Rips Corn. By S. C. Nethersole. (Mills and Boon. Cis.)
—This novel is, on the whole, a worthy successor to Miss Nether- sole's former book. "Mary up at Gaffries." The story of the
ancient family of Laqueste is given in great detail, and the studies of the old Yeoman and of the only remaining male Laqueste, his great-nephew Jim, are cleverly delineated and diversified, considering what great points of likeness there are between the two men. The story has altogether a pleasant and authentic flavour of the country, and the village life at Salt, though only outlined, is well realized. It is to be hoped, however, that the figures of the dealer in old clothes, Mrs. Sweetlove and her daughter Glady-Alice, are not usually to be found in English village life. Jim's mother, the unhappy Matilda, weak, extravagant and furtive, is portrayed with almost painful realism; but it is somewhat hard to believe that the circumstances of her downfall would ever have been allowed to separate Jim Laqueste and his early love, Jane Tallboys. They both seem of a material too sturdy for trivial misunderstandings, and the reader will have an uneasy feeling that five minutes' conversation between them would have cleared up the whole matter and led to their marriage much earlier in the book.
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