That is to say
that, though it opens with a genuine and quite horrible thrill, the
"explanation" is obscure and tame. Far more successful, to my mind, is "The
Vision," a delicate little idyll of a Midland schoolmarm, to whom is shown
the death of Adonis and the lamenting of his goddess-lover. The writing of
this touches real beauty (the high-fantastic, instead of the merely
high-falutin', which in such connection would have been so fatally easy).
To sum up, though one at least of these "dreams before midnight" may quite
possibly become a nightmare after it, I fancy that, to all lovers of the
occult, the game will be found well worth the bed-room candle.
* * * * *
There are qualities in _The Bird of Life_, by GERTRUDE VAUGHAN (CHAPMAN AND
HALL), which cause me to look forward to this lady's future work with very
considerable interest. In the present novel she sets out the life story of
_Rachel_ up to a point boldly given as being beyond the conclusion of the
War, in which, by the way, both her husband and the man whom she ought to
have married are killed on the same day. The first eighty-four pages of the
book raised my hopes very high. They describe with great simplicity and
sympathy the thoughts and feelings, the romances and difficulties, of an
affectionate and lonely little girl living with her _Uncle Matthew_ and her
_Aunt Elizabeth_, and loving them both with a childlike fervour.
Pages:
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56