Although Sir ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE calls his collection of detective stories _His Last Bow_ (MURRAY), and also warns us that _Sherlock Holmes_ is "somewhat crippled by occasional attacks of rheumatism," there is not in my lay opinion any cause for alarm. If I may jest about such an austere personage as _Sherlock_, I should say that there are several strings still left to his bow, and that the ever amenable and admiring _Watson_ means to use them for all they are worth. At any rate I sincerely hope so, for if it is conceivable that some of us grow weary of _Sherlock's_ methods when we are given a long draught of them no one will deny that they are palatable when taken a small dose at a time. _Sherlock_, in short, is a national institution, and if he is to be closed now and for ever I feel sure that the Bosches will claim to have finished him off. And that would be a pity. Of these eight stories the best are "The Dying Detective" and the "Bruce-Partington Plans," but all of them are good to read, except perhaps "The Devil's Foot," which left a "most sinister impression" on dear old _Watson's_ mind, and incidentally on my own. * * * * * Every now and then, out of a mass of War-books grown so vast that no single reader can hope even to keep count of them, there emerges one of particular appeal. This is a claim that may certainly be made for _An Airman's Outings_ (BLACKWOOD), especially just now when everything associated with aviation is--I was about to say _sur le tapis_, but the phrase is hardly well chosen--so conspicuously in the limelight. The writer of these modest but thrilling records veils his identity under the technical _nom de guerre_ of "CONTACT." With regard to his method I can hardly do better than repeat what is said in a brief preface by Major-General W.S. BRANCKER, Deputy Director-General of Military Aeronautics: "The author depicts the daily life of the flying officer in France, simply and with perfect truth; indeed he describes heroic deeds with such moderation and absence of exaggeration that the reader will scarcely realise," etc. But he will be a reader poor indeed in imagination who is not helped by these pages to realise some part of the debt that we owe to these marvellous winged boys of ours; As for the heroic deeds, they are of a kind to take your breath--tales of battles above the clouds, of trenches captured by aeroplane, of men fatally wounded, thousands of feet above the enemy country, recovering consciousness and working their guns till they sank dead, while their battered machines planed for the security of friendly lines. Surely the whole history of War has no picture to beat this in devotion. * * * * *