FICTION.
• .1' at, LAST OF THE GRENVILLES.*
'WE owe " Bennet Copplestone " an apology for our delay in noticing the latest of the excellent books from his pen in which he acts as interpreter of the Spirit of the Navy, in peace as well as in war. The Last of the Grenvilles is, speaking strictly, a work of fiction ; it takes the form of a series of episodes in the life of a young friend of the narrator, hereditarily predestined by name and family traditions and Devonshire birth for the sea, but temporarily diverted by the deliberate choice of his father, a retired Commander. It was not an arbitrary or tyrannical decision on the part of Grenville pare, but a sincere desire to do the beat for the boy, that induced him to put Dickie into Lloyd's ; and it did not prevent Dickie from becoming an accom- plished yachtsman before entering his teens. The adventures of Dickie in his father's little yacht The Revenge' make up a small Odyssey in themselves : but they only serve as a fitting prelude to what happened when his father was given the com- mand of a converted liner in the war, and took Dickie with him as his chief Gunnery Officer. The book, as we have said, is a work of fiction, but it has a considerable substratum of fact. The stranding of the battleship on the. Shutter Rock recalls an actual occurrence—one of the tragedies of the Service—and the escape of Dickie and his father from the submarine is only a romantic illustration of the daily perils of those who go " down • The net.jLad slaw Greaviilea By Bennet Copplartona. London : John Murray. under " and the enterprising heroism of those who have devised means of meeting them. So in the concluding chapters the author has invented a most plausible explanation to account for Spees strange delay after CoroneL We regret that it should have been necessary to sacrifice Commander Grenville, who is the real hero of the book, but history had to repeat itself. Incidentally the episode is utilized to pay homage to the chivalry and generosity of Spee. The pre-war incidents include a diverting_" international complication " in which Commander Grenville got into trouble at Flushing and was extricated by the tact of the Admiralty and the Foreign Office. Other characters who contribute to the gaiety of the earlier pages are John, the Blue Marine, and his wife, and Betty, Dickie's sister, a " flapper " of a type wholesomely unlike the portent denounced by Dr. Arthur ShadwelL In the sentimental episode entitled " The Warm Haven " the author . challenges comparisons with " Bartimeus " and without success ; a lighter touch is needed. But with this deduction the book is a spirited and enjoyable performance.
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