Modern 1Vonders of the World. By W. Gilbert. (Strahan and
Co.) —We suppose this book is meant to teach children our material con- ditions under the guise of telling them a story. This plan has long been a favourite with doctrinaire instructors, and we have painful recollections of a story of this class, once very popular, contained in "Evenings at Home." There are some important objections to the method. It may, though we think it doubtful, interest the children, but so far from instructing them, it only produces confusion, and there is double work to be done later in separating the literary and scientific portions. By all means develop imagination in children, and certainly instruct them in elementary science, but do not mix. Mr. Gilbert has made a Bagdad story-teller his mouthpiece, but has not caught the Oriental tone, though perhaps we should not have felt the want so keenly, had we not been reminded of the "Shaving of Shagpat," of a writer of very different calibre.
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