Brothers. By Horace Annesley Vachell. (John Murray. Os.)— Mr. Vachell
has given us in his new novel two very remarkable studies of character. The contrast is finely drawn between the "Brothers" of the title,—Archibald, the handsome and outwardly successful figure, and Mark, whose bodily drawbacks deprive him of the benefits of his mental and spiritual superiority. The book is alive, not only with the portraits of these two men, but with a host of minor characters, with all of whom the reader makes close acquaintance, and all of whom are very minutely painted. The only things which do not ring quite true about the story are the reasons which actuate Mark in not speaking to the woman he loves till too late, and the conduct of Mark and the heroine Betty when she discovers that Mark is the real author of the thoughts and ideals for whose sake she has married his brother Archibald. The reader cannot believe that a man of Mark's spiritual nature would for a moment contemplate an elopement with his brother's wife. The means by which Betty is prevented from fulfilling this scheme are also not quite convincing ; and the whole episode is out of tone with a book which preaches the moral that success is the reward of the victories of the spirit, and that the verdict of the world is often given in direct contradictiOn to the facts,—contradiction of which the persons criticised are the
character-drawing. He is as unbearable in the novel as he would have been in real life, and that is saying a good deal. The book shows a marked advance on Mr. Vachell's earlier work, and is written with much vigour and conviction.
Nature's Comedian. By W. E. Norris. (Longmans and Co. 68.) —Mr. Norris has lately allowed the gentle pessimism which has
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