21 JUNE 1890, Page 23

Cross - Roads. By May Crommelin. 3 vols. (Thirst and Blackett.)—The cross-roads

are, of course, the old opposites, " Love " and " Duty," which are represented, indeed, on the cover, in deplorably diverse directions. Margaret Aylmer is the daughter of a certain baronet, as wicked as the baronets of fiction commonly are. Her love-affairs are the subject of these volumes,—three, which, it is scarcely necessary to say, might have been advan- tageously compressed into one. We confess to having found very little to interest us in it; but there is something pathetic in the repentance of the old man. The steady brother, Aylmer, is held up to reprobation ; but why he should have cut off the entail the dispassionate reader will not find it easy to discover.