The Substitute. By Will N. Harben. (Harper and Brothers. 6s.)—The
main plot of this dory is the love of George Buckley for Lydia Cranston. He has everything against him,—poverty, a disreputable father, and a temptation, at one time very strong, to those "baser courses" which are the "children of despair." And she belongs to an old Virginian family that holds itself very high. We have seldom seen a plot worked out with more delicacy and skill. Perhaps we might say that George is a trifle unreason- able, and blinds his eyes to things which the reader, at least, sees very clearly. But lovers have that way, especially in fiction, which, indeed, could hardly dispense with this help. And then there are many other things in the book that are worth reading, minor characters who interest us not much less than the princi- pals themselves, and a ceaseless flow of humorous talk and anecdote. Truitt, the "mountaineer," is particularly admirable in this way. He is puzzled, as other people are, by the "riddle of the universe," and finds something of a solution in this reflec- tion : "The Almighty made the skunk, an' the feller may be so perfect in his way, that he is actually pleasing to an Omnipotent Eye."
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