The Lonely Plough. By Constance Holme. (Mills and Boon. 6s.)—There
are, as it were, three separate lines of interest in Miss Holme's book. First, there is the company of Lancashire farmers, rooted to the land, and drawing from it all their strength, in spite of wranglings and fears and the grave peril of the uncertain sea-wall—a question in itself sufficiently matter-of-fact, but filled by the writer with immense and dramatic interest; there is the circle of uncon- genial London folk, gathered at the big house, with the delightful personality of Dandy Anne, her love affairs, the pleasant sense of her refinement set against the stubborn coarseness of the land; lastly, and deserving of the highest praise, there is the land itself, the tranquil rolling land, the sky and sea and fields seen through the " green gates of vision" between the bushes in the lane. Miss Holme is an accomplished artist, who weaves and mingles her varying threads without a rough place or an abrupt transition. She contrives, moreover, to use admirable English, which only needs to be deprived of a few of its crowded metaphors, and she deals thus capably and fearlessly with the difficult dialect : "But I'll tell you what it is—you're an over-throng, fidging, meddling jimmy-lang-neck, as teptious as a wa 'up 1"
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