15 JULY 1911, Page 25

Burning Daylight. By Jack London. (W. Heinemaim. 6s.— The title

of this novel is really the nickname of the hero, and the story opens at Klondike before the great rush. As usual, Mr. London's accounts of journeys in the extreme North, under- taken with sledges and dogs,. are most exciting, but when "Burning Daylight" has made his pile and comes to live in San Francisco, after one unfortunate incursion into the world of New York, the novel becomes much less romantic and interesting. People who like deseriptitats of American business life will doubt- lass find "Burning Daylight's" financial adventures amusing, bat the present writer confesses that Mr. Jack London is a far more delightful writer when he is listening to "the call of the wild." It is difficult to believe in the extraordinary piece of business dishonesty perpetrated against the hero by some of the most respected business people in New York, but it is to be supposed that such things have really occurred occasionally. By the way, Mr. Jack London makes a mistake as to that delightful idyll, The Wheels of Chance. It unfortunately does not run to hundreds of pages, being quite short, and it is also an error of judgment to call it simply s. love story. In it was heard the first echo of the charm which was felt by English people when the bicycle released them from always travelling by train and caused them, like their ancestors, to sing once more the song of the open road.