18 AUGUST 1894, Page 26

In the Meshes. By Florence Severne. (Osgood, MoIlvaine, and Co.)—The

characters in this story are strong and well defined, and the plot is well worked out. Romayne, the clever and unscrupulous doctor, who is seen to be capable of a great love, and who retains our admiration and respect to the last, is a fine character, perhaps a little too highly coloured, but not inordinately so. The incident of the poison is a trifle weak. How wns the actual poisoner to know that the woman, a chronic sufferer, who took the medicine containing the poison, might not want her chloral at any moment ? She was the last person he wanted to kill, yet he, a doctor himself, is represented as trusting to the fact that she was not likely to take it on a certain day !