10 MARCH 1888, Page 45

Only a Coral Girl. By Gertrude Ford. 3 vols. (Hurst

and Blackett.)—Keith Ronaldson woos and weds a beautiful girl of Capri, a coral-seller, whom he sees on the steps of his hotel. He takes her home to England, where she, having a marvellous faculty for adapting herself to the ways of the new world into which she is brought, and of really educating herself in things more important than social observances, holds her own very well. Add to these cir- cumstances of the story a weak husband, a noble-minded friend—who would do his best for the husband, while he regards the wife with a pare affection—and an old lover of her early youth, who cannot forget that, as he thinks, he has been robbed of one who by right belonged to him, and you have the elements of the drama which Miss Ford brings with no little skill upon the stage.