CURRENT LITERATURE.
GIFT BOOKS.
The Thames, from Source to Sea. (Cassell and Co.) —We are sorry that we did not receive this handsome volume in time to include it in the same review which we gave last week of " Isis and Thamesis." The two books have points both of contrast and comparison, but both should give pleasure to lovers of Thames scenery. The volume now before us is on much the larger scale of the two, and deals with a larger snbjeck—not only the seventy miles between Godstow and Henley, but the whole distance, three times as large, that lies between the source (whether that be Thames Head or the Severn Springs) and the Nore. Various writers deal with portions which are familiar to them, and mingle agreeably description and anecdote, and now and then some antiquarian or historical detail. The Thames, indeed, is fabulosus, abounding with associations, and inspires those who write of it as well as did ever any classic stream. And we need hardly say it lends itself most effectively to the pencil of the artist. Of the wealth of illustration which has been lavished on this book it would not be easy to say too much. The frontispiece, a fine steel engraving, adequately represents the rich beauty of the Cliefden Woods ; the smaller pictures are mostly very pleasing, though now and then we come across one, that of " Eton Playing-fields," for instance, that looks a little stiff and formal. But such pictures as those of " Sonning "—the latter of the two espe- cially—of "The Mill at Mapledurham," of "The First Lock on the Thames," to mention but very few oat of many that are almost equally good, have a wonderful charm. We need not say more the
that this new volume keeps up the high average of Messrs. Cassell's splendid series of illustrated books.
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