11 JANUARY 1930, Page 30

Mr. H. W. Fowler knows his limitations, and writes about

them with a graceful exaggeration which leaves the reader no alternative to admiration. The essays in If Wishes were Horses (George Allen and Unwin, 6s.), first published anony- mously in 1907, deal with the author's alleged lack of certain supposedly admirable endowments. He makes full use of the opportunity for throwing, as it were by accident, sidelights upon the foibles of humanity, bringing to bear upon them not the weight but the lightness of his wit and scholarship. The unscholarly reviewer desires to thank him particularly for the translations which he gives of all quotations from foreign languages, and for the quality of the translations. To comment upon the purity of his English would be indeed an impertinence,