The author is not so enamoured of his delightful style that he does not make the peasants speak their natural language, and although he realizes keenly and expresses the poetry of their life, he never sacrifices truth to this perception any more than to the strange and essentially false propensities of the naturalistic school, nor refines his descriptions to a rose-colour insipidity. A good scent of the earth and of wild flowers pervades these realistic descriptions. On such lines, if this book influences younger writers, it might lead the way to many a delightful novel of the _parfum du terroir_ of Portugal. Snr. JULIO BRANDÃO (born in 1870), equally distinguished in prose and verse, is the author of _Maria do Ceo_ (1902), mystic love letters in a chiselled style, only with the mystic writers of old the style flowed naturally from an inner fervour, here it has evidently been the chief consideration. If the effort is apparent it is sometimes very successful, and in _Perfis Suaves_ (1903) and _Figuras de Barro_ (1910), fantastic stories and fascinating fairy-tales, he occasionally achieves simplicity. Equally studied is the prose of Snr. JUSTINO DE MONTALVÃO’S _Os Destinos_ (1904), twelve stories, of which _Conto dos Reis_ relates the death of a peasant child as voices outside sing _São chegados os tres Reis_. The VISCONDE DE VILLA-MOURA (born in 1877) has shown in the five _contos_ of _Doentes da Belleza_ (1913), as in _Bohemios_ (1914), that his sensitive plastic style is excellently suited to the short story. Snr. ANTONIO PATRICIO’S _Serão Inquieto_ (1910) contains two poignant _contos_: _O Precoce_ and _O Veiga_. _Os Pobres_ by Snr. RAUL BRANDÃO (born in 1869) is a succession of scenes, a striking analysis of suffering as exhibited in various strange types of the poor and of its beauty and necessity in the philosophy of Gabiru. Snr. SEVERO PORTELA displays a tortured style in _Os Condemnados_ (1906) and _Agua Corrente_ (1909); smoother but equally artificial is that of Snr. HENRIQUE DE VASCONCELLOS in _Contos Novos_ (1903) and _Circe_ (1908), the former of which contains the slight sketch _O Caminheiro_. _Excentricos_ is the title of a volume containing some notable stories by Snr. ALBERTO DE SOUSA COSTA. The large number of _contos_ is a sign of the times, corresponding to the favour shown towards the brief _revista_ in the drama and the host of sonnets which now replace the long romantic poems of the past.