6 FEBRUARY 1886, Page 23

Every-clay Life in China. By Edwin Joshua Dukes. (Religious Tract

Society.)—Mr. Dukes, who describes his book by its second title as "Scenes along River and Road in Fah-Kien," has been a missionary in China for some years. He is hopeful about the ultimate result of mis- sionary work (and that in a future which is not very far distant), though he is ready to concede that not much has been done as yet. Nor is he without some grounds for this hope. It is an excellent sign, for instance, when native congregations begin to pay for their own ministers. Mr. Dukes has other things to say about the Chinese. He tells the curious story of the Shanghai Railway, and he lets the light into the system of Chinese education. He quotes a statement from some writer that there are in China "a hundred thousand men who have taken a degree equal to any degree in England." The fact is that a man can take the highest Chinese honours, and know nothing but the "Four Books." As for the "hundred thousand," in any ease it is nothing amazing. There most be nearly as many graduates among the thirty-two millions of the British Empire. The one part of this book which we do not like is the disrespect with which the writer speaks of Roman Catholicism.