22 JUNE 1878, Page 24

Winna. A Novel. (Charing Cross Publishing Company.)—In spite of very

faulty construction, and a curiously blundering style, we are disposed to speak favourably of this story, mainly because it is, that best of all things in a novel, interesting. The people are almost all of them what are generally called "nice," and although they have their " little weaknesses," they never scare us by getting into any serious scrapes, or into doubtful company. The scene of the first half of the story is laid in Italy, at the house of an English baronet, Sir Edward Gurney, who has forsaken his Devonshire home for the banks of the Arno. To him enter his nephew and heir, Frank Gurney, and his niece Winna, who have arranged to meet their widowed moth& on her way from India at Florence. The society of Florence seems to bo cleverly sketched, without any attempt at word-painting or picturesque writing. The young Gurneys return to England, he to take possession of the family living, their return being precipitated by the unacceptable love-making of an Italian nobleman to Winne. The scene changes to the Devonshire village, and here our author is on ground more familiar, and therefore, perhaps, on some accounts, more difficult. She (we feel sure the author is a lady) continues to entertain us by bright passages of shrewd obser-

vation and characterisation ; Frank's troubles with his Dissenting parishioners particularly amuse us, in spite of the evidently narrow and prejudiced point of view of our author. Eventually Sir Edward a'so comes home and dies, and Winna marries the curate. It is not important to name all the minor figures of the story ; as the author says, they are merely "sketched," yet they each have an individuality. Our readers will see that strength of narrative is not the most notable point of !Firma, yet the interest hardly ever flags, and the story is readable and thoroughly pleasant throughout. The ending is unnecessarily disappointing. There is surely no occasion for the Ewarts (Winna and her husband) to emigrate to Central Africa, we should have liked Frank to marry his pretty convert, and some others might have been provided for ; but this might have involved a third volume, so we cry content.