There is a sentence on page 149 of A Castle to Let (CASSELL) which, though not for its style, I feel constrained to quote: "It was a glorious day, the sunshine poured through the green boughs, and the moss made cradles in which most people went to sleep with their novels." Well, given a warm day and a comfortable resting-place, this book by Mrs. BAILLIE REYNOLDS would do excellently well either to sleep or keep awake with, according to your mood. The scene of it is laid in Transylvania, where a rich young Englishwoman took an old castle for the summer. Incidentally I have learned something about the inhabitants of Transylvania, but apart from that I know now exactly what a novel for the holidays should contain. Its ingredients are many and rather wonderful, but Mrs. REYNOLDS is a deft mixer, and her skill in managing no fewer than three love affairs without getting them and you into a tangle is little short of miraculous. Then we are given plenty of legends, mysteries and dreams, just intriguing enough to produce an eerie atmosphere, but not sufficiently exciting to cause palpitations of the heart. Need I add that the tenant of the castle married the owner of it? As she was both human and sporting, it worries me to think that she may now be interned.
