The Art of Living. By S. E. Buckrose. (Gentlewoman Offices.
65. net.)—Mrs. Buckrose gives us in this volume thirteen delightful essays on various social and ethical questions,—on housekeeping, on training children, on girls' education, on entertaining friends, on dress, de omnibus rebus femineis in short, at quibusdam a/6s. These essays have a dramatic form. There is a dear old lady known as the "Duchess," Miss Craggs, who represents what we may call the opposition ; " Margaret," who is the protagonist, her two girls, Fraulein, Mrs. Ruggles, the gardener's wife, and the masculine soul whom Mrs. Margaret, with more or less irony, speaks of as her "lord." It is all pleasant reading, and profitable too. It is not often that we have the atUe and the dulce so con- veniently mixed.—We are quite sure that Mrs. Budirose, who is strong on a woman's duty of housekeeping, will not resent our men- tioning along with her charming book "Please, Arm, the Butcher!' by Beatrice Guarracino (T. Fisher Unwin, Gs. net). This takes a wider, range than the title might seem to indicate. It is, in fact, a complete book on housekeeping, with menus ingeniously contrived for expansion or contraction. More we do not feel qualified to say. There are limits to the self-confidence eYela of a
critic.
Previous page
