6 MARCH 1875, Page 23

Katerfelto: a Story of Exmoor. By G. J. Whyte-Melville. (Chap-

man and Hall.)—We always enjoy the reading of Mr. Whyte-Melville's books, but for the occasional intrusion of a certain tone of levity and worldliness. And in the work before us he has got back to a province which he has made his own. For such books as " The Gladiators " he pre- pares himself to write not only with industry, but also with success; but sport and scenery are the subjects in which he is most at home, and in which he most excels. The most striking scene in Katerfelto, and the one for which, it might with a certain exaggeration be said, the book is written, is the great hunt, which is told in chapters 22 and 23, where " a warrantable deer " is hunted and brought to bay on Exmoor. " Plain John Garnet," the heir of the story, a West-country squire, with likings for the "King over the water ;" Parson Abner Gale, a specimen, only with an element of violence which has passed away, of the sporting Parsons of Devonshire ; Lord Bellinger, the fashionable noble, dissolute but brave, one of the author's favourite studies, these, and not a few other characters—the canvas is somewhat inconveniently filled with figures—are drawn with skill, and the plot is not wanting in interest. Altogether, Katerfelto is certainly a pleasant book to read.