Books and Habits. By Lafcadio Hearn. Edited by John Erskine.
(Heinemann. 8s. 6d. net.)—Hearn's abounding popu- larity in America accounts for the appearance of this selection— edited by a Professor of Columbia University—from his three posthumous books entitled Interpretations of Literature, Life and Literature and Appreciations of Poetry, which were all taken from notes of his lectures at the University of Tokyo. In endeavouring to expound Western literature to his Eastern pupils, Hearn unquestionably threw new light on many familiar works as well as on his own temperament. Some of the subjects treated in this volume are oddly chosen ; there are two lectures on poems about insects, and there is a " Note upon the Shortest Forms of English Poetry." The enthusiastic lecture on Cory's Imam is well worth reading again. In a discourse on " The Bible in English Literature," Hearn committed himself to the strange assertion that : " Of the New Testament there is very little equal to the Old in literary value : indeed, I should recom- mend the reading only of the closing book." There Hearn's dislike of Christianity, rather than his desire not to offend Japanese susceptibilities, led him hopelessly astray.
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