"York", by John Rodgers, M

From the floor it was suggested that the many artifices employed in film-making led to a deterioration in acting ability, and the general standard was therefore lowered. The cinema had been abused and was falling behind as a fine art.

The motion was subsequently rejected by 54 votes to 36.

At the close of our final meeting, the House passed unanimously a resolution to continue our activities next term, should there be an opportunity. We hope that there will be such an opportunity. That debates should be held in the summer is something new, but it is surely a healthy omen.

D. G. HILTON.

"YORK" BY JOHN RODGERS, M.P.

(BATSFORD, LTD., 8s. 6d.)

Here is a book for which the present reviewer has long been searching. Several years ago, on first coming to York, he searched the bookshops for a readable book about York—one which did not emphasise unduly the mediaeval history, or the architecture of the city, and one which avoided the annoying guide-book habit of bluntly ordering the reader to "notice the 17th cent. altar rails, or the projecting piscina in the S. chantry". To the writer's surprise, no bookseller offered any very helpful suggestion.

Now at last we have a book which gives us a glimpse with all features of the life and tradition of "this amazing city which is a treasure-house of all periods of English history", a book which Mr. Rodgers hopes will be of value to visitors from overseas. Certainly it is a book which will appeal to all Peterites and Old Peterites, to the exiled sons of Yorkshire, and "maybe to the citizens of York themselves, who are the trustees of a truly noble heritage which they must zealously and lovingly guard".

Its excellent photographs alone are reminders to anyone who has left York of the beautiful familiar scenes, and those of us who still live here will find it a useful source of information for visitors who take it for granted that we shall know all the answers to questions about the city's history.

We are grateful to Mr. Rodgers for presenting an autographed copy of his latest book to the School Library. Many of us have enjoyed his previous Batsford books, especially "The Old Public Schools of England", which of course, included an interesting account of St. Peter's. It is most appropriate that an Old Peterite should write the best book about York, and the School is naturally proud of Mr. Rodgers' reputation as an author, as well as of his achievements as an administrator and Member of Parliament.

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Peterites and Old Peterites will be especially interested in the author's allusions to the school. The book is dedicated to "John Bowes Morrell and Stanley Mease Toyne, who together opened my eyes to the fact that I was a citizen of no mean city". And we note with interest the author's generous acknowledgment in the Preface : "As a schoolboy I was fortunate to sit at the feet of a truly remarkable teacher, George Yeld, who lived to be nearly a hundred, and who, with his flowing white beard and flashing eyes, seemed to me like one of the prophets and sages".

Mr. Rodgers has much to say about other features of the school, "the oldest secular school in the country"; of some early Masters, including Albert the Wise, afterwards Archbishop, and Alcuin, who later became, as we might say, "Director of Education in the Holy Roman Empire under Charlemagne". The author recounts that even in Alcuin's day St. Peter's was a boarding school, and states later that until the Dissolution of the Monasteries the School's 50 boarders lived in St. Mary's Abbey. Speaking of unsuccessful efforts to establish a university at York, the author mentions a petition praying Parliament in James I's time that St. Peter's School should be converted into a university in view of "its healthful situation, cheapness of victuals and food".

Mr. Rodgers states that "York remains today as it has been for centuries, the most certain anchor with the Middle Ages. Not only in England, but among European cities, it remains a complete, astonishing and unique example of a mediaeval city, built around and over a Roman one. Here truly the past is part of the present. Many of York's present day institutions, the Minster, St. Peter's School, the Merchant Adventurers' Company and other guilds, and the City Corporation, have an unbroken history since mediaeval times, and they are the watchful custodians of traditions and ceremonies which have grown up gradually since the Conquest".

His vivid picture of the days when the city was the Capital of the North is full of interesting information about the social and political background of the period. Under the Tudors, York's architecture was seriously neglected, while in the Stuart period York was too poor to go in for schemes of rebuilding or expansion.

One of the most interesting features of Mr. Rodgers' book, is his enthusiasm for the craftsmanship and beauty of the eighteenth century buildings in York. "Whenever true values are in the ascendancy, then York, due to her historic past, participates in the resurgence. The religious feeling of the Middle Ages showed itself in York in an unrivalled series of churches, abbeys and halls, culminating in the great Minster. The eighteenth century again, though the inspiration was difficult, was a time of artistic appreciation and gracious living, of great vitality and variety and the reception of new ideas." 29