The love-scenes are frequent and tempting. BRAM has
an eye to scenery, and can describe it. He knows the Irish peasant,
and reproduces his talk with a fidelity which almost suggests that he,
too, is descended from one of the early kings, whereas, as everyone
knows, he lives in London and adds grace and dignity to "the front" of
the Lyceum on First Nights and others. He is perfectly overwhelming
in his erudition in respect of the science of drainage, which, if all
stories be true, he might find opportunity of turning to account in
the every-day (or, rather, every-night) world of the theatre. In his
novel he utilises it in the preliminaries of shifting a mighty bog,
the last stages whereof are described in a chapter that, for sustained
interest, recalls CHARLES READE's account of the breaking of the
Sheffield Reservoir. The novel-reader will do well not to pass by _The
Snake's Pass_. THE BARON DE BOOK-WORMS & CO.
* * * * *
RED VERSUS BLACK.
(_TWO VIEWS OF THE SAME PLACE, BY GENTLEMEN "WHO WRITE TO THE
PAPERS."_)
_Opinion No. 1._--Monte Carlo! One of the most disgraceful places in
Europe--a blot upon our civilisation. The gambling is productive of
the greatest possible misery. It is an institution that should be held
up to the execration of mankind. All the riffraff of the globe are
attracted to this hideous spot. The place is like an upas-tree, under
which everything noble and good languishes and dies! The form of
Government is absolutely immoral.
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