20 JUNE 1896, Page 25

Fables and Fabulists : Ancient and Modern. By Thomas New-

biggiug. (Elliot Stock.)—A pleasant and sufficiently complete account of its subject. Mr. Newbigging rightly declines to be critical. He tells, for instance, the story of .1Esop as it is commonly told, and is not disposed to make him a mere name to which a floating literature of fable has been attracted. Some of the best specimens of the /Esopian fable have been quoted, and the same plan has been followed with other famous names, ancient and modern. We do not see any reference to what is probably one of the oldest fables in the world—the Egyptian variant of Agrippa's apologue of the "Belly and the Members" standing, of course, at the head—Jotham's fable of the trees and their King, as given in Judges ix. 8-15.