mésalliance, to a study of architecture in its effect upon character, to a
girls' school tale; finally to the portrait of a modern _Squire Clinton_,
struggling to adjust his mind to the complexities of the War. This last, a
character-study of very moving and sympathetic realism, suffers a little
from a defect inherent in one of Mr. MARSHALL'S best qualities, his gift
for absolutely natural dialogue. The danger of this is that, as here in the
bedroom chatter of the Squire's daughters, his folk are apt to repeat
themselves, as talk does in nature, but should not (I suppose) in art.
Still this is a small defect in a book that is sincere in quality and
convincingly human in effect. _The Clintons and Others_ is certainly miles
away from the collections of reprinted pot-boilers that at one time brought
books of short stories into poor repute. Mr. MARSHALL and Others (a select
band) will rapidly correct this by giving us in small compass work equal to
their own best.

* * * * *

_Shuttered Doors_ (LANE) is what you might call a third-and-fourth-
generation story--one of those books, so rightly devastating to the
skipper, in which the accidental turning of two pages together is quite
liable to involve you with the great-grandchildren of the couple whose
courtship you have been perusing. Observe that I was careful to say the
"accidental" turning, though I can picture a type of reader who might soon
be fluttering the pages of _Shuttered Doors_ in impatient handfuls. The
fact is that Mrs. WILLIAM HICKS BEACH has here written what is less a novel
than a treatise, tasteful, informed and sympathetic, on county life and
manners and houses. The last of these themes especially has an undisguised
fascination for her. When _Aletta_, the chief heroine, was left pots of
money by a Dutch uncle (who was so far from filling his proverbial _rôle_
that he hardly talked at all) she spent it and her enthusiasm, indeed her