Tro fame of Anatole France is at! the stage when everything that he wrote or said is collectable and collected; soon the sieve of the years will pick out the more permanent of his creations from the mass, and finally everything will be collected again and republished, and people who know only the masterpieces, will marvel at the quality of the works that arg less well-known. There is reason enough at this stage to publish both these newcomers to the fine edition of the Bodley Head. They show aspects of France that are different, but both of them admirable and both of then: engaging. "The Unrisen Dawn" is a series of discourses or letters composed on ich political and literary occasions, 28 are indicated by the names of Zolw and Picquart, Renan and iderot, Peace, the Russian People, Armenians. They are full of France's sympathy, compassion, and indignation on behalf of the' oppressed, and sometimes, since this is a partisan's business, the controversial France is more downright and sweeping than the man in conversational vein. For in th ions" (pp. xvii. 219, 78. 6d. net) he is not, indeed, more hi self, for the other self was as gen-me and authentic, but more the serene philosopher, the shrewd and sceptical commentator on the bus ness of the world. The "Opinions' fnelude a beautiful sample of France's manner in a criticism of. the "movies" and of the American mind, a sample not to be swallowed uneritieally—who would pay France the flattery of imitations would not read him uncritically—but always ightening and provocative. picture of the American as "al health and machinery and fitted with metal springs," or, better, as childlike, and therefore, with the strength and weakness of the chi but always with the future in his hands, destined perhaps to eat up the European, but not, as he thinks, without assimilating some of old Europe's virtues, is one of the best Pronouncements of the modern orles. Opinion alike saline, antiseptic. always eager to believer the best," and that of course applies all round. When the Chinese believe the best about the foreigner, as well as the foreigner about the Chinese, we may much more hopeful of the future, and race contacts will become means of greater happiness instead of causes for anxiety or danger—rat. the desert, ier of the fall abet ACE WAY 2° we, do—by the simple [phrase convenient, is. tu but the towns, and dwellers in the reedy hich tne two senses of seeing and [Omran coa octene, than the marshes prevalent in Mesopotamia ever since' the Mongols destroyed that elaborate system of irrigation which was one of the wonders of the ancient world. This third class has; been the subject of a sympathetic stud by an English civil officer and, his wife. The marsh Arab, with his psychology, customs, and tribal] tales, does not differ greatly from other Arabs, except to the expert Arabist." His ancestors, his reigion, his blood-feuds, are the same. Bur this book is better written than the majority of books about Arabs. The style is distinguished and has a dramatic rhythm well-suited to the subject.
It would gain considerably by a more personal treatment, however. The writer makes desultory journeys, through the marshes and into the fringe of the desert in the company] of Haji Rikkan, a travelling merchant, from whose own lips he sets down many of the tales and through whose introduction he gains access to his other sources. But the author himself, whether from modesty, or to preserve incognito, glides like @ wraith through all of these experiences, He is. simply "the transparent eye-ball." This} deprives the reader of the be adventure of all. Sitting in his comfortable arm-chair, the _latter fancies himself making just such a Journey. He wants to feel that he jg sitting at that moment in the Bedouin tent, in the author's place, wiping his greasy hands after the feast of steaming rice and whole roast sheep, settling himself to hear the story of the evening, clapped on the back from ti smelling. Vulturer and carrier-
Pigeons see; dogs and ants smell; wild mammals see and smell and hear; termites and many larvae feel, If you select you examples, as Rabaud selects his, keeping' within a comparatively small circle, you may go. pretty near to absolute proof that such and such particular animals trust exclusively to one or two of the normal senses common to the greater part of the animal Kingdom. No sixth sense, hardly lever a fifth, is concerned. The bird which alone has won a specific name from its skill in returning to fits base—the Homer pigeon—quite certainly sees and learns. It possesses no blind knowledge of direction, its instinct moves along tracks blazed by the senses. It finds its way almost Inboriously. In all likelihood, though the point has not been scientifically studied, it has a share of the exceptional powers of long sight possessed by the vultures and eagles. They do not scent their prey from afar, like the hyena, but see it, Migratory Instinets 'This truth is well documented, in the case of the pigeon at any rate, by M. Rabaud. Indeed, wherever touches animal behaviour, he illustrates the fine precision of' the French scientific mind. No one has more acutely analysed the causer of particular abilities birds and insects. And bed some popular fallacies of infer ence, notably in regard to the migration of bird But in this detail, some glibly write, By what quality, or qualities the animals re in touch with the streams of the world we are less likely to discover by logical analysis such as the French bid gist loves, than by physical tion, But though he is too Tittle a mystic and goes too near {to dogmatic incredulity, M. Raboud has wilton a charming essay' in selontifle method and cleared "the ground of much fallacious rubbish.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.