The Parson o' Rumford. By George Manville Fenn. (Chapman and
Hall.)—We had believed that the muscular parson had finally disappeared out of fiction, it is so long since he has been met with in a novel ; the old days of Marmion Savage and Charles Kingsley seem to be so very long ago. They were good, wholesome, cheery days, and in them everybody was ever so much younger, and more enthusiastic, and believing, and hoping. There is a breath of their keen, fresh, breezy air in Mr. Manville Fenn's novel, and we welcome it, with its revival of old associations, and its vigour and vitality. Mr. Manville Fenn's muscular parson and Christian,. Murray Sel wood, is an exceedingly flue follow ; the scenes of working life amid which he toils are full of interest, the plot is well con- structed, the tone of the book is elevated, without being sentimental or extravagant. Altogether, The Parson o' Dumford is a novel of mark, and much the best which Mr. Fenn has yet written.
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