14 DECEMBER 1929, Page 35

Despite the perseverance of his twenty volumes, the writing of

James Branch Cabell remains unaltered, and is an acquired taste. So also are the pen drawings of Frank C. Pape. If one likes either (and there is some reason to suppose they both command a rapturous public), then one can like both. Some- thing about Eve (The Bodley Head, 250 is a good example of this peculiar combination. Mr. Cabell's prose resembles the turbulent dreams of a precocious adolescent • Mr. Pape's illustrations, notwithstanding their liveliness and furtive wit, remain inadequate in drawing and feeble in design.

* * * *