the Australian Colonies, the Colonies of North America, of the West
Indies, of India and Ceylon, two volumes on the British Colonies of
Africa, a separate monograph on Tasmania, and last, and most ambitious
of all, a massive and comprehensive history of the postal issues of
Great Britain. All these works are expensively illustrated with a
profusion of full-page plates and other illustrations, and they
represent years of patient toil, far-reaching investigation, and
untiring research. The _History of the Adhesive Postage Stamps of
Europe_ has been written in two volumes by Mr. W. A. S. Westoby, and
the same author, in collaboration with Judge Philbrick, some twenty
years ago published a work on _The Postal and Telegraph Stamps of
Great Britain_. Messrs. W. J. Hardy and E. D. Bacon, in a work
entitled _The Stamp Collector_, have sketched the general history of
postage stamps. Other works too numerous to mention here have been
written from time to time for the edification of the stamp collector,
and the list is continually being increased by the addition of even
more important works.

One of the most interesting and comprehensive series of philatelic
works, still in course of publication, was commenced by Messrs.
Stanley Gibbons, Ltd., in 1893, in the form of philatelic handbooks.
These handbooks are written by leading philatelic authorities. Each
important country, _i.e._ important from the stamp collector's point
of view, has a separate volume devoted to it, and into each handy
volume is condensed as much as may be necessary to guide the advanced
collector in specialising the postal issues of the country which he
favours. There have already been published:--_Portuguese India_, by
Mr. Gilbert Harrison and Lieut. F. H. Napier, R.N.; _South Australia_,
by Lieut. F. H. Napier and Mr. Gordon Smith; _St. Vincent_, by Lieut.
F. H. Napier and Mr. E. D. Bacon; _Shanghai_, by Mr. W. B. Thornhill;
_Barbados_, by Mr. E. D. Bacon and Lieut. F. H. Napier; _Reprints and
their Characteristics_, by Mr. E.D. Bacon; and _Grenada_, by Mr. E. D.
Bacon and Lieut. F. H. Napier.

For the instruction of the beginner, Major Evans, R.A., has compiled
an excellent glossary of philatelic terms, under the title of _Stamps
and Stamp Collecting_; and there is, further, _A Colour Dictionary_,
by Mr. B. W. Warhurst, designed to simplify the recognition and
determination of the colours and shades of stamps--a by no means
unimportant matter when the va