Happy Days, Essays of Sorts. By E. CE. Somerville and
Martin Ross. (Longmans. Ids. 6d.)
Dr. SOMERVILLE has given a sub-title to her new book Happy Days. " Essays of Sorts " is a recognition of the fact that these writings have been reassembled from a number of different fields and are, indeed, something of a jumble. Horses, dogs, hounds and Irish aunts are mixed up with tourist memories of France, Spain and Sicily. Nor are these writings much in the manner of essays. They are not carefully designed, neither are they neatly argued. They tumble out in a stream of digressions like friendly conversation, and whether the reader likes them or no will depend upon what Dr. Somerville happens to be conversing. about. She is furthest away in her anecdotes of Sicily, Spain and France. Her experiences there were not much different from other people's, and in consequence her descriptions are too like letters home, letters to friends who can savour the stories more easily than the alien reader may. But when Dr. Somerville turns to her own land and her own subject, when she writes about the things nearest to her affections, nearest to her experience, then she stands extraordinarily close to the reader and seems to speak to him. Her sketches of period aunts and period entertaining, her descriptions of days with the Quorn and the West Carbery, are as vivid and as exciting as if she were telling the stories in her own voice. Happy Days is an assortment of mixed quality, but no one with happy memories of the Somerville and Ross books will wish to miss it.
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