by John Conroy Hutcheson
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This is rather an extraordinary book, because it consists of two
rather different eras in the lives of two brothers. In the
first the brother Fritz takes part in the Franco-Prussian war of
1870-71, and is severely wounded, but survives - just. He is
tended by a beauteous maiden, with whom he falls in love.
Meanwhile the brother Eric has gone to sea in what turns out to
be a rotten old vessel, which sinks in southern waters. There
are some survivors, but Eric is not among them, and is presumed
dead.
Fritz departs for America, and is wondering how to get a job. He
meets a whaling captain and they are having a chat in a bar when
who should appear but Eric, who has had a miraculous rescue, but
has never had a chance of writing home. The two brothers decide
they will get the whaling ship to drop them off on a very remote
island in the South Atlantic, Inaccessible Island, where they
will spend a year sealing, and make their fortunes from the
skins they get during the year.
There are many vicissitudes, and they do make their fortunes,
but not from sealing. There are so many tense situations, so
very well described, that the book might almost have come from
the pen of George Manville Fenn. A well-written and interesting
book, and with a very good description of the Franco-Prussian
War, the war which is so often forgotten about. N.H.
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