2 FEBRUARY 1901, Page 23

Welshmen. By Thomas Stephens, B.A. (J. F. Spriggs. Ss. net.)—Mr

Stephens gives us in this little volume a sketch of Welsh history "from the earliest times to the death of Llywelyn, the last Welsh Prince." By the " Welsh " he means the Britons, for we are told that the Welsh, "with Queen Boudicca at their head," rose against their Roman oppressors. This iss, in one way. justified, but it would certainly have been more convenient to observe the geographical limits to which the word is commonly limited. What we specially want to know is not what can be learnt from Roman writers from Tacitus downwards, but the information that comes from genuinely Celtic sources. Mr. Stephens's book becomes more interesting the more he keeps himself in these limits. We cannot help noticing a somewhat significant tone in this book. There is a certain Welsh nationalism which is becoming curiously, perhaps we might say uncomfortably, like the Irish variety. Its exponents in and out of Parliament are not, it is true, of mach count, but this does not mean that the feeling which they represent is not a thing that we shall have to reckon with, sooner or later.