n his other qualifications for writing this work the author
did not the eater aptitude for literary composition. A careful topographical
r_
description of an island like Crete would not in any circumstances be very attractive to the general reader, but Captain Spratt is very fond of coznmen-place, yet frequently ambitious of fine writing, and is almost always tautological and diffuse. But though those faults make his book rather hard reading, he is always pretty clear, so that the reader has no
e
difficulty in getting at the mass of accurate
in his work. The facts are there in profusion, and accessible. information which is to be
The occasion of the book was the appointment of the author to the direction of the Mediterranean survey, in succession to the late Captain Graves, and this has enabled him to give a very beautiful reduction of the Admiralty chart, which is a geological as well as a geographical map. And the admirable coloured illustrations and plans by which his book is profusely illustrated prove the author to be a draughtsman of no mean order. We think Captain Sprott deserves no slight praise for the good sense which made him devote the greater part of his book to the eastern part of the island, so that it forms at the same time a sup- plement and a very necessary corrective to the late Mr. Pashley's Travels in Crete, in which the eastern half is treated in a rather perfunctory 'manner. The state of the population is rather curious. About one-third are Mohammedans, but mostly of Christian descent, so that Greek is the universal language, and intermarriages are not un- known. Indeed the Christians and Mohammedans occupying the low- lands make pretty much common cause, through fear of the Sfakians, or mountaineers, who are an unmixed race, and plunder the lowlands of both creeds with notable impartiality. Their excesses in the demon- stration of 1859 did much to retard the prosperity of the island, but
they are a fine historical race and poetical robbers notwithstanding. In conclusion we heartily recommend anybody who wants to know about Crete to consult Captain Spratt's handsome volumes.
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