Twelve Years in Canterbury, New Zealand. By Mrs.Charles Thomson. (Low,
Son, and Marston.)—" The Voyage Home after Twelve Years in Canterbury, New Zealand," would be a more fitting title for this book, as only twenty-three pages of it are devoted to the Canterbury settle- ment, and the other provinces, Australia, the Rod Sea, and the Marseilles Lazaretto occupy the remaining 180. However, the whole volume is pleasant and readable, although the discomforts to which Mrs. Thomson was subjected would justify a more querulous style than that of Miss Eyre. That the young ladies of Dunedin call policemen "cheeky bobbies" to their face ; that neither candles nor hot water are to be had in the boarding houses at Auckland ; that boatmen, drivers, guides, and men in general conspire to cheat unprotected fema'es at Alexandria ; that quarantine at Marseilles is worse than imprisonment ; that it always rains, and mosquitoes always bite, and the screws of steamers always jump and thump till the passengers are distracted, were some of the most notable experiences of Mrs. Thomsou's voyage. Yet she has de- scribed that voyage so well that we should be glad to have another book from her pen, and we suggest as a subject her twelve years' stay in the Canterbury settlement.
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