Under Pressure. By T. E. Pemberton. 2 vols. (Samuel Tinsley.)—
There is no great harm about this work, but it has the great fault of being without any discernible purpose or meaning. Hugh Haslip, the son of a wealthy farmer, wants to rise in life, and finds a help in the father of a school friend, Mr. Ingledew. As a matter of fact, he does not rise, but then he is just as well off without rising, for which, indeed, he was not very well fitted. His father leaves him plenty of money, and he marries a very pretty and amiable girl, who is, indeed, the niece of the landlady of his lodgings, but is quite good enough, and indeed too good, for him. In fact, she turns out to be a lady by birth. There is, of course, a tragical element in the story, a seduction and a murder, but they are disposed of as unobjectionably as possible. By the way, is it not a little odd for a young gentleman to ask a lady to find a place in her household for a very pretty girl in whom he is interested? Given the man with impudence enough, where should we find the lady who would not open her eyes? But there are some little oddities in the book. Surely a dinner party at which Hugh is introduced into the society of "some fifty people" was a little more than large. This is, of course, the merest trifle, but if a writer when he takes a pen into his hands so loses his wits that be cannot remember the maximum number of atlinner party, what are we to think
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