4 AUGUST 1939, Page 6

Book Clubs and their ways are an absorbing subject of

study. They may be said to consist of Mr. Gollancz's Left Book Club and the rest—most, though not all, the rest owing origin and harbourage to the well-known booksellers Messrs. Foyle. The latest of the Foyle family, or flock, is the Garden Book Club, with an impressive and highly catholic list of patrons, a reminder of the fact that (according to Francis Bacon) " God Almighty first planted a garden " and an unaccountable omission of the asseveration (by T. E. Brown) that " a garden is a lovesome thing, God wot." There is a selection committee, consisting of Mr. W. A. Foyle and four others, to recommend the books, which are to be supplied (at two-monthly intervals) to members at reduced rates. The four other recommenders are Mr. W. E. Shewell-Cooper, Mr. Richard Sudell, Mr. E. Thornton-Smith and Mr. S. P. B. Mais. For its first two choices the selection committee, after ranging the horizon, has pitched on—Herbaceous Borders by Richard Sudell (" this splendid book ") and The A.B.C. of Gardening by W. E. Shewell-Cooper (" this handy volume "). After all, why not? " You want the best books ; we write. them."