TWO TALES.* WE have put these tales together as being
excellent specimens of very different varieties in the art of story-telling. Mr. Frankfort Moore entertains us with a series of exciting ad- :ventures, which, however, he contrives to keep fairly clear of the fault of bloodthirstiness with which such stories are too commonly tainted. The hero's first experience of conflict is the defence of a Queensland Station against a party of bush- rangers, who, finding New South Wales too hot for them, try their luck in the Northern Colony. The battle of the Station * (1.) From the Bitch to the Brooker& By F. Frankfort Moore. London t Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.— (2.) A .11a5 of Farthings. By Christnbel R. Coleridge, London : Nationn I Society. is a fine bit of narrative, but the real interest of the story begins when Kenneth Eyre falls into the hands of a gang of bushrangers. They have been repulsed, it should be said, by the opportune arrival of the police, and Kenneth has ridden in pursuit on a horse which he finds himself unable to manage. The picture of the bushrangers is a severely faithful photograph. A Red Indian, a Zulu, even an English highwayman, in the hazy distance of a century, may be made romantic figures, but the bushranger is an irredeem- ably prosaic ruffian. By a curious survival of conscience, which is probably true to nature, some of Kenneth's captors refuse to permit his murder in cold blood, and he survives to take an ample revenge. A lucky chance makes him master of the captain of the gang, whom he surprises while taking a siesta in a boat, for the bushrangers have made their way to the coast. The boat scone, ending with the intervention of those grim ministers of Justice, the sharks, is very good. Next comes an ingenious variation in the hero's experience. He is picked up by a trading schooner, and the schooner itself picks up a boat-load of sailors in distress, who turn out to be convicts escaping from New Caledonia. The vessel is captured and recaptured, with not a few exciting incidents in the course of this change of ownership. The story rune briskly on, without exaggeration, and with as little admixture of the horrible as may be. Altogether, it is a good example of a well-constructed and truthfully coloured tale of incident.
It is not necessary to give any great nicety of detail to figures that are always in motion ; but it is exactly in this nicety of detail that Miss Coleridge, who does not deal in startling incident, especially excels. Her characters are humble folk. An errand-boy serves for the hero, and a little girl from an orphanage is the cause of all the trouble that agitates his life; two orphan girls, who try, with indifferent success, to make their livelihood out of dressmaking, and the Johnson family, managers of a suburban tea-garden, are the subordinate characters; and "Granny Brown," a fine old lady, whose native wit has never been spoilt by book-learning, acts the part of chorus. The delicate touch with which these pictures are handled is worthy of all praise. Perhaps little Milly Morris, whom the routine of a large philanthropic establishment has turned into something like a machine, not without inconvenient survivals, however, of human nature, is perhaps the best study. Miss Coleridge is careful to explain that no "existing institution" is indicated by the orphanage ; but it will be manifest to all who have any knowledge of the subject that she has hit a blot in the system. Milly is just the sort of helpless invertebrate creature that these vast institutions turn out into the world, often with the most unhappy results. One is glad to know that in some cases they are being broken-up into something small and more homelike. The story of Bertie's troubles is ingeniously managed. He is sent at a school-feast to fetch a bag of farthings from the Rector's study, and shortly after two French gold coins are missed. He is quite ignorant and innocent in the matter, but he is harassed and haunted by those missing napoleons with a pertinacity that looks almost preternatural. However, the evil itself gives occasion for kindly and helpful action in others ; and, as Miss Coleridge puts it, in words that are well worth remembering, "there is no start of life so good for a child as the memory of goodness."
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