20 MARCH 1926, Page 26

The Sleeping Queen. By Neville Brand. (John Lane. 7s. 6d.

net.)-The opening of this novel of the 'sixties with its pictures of Provence is charming reading, and the Vision of the Madonna which comes to Louise with her very natural reaction is well managed. The catastrophe by which the heroine is thrown into the arms of Paget O'Brien is hardly convincing ; but the description of her life at Port*Said, where her husband is employed on the then incompleted Suez Canal is worth reading.