5 APRIL 1902, Page 23

ing Mr. Frank Stockton can be when he chooses, it

is exaspe- rating to find him trying to amuse us with such a very silly and impossible invention as this story of the pirate's daughter.

Kate Bonnet, heroine and godmother of the book, is the daughter of a once reputable gentleman sugar-planter of Barbadoes, who, driven to desperation by a virago of a wife, conceives the stupendous ambition of becoming a pirate. There is just a flicker of humour about some of the scenes in which Major Bonnet's gentlemanly feelings and humane habits clash with the obligations of the bloodthirsty part he has taken up. But in the main the story is tedious, and we are not sorry when the last page is turned.