Still Unsure. By C. Vane. (Samuel Tinsley).—The most satisfac- tory
thing about this story is that it is in one volume. Yet even in that comparatively small compass the author contrives, besides the story, to pack an amazing quantity of moralising and a selection of extracts from his (or her) favourite writers sufficient to fill a moderate- sized volume. Of course, all sensible persons (if any such venture on reading Still Unsure) will skip the moralising, yet on so very fine a thread of incident does the story depend that there will be hardly anything left. A child of eighteen, with the usual sylph-like form, becomes prematurely engaged to be married to a substantial, middle- aged, and very common-place country squire. But before her marriage she becomes accidentally acquainted with a very romantic and uncom- mon-place artist, and of course the fitness of things demands that they fall very deeply in love. When Alice, the sylph-like child, marries Hugh, " the superior, excellent landlord and owner," we know almost to a certainty what must happen. It will be a case either of broken hearts or broken necks. So strong is our presentiment, that we cannot bear to hear of Hugh journeying by railway, or fishing by the sea, or donning his scarlet coat, without nervously fearing that his hour has come. In this case, the particular catastrophe which clears the way is thus described : —"Hugh at this moment lies where his horse trampled over him, a lifeless heap." As this does not occur till within two or three pages of the end, the widow has only just time to say to the artist that "Love is enough," and let all end happily. Besides the moralising, this story is disfigured by countless faults of style and grammar, and such pre- posterous amplifications of old saws as this, " Second experiences often disillusionise preceding ones." We cannot recommend Still Unsure.
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