South Sea Shipmates. By John Arthur Barry. (T. Werner Laurie.
6s.)—We are told in the biographical preface to Mr. Barry's book that it was left in manuscript form at the time his death. Perhaps if he had lived to revise the proofs he would have corrected those slips of grammar and writing which lessen considerably the artistic value of his stories ; or perhaps he felt that, after all, English style was of little importance in matters of thrilling, desperate adventure. At all events, those whose pleasure depends on the turn of a phrase, on what Stevenson calls "a web at once sensuous and logical, an elegant and pregnant texture," must take warning- by the title of the book, and leave it alone; but for those who, look for deeds, not words, it is excellent reading. Mr. Barry spent his youth at sea, in the Merchant Service, and knew the life of which he wrote ; he had, moreover, a fine, strong imagination which, with his good sense of humour, wrought and eolved most admirable situations, as when the League of Ancient Mariners took to the sea again, or when the neat little. craft hunted down a great derelict steamer, and ran out of coal, even as she lay alongside. Here, then, are capital stories, of the sea, in all her varying moods; now and again they may be a little overloaded with technicalities, but they bring with them, nevertheless, the smell of the brine and the freshness of the winds that blow.
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