). There are also several young men. To test his
abilities in the _Admirable Crichton_ line _Diana_ maroons the most
favoured of these, together with three other aspirants to her hand, and her
bachelor uncle, on an island in a Scottish loch, hamperless, on a soft day.
As the affections of all the lovers remain undimmed, you can guess what
kind of a girl _Diana_ must have been. _Shant's_ even more responsible job
is to tumble off a pony and allay the temporary tartness which existed
between her two elderly admirers, so that nothing but oranges and
orange-blossoms remain. Really, of course, none of the story much matters.
But if you want the sensation of having stayed with delightful people in
delightful places, where rising prices are not even mentioned or thought
of, Mrs. WEMYSS can give it you all the time.

* * * * *

_Night and Day_ (DUCKWORTH) is the title of VIRGINIA WOOLF'S last book; but
there is no night for the author's clarity of vision, or her cleverness in
describing every detail she has seen, or her delicate precision of style;
there is only daylight, temperate, pervading, but at times, I am afraid,
almost irritatingly calm. "Give me one indiscretion of sympathy or emotion
on behalf of your characters," the reader is tempted to implore her; "let
me feel that you are a little bit excited about them and I shall feel
excited too." The story, after all, is the simple one (to put it in the
shudderingly crude language of former days) of a girl's change of heart
from an unreal love to one of whose sincerity she eventually convinces
herself. _Katharine Hilbery_, the granddaughter of a great poet, brought up
by a father whose only interest is in literature, and a charming mother who
wanders in fields of Victorian romance, breaks off her engagement with a
civil servant who has more taste than talent for letters, and chooses
instead a man slightly below her in social position, but with firmness and
decision of character and genuine skill in--what? Ironmongery? No,
literature. All through the book I found myself wondering whether a mind so
finely tempered as _Katharine's_, a perception so acute, was really fitted
for anything so commonplace as, after all, love is. And I longed for the
authoress, who explained every mood so amazingly well, to explain this too.

* * * * *

Mrs. NORRIS is evidently a specialist in unconventional situations. In her
last novel