with shrewd affection.
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