One for the Other : Stories of French Life. By
Esme Stuart. 3 vols. (Ward and Downey.)—Miss Esme Stuart is one of the few literary artists who work with equal success upon a large and a small canvas ; but if the question were not one of praise, but of personal preference, we should be inclined to put these short stories even above her novels. Most of them are in the minor key, but their pathos is not harrowing ; it is sweet and tender, and we are conscious less of sadness than of beauty. The title-story does not seem to us so good as some of its companions, for though it is very pretty and graceful, M. Baptiste has a certain air of unreality ; he is "too bright and good for human nature's daily food." Miss Stuart, however, is probably wise in not giving us her best first, and in "The Cure of Saindol " we have a story in which the imaginative truthfulness is as noteworthy as the grace and charm of the literary handling.
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