The Hidden Flame. By R. Dowling. 3 vols. (Tinsley Brothers.)
—John Lyster, alias Frederick Berl, and Edward Rolt conspire together to murder a certain old man named Richard Lyster, into whose confidence the so-called John Lyster has wormed himself, by letting the punt in which he is fishing float over a weir. The amiable pair fall out, Holt desiring to be paid more for his help and complicity than Lyster finds it convenient to pay. Out of the quarrel of these two villains, whose end is happily that of the Kilkenny cats, the proceedings of lawyers, detectives, and so forth, who combine to expose the misdoings of the chief rascal, and the foolish love of Muriel Freyne, granddaughter and co-heiress of Richard Lyster, for this fellow, Mr. Dowling makes-up his novel. There is more bustle than energy in it. It is meant for tragedy, but somehow fails to move either pity or terror. Nor is the effect of the whole increased by the sham mystery, so to speak, of the mysterious lamp, which serves no other purpose, as far as we can see, than to give the story a very inappropriate name.
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