Greater London. By Edward Walford, M.A. (Cassell and Co.)— By
" Greater London " is meant, as Mr. Walford explains in his intro- ductory chapter, the district included in the Metropolitan Police jurisdiction, a tolerably regular circle, with a diameter of about twenty-eight miles, of which Charing Cross is the centre. No one is better qualified to deal with the subject thus proposed than Mr. Wal- ford, whose able continuation of Mr. Walter Thornbury's "Old and New London" marked him out as the very man for the task. That he has executed it well, no one who examines this, the first volume, with any care can doubt,—how well, it is probably beyond the power of any but one or two people to judge. A good many people, indeed are judges, more or less competent, in the matter of their own neighbourhood. These, if really well informed, will certainly find that they can supplement the information given in these chapters. Bat they must not, therefore, conclude that Mr. Walford is in fault. There are limits of apace which authors and publishers understand, if amateurs critics and amateur writers do not. There is not a parish in this circle about which a whole volume, fall of interesting matter, might not be written. Mr. Walford's skill has been shown in choosing out of a mass of material of which it is difficult to estimate the bulk. As far as we can judge, he has chosen well. That these chapters are eminently readable, there can be no doubt ; that they are sub- stantially correct, we feel tolerably sure, because, where we have been able to test them, we have found omissions, indeed, to be ac- counted for as explained above, but no, or only quite insignificant errors.
Previous page
