COUNTRY LIFE PICTURE BOOK OF WALES.
(Country Life, 12s. 6d.)
SHELL GUIDE TO DEVON. By Brian Watson. (Faber, 12s. 6d.) SHELL GUIDE TO DEVON. By Brian Watson. (Faber, 12s. 6d.) MR. FLETCHER'S book, the first of two volumes hp is writing on The Queen's Wales, covers the counties Anglesey, Caernarvon, Denbigh, Flint, Merioneth and Montgomery.
Each county is given a general description. followed by a gazetteer. Much useful and interesting information is thus given about towns and villages, but there is no mention in the gazetteer of the mountains or such famed jumping-off places as Ogwen or Pen-y- Gwryd. In the illustrations, too, the moun- tains receive scanty consideration.
The Picture Book of Wales is a collection of fifty-nine photographs ranging from St. Davidts Cathedral to Holyhead. The work of leading landscape photographers depicting cathedrals and castles, abbey ruins and villages, lakes, rivers and mountains is here excellently re- produced. Here again, though, the mountains receive less than their due. Except for a strik- ing early morning view from Snowdon, most of the mountain scenes are of, rather than in, the hills.
The Shell Guide to Devon. originally writ- ten by John Betjeman, has been revised and presumably rewritten by Bllan Watson:ln a concise preliminary survey he gives a fair picture of this extensive county. In the gazet- teer he presents a grand array of information as he ranges from Abbot's Bickington to Zeal Monachorum. Maps on the scale of five miles to the inch; and appendices listing mansions, shooting, sailing, hunting and golf, complete a handy and informative book.
TOM STEPHENSON ■
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