⸺ BRITAIN LONG AGO: Stories from Old English and Celtic Sources. (Harrap: Told through the Ages series).
⸺ OLD CELTIC TALES. Pp. 128, large clear type. (Harrap). 6d. 1910.
One of Harrap’s “All-Time Tales,” a series of supplementary readers for young children. The first tale is “The Children of Lir,” told in three-and-a-half pages. The rest are from the Mabinogion and other Welsh sources. Six or seven moderately good full page ill. (one col.). Neat cover. Remarkably cheap.
WINGFIELD, Hon. Lewis Strange. B. 1842. Son of 6th Lord Powerscourt. Ed. Eton and Bonn. Lived a very strange life, trying as experiments various rôles—actor, nigger minstrel, attendant in a mad-house, traveller in Algeria and China, painter, &c., &c. Wrote many novels and books of travel. D. 1891.
⸺ MY LORDS OF STROGUE. Three Vols. (Bentley). 1879.
“A Chronicle of Ireland from the Convention to the Union.” History and romance curiously intermingled, e.g., Robert Emmet’s Insurrection is purposely ante-dated by two years and a half. “The prominence given to such unpleasant personages as Mrs. Gillin makes the book unsuitable at least for the lending libraries of convents.”—(I.M.). The Author is fair-minded and not anti-national.
WOODS, Margaret L. B. Rugby, 1856. Dau. of late Dr. Bradley, Dean of Westminster. Ed. at home and at Leamington. Lives in London. Author of about a dozen volumes—novels, poems, and plays.
⸺ ESTHER VANHOMRIGH. Pp. 347. (Murray). 1891.
A clever and interesting psychological study of the relations between Swift and the two Esthers, Johnson and Vanhomrigh, the latter being the chief centre of interest. The scene: partly in Ireland, partly in England. The political events and questions of the time are scarcely touched upon, but the atmosphere, language, and costume of the time have evidently been carefully studied, and are vividly reproduced. Swift’s relations to these two women are represented in a convincing and sympathetic manner. There is nothing objectionable in the tone of the book.