tory, which (pardon me) I do not
mean to tell. If it is no tremendous matter, it will at least please an
idle hour, which will be almost time enough for you to enjoy every word
of it.

_These Lynnekers_ (CASSELL) is yet another example of the "family" novel
whose increasing popularity I have lately noticed. It is a clever and
interesting story--the name of Mr. J. D. BERESFORD assured me in advance
that it would be--and, when it is finished, the characters go on living
and speaking in one's mind, which is, I suppose, a sound proof of their
vitality. Yet in a sense vitality was just what most of the _Lynneker_
tribe chiefly lacked. They were an ancient and honourable house,
country-born to the third and fourth generation, and all of them far too
conventional and apathetic and fuss-hating ever to follow any but the
line of least resistance. All of them, that is, except _Dickie_, who was
the youngest of his father's numerous progeny, and in more senses than
one a sport. How _Dickie_ released himself from the shackles of family
tradition, how he grew up and bustled things about, and generally made a
real instead of a conventional success--this is the matter of the tale.
All the characters are well-drawn, and about _Dickie_ himself there is a
compelling virility that rushes you along in his rather tempestuous
wake. I am not sure that I altogether believe in his attitude towards
the question of sex. He appeared to think generally too little, and on
occasions remarkably too much, about it. Also the painful detail with
which the author lingers over the death of old _Canon Lynneker_ (that
attractive and human figure of ecclesiastical gentility) roused me to
resentment. When will our novelists learn that, as regards the physical
side of mortality, reticence is by far the better part of realism? This
marred a little my pleasure in a story for whose quality and workmanship
I should else have nothing but praise.

* * * * *

In _To Ruhleben--and Back_ (CONSTABLE), Mr. GEOFFREY PYKE has such a
fine yarn to spin of his foolhardy proceeding in walking right into the
eagle's beak as correspondent for an English newspaper, at the end of
September, 1914, and (after some months' solitary confinement in Berlin
and his transfer to the civilian prisoners' miserable internment camp at
Ruhleben) walking right out of it again, that one can forgive him for
spreading his elbows for a piece of expansive writing when h