d
treatment are alike new, and one can safely prophesy that when Sir
ALEXANDER BANNERMAN produces his nextling he will find a large and
appreciative circle of readers waiting to welcome it.

* * * * *

Three things charmed me particularly about _Henry Elizabeth_ (HURST AND
BLACKETT), whose remarkable second name was due to the fact that he was
born in the same year as the Virgin Queen and that his father had hoped
that he too would be a girl. In the first place he became the greatest
swordsman of his age and I was thus able to add him to my fine collection
of Elizabethan heroes who have achieved this honour. What happens when two
of these champions meet in those shadowy regions of romance where all
costume novels are merged I do not know. It must be rather like the
irresistible force and the immovable object. In the second place _H.E._ (no
one could better deserve these formidable initials) was given the job of
clearing Lundy Island of its piratical tenants, and I happened to have
Lundy Island just opposite me as I read the book. It is not often that a
reviewer has the chance of checking local colour with so little pains. And
in the third place Mr. JUSTIN HUNTLY MCCARTHY informs me, on page 101, that
his hero will "gaze one day upon rivers to which the Thames should seem
little better than a pitiful rivulet." As _Henry_ never gets further from
his native Devon than London in the course of this novel I take it that
this is a delicate allusion to the possibility of a sequel. I hope it is
so, and that I shall hear of _Henry_ in days to come, after a trip or two
with RALEIGH or DRAKE, rebuilding his manor of Braginton, which was
unfortunately burnt to the ground, and settling down to plant potatoes and
tobacco in prosperity and peace.

* * * * *

From the title, _Brute Gods_ (HEINEMANN), you may guess that Mr. LOUIS
WILKINSON'S new novel does not deal with homely topics in a vein of
harmless frolic. In recommending this very serious work of an expert author
and observer, I am bound to make some reservation. Unsophisticated youth,
if such there be in these days, should be kept away from the affair between
_Alec Glaive_ and _Gillian Collett_. _Alec_, a mere boy, was in a
dangerously unsettled condition when the lady crossed his path. His mother
had upset a not too happy family by eloping with a literary _poseur_; the
egoism of his father had been rendered even m