18 NOVEMBER 1893, Page 37

Something Wrong. By E. Nesbit. (A. D. Innes.)—The first of

these eight short stories is in the manner of Edgar Poe, whose influence, indeed, seems, with or without the author's consciousness, to have affected the whole book. But there is much that has come into fashion since Poe's time. He could not have written anything so bitterly cynical as the "Blue Rose." "A Grand Piece of Work" might be read with good effect at certain mining villages in Yorkshire and elsewhere.