ased a
British Army horse)._ "FAIR WORDS DID I SPEAK HIM, SAYING, 'PEDRO,
AVANTI PIANISSIMO,' AND--BEHOLD!"]

* * * * *

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

_(By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks.)_

_Within The Rim_ (COLLINS) is, I suppose, the last of the posthumous
volumes of Mr. HENRY JAMES. It is a short book, produced with the
beauty that I have already grown to associate with the imprint of its
publishers, and containing five occasional pieces. Of these the first,
which gives its title to the whole, is the most considerable: an essay
of very moving poignancy, telling the emotion of the writer during
the earliest months of the War, in "the most beautiful English summer
conceivable," months that he "was to spend so much of in looking over
from the old rampart of a little high-perched Sussex town at the
bright blue streak of the Channel ... and staring at the bright mystery
beyond the rim of the farthest opaline reach." In the thoughts to
which HENRY JAMES here gives expression one may find much of the love
and sympathy for this country that subsequently led to that assumption
of British citizenship which he intended as their demonstration to the
world. Of interest also in this same paper is the revelation of a mind
that knew already by a personal experience (of the American Civil War)
"what immensities our affair would carry in its bosom--a knowledge
that flattered me by its hint of immunity from illusion." I would not
be understood that this is a volume for the casual reader, or even for
one desirous of making a first acquaintance with the Master, since
much of it exemplifies not only the beauty but the perplexities of
his later style; but it is certainly one which his disciples will not
willingly be without.

* * * * *

_Notebooks of a Spinster Lady_ (CASSELL) is smallish talk about
biggish wigs of the Victorian era, but not on that sole account to be
condemned. Perhaps rather wholesome as showing how little distant we
are from an age of government of the people by superior people for
superior people. The notebooks cover the years 1878-1903, but the
anecdotes have a much wider range, are often indeed of a venerable
antiquity. The lady of the notebooks was not, I fancy, of a critical
temper, and versions not too credible of well-known _contes_ figure in
her quiet kindly pages. There are moreover stories which I should not
hesitate to describe as of an appall