Unlike other birds, owls cannot exist where there is noise. Most of their hunting is done by sound, detected by the ultra-sensitive and enormous cavities in the sides of their head, much larger than their eyes. Maybe you will see Strix Flammea as he floats, a great moth of a bird, round the ancient wharves and docks of London Bridge. But it will be in the forsaken silence of the morning, when the traffic of the streets is stilled and few people are about, except the human derelicts huddled by London’s river and an occasional poet enraptured at life’s beauty. [Illustration] GLASGOW: W. COLLINS SONS AND CO. LTD. Messrs. COLLINS’ Latest Novels [Illustration] _Messrs. COLLINS will always be glad to send their book lists regularly to readers who will send name and address._ PIRACY Michael Arlen This is the story of Ivor Pelham Marlay between the ages of 18 and 32, and the period is London, 1910-1922. It is the history of England, two loves, and an ideal. Mr. Arlen deals with all the types of London Society, and he likes to bring out the queer and unexpected sides of his characters. No one who read Mr. Arlen’s first book, _A London Venture_, or his delightful short stories, _A Romantic Lady_, needs to be told that he writes wittily and well. TYLER OF BARNET Bernard Gilbert Author of _Old England_ This long, powerful novel shows the dilemma of a middle-aged man with an invalid wife and grown-up children, who falls passionately in love for the first time. As he is a man of iron self-control he represses his passion till it bursts all bounds, with a tragic result. No one now writing knows so well or describes so vividly life in the English countryside as does Bernard Gilbert. THE PIT-PROP SYNDICATE Freeman Wills Crofts Another brilliantly ingenious detective story by the author of _The Ponson Case_. The mystery of the real business of the syndicate utterly baffled the clever young “amateurs” who tried to solve it, and it took all the experience and perseverance of the “professionals” to break up the dangerous and murderous gang. THE BEAUTIFUL AND DAMNED F. Scott Fitzgerald This book has caused an even greater sensation in America than _This Side of Paradise_. It is a long, searching, and absolutely convincing study of degeneration, that degeneration which ruins so many of the rich, young, idle people. The “smart set” of New York is hurled into the limelight and mercilessly revealed. A witty, pungent, and entirely original book. DANDELION DAYS Henry Williamson This is the tale of a boy’s last terms at a public school, a very sensitive, unusual boy, and it is in a sense a sequel to _The Beautiful Years_. It is the work of a very clever young writer whose nature essays have attracted the widest attention here and in America, and is utterly unlike the usual “school story.” It is a subtle and beautifully written study of character. BEANSTALK Mrs. Henry Dudeney