From Behind the Arras. By Mrs. Philip Champion de Crespigny.
(T. Fisher Unwin. Os.) —At first sight it seems a strange thing to recommend an author by saying that he or she has never written anything before. So might a tailor say of a coat that the cutter-out had been exercising his art for the first time. Still, the venture may justify itself. Some novelists have never again equalled their first venture. The plot of Prom Behind the Arras is familiar. The heroine is a young French lady, and a marriage with which she is not satisfied has been arranged for her. The situation is complicated by various circumstances; as by the obscurity that hangs over her father's fate, and by intrigues which have for their object the young lady's fortune. The author has certainly contrived to make an effective story, not always, perhaps, as clear as it might be, but full of well-told adventure, and not wanting in interest.
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