STORIES FOR BOYS.
MR. WALTER RHOADES has written an uncommonly good school story, In the Scrum (Milford, 6s. net). The small hero, Dick, has a very rough time when he goes to school, both with the boys in his own dormitory and with several unsympathetic masters. He gains respect by playing a foolhardy trick on another dormi- tory, whence he steals a challenge cup at the risk of breaking his neck. He establishes his reputation by batting well for his school in a critical match. The incidents are natural and the school life is well described.—In Mr. St. John Pearce's interesting story, Off His Own Bat (Ward, Lock, 4s. 6d. net), the leading figure is an orphan• boy who, rather than seek the help of an unsympathetic uncle, takes a post as groundsman at a. public school not far from the school where he had been educated. It is a difficult position to fill among boys of his own age and class, and his trials are not understated. He makes himself respected by his batting before he is at last discovered by the uncle, who is not such a bad fellow after all. The unusual theme is cleverly worked out.—Yet another pleasant story, mainly concerned with cricket, is Mr. John Finnemore's Teddy Lester in the Fifth (Chambers, 6s. net). It was unnecessary, perhaps, to introduce famous cricketers like Mr. Fry into the book, for Mr. Finnemoro is a racy and humorous story-teller who can depend on his own imaginative characters.—Mr. Kent Carr's amusing tale, Dixie of the Cock House (Chambers, 5s. net), is mainly concerned with the tracing of a thief and with a mutiny of the Fifth Form, who are soundly flogged in turn by the Doctor, a worthy follower of Keate. That any head would have gone on for hours, " as birch after birch wore out," seems to us incredible, though the victims well deserved their punishment.—In The Boys of Castle Cliff School (Blackie, 6s. net) Mr. R. A. H. Goodyear tries unduly hard to create " atmosphere " by using a great deal of schoolboy slang in the conversations. It is a readable story of a school by the sea, but the slang is rather tiresome. Mr. Hylton Cleaver's school story, The Old Order (Milford, 6s. net), is dramatic and ably written. The captain, Merriam, is deposed through the intrigues of a malicious rival, who contrives to delude the masters. Merriam's successor then leaves him out of the first eleven—a bitter pill for a good cricketer. The enemy is caught in his own trap at the end and disgraced, and Merriam's batting triumph concludes a remarkably attractive story.— We may commend also Mr. Harold Avery's Schoolboy Pluck (Nisbet, 6s. net), in which there are an exciting adventure in a tunnel and a mysterious theft. The interest is well maintained to the end.
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