assed as fiction or not they contain facts, and as they
are written in a style at once vivid and engaging my advice to you is
to read them and not worry too much about the foreword.

* * * * *

_The Four Corners of the World_ (HODDER AND STOUGHTON) is emphatically
what I should call a fireside book. On these chill Autumn evenings,
with the rain or the dead leaves or the shrapnel whirling by outside,
you could have few more agreeable companions than Mr. A.E.W. MASON,
when he is, as here, in communicative mood. He has a baker's dozen of
excellent tales to tell, most of them with a fine thrill, out of which
he gets the greatest possible effect, largely by the use of a crisp
and unemotional style that lets the sensational happenings go their
own way to the nerves of the reader. As an example of how to make the
most of a good theme, I commend to you the story pleasantly, if not
very originally, named "The House of Terror." Before now I have been
ensnared to disappointment by precisely this title. But Mr. MASON'S
House holds no deception; it genuinely does terrify; and when at the
climax of its history the two persons concerned see the door swing
slowly inwards, and "the white fog billowed into the room," while
"Glyn felt the hair stir and move upon his scalp," I doubt not that
you will almost certainly partake of some measure of his emotion.
Naturally, in a mixed bag such as this, one can't complain if the
quality of the contents varies. Not all the tales reach the level of
"The House of Terror"; but in every one there is enough artistry to
occupy any spare half-hour you may have for such purposes, without
letting you feel afterwards that it was wasted. And as a hospital
present the collection could hardly be beaten.

* * * * *

Miss MARJORIE BOWEN'S historical romances usually have the merit of
swift movement, and that is precisely the quality I miss in _The Third
Estate_ (METHUEN). It does not march--at least not quick enough.
You will not need to be told that Miss BOWEN has saturated herself
conscientiously in her period--an intensely interesting period
too--and has contrived her atmosphere most competently and plausibly.
But for all that I couldn't make myself greatly interested in the bold
bad Marquis DE SARCEY in those anxious two years before "the Terror,"
with his insufferable pride, his incredible elegance, his fantastic
ideas of love and his idiotic