Mr. Howells shows a light and exquisite touch in "April Hopes," a novel, it is safe to say, in which all his finer qualities are seen at their best. The sweetness of it is perhaps a trifle cloying now and then to robust palates, but the story is for all the world like a spring day where showers and sunshine grace fully intermingle. Story, we say, while in reality there is no story at all, in accordance with Mr. Howells' views of the lack of stories in "real" life. Only an account of how two young things fell in love with one another and quarreled and made up, and quarreled again, and made up again, and broke off the engagement once more, and finally made up for good and got married. But how charmingly the affair is put before us—all the foolish, silly, entrancing details are there, and never does the author exceed the limits of probability or the canons of good taste. It is like a pretty play, for the narrative in the book is a poor pennyworth of bread to an infinite deal of sack in sh