18 AUGUST 1928, Page 19

Mr. Gordon S. Maxwell's The Road to Prance (Methuen, illustrated,

75. 6d.) is an account of the thrice-told tale of Watling Street and of its associations and near surroundings from London, through Canterbury, to Dover. The book is pleasant enough commonplace, punctuated at times by a dreadful literalness, which is, for instance, at pains to assure the reader that Byron, when he wrote in Don Juan of a " puncture " on the Dover Road, was not thinking of pneu- matic tyres. However, every reader will enjoy Mr. Donald Maxwell's black-and-white illustrations, which are, as usual, wholly charming.