sympathy, so quick and true her instinct that she is able to revivify
the old scenes and reproduce the atmosphere of the time. The darkey
nurse of earliest childhood lives again, sometimes bringing with
her plantation songs like "Voodoo-Bogey-Boo," quaintly musical. Many
passages of the grandfather's conversations are preserved, in which we
may detect the voice of the gifted granddaughter. But the influence of
heredity is strong, more especially "down South." Also there are many
charming stories redolent of the South. I was about to mention the
page on which will be found the thrilling history of a mule aptly
named "Satan." On reflection I won't spoil the reader's pleasure in
unexpectedly coming upon it somewhere about the middle of the book.
Nobody--man or woman, girl or boy--who begins to read _My Beloved
South_ will skip a page. So the story cannot be overlooked.

* * * * *

In _Lost Diaries_ (DUCKWORTH) Mr. MAURICE BARING travels by an easy
road to humour, and he does not pound it with too laborious feet. This
is perhaps a fortunate thing, for a farcical reconstruction of history
in the light of modern sentiment and circumstances might easily tire;
a Comic History of England, for instance, is stiffer reading to-day
than GARDNER or GREEN. Sometimes, however, Mr. BARING seems to carry
to extreme lengths his conscientious avoidance of efforts to be funny;
and in the imaginary records of one or two of his subjects there is
little more to laugh at than the unaided fancy of the student has long
ago perceived. _Tristram_ loved two _Iseults_, and JOHN MILTON was
an exasperating husband; but these things I knew, and the author of
_Lost Diaries_ has made no more capital out of the situations than
the eternal merriment which the bare statement of the facts inspires.
But where Mr. BARING, pleasantly disdainful alike of consistency