20 JULY 1918, Page 16

Oriental Encounters. By Marmaduke Pickthall. (Collins. 6s. net.)—In these amusing

sketches of Eastern life Mr. Pickthall recalls his first experiences of Syria more than twenty years ago. He says that his English friends tried vainly to discourage him from mingling with the natives, as Sir Richard Burton, Mr. Doughty, and others had done before him. Mr. Pickthall takes his revenge on these friends by caricaturing the missionaries and native Christians in several chapters that show an unworthy and unnatural prejudice. The humour and sympathy with which he describes his native attendants and the happy-go-lucky Orientals from whom he tried to buy a piece of land seem to disappear when he has to deal with a fellow-countryman or a fellow-Christian.