30 JANUARY 1904, Page 38

The Life of Robert Burns. By T. F. Henderson. (Methuen

and Co. 35. 6d.)-Mr. Henderson has done his work well. He is a judicious and candid biographer, who regards his subject with sympathy, but looks at facts quite straightly, and will have nothing to do with special pleading and the making of excuses. But do we want any more biographies of Burns? Does not one sometimes think that it would have been well if we had never had a biography at all? What a disenchantment, for instance, after reading those pathetic poems about "Highland Mary," to hear the true story. Whatever good qualities Burns may have had, he was without a moral sense.