24 JUNE 1893, Page 11

Shall Girls Propose ? By a " Speculative Bachelor." (Gay and

Bird.) — This is a book which we could have very well done with- out. We can scarcely say that there is any harm in it, except that it has a tendency to vulgarise the subject. The author begins by complaining that "a subject which is scarcely second in magnitude to any other in life [a somewhat awkward phrase] gets no treatment in literature of a strictly serious kind." But he does not accomplish much towards remedying the wrong.