I found the arrangement of _The Clintons and Others_ (COLLINS) at first a little confusing, because Mr. ARCHIBALD MARSHALL, instead of keeping his _Clinton_ tales consecutive, has mixed them democratically with the _Others_. Our first sight of the family (and incidentally the most agreeable thing in the volume) is provided by "Kencote," a brightly- coloured and engaging anecdote of Regency times, and of the plucking of an honoured house from the ambiguous patronage of the First Gentleman in Europe. I found this delightful, spirited, picturesque and original. Thence we pass to the _Others_, to the theme (old, but given here with a pleasant freshness of circumstance) of maternal craft in averting a threatened mesalliance, to a study of architecture in its effect upon character, to a girls' school tale; finally to the portrait of a modern _Squire Clinton_, struggling to adjust his mind to the complexities of the War. This last, a character-study of very moving and sympathetic realism, suffers a little from a defect inherent in one of Mr. MARSHALL'S best qualities, his gift for absolutely natural dialogue. The danger of this is that, as here in the bedroom chatter of the Squire's daughters, his folk are apt to repeat themselves, as talk does in nature, but should not (I suppose) in art. Still this is a small defect in a book that is sincere in quality and convincingly human in effect. _The Clintons and Others_ is certainly miles away from the collections of reprinted pot-boilers that at one time brought books of short stories into poor repute. Mr. MARSHALL and Others (a select band) will rapidly correct this by giving us in small compass work equal to their own best. * * * * *