~ygus Spout or TE Win."—By W. R.
Calvert, Londos, Hutchinson, 2s, intellectual exercise within that sphere is futile, Pascal is: the most suitable approach to a satisfactory Knowledge of the great genius, yet it isan Interesting "portrait."
"Somewhere inthe north or Eng-Jarki!Hived an old mole-catcher whom disappointment in love had turned into.a solitary. But one day he found an abandoned infant, carried it-tochis lonely hearth, and reared itwns his own, The pair, as the <foandlig grew to boyhood, became inseparable. Nature had few secrets from old Isaac, and Crispin asked for nothing better than to share hi knowledge. They never wearied 2 watching the ways of their wild neighbours of heater and fell. In course of time Isaac passed awa and Crispin mated with one who was as devoted as himself to the observation of nature.
slender and so simple is Mr. Calvert's story. But it is apparent that the narrative is employed as a framework, to be filled in from the] abundant store of his own acquaintance with the problems and intrieacies of bird and animal life. He it was, we feel, who won the otter's confidence, who traced the sheep-layers to their lair, who was the death of the escaped wolf. Mr. Calvert has not shirked the tragedies of wild life; indeed, some may think he has emphasized the tragic side overmuch, that the creatures are not 0 perpetually in conflict with one another. His too, we fei and not Crispin's, is the' protest against the so-called naturalist, who thinks of nothing but the addition of dead "specimens" to his collection, and against such game-preserve as destroy the fertility of the coun-ide by coging on ignorant gamekeepers to the extirp "vermin." His, too, the indings with the employment of certain cruel traps, at this very moment the] subject of adverse comment in an important quarter.
But, lest it should be inferred that the interest of this book is wholly; of a painful character, some of they episodes of which it is' made up are!
ance The Wel ing." Tnane of lic charm. Take, for me and Grispin watched two parent badgers shepherd their cub, which "thin and wenk and covered with gores," to a certain spring, and force it to bathe—one thinks, by the way, of Bladud and the swine—and saw' the process repeated day after! day; till presently the cub grew. lean and strong. Now there was a gipsy child in similar poor ease, and Crispin acquainted its mother with' the healing properties of the spr Ani, as it had been with the end, so war it with the child. The pas: sage is a characteristic example st Mr. Calvert's happier mood.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.