The latest of the now so fashionable short-story volumes to come my way is one called _Our Casualty, Etc._ (SKEFFINGTON). Much virtue in that "_Etc._," which covers other fifteen little tales in the best, or nearly the best, "Birmingham" manner. I say "nearly," because for its happiest expression the art of "Mr. GEORGE BIRMINGHAM" demands space to tangle events into more complicated confusion than can be contrived in the dozen pages of these episodes. But within their limitations they are all excellent fun, partly concerned with the War (usually with an Irishman involved), partly recalled from the piping and whisky-drinking times of peace, at Inishmore and elsewhere. One can only treat them after the manner of the schoolboy who declined to distinguish between the Major and Minor Prophets. But I rather specially enjoyed the title-piece, which tells how the super-patriotism of an aged volunteer defeated the kindly plans of those who would have saved him fatigue by assigning to him the rôle of casualty in a trench-relief practice. Casualties also figure in "Getting Even," an improbable but highly entertaining fiction of the score practised by an ingenious Medical Officer (Irish, I need hardly say) upon an over-zealous C.O., who, to keep him busy during a field day, flooded his "clearing station" with all sorts of complicated imaginary cases, only to find the fictitious victims arranged comfortably in rows under the shade of the trees to await the Padre and a burying party, the M.O. reporting that they had all died before reaching him. It couldn't possibly happen as here told, but that matters little, since, so far as I am concerned, a "Birmingham" tale can always well afford to dispense with credibility. * * * * *