s of the story rather than the development and
experience of the character dictated; but he did make me see and like
the fellow. _Mrs. Quinney,_ that faithful timid soul, is admirably
drawn, both in her courtship and her matronly days. But I found
_Quinney_ a little hypocritical in his denunciation of _Miggott_, the
chair-faker, who was not really sailing half so close to the wind or so
profitably as _Quinney_ and his bibulous friend of a dealer, _Tamlin._
There are some interesting side-lights upon the astonishing tricks of
the furniture trade, which are reflected by the authentic experience of
the bitten wise. An entertaining and clever book; but why, why should H.
A. V. drop from his Hill into the discreditable fellowship of those who
have misquoted "honoured in the breach"?

* * * * *

Anybody can understand how extremely annoying and inconvenient the
complete disappearance of a husband would be to a wife after a mere
fortnight or so of married existence, before he had even begun to
complain of the--well, anyhow that is what happens in Mrs. BELLOC
LOWNDES'S latest novel, _The End of Her Honeymoon_ (METHUEN). The
_Dampiers_ arrive in Paris, a Paris _en fete_ and crowded beyond all
custom because of the state visit of the TSAR, and are obliged to occupy
rooms on different floors of the _Poulains'_ hotel. Next morning _Mrs.
Dampier_ awakes to find herself in the awkward predicament of Ariadne on
the beach of Naxos, with the aggravation (spared to Theseus' bride) that
the hotel people absolutely deny that she came with a husband at all. A
punctilious if sceptical American senator (refreshingly guiltless of
accent) and his enthusiastic son and daughter take pity on her, and the
rest of the book resolves itself into a detective story, saved from
conventionality by the pleasantly distinguished style in which the
author writes and the intimate knowledge which she appears to possess of
the Paris _prefecture de police._ _Gerald Burton,_ the young American,
not entirely platonic in his solicitude, is baffled; _Salgas_, a famous
enquiry agent, is baffled; and I am ready to take very long odds against
the reader's unravelling the mystery, unless he happens to be familiar
with a certain legend of the plague (though no plague comes in here).
Indeed, it is only a chance conversation in the last chapter that throws
light, my dear Watson, on this particularly _bizarre_ affair. And what
then, you ask, h