The Building of St. Barnabas. 2 vols. (Chapman and Hall.)—
Michael Warner, who has done very little in the way of good works during his lifetime, bequeaths £5,000 for the building of a new church, and £7,000 for its endowment, if the church should be finished within four years of his decease. His motive is to spite his nephew, one Stephen Rushworth, who, however, is to come in for the whole of the property (212,000 more being bequeathed to certain Church societies) if the condition of time is not fulfilled. There is some good description of the perplexities which beset the Vicar of Moreton (the town in which the new district church is to be built), in his endeavours to carry out the work ; and incidentally there are some fairly amusing sketches of Moreton society, the poor and second people of Old Moreton, the nouveaux riches of New Moreton, a creation of the " Central Counties Railway Company." But a great part of the novel is occupied with the misdoings of Stephen Rushworth, a most unmitigated villain. This is very unpleasant reading indeed, and spoils, to our mind, what would otherwise be a book of more than average merit.
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