On the whole the book is timely and deserves a wide reading. In the endeavor to catch the public ear by the presentation of a lurid array of facts under a sensational title I fear the author has overshot the mark. Thoughtful readers are likely to discount much that apparently has a reasonable basis of scientific study merely because of the overstraining after startling statement. The author’s style is not altogether pleasing, nor does it always carry conviction nor inspire confidence in the author. It is not a great book nor an epoch-making one, but it bears the stamp of sincerity, provided one reads to the end, and calls attention to a number of awful truths that should give us pause. The keynote of progress is “light and enlightenment,” rather than repression. ALEXANDER E. CANCE. THE THREE GIFTS OF LIFE By NELLIE M. SMITH. Dodd, Mead & Co. 138 pp. Price $.50; by mail of THE SURVEY $.56 The market is flooded with publications on education with reference to sex, and most of them are the product of superficial or one-sided knowledge and a ready pen. The emphasis is unduly put on disease because most writers are so impressed by the results of ignorance that they find it impossible to take the attitude of the normal, healthy individual whom they are trying to reach. Among this mass of material, there have been two or three books which could be put into the hands of young girls, but even these should be used with care. The large demand for a good book and our failure to meet it has been a source of anxiety to all who have appreciated the dire need which it voiced. Then came The Three Gifts of Life, which answers the appeal for knowledge concerning the mysteries of reproduction, showing the origin of life in plants, animals and human beings—not detached as physiological fact but interwoven in ordinary experience. The Three Gifts are the three attributes by which the different forms of life progress: i.e., dependence, as illustrated by plants; instinct, plus dependence, as shown by animals; choice, plus dependence and instinct, which are given to every human being. Throughout the interesting account of plant and animal reproduction, Miss Smith is working through the law of progress to the girls’ responsibility in the life of the race, showing how the reproductive instinct can be made into a race instinct by means of the gift of choice. The one adverse criticism I should make is calling any gift of the flowers “poor” even in comparison. When the marvels of plant and animal life are being so wonderfully revealed, there is a singular opportunity to communicate the thrill and zest which come from close contact with Nature: there is nothing poor in the “scheme of things.”