For six years our novelist remained silent; and he never returned to the method of reversed dynamics until the year 1915, when he published _Upsidonia_, another failure. Once again his purpose is all too clear; possibly irritated by the exaltation of slum stories and the depreciation of the characters of the well-to-do often insisted upon in such works, he wrote a satire in the manner of _Erewhon_, and called it a novel. Here poverty and dirt are regarded as the highest virtues, and the possession of wealth looked upon as the sure and swift road to social ostracism. There is not a gleam of the author's true skill in this book, mainly because he is so bent on arguing his case that exaggeration triumphs rather too grossly over verisimilitude. He is, of course, trying to write nonsense; a mark that some authors have hit with deliberate aim, while perhaps more have attained the same result with less conscious intention. Now Mr. Marshall cannot write nonsense even when he tries; and failure in such an effort is particularly depressing. He is at his best when his art is restrained and delicate; in _Upsidonia_ he drops the engraving-tool and wields a meat-axe. Let us do with _Peter Binney_ and with _Upsidonia_ what every other reader has done; let us try to forget them, remembering only that two failures in fifteen books is not a high proportion. Of the remaining thirteen novels, two attained only a partial success; and the reason is interesting. These two are _The House of Merrilees_ and _Many Junes_ (1908). The former was written in 1901 but publishers would none of it, and it did not wear a print dress until 1905. Meanwhile the author was trying his hand at short stories, for which his method of work is not particularly fitted, his skill being in the development of character rather than in the manufacture of incident. He did, however, publish a collection of these tales in one volume, called _The Terrors_, which appeared in 1913, their previous separate publication covering a period of sixteen years. They are amazingly unequal in value; some are excellent, and others trivial. This volume is out of print, and whether any of the contents may be rescued from oblivion is at present problematical. It is interesting, however, that he, at the outset of his career, supposed that invention, rather than observation, was his trump card. The realism of _The House of Merrilees_ is mixed with melodrama and mystery; these are, in the work of a dignified artist, dangerous allies, greater liabilities than assets. In a personal letter he confesses that this artificial plot hampered him; but he goes on to say, "the range of scene and character in that book is something that I have never been able to catch since." He has since--with only one relapse--happily forsaken artificially constructed mysteries for the deepest mystery of all--the human heart. In _Many Junes_, a story that will be reprinted in America in 1919,