A Mingled Yarn. By Mrs. Henry Mackarness. 3 vols. (Bentley.)
—Mrs. Mackaimess is the author of a charming little book which every one who may have read it must remember with pleasure, "A Trap to Catch a Sunbeam." We gladly allow that there are passages in A Mingled Yarn which have something of the charms of that story, but the whole must be pronounced to be a failure. The three-volume story seems too much for the writer's strength ; there is nothing like enough material to give proper substance to so extensive a work. The story opens with introducing us to Mistress Medlicott," the maiden aunt and guardian of the fair daughters of the Duke of Claverton, deceased ; to the young ladies themselves, and to a handsome young stranger, who has to take an important part in the story. In the second chapter we make the acquaintance of another family ; and these, their loves and sorrows, occupy us for nine hundred pages and more. We will not say that the book is positively tedious. It is pleasantly written, for the most part, and the people in it are made to talk naturally, and even with a certain liveliness, and such talking is not perhaps more tiring to read about than to listen to. A reader perfectly at leisure, who thinks that quiet love-making should be the staple of a novel, will find satisfaction in A Mingled Yarn.
Previous page
