4 MAY 1889, Page 26

The Coming of the Friars. By the Bev. Augustus Jessopp,

D.D. (T. Fisher Ifnvvin.)—This volume contains seven essays, which nave appeared at various times in the Nineteenth Century, and have, we think, been noticed on the occasion of their first publi- cation. The fourth and fifth, relating the story of "The Black Death in East Anglia," are perhaps the most striking. "Village Life in Norfolk Six Hundred Years Ago" is also very good; but the superior definiteness of the first-named subject enables the writer to produce a more distinct effect on his readers. The other essays are "The Coming of the Friars," " Daily Life in a Afediteval Monastery," "The Building of a University," and "The Prophet of Walnut-Tree Yard," a very interesting account of Lodowick Muggleton, whose name was, and possibly is, still borne by one of the countless sects which are, so to speak, the" seamy side" of Protestantism. If Dr. Jessopp could purify his style of an occa- sional colloquialism, which sometimes comes perilously near to vulgarity, it would be well.