11 NOVEMBER 1893, Page 22

Personal Reminiscences. By It. M. Ballantyne. (Nisbet and Ballantyne tells

us very pleasantly how he came to write books. Abundant leisure as a clerk in the service of the Hudson's Bay Company suggested the writing, first of long letters home, and then of a tale. Then we hear from him how, baying once taken up the occupation of literature, he proceeded to make various subjects his own, how he went out in a life-boat tug, spent his nights in a fireman's station, &c. Unfortunately he breaks of in these reminiscences, which are full of interest, and for a reason—ill-health—that we greatly regret. The vacant

space in his volume is filled up with some short stories, good enough in their way, but not so good, it will readily be believed, as the pages which the writer transcribes from his own life.