Fortune

The story, when fairly developed, turns out to be a chronicle of the efforts of three bizarre soldiers of fortune, the pretentious and ignorant Spaniard, the bombastic Richard Pendragon, “in whose veins flowed the blood of kings,” and the Comte de Nullepart, unacknowledged son of the French sovereign, to rescue, on behalf of the Duke of Montesina’s daughter, her family estates from the greed of John of Castille. Burlesque or not, the amazing audacity of the tale sweeps you along in spite of yourself. In a way, the production of such a book in these opening years of the twentieth century is in the nature of an anachronism. It proves that there is still the possibility of writing genuine, old-fashioned, virile romance with real brawn and muscle in it—a possibility which the modern flabby, weak-kneed swash-buckler type of fiction has long taught us to despair of. For this reason, all hair of Mr. Snaith’s latest and most unique achievement. —The Bookman, 1910