Chapter I: Front Matter

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Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).

Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold face (=bold=).

THE BECKONING HAND ETC.

* * * * *

_STORIES BY GRANT ALLEN._

STRANGE STORIES.

Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with a Frontispiece by George Du Maurier, 6_s_.; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2_s_.

"Mr. Grant Allen has fully established his claim to be heard
henceforth as a story-teller."--ACADEMY.

"No one will be able to say that the stories are dull. The lighter
stories can be read with pleasure by everybody, and the book can be
dipped into anywhere without disappointment. One and all, the
stories are told with a delightful ease and with an abundance of
lively humour."--ATHENAEUM.

"Almost all the stories are good, coming nearer to the weird power
of Poe than any that we remember to have seen."--PALL MALL GAZETTE.

"Perhaps the best fiction of the year is 'Strange Stories.' Mr.
Grant Allen certainly took his friends by surprise when he burst
forth as the author of the stories which had appeared under the
signature of J. Arbuthnot Wilson. He was known to us all as one of
the most able of the rising men of the evolution school, his
contributions to modern science being of considerable value. Few
suspected him of such levity as telling light stories. The volume
is distinctly good."--COUNTY GENTLEMAN.

PHILISTIA.

Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3_s_. 6_d_.; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2_s_.

"A very clever, well-written novel, full of freshness and
originality."--ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE.

"A book displaying considerable cleverness.... Very readable and
clever."--ACADEMY.

"'Philistia' is distinctly clever, and much may be learned from its
perusal."--MORNING POST.

BABYLON.

Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with twelve Illustrations by P. Macnab, 3_s_. 6_d_.

"The book justifies itself amply. It is fresh, entertaining, and
pleasant from beginning to end. The author has kept in check his
peculiar power of weird and fantastic realism, but he has proved
himself equally at home in the observation of commonplace
character, and the reproduction of everyday life."--PALL MALL
GAZETTE.

"Very bright and very amusing.... That it stands far above the
average of contemporary fiction goes without saying."--SPECTATOR.

FOR MAIMIE'S SAKE.

Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6_s_.

"'For Maimie's Sake' is a book that every one who has made
acquaintance with the stories signed by 'J. Arbuthnot Wilson' will
naturally take up with pleasure. Pleasurable anticipation soon
becomes interest, and this interest must rapidly grow into absorbed
attention. The humour throughout the first part of Mr. Allen's
story is delightful. The reader falls in love with laughing,
lovely, unconventional Maimie."--ACADEMY.

"This is a very remarkable book. Maimie is essentially human,
intensely womanly, and there is something so bewitching in her
childish ignorance, something so innocent in her wickedness, that
we can understand her friends' and her lovers' infatuation for
her.... There is power of a very high order in writing which can so
consistently, yet without the smallest effort, concentrate the
reader's attention on the sinner as apart from the sin. There is
not a character in the book which fails to interest us, and the
writing is, of its kind, faultless."--TIME.

IN ALL SHADES.

3 vols, crown 8vo, cloth extra, 31_s_. 6_d_.

"Mr. Grant Allen could not write a dull story if he wished to do
so.... The plot is capitally developed. There is one extremely fine
character, Louis Delgado, who stirs up the negroes to revolt; and
there is a scene where an attack is made by the negroes on a
planter's home, which, for dramatic force, has rarely been equalled
of late in fiction. The novel has, in addition to excellence of
plot and situation, all the charm that comes of bright and easy
dialogue and of character-drawing far above what is ordinarily
found. In short, the novel is one to delight every one of good
taste."--SCOTSMAN.

"Nora Dupuy is a true, brave, eminently lovable woman, and stands
out in the pages of 'In all Shades' as an eminently charming as
well as characteristic figure.... On the whole, this is a story of
unusual excellence."--PALL MALL GAZETTE.

LONDON: CHATTO AND WINDUS, PICCADILLY.

* * * * *

THE BECKONING HAND AND OTHER STORIES

by

GRANT ALLEN

Author of "Strange Stories," "In All Shades," "Philistia," etc.

With a Frontispiece by Townley Green

London Chatto and Windus, Piccadilly 1887