There is little to be said in favor of his books that could not be said for narcotic-taking, gambling-hells, and underworld tango palaces. They have a glamour about them and an aroma that appeals to the feeble-minded, the inherently decadent, and the ennuyed idle. It is a realism whose reality exists only in a mind made lubricitous by cupidity. Marino Moretti is one of the young writers whose short stories and romances have found much favor. There is an atmosphere of triviality, of lightness, of inconsequentiality about his writings which is an important part of his art. In reality he is a finished technician and an artist with a wonderful mastery of perspective and of color, and a commendable capacity for expression. His particular charm is that he creates an atmosphere or a situation, but does not insist upon giving a chemical analysis or physical description of either. When he takes you to a drawing-room or to the bathing-beach at the fashionable hour he does not insist on presenting you to every one or giving you a detailed history of their lives and particularly of their amatory tidal waves. Although he seems to give his clientele soft food, he does not insist on spoon-feeding them. In the guise of pap he gives them often thought-making pabulum. Some of his popular books are "Il Sole del Sabato" ("Saturday's Sun"), "Guenda," "La Voce di Dio" ("The Voice of God"), and "Adamo ed Eva." Antonio Beltramelli is another writer who has studied literary form to great purpose and with it he combines imaginative gifts of an exceptional order. His earlier books, short stories entitled "Anna Perena" and "I Primogeniti" ("First-born Sons"), were well received. He has recently come back to similar presentations in "La Vigna Vendemmiata" ("The Harvested Vineyard"), which while not revealing the spiritual growth which his admirers expected from him, shows him, nevertheless, to be a man of parts. His chief defect is his ignorance of behavioristic psychology which is nowhere better shown than in this collection of short stories, "La Madre," for instance. Moreover, it is an ambitious writer who makes a story of these unromantic facts; a stupid man with some of the characteristics of the ox and the rat is married to a gross, slovenly creature who deceives him. A friendly neighbor opens his eyes and he finds her and her paramour in the brake and cane around the vineyard. On his way thence he encounters the parish priest and asks him if one would be justified in meting out personal punishment to such transgressors. "Perhaps yes, perhaps no" is the reply. When he comes upon the guilty couple he kills the man with the blow of a stick, then falls back upon the priest's words for justification. "Gli Uomini Rossi" ("The Red Men") is his best-known romance. He has read and still reads Cervantes and Rabelais. Had he the gift of artistic presentation he might become a great novelist, but until now he has confounded embellishment with natural beauty.