Betty and Co. By Ethel Turner (Mrs. H. R. Curlewis).
(Ward, Lock, and Co.)—The first of these twelve stories, which gives its name to the book, is the best, as it is the longest. The children of a doctor's widow set up a shop to help out their mother's slender income. Commonly, these efforts have a romantic success—in fiction. The mistake is not made here. The venture prospers, but not till there have been disappoint- ments, and it has been abundantly proved that trade will not flourish except according to trade methods. This is a good tale. Some of the other pieces are needlessly painful for a book of this kind. "The Silence Broken," for instance, is one which we should not wish a child to read,—and the book is presumably written for children.—Three Rascals. By Raymond Jacberns. (Macmillan and Co. 4s. 6d.)—Three mischievous children, more pleasant to read about than to deal with in actual life ; a surly squire, who turns out to be far less disagreeable and hard-hearted than his reputation ; a very well-behaved little lady, and her brother, a studious lad, who makes the best of a feeble body, are the chief characters in this book. These stories are bound to produce a certain sense of exaggeration. Children who lived in the con- tinuous trouble and mischief that have to be crowded into the limited space of a story would be quite unendurable. But this is a decidedly amusing story, and the illustrations are particularly good.
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