_Succession_, though complete in itself, is really a sequel to _Promise_, published a year ago. The sub-title presents the idea, and can be concretely expanded in a sentence: Antoine, child-wonder violinist, and the youngest of the celebrated Lemaures, revolts against the musical ideas of his grandfather. Here it is again--the battle of youth and age, made particularly interesting because it's a purely intellectual warfare, and particularly charming because its participants are such delightful people. The first glimpse of Antoine is irresistible. After a series of concerts in England, he is being taken by his uncle to their home in France. M. Lucien Lemaure has chosen the long route because his nephew has an odd habit of sleeping better on the water than in any house or hotel on shore; and while he doesn't understand this nephew, he has vital reasons for considering him: for upon Antoine's delicate shoulders rests the musical honor of the family. "Sleep well, mon petit," he said, in the tiny cabin. "We are going home." Antoine, who had no immediate intention of sleeping, was staring out of the dim porthole of a fascinating space of the unknown. "That is home to you?" he asked vaguely. "To be sure. My first youth was passed there, like thine." After an interval passed spent in a vain effort to imagine his uncle with no hair on his face, Antoine gave it up and recurred to the window. "I wish I lived on the sea," he murmured. In the train, flying toward Paris, Lucien refers to the last London recital, when Antoine had made both his uncle's and his conductor's lives a burden by his indifferent rehearsal of his grandfather's latest composition. Antoine's outburst had outraged Lucien, to whom faith in his father's character and genius had, all his life, amounted to a religion. "What will you tell him then?" said Antoine, turning his dark eyes without deranging his languid attitude along the seat. "Just that I said some 'sottises,' the same as always?" "He is not a child," thought Lucien instantly. "He is clever, maddening. Of course, my action will have to be explained. I shall say," he said aloud, with deliberation, "that we differed about the concerto. That you were difficult and headstrong over that, which is certainly true. You have admitted since that it was too much for you, eh?" "Yes," said the boy. "It is an awful thing, but I played it. I had to have something real that night." "You imply my father's composition is not real?" "Oh, do not," said the boy, under his breath. "I have remembered he is your father now." "To be sure," said M. Lucien, with stateliness. "And have you no duty to him as well?" "I shall see him soon. I shall remember then." Antoine diverted his eyes, to his uncle's private relief. "Do you think I do not want to remember, after that?"