25 JUNE 1898, Page 14

Poppy. By Mrs. Isla Sitwell. (T. Nelson and Sons.)— Everything,

doubtless, was for the best in the little life-drama which Mrs. Sitwell causes to be enacted before us in this volume. Still, we cannot help wishing that Poppy had had a happier lot. It is hard to hold on tc optimistic views of life in the face of facts, but if there is a time when one ought to be allowed to do it, it is when we are reading books of this kind. If these tales, also, are to be infected with melancholy they will become unbearable.