3 OCTOBER 1931, Page 33

In THE BRONTRS WENT TO WOOLWORTH'S, (Benn, 7s. fid.), Miss-

Rachel Ferguson has written a book about a family's private code of humour : a remarkable feat, very successfully carried out. Mrs. Came, her three daughters, and their dog are a quintet gifted with great —at times rather overpowering—charm, and a surprising power of upholstering reality with fantasy. The most satisfying and sacred element of their lives is their elaborate but entirely imaginary relationship with a Mr. JuStice Toddington ; in the course of the book this develops into friendship on a more normal human plane, thereby losing, curiously enough, in verisimilitude and interest. The arbitrary inclusion of the Brontds is engineered on a vaguely psychic basis. It is the sort of book which will appeal to everyone except the distressingly literal-minded : even they can find compensation in the characters of two governesses who arc handled, poor things, in accordance with the more orthodox canons of fiction. The only other readers who are likely to object to it are those who, like myself, would prefer to see Miss Rachel Ferguson's very considerable powers of perception and her highly civilized, rather masculine humour employed to better purpose. What she has done she has done well. But she is already described as " of Punch." I hope she will fly higher next time.