Bad Luck. By Albany do Penhlongue. 3 vols. (Bentley.)—We m as t
accord to this novel the merit of a good plot. There will be but few readers but will be surprised at tho way in which the mystery is cleared up. It would be possible, indeed, to critloise it ; and some would cer- tainly be inclined to say that it is unexpected because it is improbable. But it would be difficult to criticise without explaining it, and to ex- plain it would certainly spoil Mr. Do Fonblanque'a story. To one thing wo must certainly object, on the score of its unlikelihood, and that is the incredible baseness and falsehood of the Hon. and Rev. Mr. Marston. But then Mr. Marston is, in every way, an impossibility. An Earl's brother, and uniting the extraordinary qualifications of having been " second wrangler and Smith's prize:mart of his year," and editing several Greek tragedies, nothing in the world could have kept him back from high dignity in the Church. A man of noble birth, a great classic, and a great mathematician, ho must have boon a bishop, if he could have kept from getting drunk in public, which Les apparently did, as soon as ho was thirty. The tone of the novel is somewhat cynical. Evil things seem to be taken for granted, and are introduced as a matter of course, in a way which makes lied Luck more amusing than edifying.
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