4 SEPTEMBER 1909, Page 25

Among the Danes. By F. M. Butlin. (Methuen and Co.

7s. 6d. net.)—This is a pleasant book to read. There is nothing certainly of the " Smelfungus " tone about it. Everything pleased the traveller, except perhaps the etiquette of the Copenhagen pave- ment which, as an earlier traveller expressed it, consists in pushing you into the gutter. Perhaps the most interesting chapter is that in which what we should call the "continuation schools" are described. It is a quite inexhaustible wonder, when we remember what the corresponding class in England think about such things, that thousands of young men and women, women chiefly in summer and men in winter, leave their places to improve their education. It is no thought of bettering themselves that moves them ; simply, it would seem, the desire of knowledge. Another Danish wonder is the co-operative system. Will not some one learn the secret ? In discovering it lies the best, it may be the only, chance of success for the small holdings scheme. Our author does not seem to have seen so much of the people as the "Walking Parson," whose Danish experiences we noticed a short time ago. But this is, as we have said, a pleasant book, and Miss Ellen Wilkinson's pictures add greatly to its attraction.