6 MARCH 1926, Page 23

There are some good things in Mr. Kenneth Hare's book

on London's Latin Quarter (Bodley Head, 15s.). But there are also some stupid stories and an occasional slicing-off of nar- rative at the most interesting part, which produces—to use a phrase of the author's—an " oddly fatiguing " effect. For instance, returning unexpectedly from the Continent, the author discovers a girl in the bath of his Chelsea moms. His

comment Her figure was Praxitelean and her blush a fairy tale." He bowed himself out—yes, but if this is a story it needs more telling. Yet, on the whole, the book is amusing. Epstein, Gilbert Frankau and Augustus John flit through the pages without, however, saying anything remarkable.

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