The picture of Thomas Hardy which I should prefer to keep is neither that which George Moore has slashed irreverently nor that which Mr. Brennecke has muddled with too much reverence, but that traced by James Barrie in his famous rectorial address: “The pomp and circumstance of war will pass, and all others now alive may fade from the scene, but I think the quiet figure of Hardy will live on.” As an antidote, I suggest to those who have not found Dr. F. A. Hedgcock’s _Thomas Hardy_ sufficiently informative and appreciative that they read the chapter entitled “The Builders” in Miss M. P. Willocks’ recent book called _Between the Old World and the New_. Another biography which should be discouraged is _James Elroy Flecker_, by his friend Douglas Goldring. Critics of poetry who fulfil all the requirements set forth in Flecker’s Essay on “The Public as Art Critic” say that he has a permanent place in English literature. We should like to forget that his obscenity amounted to a gift; that one of Mrs. Peachum’s many descendants taunted him at a dinner party that his swarthiness would succumb to “soap and water” and that he thought our boys should not neglect the _Cortigiano_; whether he had one or several moustaches during his early manhood does not seem to be essential for our understanding of his emotions or our comprehension of his intellectual remains. Flecker was a champion of beauty. One who knows him only from his friend’s “appreciation” could scarcely believe it. For years Henry Fairfield Osborn, a distinguished naturalist of New York, has been publishing a variety of biography somewhat after the manner of the “Roadmakers” series of Small, Maynard and Co. It deserves praise and imitation. _Impressions of Great Naturalists_ are made up of reminiscences of Darwin, Huxley, Cope and other great men with whom he was once intimate. Each verbal portrait is prefaced by a brief legend which summarises the author’s relationship to, or contact with, the subject. Professor Osborn does not attempt to portray the whole man but a principal aspect of each life, and as such aspect is always pleasant and inspiring, he has only praise for his subjects. Some will find him too laudatory, too uncritical. But he maintains with the French author that if love is blind, friendship will not see faults; and when friendship is engendered by the admiration and veneration that every one should have for such benefactors of science, petty faults of life and trifling defects of nature are forgotten.