21 JANUARY 1911, Page 24

The January issue of the New English Dictionary, Edited by

Sir James A. H. Murray (Clarendon Press, 2s. 6d.), contains an instalment of Vol. IX., " Si—Simple," by W. A. Craigie, LL.D. It is interesting, to take the last word of the contents, to see that "simple life" is a phrase of considerable antiquity, though not always in its modern sense. So we have " mene men of simpel lijf " in the very earliest quotation, dating from the fourteenth century.