question of its very unusual interest, nor of the skill with which its
translator, who should surely be acknowledged upon the title-page, has
preserved the vitality and appeal of the original.


[Illustration: _Tommy_ (_who has made a find in a German dug-out_).
"_NOW_, ALBERT, AREN'T YOU GLAD YOU CAME? WHY, THESE CIGARS IN LONDON
WOULD COST YOU CLOSE ON A TANNER APIECE."]

* * * * *

The author of _Helen of Four Gates_ (JENKINS) has chosen to hide her
identity and call herself simply "An Ex-Mill Girl." I am sufficiently
sorry for this to hope that, if the story meets with the success that
I should certainly predict for it, a lady of such unusual gifts may
allow us to know her name. Of these gifts I have no doubt whatever. As
a tale _Helen of Four Gates_ is crude, unnatural, melodramatic; but
the power (brutality, if you prefer) of its telling takes away the
critical breath. Whether in real life anyone could have nursed a
lifelong hatred as old _Mason_ did (personally I cherish the belief
that hatred is too evanescent an emotion for a life-tenancy of the
human mind; but I may be wrong); whether he would have bribed a casual
tramp to marry and torment the reputed daughter who was the object of
his loathing, or whether _Day_ and _Helen_ herself would actually so
have played into his hands, are all rather questionable problems.
Far more real, human and moving is the wild passion of _Helen_ for
_Martin_, whom (again questionably as to truth) her enemies frighten
away from her. A grim story, you begin to observe, but one altogether
worth reading. To compare things small (as yet) with great, I might
call it a lineal descendant of _Wuthering Heights_, both in setting