ESSAYS.

THE BRITISH PARLIAMENT: ITS HISTORY AND

ELOQUENCE.

A Book of Parliamentary Anecdote, Compiled from Authentic Sources. By G. H. JENNINGS and W. S. JOHNSTONE. London, Paris, and New York: 1872.

THERE is a comic History of England. Why might there not be an anecdotical one, in which the salient points should be placed in broad relief by memorable sayings and striking incidents-by well-chosen traits of valour, virtue, patriotism, eloquence, and wit? There is no pleasanter mode of conveying knowledge, no surer mode of durably impressing it. The most fugitive attention is caught by anecdotes: the most volatile mind retains them so long as it retains anything; and none but the shallowest will miss the moral they point, the reflections they suggest, or the conclusions they justify.

The compilers of 'A Book of Parliamentary Anecdote' have manifested no extraordinary amount of discrimination or research. Their materials are drawn from familiar and easily accessible sources: their arrangement is open to grave objection; yet their main object, as explained in their Preface, has been attained. They have produced an amusing, useful, and interesting work; nor is it well possible for any thoughtful reader, at all given to political speculation, to skim