"Sir! When an author submits a work to a friend, he puts that friend to the torture, and the latter is not obliged to tell the truth in expressing his opinion." This remark of ursine Samuel occurred to us on reading the very flattering critiques of the London Press on Mrs. King's book; it is our present intention to falsify the dictum.
As the daughter of Dr. and Mrs, Wil-liaison, Mrs. King has " hereditary aspiration to literary success, and a double claim on the indulgence of readers in the Far East, but, apart from such extrinsic considerations, her book on its own merits demands and amply repays our atten-tiou. Determined no longer to waste her powder on the squibs of criticism and journalism, Mrs King has taken to artil-ery (we do not say heavy) practice, and has fairly hit the mark at the first round, Her many friends may say "Tis pleasant sure to see her name in print 5 Her book's a book; and truth, there's louty inst."
Cousin Cinderella, or to give it its proper title "The 'Amurcans' in London," sets forth the experiences of an American plutocrat who joins to himself a strict!
latonic harem, or as Mrs. King calls it 'a caravanserai of scratching cats," and sets out to-storm the highest circles of English society and "place" his women therein Remembering Miss Braddon's famous appeal to her revie not disclose the details of story. The plot is in itself thin, serving much the same purpose as ther string in sugar candy: it precipitates: the characters from solution, and keeps them together when crystallized into definite shaps once does it savour of plot at the heroine poses asa bigamy tragedy well and fills the air, and 3 everything points to a powerful and pathetic end—but down comes the authoress, brains the second husband on the spot, and runs her readers smoothly into the' ' Happy-ever-after" terminus. But even Naaman worshipped in the House of Rimmon.
The work possesses some of thie features of a.chess problem; it stimulates the mind, raises intellectual interest in the reader, and relieves the ennui of several hours; but it neither moves the heart nor, except in one place, kindles an emotion, It has nothing in common with those affecting tales which, according to Hudibras, ""Do purge the eyes and move the bowels, And drench your handkerchiefs like towels."
The book contains no striking tableaux; nor is it marked by that fine, literary taste and finish which may atone for the absence of portraiture, plot, and. passion. Still Mrs. King has scored a decided success, has shown a marked individuality, and given. abundant promise for the future. The book has impressed us somewhat as Disraeli's novels affected. our juvenile mind. In reading them we had a constant sense of cleverness in the author, a lively appreciation of bite in. the satire, of wit and brio in the conversation, and of pungency in, the author's asides but the whole. somehow or. other. was accompanied by a feeling of want, a want
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.