various contributors

“ Yes, I like Penrod, though I have not any great desire to meet him in the flesh. It grieves me, however, that such a character as Mr. Kinosling should have been dragged in by the heels. If fatuous clerics are worth any novelist's attention they certainly are not worth Mr. Tarkington's, and the only effect Mr. Kinosling had upon me was to fortify my conviction that it is far easier to begin a book of humour than to finish it. ”

“ The plot, so far as there is one, concerns the chequered career of a certain Major Smart, who seems to have been by no means all that a major should be. Amongst other unpleasing peculiarities, he was apparently possessed of a fetish that brought misfortune or death to all who were associated with him. These results were in the main involuntary; but it is only just to add that Smart was not above assisting nature to take her course. Thus, some years before the opening of the story, he had deliberately buried one poor lady alive in a cave containing sulphide of mercury. ”