AT THE SIGN OF THE GOLDEN COMPASS
A Tale of thePrintingHouseof Christopher Plantin in Antwerp,1576, by Eric P. Kelly 'O6. The Macmillan Company, New York, 1938. pp. (xii),194, (I)- $2.00.
This time Professor Kelly has laid a spine-tingling adventure story for modern boys, and their sisters, in the foreign troubles of the reign of Queen Elizabeth.
Godfrey Ingram is discovered in London, a nineteen-year-old apprentice learning how to make great books rather than to remain at Oxford merely reading them. But an envious plot causes him to fly, charged with treason. Hidden away in the good ship Dartmouth he crosses to Antwerp—Professor Kelly then sends the Dartmouth to Davy Jones's locker—where desperate deeds and hairbreadth escapes are relieved by word-pictures full of old world savor.
In Antwerp the young hero's lucky star, and keen olfactory sense, lead him to the hospitable door of the premier European printer and publisher, Christopher Plantin. So the story's thread weaves nimbly in and out among descriptive passages and explanatory matter concerned with early book making and printing.
It seems to me that the publishers make rather too much of this didactic side when they say of the Golden Compass: "In dramatic form it presents to young people an important chapter in the history of printing Together a painstaking author and artist have given young people an interesting book of printing history "
In locating the tale when and where he did, the story teller made a very happy selection. But it is obvious that his intention of providing colorful and lively entertainment cannot properly be burdened by too much of the professorial function: there are some anachronisms and errors of fact which ought to be put right in future editions if the publishers load the book with scholarly responsibilities.
An able and sympathetic illustrator, Raymond Lufkin, has provided pictures and ornament worthy of the spirited story, and throughout the book there is evidence of more than ordinary interest in the details of its making.
Professor James W. Goldthwait is the author of an article Geology of the Dartmouth-Lake Sunapee Region. This appears in the profusely illustrated 64 page pamphlet DARTMOUTH-LAKE SUNAPEE REGION OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.
There has recently appeared in mimeographed form a publication of 147 pages by Professor Malcolm Keir, A Study ofEconomic Conditions and their Relationto the States Comprising New England andthe South. The material in this publication was presented by Professor Keir before the Interstate Commerce Commission.
The June issue of THE JOURNAL OF HIGHER EDUCATION contains an article Biography in College by Professor Donald Bartlett.
The late Professor Charles D. Adams '77 is the author of Speeches VIII and X ofthe Demosthenic Corpus, which has been reprinted for private circulation from the April number of CLASSICAL PHILOLOGY.
Developments of the Labor MovementLeaditig to the A. F. of L. and the C. I. O. by Professor Herman Feldman has been reprinted from the May issue of THE SOCIETY FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF MANAGEMENT JOURNAL.
Professor C. N. Allen is the author of Psychological Elements in ContinuousBath Therapy, reprinted from the April issue of the PSYCHIATRIC QUARTERLY.
The June issue of SCIENCE contains an article by Professor Bancroft H. Brown entitled Exact Probabilities in Card-Matching Problems.
Color-Music by Professors Theodore F. Karwoski and Henry S. Odbert '3O has been published as no. a of vol. 50 of PSYCHOLOGICAL MONOGRAPHS.
