hrewd guess at its plot. This is an agreeable affair of a maid,
reputed Catholic heir to the English Crown, and used as pretext for an
abortive rising against KING JAMES I. You can see that in practised
hands (as here) and decorated with a pretty trimming of sentiment,
abductions, witch-finding and other appropriate accessories,
this furnishes a theme rich in romance. Perhaps I was a thought
disappointed that more was not made of the actual conspiracy, and
that, having started "too near the throne," the tale subsequently gave
it so wide a berth. But this is no great fault. I can witness that
Mrs. WILSON FOX has at least one essential quality of the historical
novelist in her appreciation of picturesque raiment. Almost indeed she
emulates those jewelled paragraphs in which the creator of _Windsor
Castle_ would fill half a chapter with a riot of sartorial
coruscations. As a birthday present, say for an appreciative niece, I
can think of few volumes whose welcome would be better assured.

* * * * *

Mr. JOHN MASEFIELD has brought together in _St. George and the Dragon_
(HEINEMANN) a speech "given" by him in New York on last St. George's
Day, and a lecture on The War and the Future which he delivered up
and down America from January to August of last year. Since then
many things have happened. But nothing has happened that can make Mr.
MASEFIELD other than proud of the part he has played in explaining and
glorifying his country's cause and commending it to the hearts and
minds of all good Americans. I confess that when I took up the book
and read the first few lines I was afraid that Mr. MASEFIELD had
yielded to the temptation of delivering his speech in poetical prose
of a faintly Biblical character, as thus: "Friends, for a long time
I did not know what to say to you in this my second speaking here. I
could fill a speech with thanks and praise--thanks for the kindness
and welcome which have met me up and down this land wherever I have
gone, and praise for the great national effort which I have seen in so
many places and felt everywhere." Mr. MASEFIELD however soon abandoned
this manner and made the rest of his way in a good solid pedestrian
style. But he did not disdain to go so far in flattery of the
Americans, his audience, as to use the word "gotten" for the past
tense of the verb "to get."

* * * * *

There can be few Irishmen who look at their England