Cut Adrift. By Albany Fonblanque. 3 vols. (Bentley.)—There is something
about this novel which reminds us—we wonder how many of our readers will be enlightened by the comparison—of Albert Smith's "Christopher Tadpole." The scene in which the hero insists upon being brought before the bench of magistrates is one of the resemblances which struck us. But the comedy is more genteel, and the tragic element is stronger. Mr. Fonblanque adheres in the construction of his plot to the expedient which recent novel - writers have commonly discarded, of making his hero turn out to be somebody's son. These discoveries are certainly very uncommon in real life, but they have the advantage of being less offensive than the murders and bigamies which may yet be more true to life. Murder, indeed, is an attraction which Mr. Foublanque does not disdain to use. He has introduced—it is not the first time, we fancy, that it has been seen in fiction—the Buckingham Street tragedy, and has done it with considerable ingenuity ; there is much power, too, about his description of the murderer's flight. It is not, however, the tale itself which will please, so much as the vivacity and force with which it is written. It is always readable, and sometimes exceedingly amusing.
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