Mr. Nigel Balchin, an Englishman, is presented again to America with this rosary of short stories. May he receive — he should receive a wide and warm welcome! He descends happily from, and has inherited some of the genius of, Aristophanes, Apuleius, Boccacio, Chaucer and the best of the Pickwickian Dickens.
He strings a necklace of anecdotes, each one a prism of radiant intelligence and understanding, on the thread of his irresponsible and immensely lovable Uncle Charles. Uncle Charles is a sponge who, if he lives off his friends, does so with elegance, and who has the distinct recommendation of having soaked up and stored for our enduring delight more of civilization than the great mass of the world’s hardworking nonentities.
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