The ,Phantoms of the Donee. By Brownlow Fforde. (A. H.
Wheeler and Co.)—This is one of the brightest and most humorous stories that have yet been published by a writer who has shown such an intimate knowledge of Anglo-Indian life that he has been often supposed to be Mr. Rudyard Kipling writing under a nom de guerre. His slang and strong language, which include " sitting tight " and " beastly hole," " the other Johnnie " and "damnable long road," are almost as remarkable as Mr.
; but his fun is much more rollicking. Some of the adventures of Smiler, the hard-up Civil servant, who is as much of a hero as The Phantoms of the Dome can show, are quite Pickwickian. One's powers of belief are perhaps strained by his experiences of ghosts and his mother's discovery of the will which makes her wealthy, and allows her son to marry Theo Armleigh: But Smiler and his chum Goodson and the Armleighs, more particularly the father, who is an admirable specimen of the rather pompons but good-hearted Indian Col- lector, and is a great contrast to his match-making wife, are all delightful sketches. Mr. Brownlow Fforde is a very clever writer indeed. A word of favourable comment is also due to his publishers for the dainty get-up of this volume.
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