Luck at the Diamond-Fields. By Dalrymple J. Belgrave. (Ward and
Downey.)—The volume contains thirteen short stories, relating the experiences of diggers, sportsmen, speculators, and gamblers of various kinds at the Kimberley diamond-mines. Swindling in many varieties seems pretty rife there, and the " turf " is as fertile of fraud as it is elsewhere. Still, the place is "not so barren of virtue as not to furnish noble examples,"—e.g., when Charlie Lumsden picks up, unseen by any human eye, a big diamond in a dead man's claim, and hands it over for the benefit of his unknown heirs. It is satisfactory to find another honest finder getting his reward in "A Vaal River Heiress." This is, to our mind, far the best, as it is the pleasantest to read, of all the stories. "A Compact," with its mixture of the supernatural, is an effective story.
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