Jack's Mate. By Noel West. (Gardner, Darton, and Co.)— This
is a fresh and readable story of ranch life in one of the Western States. It relates the life of a cultivated family, of course, and not so much the actual cowboy life as the routine that goes on round the homestead. There is some excitement, for Jack captures a noted horse-thief, and the small boy, Charlie, falls in with escaped convicts. Charlie's enjoyment of the ranch life—he is a delicate boy sent out for his health—is pleasant reading. The story certainly gives the reader a fair idea of the sunny side of Western ranching life, and has some capital de- scriptions of a storm, a round-up, and a short trip of the two heroes to the mountains to prospect for gold. Noel West makes, we see, the timber-wolves " pack " when pursuing the prospectors. This is so unlikely, even with timber-wolves, that he has no legitimate right to introduce the episode in a story descriptive of Western life.
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