"Woxtixe Tower'—by John Buchan. Holder & Sloughton. London.
There is always a real pleasure in getting a new book by Mr. John Buchan. No modern writer p a better imagination and his stories are always vividly and convincingly told avd finely constructed. He wastes no time in introspective. analysis and long author's foot-notes to his vharacter>, He goes back to the ways of the old romanticist and gives you a splendid story of adventure, in which his characters stand out as real living creatures by what they do, and not by what the author laboriously tells you about them. "Hunting Tower," which deals with the pursuit by Bolshevists of a lovely Russian princess in a lonely promontory of West Scotland, is a fine specimen of Mr. Buchan's art: and if some readers object that it is all rather wildly improbable, let them asi ves whether they would not ars ago have said that the Bois t and all his works, if described in some novel of the future, were also wildly improbable. The story is thrillingly exciting, and like most of Mr. Buchan's books, it simply cannot be put down until the last page is read. It is distinguished by the creation of two magnificent characters, ''Dogson" the retired grocer, who starts out as a knight errant when past middle age, and "Dougal"? the Napoleonic leader of the Gorbals boy scouts. These two are quite the best drawn figures that we can recal) for many a long day of modern fiction.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.