_Hard Luck_, by ARTHUR A BECKETT, begins a trifle slow, but works up to
an exciting climax, of which the secret is so profoundly kept, up till
the very last moment, that not the most experienced in sensational plots
would discover it. Capitally managed. It is one of the Arrowsmith
Series, and a genuinely artistic shilling shocker.
_A Black Business._ By HAWLEY SMART. Uncommonly smart of him bringing it
out just at this time, when the talk everywhere is about the Slave
Trade, the struggle for Colonial life, STANLEY, and the Very Darkest
Africa. There's Black Business enough about. Smart chap HAWLEY.
The only thing I've to say against the _Remarks of Bill Nye_, in one
volume, says the Baron, is the size of the book, which is as big as a
family Bible. Nowadays, when busy men can only snatch a few seconds _en
route_, the handy volume is the only really practicable form of
literature. I'd rather have three small pocketable volumes of BILL NYE'S
essays and stories than this one cumbersome work, which, once on the
shelf, runs a pretty good chance of being left there. The majority of
BILL NYE'S sayings are very amusing, and one of his short papers shows
that the humorist can be pathetic on occasion without falling into mock
sentiment. It is published by NEELY, of New York, and, if reduced in
bulk, the _Remarks of Bill Nye_ ought to do very well here, even among
those who, for want of familiarity with American slang, do not keenly
appreciate American humour. The Baron does appreciate it when it is
genuine American humour, but when the peculiar style is only copied by a
journalistic 'ARRY, with whom the stupidest and most vulgar Yankeeisms
pass for the highest wit, simply because they are Yankeeisms, then for
this sort of imitation the Baron has no criticism sufficiently severe.