Our Journey to the Hebrides. By Joseph Pennell and Elizabeth
Robins Pennell. (T. Fisher (Tnwin.)—It is quite as well that, to avoid any possible mistake, Mr. and Mrs. Pennell begin by telling us that their trip to Scotland was "moat miserable." They found walking a bore, their knapsacks felt very heavy, the food was indifferent, the weather was bad. The country "is the most abominable to travel through, and its people the most downtrodden on God's earth." Well, Mr. and Mrs. Pennell are at liberty to feel as they like. They are free to think Scott's romance " stupid ;" thoroughly well-bred people as they are, they are entitled to believe that "the Englishman who understands true politeness is the exception." If they think it good taste to parody the Parable of the Good Samaritan, we can only shrug our shoulders. But when it comes to questions of domestic politics, they had better mind their own business, leave the Crofters' controversy alone, and, if they must talk about such things, enlighten their countrymen about the Chinese, the Mormon, the Negro, the Red Indian questions. They must have learnt what porridge is in Scotland. There is a proverb about it which might apply.
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