The Enchanted Garden. By Maud Stepney Rawson. (Methuen and Co.
6s.)—The charm of this story consists chiefly in the description of a beautiful Spanish garden in an island in mid.: Atlantic. The.island—" San Carlos"—appears to be one of the Madeira group, though, Madeira being also mentioned, it is obviously not intended for that place. The picture of the mixture of hotel and Spanish society is cleverly drawn, and many of the personages of the book are attractive. The author makes the most of the privilege of the modern novelist, and gives us a heroine, Joanna Hurst, Of the ripe age of thirty-five. The episode of the abduc- tion of Joanna, by. her worthless husband is exciting ; but the husband cannot be called a lifelike portrait, as he is not even credited with the qualities of his defects. The style of the book is excellent, and the descriptions of the climate and of Joanna's flowers are calculated to make the British gardener's mouth water when he is battling with the weather conditions of the average English summer.
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