enjoyment of _The
Blows of Circumstance_ waned towards the end and the book seemed to me
to lose grip, it was because the sudden discovery on the part of _Quinn_
and _Amalie Gayne_ that they were soul-mates was too sudden to convince
me. Up to the beginning of the trial the story has vigour and an air of
probability, with its careful building-up of _Amalie's_ curious
character and the vivid description of her life on the stage and off it
in the society of a drug-taking husband; but from that point on it
seemed to me to fail. In real life all might have happened just as it is
set down, but real life is sloppily constructed. A novel must obey more
rigid rules. Miss KELSTON writes extremely well, if a trifle too
gloomily for my personal taste, but she cannot afford to ignore the laws
of construction and hurl her big situation at the reader with an abrupt
"Take it or leave it!"

* * * * *

For _Thirteen Stories_ I've nought but praise,
Although you'll find when you overhaul them
They're best described, in the author's phrase,
As "sketches, studies or what do you call them?"

Per DUCKWORTH forward and back you trek;
You may book right through or choose between a
Peep at Perim or Chapultepec,
Sahara, Hampstead or Argentina.

You may halt, if you will, at phalansteries,
Where Mescaleros on maturangos
Eat or drink (whichever it is)
Baked tortillas and twang changangos.

Suchlike things come easy as pie
To the author, Mr. CUNNINGHAME GRAHAM,
And I quite like 'em so long as I
Have only to read and not to say 'em.

* * * * *

If 'tis love that makes the world go round, it is certainly the same
force that maintains the circulation of the libraries. So it is safe to
assume that such a title as _The Little Blind God_ (MELROSE) is itself
enough to preserve the volume that bears it from any wallflower
existence on the less frequented shelves. But as for the story to which
Miss ANNE WEAVER has given this attractive name I find it very difficult
to say anything, good or bad. Only once did its placid unfolding cause
me any emotion, even the mildest. Old _Lady Conyers_ had adopted as
companion one _Mistress Barbara Cardeen_ (need I interpolate that the
time is the eighteenth century? O brocade and lavender! O swords and
candle-light and general tushery!), whom she found playing a violin in
the streets of Bath--I shoul