Dorothea. By Maarten Maartens. (A. Constable and Co. 6s.)— The
author calls his book " a story of the pure in heart," and the reader, while acknowledging the truth of this description of the heroine, will regret that she has been placed in situations so very unsuitable to her particular character. The unfortunate Dorothea all through the book is obliged not only to consort with, but to stand in a position of the closest relationship to, a number of persons who can only be described as " riff-raff." The man she marries, indeed, is quite undeserving of this description ; but some of his relations are atrocious, and Dorothea's father and stepmother come under the same category. As they all live on the most intimate terms, Dorothea has an anything but pleasant time. Mr. Maartens appears to imagine that Dorothea has an exceptional character, and that all the others are commonplace people whom one is liable to meet every day. This may be so at Monte Carlo and other places where the idle rich resort, but it is certainly not the case in everyday life. Dorothea. would have been happy enough as the wife of a hard-working professional man, and, had she been English, need have been troubled by no questions as to whether it was right for her husband to be his brother's second in a most iniquitous duel.
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