The Sewn Heroines of Christendom (W. Swan Sonnenschein), by Charles
Duke Yonge, is a very good example of the historico- biographical gift book, it being quite unnecessary to say that Mr. Yonge tells, in a way that is thoroughly suited to the youthful in- telligence, the different, but equally attractive, stories of Joan d'Arc, Margaret of Anjou, Isabella of Castilla, Charlotte, Countess of Derby, Maria Theresa, Flora Macdonald, and Mario Antoinette. 'The title of the book is, however, unfortunate and misleading. With the very doubtful exceptions of Joan d'Are and Isabella of Castille, none of the seven can be said to have been' a heroine of Christendom, in the sense that she devoted her- self to any cause really or nominally identified with Christ.
ianity. Then, again, Margaret of Anjou, while courageous to a fault, and the loyal defender of the rights of her husband and her family, did not exhibit the possession of those higher womanly qualities which should go at all events to the making of a heroine. As for Marie Antoinette, her death may have made a martyr of her, and she certainly bore the misfortunes of her later years with unflinching fortitude; but Mr. Yonge should have remembered the familiar stories of her youthful frivolities after she became Queen of France, before, echoing Berke, he de- scribed her as "one of the purest, bravest, and noblest of her sex, who, while in prosperity, was the pattern of every grace and every virtes."—Hubert d'Arcy, by N. Payne Gallwey ; Red and White, by Emily Sarah Holt ; Gold and Glory, by Grace Stebbing (all published by John F. Shaw and Co.), and Under the Blue Flag (S.P.O.K.) are romances, dealing with the times respectively of the Crusades, the Wars of the Roses, the Spanish conquest of Mexico, and Mon. mouth's rebellion ; and the writers of all have endeavoured to give them an air of historical reality, the most successful in this respect being, however, the authors of the second and fourth. There is plenty of life and incident in Hubert d'Arcy and Gold and Glory, but the plot is rather loosely constructed, and the narrative occasionally hangs fire.—Garnered Sheaves, by Mrs. Emma Raymond Pitman (Blaekie and Son), while well intentioned, is open to the charge of " gooditaess," from which "a tale for boys," as this is styled, should always be free. Ormond Lee, the Sunday-school teacher,who is its hero, if not exactly the " muff " he was styled by some of his own friends, is decidedly self-conscious, and his right hand knows too well what his left does. It may be suspected, moreover, that many of the boys, for whom the "tale" is intended, will only laugh at Lee's adventures in a music.hall in search of an errant pupil. Ile becomes decidedly more human, however, when he crosses the Atlantic, and actually gets married.—The Hut in the Bush, a Tale of Australian Ad- venture, 4•c., by Robert Richardson (Oliphant and Co., 'Edinburgh), is a collection of rather slight, but not unreadable stories. There is most promise in the first, which is, as the name would imply, the relation of a bush adventure in Australia. The author might write a good Australian novel, if ho could confine himself within the limits of one volume.—Garrick ; or, his Own Fault, by Yotty Osborn, and Bertie's Wanderings, by Ismay Thorn (John F. Shaw), are good, healthy, and natural stories of the adventures of children in the realms of the subjective rather than of the objective. We prefer Berths to Garrick, however, because she is full of mischief, and because she brings about a, family reconciliation, although in a somewhat common-place way.
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