Pan's Garden. By Algernon Blackwood. Illustrated by W. G. Robertson.
(Macmillan and Co. 6s.)—Mr. Blackwood gives us another of his books which are valuable because utterly beyond the ordinary. His aim in these " Nature Stories " is to present realizations of the personality of Nature or of parts of Nature, such as trees, waves, snow, &c. Each of these manifestations of Nature has for the author a special personality which compels men : and his conviction of their power is so intense that only the most unimaginative readers will say that the human beings become mere maniacs. In some of the stories Nature herself, or, as in the last, the personality of a particular place, is manifested through a human medium. It is noticeable that, except for one cat, no animal has any place of importance. Though Mr. Blackwood occasionally refers to such questions as the relations between " the one" and " the many," it is not ancient philosophy that inspires him; it is rather the mysticism and sheer paganism of the Bacchus. (Let no one be alarmed by the phrase : he writes as tenderly and reverently as any could wish of the self-sacrifice of a simple Christian character.) The stories are never merely grim or horrible, but enthralling in their power of imagination and delightful in their picturesque and carefully chosen language. The illustrations have caught something of their spirit.
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