17 JULY 1920, Page 23

Mr. Thomas Hardy prefaces by a little note a small

book of studies of London by "Dora Sigerson " (A Dull Day in London ; Nash, 4s. 6d. net). Mr. Hardy was struck, as the reader will be, by the author's unusual sympathy with animals and even with inanimate things. Hers is not only the sympathy of comprehension, but that of tender-heartednees. If she has not always currency to represent her fund of sympathy, and if the reader is sometimes cheated with the false coin of senti- mentality, it Is a question of coinage and not of poverty of heart.