ke up for this the
author has gifted them with his own exquisite sense of colour and words,
and especially a feeling for the beauty of London that at times almost
reconciles them to life. But I could wish them merrier.

* * * * *

Mr. HAROLD SPENDER'S new novel, _One Man Returns_ (MILLS AND BOON),
opens with a very powerful and dramatic situation. Nothing in its way
could be better than the description of the lonely _Trevena_ family, of
their vigil during the terrible storm, of the shipwreck and the sudden
arrival of the two strangers, father and son, who are its only
survivors. The father dies immediately without revealing his identity,
and the son, slowly nursed back to health by the devoted care of _Enid
Trevena_, resumes his life without any consciousness of the past, having
forgotten even his own name. As a matter of fact he is _Cyril Oswald_,
the lawful inheritor of Oswald Hall and great estates, which, of course,
pass into the possession of the nearest villain. This is _Major Harley_,
a gentleman of a lurid past and an infamous present, mitigated only by
the fact that he has a beautiful and amiable daughter, _Dorothy_, who,
having been educated at Roedean School, conceives herself to be
qualified to run after beagles. In the natural course of things she
sprains her ankle and is beloved by _Rupert Sandford_, the chief beagler
of the novel. She then quarrels with her disgraceful parent, is adopted
by _Mrs. Sandford_ (mother to _Rupert_), and becomes the affianced bride
of _Rupert_, though for a time she had been inclined to look with favour
on _Cyril_. This young gentleman eventually recovers his estates by
course of law and returns to Cornwall and _Enid_ just in time to cut out
that young lady from under the guns of _Merrifield_, a South African
millionaire who had complicated the situation by providing _Cyril_ with
money for his law-suit. What happened to _Major Harley_ is not stated,
but I presume he must have drunk off the phial of poison which such
desperate adventurers always carry concealed about their persons.

* * * * *

"The matrimonial career of suburban lovers," says Miss JESSIE POPE in a
prologue to _The Tracy Tubbses_ (MILLS AND BOON), "is seldom variegated
by so many curious happenings as fell to the lot of Mr. and Mrs. _Tracy
Tubbs_;" and to this statement I can give my unqualified assent. No
sooner were the _T. T.'s_ married than they