_Fool Divine_ (HODDER AND STOUGHTON) stands to some extent in
a position unique among novels in that its heroine is also its
villainess, or at least the wrecker of its hero. _Nevile del Varna_,
the lady in question, is indeed the only female character in the
tale, and has therefore naturally to work double tides. What happened
was that young _Christopher_, a superman and hero, dedicate, as a
volunteer, to the unending warfare of science against the evil goddess
of the Tropics, yellow fever, met this more human divinity when on
his journey to the scene of action, and, like a more celebrated
predecessor, "turned aside to her." Then, naturally enough, when
_Nevile_ has gotten him for her husband and when love of her has
caused him to abandon his project of self-sacrifice, she repays
him with scorn. And as the unhappy _Christopher_ already scorns
himself the rest of the book (till the final chapters) is a record
of deterioration more clever than exactly cheerful. The moral of it
all being, I suppose, that if you are wedded to an ideal you should
beware of taking to yourself a mortal wife, for that means bigamy.
Incidentally the book contains some wonderfully impressive pictures of
tropical life and of the general beastliness of existence on a rubber
plantation. At the end, as I have indicated, regeneration comes for
_Christopher_--though I will not reveal just how this happens. There
is also a subsidiary interest in the revolutionary affairs of Cuba,
which the much-employed _Nevile_ appears to manage, as a local Joan of
Arc, in her spare moments; and altogether the book can be recommended
as one that will at least take you well away from the discomforts of
here and now.

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[Illustration: TALE OF A GREAT OFFENSIVE.