27 JULY 1867, Page 22

The Complete Reader. In Four Books. Book III. — The Exemplar of

Style. By E. T. Stevens and Charles Hole. (Longman.)—A selec- tion from the standard poets and prose writers of England, beginning with Sir Thomas More and coming down to "A. S. H. B." Some of our readers may be tempted to make a pun on tho latter half of this sen- tence. We are certainly disposed to object to the Country Parson being described as "one of the first essayists of the day." But this is the only quarrel we have with the book, which is made up of well chosen and generally classical pieces, and which would give a beginner a good idea of the main stream of his country's literature.