Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 11.djvu/86

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78


NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s. XL JAN. 24, 1903.


at Stepney some years ago I failed to find any traces of this memorial. JOHN T. PAGE.

MONAECH IN A WHEELBAEROW (9 th S. X.

467 ; xi. 14).

" Evelyn had a favourite holly hedge, through which, it is said, the Tzar, by way of exercise, used to be in the habit of trundling a wheelbarrow. Evelyn probably alludes to this in the following passage of his ' Sylva,' wherein he asks, Is there, under the heavens, a more glorious and refreshing object of the kind, than an impregnable hedge, of about 400 feet in length, 9 feet high, and 5 in diameter, which I can still show in my ruined garden at Sayes Court (thanks to the Tzar of Muscovy) at any time of the year, glittering with its armed and variegated leaves ; the taller standards, at orderly distances, blushing with their natural coral ? " ' Memoir of the Life of Peter the Great ' in " The Family Library," 1831.

"I went to Deptford to see how miserably the Tzar had left my house after three months making it his Court. I got Sir Chris. Wren, the King's surveyor, and Mr. London his gardener, to go and estimate the repairs, for which they allowed 150^. in their report to the Lords of the Treasury." Evelyn's 'Diary,' 9 June, 1698.

I think I have seen in Once a Week, among a series of eccentricities of notable people, an illustration of the Tzar wheeling or being wheeled through such a hedge.

ADRIAN WHEELER.


NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

The New Volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica. Vol. VIII., being Vol. XXXII. of the Complete Work. (A. & C. Black and the Times.) ONE more volume, ending with ' Stowmarket,' has been added to the tenth issue of the ' Encyclopedia Britannica.' It is, of course, difficult in any work the arrangement of which is simply alphabetical to seek to assign any special feature to one volume as apart from the rest. The contents of the latest instalment are, however, representative, inasmuch as they deal to an almost equal extent with the applied sciences and arts, with what may be called in the fullest sense practical and with the remotest investigations of speculative thought. The pre- fatory essay, by Prof. Karl Pearson, F.R.S., on the subject of ' The Function of Science in the Modern State,' is more abstract and less popular than the articles holding the same place in previous volumes. The theory of national life which presents itself at the outset of the twentieth century is that intelli- gence, and not .brute force, strength and bravery, and material wealth, will be dominant in the coming struggle, from which the most intelligent nations will issue victorious. For such a contest training is all - important, and the article deals subsequently with the necessities of educational change. Perhaps the most obvious and indis- pensable, and at the same time the most hopeless demand of the professor is for a school of statecraft. If such were established, how many of those, it may be wondered, by whom our affairs are guided would be able to pass the preliminary examination ? Much is said upon the general functions of secondary


craft schools. In the higher craft schools we are lamentably deficient. Most urgent seems to be the need for scientific method in medicine. What is said about the progress of medical science deserves the closest attention. Prof. Pearson's article must, however, be studied as a whole ; it is forcibly argued, and does not admit of our dragging to light and debating solitary propositions. With a sigh we accept the truth that " it is little good after an army has been decimated by enteric to appoint a commission to inquire into the causes of it." The mere mention of the pollution of rivers, again, shows at what an elementary stage of knowledge we still are. The most important among the general contents are those especially with which it is impossible to deal. Take ' Ships and Shipbuilding,' by Mr. Philip Watts, F.S.S., the Director of Naval Construction. This is one of the longest and most scientific articles in the volume, and is also one of the most fully illustrated. Nothing whatever can be parted from the context. A portion of the article to which many will turn ia submarines, which will probably be treated at more length in the next volume. Mr. Theodore L. de Vinne's article on 'Printing Presses' is com- paratively brief, the more important changes of modern days being possibly reserved for forth- coming essays on 'Type' and 'Type-setting.' Dealing with ' Prison Discipline,' Major Arthur Griffiths, an omniscient authority, holds with others that the gravest feature of modern penology "is the vitality of 'recidivism,'" a phrase the significance of which was anticipated in the once current phrase "Qui a bu boira." 'Process,' a vague term to which is now attached a sufficiently precise meaning, is by Mr. Edwin Bale. Both word and thing have come to stay. The article is accom- panied by the illustration of the various stages in three-colour printing, reproduced from the 'Japan' of Mr. Mortimer Menpes, which has recently attracted much public notice. Dr. Shadwell has a powerful and not very hopeful article on ' Prosti- tution.' ' Provenal Literature,' a subject of high interest, is by Dr. Oelsner. The felibres are freed from the charge of want of patriotism, and the utterance of Felix Gras at the head of his ' Carbounie ' is quoted: "I love my village more than thy vil- lage ; 1 love my Provence more than thy province ; I love France more than all."

Mr. Lang's article on 'Psychical Research' is profoundly interesting and suggestive, but, like most discussions on the subject, gets us no "for- rarder." That man should be deeply concerned with such problems is natural, and it may be, though there are few signs of such an event, that light will be ultimately forthcoming. Dr. Ward chronicles some advance since 1885 in ' Psychology,' though the attention bestowed on the subject is still disproportionate to its importance. ' Publish- ing ' deals, inter alia, with the progress of many bookselling firms, some of them now extinct, and displays more care and judgment than spirit in its narrations. A capital reproduction of ' St. Genevieve watching over Paris ' accompanies an excellent article on 'Puvis de Chavannes' by Henri Frantz. An important account of Queensland is the only noteworthy article under Q. Railways between 18s3 and 1900, when were compiled the statistics now supplied, have undergone naturally an immense development. How much of recent advance is due to the substitution of steel for iron rails is shown. Signalling and locomotive engines