A Whaleman's Wife. By Frank T. Bullen. (Hodder and Stoughton.
6s.)—We are inclined to doubt whether Mr. Bullen shows his gifts to the best advantage when he writes a novel. He has many qualifications. Fla knows the sea, for instance, and can picture its moods and humours ; he has studied the " sailor man" at close quarters, and to good purpose ; and he writes always vigorously, and often with charm and real distinction. But he has strong convictions which somewhat interfere with the artistic development of his work. When a captain is in sore straits because he has been compelled to ship a crew who are positively unable to furl the sails, we resent being told, what is doubtless true, that the merchant service is ill-paid and unpopular. Nor do we see why in the very same chapter Matthew Arnold is singled out as the "high priest of the superior persons" who would "curl the lip of scorn at any sorely pressed human creature in his extremity of need lifting his heart in prayer to God for help." The man who wrote "Rugby School Chapel" would never have done anything of the kind. We quite understand why Mr. Bullen writes thus. He feels very strongly. But such writing is out of place in a novel. For all that, however, we have no doubt that Mr. Bullen's book will find plenty of readers. And he will deserve them, for he has never stooped to anything that is base in his literary work. It is always sane and wholesome, as well as readable.
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