background;
secondly, the loose construction that allows the tale to be continually
turning back to look behind it. He would keep a lover in the act of
embracing the lady of his heart while he explains what the parents of
each died of, and all that has happened since. Still, _The New Dawn_
remains an unconventional and strongly written story, which will
certainly interest though perhaps hardly enliven you.

* * * * *

There is something very soothing in the peeps into dusty family papers
and the faint echoes of departed gossip which Mrs. STIRLING provides in
_A Painter of Dreams_ (LANE). These pleasantly amateurish historical
studies go back a century and a half. A commonplace book from which are
quoted many diverting and incredible things; a chapter in which those
queer Radicals, HORNE TOOKE, COBBETT, Sir FRANCIS BURDETT and bluff
Squire BOSVILLE, are chiefly concerned; a sketch of the fourth Earl of
ALBEMARLE, keen farmer and friend of COKE of Norfolk, Master of the
Horse to WILLIAM IV. and QUEEN VICTORIA (it is to ALBEMARLE in this
capacity that the IRON DUKE said: "The Queen can make you go inside the
coach, or outside the coach, or run behind it like a d----d tinker's
dog"), winner of the Ascot Gold Cup three years running and stiff-backed
autocrat; an account of the beautiful Misses CATON of Baltimore and
their matrimonial adventures--the American invasion of brides bringing
money and beauty in exchange for titles thus dating back to 1816; some
details of the lives of two artists, JOHN HERRING, animal painter, and
RODDAM SPENCER STANHOPE, one of the lesser pre-Raphaelites and the
painter of dreams referred to in the title--these all make up an
agreeable pot-pourri with an old-world fragrance which ought to be able
to charm you out of the preposterous nightmare of the present. But it
makes one feel old to see that the conscientious author thinks that
DICKY DOYLE now needs a footnote to let the present generation know who
he was.

* * * * *

From the Catalogue of a V.T.C. Tailor.

"'I am,' a V.T.C. Secretary writes, 'in correspondence with the
undertaker, and hope at last to induce the War Office to
recognise us by sending a representative to attend our funeral
rites.'"

* * * * *

"One man of four who escaped the bombs."--_Morning Paper._

A little too old for the baby-killers.

*