The forty-nine guinea one has challenged HUGH HENDERSON. * * * * * [Illustration: _East Coast Farmer._ "HAVE I REALLY TO DO THIS WI' ALL MY BEASTS, IF SO BE AS THE GERMANS LAND IN THESE PARTS?" _Officer._ "YES. LIVE STOCK OF EVERY DESCRIPTION HAS TO BE BRANDED AND DRIVEN WEST." _Farmer._ "I CAN SEE MY WAY ALL RIGHT EXCEPT FOR MY BEES. WHAT AM I TO DO WI' MY BEES?"] * * * * * OUR BOOKING-OFFICE. (_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._) There are few living writers of romance who can carry the sword and doublet with the ease of Miss MARJORIE BOWEN. She has long since proved herself a practised mistress of mediævalism, and _The Carnival of Florence_ (METHUEN) finds her therefore on sure ground. It is a pleasantly stimulating tale of love and adventure in the days of SAVONAROLA. The heroine is one _Aprilis_, a fair Florentine whose matrimonial affairs were complicated by the fact that early in the story she had been abducted (strictly _pour le bon motif_ in order to score off the gentleman to whom she was then engaged) by the too notorious PIERO DEI MEDICI. The unfortunate results were twofold, for though _Aprilis_ was returned unharmed to her father's house her noble betrothed would have no more of her, so she had to put up with another husband who took her for charity, and to suffer in addition the pangs of unrequited love for the Lord of Florence whom she was unable to forget. What happened--how the MEDICI were turned from their heritage, and the part played in all this by the grim Revivalist of San Marco--is the matter of a story well worth reading. As is his way with tales in which he appears, the figure of SAVONAROLA comes gradually to dominate the whole; did he not even master GEORGE ELIOT? The present story is dedicated "In Memory of Florence, Summer 1914." Presumably, therefore, Miss BOWEN shares with me certain memories that have been very vividly recalled by her pages--memories of a June evening when, as in the days of which she writes, the Piazza della Signoria echoed to the clash of swords and the tumult of an angry mob. That it has thus reminded me of what would, but for greater happenings since, have been one of my most thrilling chimney-corner reminiscences, is among the pleasures that I owe to a stirring and successful novel. * * * * *