Praize and Criticism for. the Annual The year's Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (North China Branch), the 53rd of the series, will be received by readers with disappointment or with delight according to their tastes: with disappointment by those whose interests are literary or sinological, with delight by those who are followers of natural science. For the former there is little beyond an article on the Shule country by the Rev. J. Hutson, a continuance of the rather heated controversy between Dr. H. A. Giles and Mr. Werner as to whether a certain picture represents Christ or Buddha, a criticism by Dr. Ferguson of Mrs. Ayscough's "Fir Flower Tablets," and a very long poem " Lan-T'sih" by Mrs. Elfrida Hudson. For the latter there is an interesting paper by Mr. Sowerby on the natural history of China, a description of the growth of the Yangtze Delta by Mr. von Heidenstam, notes on the coal and iron deposits of Central Shansi by E. Norin, and numerous lists of names of plants, etc., no doubt of great value to the scientist, but very arid for the lay reader. The writer has heard criticism of the publication of those long lists of names in the Journal, but his own view is that. the add at least one big Highbury, Editor has acted rightly in insert-police them with red-turbaned ing them, and so obtaining a wide Sikhs, and you havea very fain circulation for scientific data of copy of Shanghai." And he aes interest to many enthusiastic in-up with this terrific forecast: "The quirers throughout China, and ime will come when people will speak about London as the Shanghai of the West."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.