Messrs. HODDER AND STOUGHTON have beaten up various American magazines and shepherded a few _Waifs and Strays_ of short stories by the late "O. HENRY" (WILLIAM SYDNEY PORTER) into a final volume of their excellent edition of his works. They have also included appreciations by various American and British critics of the author's achievement, together with some sparse biographical details. The stories are of varying value, exercises on a sentimental motive cloaked by humorous or bizarre exaggeration of language, with those unexpected but ingeniously plausible endings which are of the essence of "O. HENRY'S" method. Of the criticisms, English readers will be most affected by Mr. STEPHEN LEACOCK'S "The Amazing Genius of O. HENRY," an analytical appreciation in the most handsome terms, deploring English neglect of this master of one of the most difficult of art-forms--a neglect which we have done something of late to remedy.