f considerable sympathy for cranks, and perhaps that is
why I regard Mr. ONIONS' satire as a dry, gritty business. His humour is,
of course, always a delightful thing, but here I fancy that he has not
drawn the true line between comedy and farce, between satire that preserves
the probabilities and indiscriminate exaggeration. Of the three Mr.
ONIONSES who have at different times given me pleasure--the author of
_Widdershins_, the author of _In Accordance with the Evidence_, and the
author of _Little Devil Doubt_--I greatly prefer the first. In _A Crooked
Mile_ there is one chapter worthy of all three of them--that chapter where
_Amory_ discovers that her lover is going away with another woman. That is
fine work. For the rest I hope that he will grow tired of his social satire
and soon give us again some more of his delicate imagination and fancy.

* * * * *

What I felt about _The Girl on the Green_ (METHUEN) was that, however
charming and capable, she was not quite likely, after but a few short
months of golf, to have put up such a good fight in her great match with
the crack amateur, _Jim Beverley_, who was giving her a half. I couldn't
manage to believe it. However, that was not my business, but MARK
ALLERTON'S. According to him, _Frank_ took her match to the last green, in
spite of a number of cats, headed by the Vicar's wife, who did their best
to put her off her game. Yes, you are right to presume that what began as a
single developed into a flirtsome, and that the twain lived happily ever
after in a nice little dormy house, and that _Jim_ bested the HILTONS and
the OUIMETS, while _Frank_ put permanently out of joint all the noses of
all the Misses LEITCH. Those who not only play but talk, dream, read and
generally live for golf will, I can say with confidence, be grateful to Mr.
MARK ALLERTON for this easy, hopeful narrative.

* * * * *

[Illustration: _Vendor of studs and buttons_ (_to vendor of inflating
baby_). "NOW THEN, _FATHER_, NOT SO MUCH OF IT. GIVE AN OLD BATCHILER A
CHARNST, CARN'T YER?"]

* * * * *

_The Morning Post_ on the Army and Navy Boxing Championships:--

"These men's middles were full of good things."

Why don't they train better?

***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI, VOL.
146, APRIL 22, 1914***

******* This file should be named 23815.txt or 23815