1 1 6 Rez'iezi'S of Books had a book of about half the size of this, likely to win more readers and do far more good, even though less of a thesaurus. For that is what Mr. Holmes's book now is, a thesaurus of all that has been written, good, bad and indifferent, on Gaul and its conquest by Caesar. It serves the student of Caesar's Gallic War much as Frazer's Pausanias serves the student of that author. ot only are the monu- mental editions and epoch-making treatises called forth by the Commen- taries duly named, described, and conscientiously utilized, with excellent independence of judgment ; but obscure articles hidden away among the transactions of various archaeological societies, numberless monographs, pamphlets and even medieval chronicles have been diligently hunted down and collated. The ' ' bibliographical note ' ' which forms part of the introductory matter (pp. xxv.-xxvi.), is a bibliography of biblio- graphies. " For fear I might have overlooked any reference to articles in foreign periodicals, I also worked through the back numbers of all the transactions of learned societies, French and German, which I could find on the shelves of the gallery which they occupy in the British Museum." After the preface (pp. v.-xix. ), which is written con amore, and tells the reader how the work grew to its present dimensions from the first modest projection, comes a short paper on " The Busts of Julius Caesar " (pp. xx.-xxv.); then the " Bibliographical Note " ; then a controversy entitled "Mr. Stock's Edition of Caesar's Gallic War and Colonel Stoffel's Ex- cavations " (pp. xxvi.— XXX.) ; and then the usual table of contents. Part I. (pp. 1-162) consists of the narrative proper of the conquest of Gaul. It is not a translation, nor even a free paraphrase of Caesar, but a connected narrative based more or less closely on the words of Caesar. The author's exhaustive study of the topography of the various routes and sites enables him to supply, where they most aid the narrative, ample geographical and strategical details. Gaps in the terse story of Caesar are inferentially filled, and, on the other hand, those episodes which do not bear directly on the conquest of Gaul, like the inroads into Britain, are omitted. Again, not all of Caesar's movements in Gaul are fully determined, but only those sections of his devious track which can be followed with certainty. The student of Caesar and above all the lover of Caesar's Latinity, will use this " narrative " only as an ac- companiment to the immortal text. The general reader, who may not know Latin, will get almost no idea of the literary features of the great Commentaries. At the risk of seeming ungrateful to one who has confer- red a boon on all lovers of Caesar, the wish might be hazarded that Mr. Holmes had given us in Part I. a straightforward, idiomatic translation of Caesar's words, as Mr. Frazer has translated his Pausanias, and incor- porated all the interesting " Fuellmaterial " in the running commentary which now constitutes Section VII. (pp. 607-823). As a fair specimen of the liberties of omission and commission which Mr. Holmes has allowed himself with the words of Caesar, it will be suffi- cient to cite Caesar's account of that part of his first great battle with the Helvetii which followed the dangerous flank and rear attack of the Boii
