OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
In consequence of the taking in or taking out of Nobodies' luggage, the train had been considerably delayed, and this delay had been protracted by the thirsty condition of the panting and enfeebled engine. Stopping to water the horses in the olden days took much less time, I should imagine, than stopping to supply the engine with water in our own day. Be this as it may, the stoppages had already been considerable, and the Baron was ruminating on the best method of passing his valuable time for the next two hours, when it occurred to him that in his bag he had been carrying about for some time past three books, in the hope that there might occur some opportunity, of which the Baron could avail himself, to peruse these works, and remark upon them for the benefit of the select reading public. He took up the first, read a few sketches of Our Churchwardens, but failing to appreciate the subject, returned it to the bag, and went in for Monsignor. Perhaps the weak state of health in which our engine found itself, had not been improved by the additional weight imposed on it, owing to having to carry Monsignor. "Uncommonly heavy," said the Baron, when he arrived at the hundredth page; "I will keep it in reserve for my lighter and gayer moments, when timely repression may be necessary." So saying, he restored this to the same receptacle, and made another dip in the lucky bag. This time he brought to the surface The Case of George Candlemas, by GEORGE SIMS. Very nearly giving it up was the Baron, on account of its title, so suggestive of the usual vein of shilling shockers, and very glad is he that he did not do so, as for the next hour and a quarter not only was the Baron really interested, but highly amused, and it would have done the heart of GEORGE SIMS, of Horrible London and other emotional tales, good to have seen the Baron chuckling over this capital short story, which is as ingenious as it is genuinely droll. It belongs to the same genus as the Danvers Jewels, though, in this latter, the idea of the character of the narrator is more humorously conceived than is Mr. SIMS's Baronet who acts as an amateur detective. The Baron highly recommends this story, as he also does a short tale in Blackwood, for this month, entitled, A Physiologist's Wife, by A. CONAN DOYLE.
The Baron's attention has been turned to five little volumes of Love Tales, English, Irish, Scotch, American, and German. They form a companion set to Weird Tales, published also by PATERSON & Co., and a pocketable size, most useful for travellers.
A propos of Travellers, why does not some English firm bring out a series of Guide-books, of the size, and written in the style of the Guides Conty, which, for travelling in France, are far and away the best Guide-books I know. The Guides Joanne are of course good, steady, trustworthy Guides, but they don't attract the traveller's attention to out-of-the-way places, and to the "things to do," in the same pleasant way as do the writers in the Guides Conty. Where to go, when to go, how to go, how to make the most of a short visit, what to ask for, what to look for, what to take, and what to avoid, these are details for which the Guides Conty go in. They might be better, perhaps, in the way of maps, but this is a fault of all Guides. Wishing, when at Havre, to visit Merville-sur-Mer, and the celebrated Corneville, with whose cloches we are all acquainted, in vain I searched the ordinary maps, and at last found quite a microscopical place, and without the "Sur Mer," as there wasn't room for it in a map of either the Guide Joanne or Conty, I forget which. Why it seems to be generally ignored I don't know, but in this respect it is a fellow-sufferer with Westgate-on-Sea, whose name is on no sign-post that ever I've seen in the Island of Thanet, though it may by this time figure on some recent maps. The village of "Garlinge," which is on the inland side of the L.C.&D. line, is to be found on every direction-post and on every map, and the fashionable Westgate is, so to speak, nowhere. BARON DE BOOK-WORMS.
P.S.—Just attempted to read RUDYARD KIPLING's On Greenhow Hill, in this month's Macmillan. No doubt very clever, and will be greatly admired by Kiplingites, but, for me, time is too valuable and life too short to study and appreciate it. I can't even read it: dommage, but I can't.
In this month's number of The Cabinet Portrait Gallery (CASSELL & CO.) there is one of the best photographs of JOHN MORLEY I ever remember to have seen. Not easy to take: this one is by DOWNEY. No mistaking a photo by DOWNEY, and this one of JOHN MORLEY, the Nineteenth Century ST. JUST, has a thoroughly downy look about the face. Those of Lady DUDLEY and Sir FREDERICK LEIGHTON are not up to the DOWNEY standard, specially Lady DUDLEY's.
In the Fortnightly Mr. FRANK HARRIS has induced Mr. W.S. LILLY to give us some personal reminiscences of Cardinal NEWMAN, together with some letters of the Cardinal's to him. Interesting, but too brief. Oddly enough, à propos of "Reminiscences," there is in this same Number a very amusing article by J.M. BARRIE on the manufacturing of reminiscences. Very droll idea. "Read it," says the Baron.
In the Contemporary Mr. WILFRID MEYNELL gives an interesting Memoir of the great Cardinal and his contemporaries, and Mr. RUDYARD KIPLING writes a tale entitled The Enlightenment of Mr. Padgett, M.P.—of which more when I've read it. * * * I have read it. It isn't a story, so I was disappointed, and about as interesting to a story-seeker as The National Congress, of which it treats, to the majority of the Indian natives. But the dialogue is instructive and amusing, and will enlighten many Padgetts. B. DE B.-W.
"UN PETTITT-HARRIS COMPLIMENT."—AUGUSTUS DRURIOLANUS and his colleague in the authorship of the new piece at the National Theatre are to be congratulated. As might have been anticipated from the title, "there is money in it."