"Rather disappointing," murmured the Baron, as he closed the book, and "read no more that day." "Why, with a good memory, a lively imagination, and a pleasant style, this 'Old Colleger' might have given us something far more amusing than he has done. Of course Anybody's Anecdotes of our Grand Old School will probably be interesting up to a certain point: and they might be made 'funny, without being vulgar.' But this worthy Octogenarian, be he who he may, has produced only a very matter-of-fact book, containing historic information likely to arrest the attention of an old or young Etonian, but only now and again does the author give us anything sufficiently amusing to evoke a laugh. However, in the course of perusal, I have smiled gently, but distinctly. Had the Octogenarian already told many of these stories to his intimates, to whom their narration caused as much facile entertainment as was given to the friends of _Mr. Peter Magnus_, when he signed himself 'AFTERNOON,' in substitution for his initials, 'P.M.'?" And it is related how _Mr. Pickwick_ rather envied the ease with which _Mr. Magnus's_ friends were entertained. If so, then is the Baron to the Octogenarian Etonian and his intimates as was _Mr. Pickwick_ to "P. M." and his correspondents. There are some good tales about KEAT and HAWTREY, and of course the book, as one among an Etonian series, has its own value for all who care about Eton of the past. * * * * * "_Perdidi diem_," says the Baron, "or at least the better part of it, in reading _Zero the Slaver_, by LAWRENCE FLETCHER, who seems to me to be a promising pupil in the school of RIDER HAGGARD and LOUIS STEVENSON, but chiefly of the former. It was a beastly day, snow falling, and North-West-by-North wind howling, bitterly cold, and so," continued the Baron, "I was reduced to _Zero_. The construction of the plot is clever, as is also the description of a great fight, in the latter portion of the story; but, as a whole, the story is irritatingly ill-written, and tawdrily coloured, while italics are used to bring into prominence any description of some strongly sensational situation." Few things so annoying to me, personally, as the romancer speaking of his chief puppets as "our friends." This LAWRENCE FLETCHER is perpetually doing. Now his heroes are not "my friends," for, when I read, I am strictly impartial, at all events, through two-thirds of the book, and, if I learn to love any one or two (or more) of them, male or female, I should still resent the author's presuming to speak of them as "our friends." To do so from the first is simply impudent presumption on the part of the author, as why, on earth, should he assume that his creations--his children--should be as dear to us as they are to him? No--"Our friends," so used, is a mistake.