22 MAY 1886, Page 23

Biographical Dictionary of English Catholics. By Joseph Gillow. Vol. I.

(Burns and Oates.)—This volume contains the biographies, A—C. The plan of the work, which includes a number of names quite, undistinguished (many, for instance, not included in the very wide scope of "The Dictionary of National Biography "), renders necessary a certain dryness of treatment. The notices have to be very brief, and are commonly somewhat bare of interesting detail. In the memoir of Bishop Gilbert Bourne (Bath and Wells, 1554.59), it would have been gracious to mention that the Bishop was saved from injury in the tumult at Paul's Cross by the interposition of the Reformers Bradford and Rogers. His enforced residence, after his expulsion from his See, with the Bishop of Lincoln is not spoken of. Sir George Bowyer was not eduoated at Oxford, but had the honorary degrees of M.A. and D.C.L. bestowed upon him. Is there any reason for spelling the title of Dr. Richard Broughton's book " Monaatichon Britannicum ?" Eccentricities of spelling were common enough, but this is a very curious one. We can hardly accept, without some reason, the statement that "undeviating attachment to their Sovereign and his rightful heir" has ever been the distinguishing mark of Catholics." Elizabeth is not considered to have been a "rightful heir," it mast be supposed; for certainly "undeviating attachment" hardly de- scribes the relations of the Catholic body to her. Still, she was as rightful an heir of Henry VIII., Edward VI., and Mary, as was William III. of James IL, and George I. of Anne,—possibly a little more so.