New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1902-04-06
FICTION.
STORIES OF IRELAND, ENGLAND AND
AMERICA

Burrow. 12mo. PIP w. $50. G. r. Putnam Sons
THE GAME OF LOVE. BY benjamin Swift 12mo.
PIP 314. Charles Scribners Sons.
vHE LEoPARD'S SPOTS A o Romance of Ihs
H Mhte IN ManT iusratSd by 6 D. Wams Emo
up. Xiii. 40. Doubleday, Page & Co
S,D SAUNDERS, His Adventures West and md E Ma
BY Henry Wallace Phillips Emo PIP. zlo Nc
Clure. Phillips * Co
patricia of the Hills" is very pretty Irish
story. with some tragical streaks running
through it. but with an atmosphere that is on
the whole cheering The heroine is familiar
type thu beauteous daughter of a man who has
40 head for affairs, and whose fallen fortunes
she is called upon to repair, us ne her bedullu
voice Us the means There is the inevitable Suit'i
whom she would like to send flying, but win
whom she is obliged to remain ON amiabe terms
out of consideration for her foolish parent.
There is equally of course. the lover whose only
claim upon her is romantic and unSehiSh.
It is all conventional in the last degree. yet We
like Patricia of the Hills" 1t gives interesting
elimpses of Irish life and character. and The
author is not without the little insight into
human nature which VIII serve to make even so
modest 4 composition as this readable and en-
tcrtaining Even for the eccentric Lord Clogher
the wealthy sutton aforesaid. he manages 10
excite some sympathy. and he surrounds Ia"
principal personages of his story with figures
that sometimes picturesque and always
credible. A quiet. unpretentious tale Is this
smoothly written and not too long.
The author of The Game Of Love" has made
q fairly good story out of more less repelIant
material His first chapter concerns miser
and other people" and the other people in
Clude a starveling poet. an equally poor french
flower girl a TickpOcket. chimneysweep and 4
doctor with small practice in the Sums Tn"
scene is chiefly laid in i'll smelling lodging
house. Benjamin Swift presently adds to the
list OF his characters a couple of sp"ndt rlitS.
one of whom has separated in anger from his
family. and though this young gentleman has
his good qualities it takes all that one two
decent people in the country can do to give the
narrative any agreeable tone whatever. Besides
the squalOr at Charnock's, the cheap lodging
house just mentioned. where thevery goes on
and two of the characters tenble on the verge
OF murder. there are two cases of cancer to be
reckOned with enabling the author to indulge
in such inspiriting and romantic remarks
that 'schrrus had become encephaloid. and the
bOne-marrOw infected" He is of the opin
Ion that 1.-The origin of cancer of any disease
is worth far more philosophical inquiry than has
been spent upon it. The primary cause of prob
ably every organic degeneration is, indeed.
fact of the most profound moral significance"
He follows these wonderful and edfying pro-
nouncements with owlish prattle about the in
fernal egoism of cellular life rising to the
hilarating statement that "epithelial cancer is
miserable plagiarism of healthy epithclium'
Obviously benjamin Swift has his views as to
the right sort of stuff for a novel Nevertheless
he keeps us interested. His personages not
always engaged in unoveIy tranSa ctonS he is
not himself forever making preposterous .obser-
Vations matters of disease. and his plot is
ngeniously enough put together to make ths