In Search of the Wallypug. By G. E. Farrow. With
Illustra- tions by Alan Wright. (C. Arthur Pearson. 6s.)—Of this con- tinuation of the Wallypug theme we do not know how we can give a better or more succinct account than that kindly furnished by the publishers on a slip within the book :—" Mr. Farrow has returned to his old love, and again leads us through the wonder- ful paths of Wallypugland. Our old friend, the preposterous Dodo, is again with us, as amusing and conceited as ever, together with many new characters, wonderful and weird, fairy and gnome, furred and feathered." The vein is as sprightly as before, and the abundant illustrations are innocently grotesque. British Soldiers in the Field. By Sir Herbert Maxwell. (George Allen. 6s.)—Sir Herbert Maxwell's introduction is a most in- structive piece of writing. He quotes a remarkable utterance of the Duke of Wellington in which that great man deprecates any attempt to alter the musket (Brown Bess) with which the intently was then armed. He next proceeds to show how Edward I. bestowed the greatest pains on the endeavour to make his military engines as perfect as possible. He was far removed from the stare super antiguas vies which was the principle of the Iron Duke, always relying, as Sir Herbert Maxwell puts it, "far more upon his workmen than upon their tools." A few months before his death in 1852 he sanctioned the exchange of Brown Bess for the Minie rifle. Had it not been for this we should have fared but ill in the Crimea. Our victory at Inkerman was largely due to our superiority in small arms. Of course, they were wielded by first-rate soldiers; but without them our scattered companies, hundreds matched against thousands, could not have held their own. Sir Herbert Maxwell gives us in the book itself nine chapters dealing with great military events. Bannockburn stands first; then comes Agincourt, followed by Blenheim, Blenheim being succeeded, after an interval of nearly a century, by Assaye. The other chapters are "The Passage of the Douro," " Hougou- mont," " Inkerman," "Delhi," and "Two Famous Marches," the second being Lord Roberts's march from Kabul to Kandahar. These incidents are, as we might expect, admirably described.
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