The Lord Hermitage. By James Grant. 3 vols. (Chatto and
Windns.)—We suppose that this novel was written at a time when authors, "royal and noble " or other, were doing their best to stir up the mind of the British public against Russia. Hence to a story of the ordinary kind, in which we have a villanous noble, a disowned mar- riage, and two gallant young fellows finding out that they have nothing, not even a name, in tho world, we have added a story of the Crimean, war. Russian officers figure as spies, as murderers of the wounded in every character of savagery and wickedness. There is a time to remember such things, so far as they are true, and a time to forget them. Very likely Mr. Grant differs from us about the appli- cation of the maxim. He certainly has chosen a time for re- membering which would not have seemed expedient to us. Apart from this, the book is sufficiently readable. The young hero is a fine fellow, we follow his brave career with interest, all the more eagerly because it is connected with some of the most gallant victories that our armies have ever achieved, and we are glad when he comes by his own. As for Salome, we cannot allow, as a justification of Mr. Grant's very curious creation, the quotation from Lord Lytton :—" I have availed myself of the marvellous agencies which have ever been at the com- mand of the fabulist." A Wandering Jewess is indeed a monstrum horrendum.
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