Fiction. "The Lady with the Rubies." Translated from the German of E. Marlitt by Mrs. A.L. Wister. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company. "Barbara Heathcote's Trial." By Rosa Nouchette Carey. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company. "The Bar Sinister. A Social Study." New York: Cassell & Co. "Pine-Cones." By Willis Boyd Allen. Boston: D. Lothrop & Co. "An Old Maid's Paradise." By Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. In spite of all the clever pleas urged by the lovers of realism for realistic novels, it is easy enough to see that the mass of readers are just as much in love as ever with a high romanticism, and Miss Marlitt's stories still retain the strong hold they first took of the popular heart. The success of fiction comes from the fact that it supplies a want existing in most people's minds: lively incidents to awaken and stimulate the fancy, a touch of mystery to give a thrill of pleasing fear, sharply diversified characters impelled by strong motives which insure a lively conflict of passions,--all these are what the average novel-reader demands, and finds in Miss Marlitt's works. A great rambling German house, with suites of disused apartments shut away from sunshine and air and haunted by vanished forms and silent voices, while its open rooms are tenanted by a nest of gentlefolks of all degrees of relation,--some united by love, and others at swords'-points,--offers a lively field for the romancer; and such is the scene in "The Lady with the Rubies." "Belief in the Powers of Darkness will never die so long as poor human hearts love, hope, and fear," is the moral, so to speak, of the book; and the author has used with good effect this vein of superstition which "makes the whole world kin." Little Margarete's encounter with the family spectre, her flight from home, her lonely and terrifying night, are touchingly described; and, in fact, the book is full of pretty child-pictures, which enhance the pleasantness and charm of the love-story. Few of Miss Marlitt's books possess more interest and diversity than "The Lady with the Rubies;" and, as usual with Mrs. Wister's work, it is well and gracefully translated. Given a family of girls well contrasted, utterly untrammelled, and each in possession of a will and a way of her own, materials for a romance are not hard to find; and in telling the story of the Heathcotes Miss Carey seems to have jotted down a series of events exactly as they fell out in actual life. There is plenty of sentiment, but its expression is dealt out with a sparing hand; there are pretty sylvan scenes, and the wood-paths, the warm homesteads, the meadows and fields, all enter into the story and make a pleasant part of it. If "Barbara Heathcote's Trial" has no leading motive as strong and as universally interesting as the author's former book, "Not Like Other Girls," it is, to our thinking, quite as pleasant and readable, and will no doubt enjoy its predecessor's popularity.