8 DECEMBER 1906, Page 27

Old English Wood - Carving Patterns. By Margaret F. Mali/a, (B. T.

Botsford. 8s. 6d.)—This is a really useful portfolio of designs of the Jacobean period. In a note Mrs. Malim says truly how much a collection of this kind is wanted by wood-carvers, especially by carving classes. The examples given show what a wonderful and masculine sense of design our old furniture- makers had. How sad it is to compare such work with the poverty-stricken and perverted invention of to-day when it is not merely copying old work. The patterns here reproduced are from rubbings, which though clear and distinct are somewhat like negatives, for the prominences are black and the hollows white. This does not, however, make them in any way difficult to follow, and sections are also given in many cases.