Memories. By Charles H. Kelly. (Robert Culley. 3s. 6d. net.)—
This book is worth reading, and for more reasons than one. In the first and most important place, it tells us much about the Wesleyan body. Mr. Kelly has been twice President of the Conference—an honour not often given—and he has discharged other important functions of a kindred kind, the secretaryship to the Examining Committee for Ministerial Candidates among them. On the whole, he thinks well of the prospects of the Communion; it has moved in his time from an oligarchic to a democratic con- stitution, and the laity has a voice in its management which it did not always possess. Of course this is not an unmixed advantage. Where breadth of view is concerned the few are more to be trusted than the many, the "platform" rather than the "floor," to use terms which are not unknown, we take it, to a Wesleyan. And the feeling towards Anglicanism and its ways grows less friendly. The use of the Liturgy is less frequent. We are told, for instance, that one of the causes of the depression of Wesleyanism in London at one time was the Liturgical service in the chapels. Mr. Kelly himself is not too friendly. He tells. us that an Anglican clergyman on ship-board related in the smoking-room a story which was too gross for the saloon. What is his evidence? A young man told him that the clergyman was going to tell it ! Is this sufficient for one minister of Christ to condemn another? There is another curious narrative. When Mr. Plimsoll had given up his seat at Derby to bring in Sir William Harcourt, rejected by Oxford City, a meeting was held to welcome the new Member. Mr. Kelly, put up to speak, told the story of how certain students had been expelled from Oxford, and drew the inference that it was no disgrace to be rejected by Oxford. Of course this was good enough for the Derby crowd; but what did Sir William Harcourt think of it? And is it possible that a cultured person such as Mr. Kelly did not know that the University of Oxford and the City of Oxford were two distinct constituencies Mr. Kelly's book is full of good stories. Here is one. Some one made himself very troublesome in claiming acquaintance with a man of some note. "Yes," said the tormented man; "I know you ; your mother lived at —, and had twins, a boy and a monkey—and the boy died." Here is another of strange resemblances. Some people were telling of how they had been mistaken for others. "That is nothing to my ease," said an Irishman. "A man clapped me on the shoulder and shouted : 'Holy Moses, is that you 2"
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