6 JANUARY 1877, Page 29

'Through Fire and Water. By Lady Wood. 2 vols. (Chapman

and Hall.)—This is a romantic story of two girls, one of whom is carried off by gipsies, the other brought up by the Lady of the Manor. It does not differ, except in the general cleverness in which Lady Wood is never wanting, from any of the hundred-and-one stories of of the same kind which it has been our duty to read before. The only criticism which it occurs to ne to make on it is that we quite need the occasional reminders which Lady Wood gives us of the scene being laid in the seventeenth century. There is very little characteristic of the time, except the trial for witchcraft. The various personages talk very much as they might do nowadays.