259
Courtesy of D. Applcton & Co
E. L. SHUMAN.
Author of "Practical JourDalism." '
comes to Hallworth upon the death Of her
uncle, a learned scholar and philosopher with
whom she has lived a totally secluded life and
from whom she has learned Greek and Latin,
idealism and poetry. Her guardian. Dr. Pen-
fold, a man of forty-five, is professor of ab-
stract mathematics at Hallworth. Poor little
Barbara after her life among the ancient
Greeks feels totally lost among the students
of this co-educational university. She has
learned to worship learning and she is honest
and real in every thought. She scarcely un-
derstands the language of the modern man
and woman, made up of epigram and slang
and references to unknown events. She is
lonely among her classmates and spends
more and more of her time with her guardian
and his Fellow, Waring, who is taking a post-
graduate course at Hallworth.
Dr. Penfold likes the companionship of the
intelligent, helpful girl and offers her his
home in marriage. She accepts and he goes
back to his study and his mathematics and
leaves her to attend to all her social duties
under the care of Waring. Waring is also
full of ideals, especially for Hallworth, and
here is some of Miss Sholl's finest work. He
thinks an American college should train good
American citizens and that students should
be trained in their judgment of all the events
that are before the world. He does not be-
lieve in accepting endowments from million-
aires who have made these millions without
principle. He fiercely fights the frivolities and
flirtations and superficialities of a co-educa-
tional college course. The comparison of for-
eign methods and foreign character with
American ways shows also good thinking and
clever presentation. Of course Barbara and
Waring grow to love each other. Miss Sholl
is outspoken and very keen in psychology
and physiology. The book will bear several
readings. The character drawing of the pro-
fessors and many of the girl students is very
fine indeed. The "law of life" would seem to
be devotion to duty and sacrifice of the in-
dividual for the greatest good of the whole.
(Appleton. $1.50.)
Henry Holt & Co.'s Successes.
"Red-Headed Gill/' the very remarkable
story in which an East Indian influence
crosses the seas and affects the life of the
Cornish heroine, has now been printed for the
third time.
Rye Owen, the author of this highly origi-
nal romance, though an English woman, and
coming of a family whose birthplace was amid
the very scenes in Cornwall where her hero-
ine lived and died, has passed a great part of
her life in Southern Europe an^ is now a
resident in Madeira. Van Zile's "A Duke and
His Double," noticed in August issue, has
also gone to press for the second time. "The
Lightning Conductor," that buoyant love
story of automobiling, has been printed for
the tenth time, and still goes steadily out to
meet the increasing popular demand. Its title,
the publishers say, has brought them requests
for review copies from scientific periodicals.
Courtesy of Henry Holt & Co.
RYE OWEN,
Author of "Red-Headed Gill.'
26o
THE LITERARY NEWS.
{September, 1903
Conrtesy of A. C. McClurg & Co.
MARGARET HORTON POTTER.
Author of "Castle of Twilight."
Castle of Twilight.
For some time Miss ]Margaret Horton Pot-
ter has had in mind a book which would give,
in some measure, an idea of the conditions
under which women lived in the days of
Feudalism. It is difficult for a modern mind
to realize the loneliness and monotony that
were bravely faced by the chatelaines of
isolated castles, when their husbands and sons
departed to battle or to the court. Some-
times the women were left alone six months
or a year at a time, and just what this meant
to them is brought out with notable art by
Miss Potter in her new romance. Her story
of the life of three brave and beautiful women
at the Breton Castle will reach the sympathies
of the reader in a way that can be equalled
by few recent novels. It is equally apparent
that this is no hastily put together piece of
romantic fiction, but a thoughtful, thoroughly
studied picture of mediaeval life, convincing
in its sincerity, moving in its power of de-
scription, and above all a high example of
literary craftsmanship. The pictures in color
by Ch. Weber are equally notable for their
sympathy with the text and their rare artis-
tic quality. A consistent decorative treat-
ment has been utilized in the type and bind-
ing, and altogether the book is one of re-
markable distinction and most exceptional in-
terest. (McCIurg. $1.50.)
Limanora : The Island of Progress.
"LiMANORA," by Godfrey Sweven, is a se-
quel to "Riallaro," which was published a
year or two ago, and, like "Riallaro," it is
at once both a satire and an allegory. "Rial-
laro" describes a Darwinian experiment in
artificial selection on a Southern Pacific
Archipelago, which is sealed from intercourse
with the rest of the world by an atoll reef
and a ring of mist. The criminals and all
persons morally diseased are placed accord-
ing to type upon the smaller islands, while
the central and largest island is reserved for
normal healthy individuals. The author
studies the life in these different imaginary
communities.
In "Limanora" the author has fulfilled his
promise of describing the scientific advance of
the community left on the central island after
the complete expulsion of what to its inhabi-
tants seemed the clogging elements. (Put-
nam. $1.50.)
The Dominant Strain.
Anna Chapin Ray's hero is. a man in
whom the ancestry of two antipodal races are
blent. His name, Cotton Mather Thayer, is
significant of a line of Puritan ancestors, a
line unbroken, save in the case of his own
father who marries the daughter of a Russian
musician. Thayer is a professional singer, a
baritone. He has the musical temperament,
the emotional nature, which make him an
artist. Ordinarily the New England reserve,
the Puritan poise, finely balance the more
impulsive tendencies, but he has his tempta-
tions. The title of the book is significant.
In the struggle between the two strains, the
Couitesy of Henry Holt & Co.
EDW^ARD S. VAN ZILE.
Author of "The Duke and His Double.'
September, 1903]
THE LITERARY NEWS.
261
iNevv England proves the dominant one. The
supreme test of Thayer's strength and weak-
ness comes through his love for a woman,
Beatrix Dane. Like many another woman,
Beatrix tries the fatal experiment of marry-
ing a man of whose life she knows enough
by implication and hearsay to feel sure is
shadowed by the vice of drink.
edge her attraction to him. Both Thayer and
Beatrix are true to the best traditions of
right, and this without any compromise with
duty. Fate eventually simplifies matters by
carrying Lorimer off in one of his drunken _
frenzies.
Miss Ray's touch is light, but sure, her
dialogues are bright, the musical atmosphere
From 'Cornet Strong."
Copyright, 1903, by John Lace.
.\ LOOK OF SURPRISE ON EVERY FACE.
In spite of her better judgment, she mar-
ries Sidney Lorimer, feeling sure that her
influence after marriage will prove strong-
enough to reform him. It is only the old,
old story over again. Lorimer is a brute,
a madman after he has been drinking, and
Beatrix learns to hate him.
The tragic complication of the affair is that
Thayer loves her, and she, even while she
despises herself for it, is forced almost from
her first meeting with Thayer to acknowl-
is sustained without undue insistence or ar-
tificiality. The moral question is not forced
upon the reader, but suggests itself naturally.
An outline of the story suggests a serious-
ness and heaviness that do not exist in the
book itself. The minor characters are agreea-
ble. Miss Garmion is a delightful spinster,
2nd Sally Van Osdel and Bobby Dane
are a divertingly gay and happy young
pair. (Little, Brown & Co. $1.50.) Brook-
lyn Times.
262
THE LITERARY NEWS.
[September, 1903
From "The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come " Copyright, 1903, by Charles Scrlbnei * Sons.
"l hain't NOTHIN' but a boy, but I GOT TO ACK LIKE A MAN NOW/
The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come.
John Fox's novel in book form, with illus-
trations by F. C. Yohn, is an assured suc-
cess from the very start. No serial for many
years has attracted more enthusiastic comment
from a wide circle of readers, North and
South. It owes its success to many attractive
qualities, but above all to the simplicity and
pathos of its characters and the admirable
writing which Mr. Fox has shown on every
page. He has pictured sympathetically boy
life among the Kentucky mountaineers ; life
at a blue-grass college in the simple days
before the war; class feeling between the
mountaineer and the "furriner," which per-
sists to the present day ; the way in which
Kentucky was rent asunder by the Civil War ;
and the romantic glory of Morgan's Men.
The whole book is bound together by a beau-
tiful love story. (Scribner. $1.50.)
How to Keep Well.
Dr. Floyd M. Crandall has prepared a
book which sets forth in a popular manner
the peculiarities of various diseases and the
methods taken by modern medicine to avoid
and prevent them. "How to Keep Well" is
not a book which is intended to make the
reader his own physician; but rather, so far
as possible, to do without one. The first part
concerns itself with an exposition of the na-
ture of many infectious diseases, and their
methods of treatment and control, with a
chapter on antitoxins and vaccination. In
the second half of the book the author dis-
cusses the conduct of life at the present mo-
ment from the medical aspects, the effects
upon disease of the overcrowding of our cit-
ies and the general tendency toward civic
consolidation; the evils of the sedentary life,
and the effect of these changes, since the days
September, 1903]
THE LITERARY NEWS.
263
the national
of wilderness fighting, upon
character and safety.
Golf and tennis would have been prepos-
terous in Colonial times. The people took no
end of exercise in the ordinary course of
their day's duties. The commercial life of
the present hour imposes a strain upon us
"more exhausting than were as many years
of the old village life of the North or the
plantation life of the South." When people
walked or rode on horseback most of the
time, even in the cities, there was little need
of a jaunt in the mountains. The adoption
of these sports and periods of recreation as
a regular feature of life to-day seems to Dr.
Crandall to denote a recognition of the
changes that have come about almost sud-
denly. On the other hand he sees too much
tension and exhaustion in the recreations of
the general run of business men. Side by
side with this tendency goes a movement
toward centres of excitement, which adds to
the frequency of breakdown in middle life.
We have guarded the early years of life so
well that infant mortality is appreciably less,
H sure sign of an advancing sense of respon-
sibilities implied in a high civilization. But
we have at the same time fallen into a man-
ner of sacrificing uselessly the later years.
And it is against this waste, as it appears in
various departments of national activity, and
toward a civilized comprehension of its ab-
surdity, that the author directs the latter part
of his volume. The discussion is clear and
pointed, and should hold the interest of the
general reader. (Doubleday, Page & Co.
%i.So.)N. Y. Tribune.
The One Woman.
Several novels have been written with the
purpose of propagating socialism ; this one
has been written with the purpose of attack-
ing it. Frank Gordon, pastor of the Pilgrim
Congregational church of New York and then
of the "Temple of Humanity" dedicated to
the preaching of socialism, is the character in
whose rise and fall are illustrated the falla-
cies of the political creed that Mr. Dixon
seeks to condemn. In so far as there is any
central point of attack, this is directed against
the influence which the Gordon brand of so-
cialism has in the destruction of the home and
the family free love being prominent among
the other species of freedom preached by this
disciple.
Gordon was married to a woman about
whose personality "there was a haunting
charm, vivid and spiritual, the breath of a
From *'Monsiffny.''
Copyright, 1903, by Doubleday, Page & Co.
THE MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMAN OF FRANCE,
soul capable of the highest heroism if once
aroused." His ideas on the subject of perfect
freedom in the selection of one's "affinity" of
the opposite sex developed shortly after he
met Kate Ransom, who, as he said, was "The
kind of woman who enraptures the senses,
drugs the brain and conscience of the man
who responds to her call the woman about
whom men have never been able to comprom-
ise, but have always killed one another." An-
swering this woman's "call," Gordon casts off
his wife and children and marries (after a
form of his own) the wealthy Miss Ransom,
who not only inspires him with her charms
264
THE LITERARY NEWS.
[September, 1903
and assists him in his work for the poor, but
supplies him with abundant funds to carry on
this work.
It is not very long, however, before the
second Mrs. Gordon tires of socialism. Gor-
don, too, discovers that "mental freedom could
be made a cloak for the basest mental slavery,
and that the most hide-bound dogmatist on
earth is the modern crank who boasts his
freedom from all dogmas. He found the Lib-
eral to be the most illiberal and narrow man
he had ever met." His following narrowed
down to a "crowd of cranks," to whom he
pleached socialism, and for whom, outside of
this doubtful service, he did nothing. Mean-
while his wife, having little else to do, and
having been thoroughly imbued with the doc-
trine of perfect freedom as expounded by her
husband, had found a new affinity a "gnarled
beast" of a man whose only attraction was
the possession of a quick wit (mostly dis-
played in puncturing Gordon's sophistries)
and great muspular strength. The contest for
the "other woman" between Gordon and the
new affinity is fought out in the good old way,
with brawn and dagger.
The story is a sensational one, but it can-
not be said that it is extravagant or outside
the region of possibility. Part of it dupli-"
cates a familiar newspaper story. In its emo-
tional passages, of which there are many, the
reader's sympathies are wrung again and
again too deeply for one's mental comfort,
but with all the more credit to the author's
powers. There are no heroes in the book,
but there is a noble heroine "the one wom-
an" Ruth Gordon, whose perfect faith, devo-
tion, purity, and goodness make a whole his-
tory of sordidness seem bright and hopeful
of better things. All Thomas Dixon's books
have a distinct social purpose which is not
always so clearly defined as to be recognized
at once. This leads to discussion and makes
them interesting if not always satisfactory.
(Doubleday, Page. $1.50) Public Opinion.
Courtesy of H. S. Stone & Co.
MARY m'lANE.
Author of *-My Friend Annabel Lee."
The Musical Guide.
This guide, by Rupert Hughes, presents in
as condensed a form as possible, without in
any way sacrificing completeness, all the im-
portant facts of music personal, historical,
and technical. It has been written with a
constant view to the needs of the layman,
who knows little or nothing of the science or
history of music, but has an affectionate curi-
osity upon points of discussion that arise in-
cessantly. Those for whom the usual seven
or twelve volume musical dictionaries are too
hrge and expensive will find this a work
splendidly fitted to their needs. Matters of
minor interest are condensed, but not omitted ;
important things are treated in full. In mod-
ernity it supersedes anything else, for it comes
down to 1903. It prints more explanations,
more definitions, and more biographies than
any other book given up to these branches
separately. It gives the pronunciation of
every name in music, and has a chart show-
ing the principles of pronunciation in sixteen
languages. It tells the stories of all the
operas, giving the original casts.
An essay for the uninitiated, which ex-
plains in simple terms the construction of
music from a common chord to a symphony,
serves as an introduction, and there are be-
sides about fifty contributed articles on va-
rious musical subjects by leading writers,
such as Sir Hubert Parry, Runciman, Shed-
lock, Krehbiel, Fink, Henderson, etc. Mr.
Hughes is the author of the well-known work
on "American Composers," which is the ac-
cepted authority on the subject, and his name
alone gives this newer book importance and
reliability. It is both a library in itself and
an important addition to any library. (Mc-
Clure, Phillips. 2 v., $6.)
September, 1903]
THE LITERARY NEWS.
265
On Lawn Tennis.
Probably the Wrenn brothers could give
quite as clear and concise an account of how
R. F. and H. L. Doherty play tennis as the
British champions themselves; but, their
printed testimony being lacking, the English-
men have furnished under the guise of a man-
ual "On Lawn Tennis" a clear and readable
exposition of their style of play. The
Dohertys give their advice clearly, and if they
care to point to themselves as examples, the
player is not in sight at present to question
and ingenious. It shows a disregard of form
for the sake of results, a gre'ater aggressive-
ness, and a greater show of pace, though the
authors reserve a doubt whether the pace is
not more apparent than real an idea that
hints, perhaps, at the general feverish haste
often made a national charge. (Baker & Tay-
lor Co. $1.50.) AT. Y. Tribune.
Our Feathered Game.
"Our Feathered Game/' by Dwight W.
Huntington, is a treatise on land and water
From ** On Lawn Tennis.''
Copyright, 1903, by J. F. Taylor & Co.
R. F. AND H. L. DOHERTY.
that they give it soundly. The high lob, the
snarling service, the eager effort to spring to
the net, the extreme apparent aggressiveness
of the American style of tennis, however,
they do not recommend. Keep your eye on
the ball, follow your strokes through, learn
your man, and, above all, be steady, is the
burden of their advice. It is, in short, just
what cne would expect from these two ex-
ponents of the "patient" style of play.
The book is illustrated witli views of the
American and the English player in proper
action, and contains interesting estimates of
the ranking American players. Whitman is
praised most highly. Contrasted with the
r.nglish, the American game is called brilliant
birds from the sportsman's point of view, and
aims, like certain other recent works on the
subject, to give enough ornithological descrip-
tion of each species to enable the layman to
identify the birds he bags. What the author
has to say about the absence of characters
that should separate certain sub-species will
appear footless to the systematic ornitholo-
gist, and the description of hunting wild tur-
keys may amuse sportsmen who have shot
the king of our feathered game, but on the
whole the book is remarkably free from slips.
The parts devoted to the woodcock and the
Wilson's snipe are especially good. The au-
thor's point about holding well ahead of a
swift-flying game bird is one that old hands
266
THE LITERARY NEWS.
[September^ 1903
a? well as novices should bear in mind. The
subject most valuable, perhaps, and less ade-
quately treated in other late books, is the
preservation of game birds and the legisla-
tion therefor. Interesting accounts are given
of the various ducking clubs and their meth-
ods. The registers of several clubs are in-
serted, showing alarming decrease, during the
last ten or more years, in the bag of our most
valuable ducks. Upland game preserves are
described, and game laws bearing on the
limit of the bag and suppression of the mar-
ket hunter are discussed. The author has at-
tractively illustrated the book with his own
colored drawings of hunting scenes. (Scrib-
ner. $2.) The Nation.
The Long Night.
Geneva in the early days of the seven-
teenth century; a ruffling young theologue
new to the city; a beautiful and innocent
girl suspected of witchcraft ; a crafty scholar
and metaphysician seeking to give over the
city into the hands of the Savoyards ; a stern
and powerful Syndic whom the scholar be-
guiles to betray his office by promises of an
elixir which shall save him from his fatal ill-
ness ; a brutal soldier of fortune these are
the elements of which Weyman has composed
the most brilliant and thrilling of his ro-
mances. Claude Mercier, the student, seeing
the plot in which the girl he loves is in-
volved, yet helpless to divulge it, finds at last
his opportunity when the treacherous men
of Savoy are admitted within Geneva's walls,
and in a night of whirlwind fighting saves
the city by his courage and address. For fire
and spirit there are few chapters in modern
literature such as those which picture the
splendid defence of Geneva by the staid,
churchly, heroic burghers, fighting in their
own blood under the divided leadership of
the fat Syndic Baudichon, and the bandy-
legged tailor, Jehan Brosse, and winning the
battle against the armed and armored forces
of the invaders. The book is charmingly il-
lustrated by Solomon J. Solomon, (Mc-
Clure, Phillips & Co. $1.50.)
From Weyman's "The Long Night." Copyright, 1903, by McClure, Phillips & Co.
SHE WAS SUSPECTED OF WITCHCRAFT.
September, 1903]
THE LITERARY NEWS.
267
The Tu-Tze's Tower.
"The Tu-Tze's Tower/' by Louise Betts
Edwards, is the story of an American woman
who loves and marries a Thibetan chieftain,
she the widow of a French explorer and loved
by Michael Traquair, who has traversed Asia
amid many perils to rescue Winifred Blaize
perience such as comes to few men or women
of twice her age, ordinary lovemaking had
played a less part than enters into that of
many a girl of sixteen. The grotesque phe-
nomena of so-called civilized courtship, a
study for Gulliver himsef, which, like a false
corona, play around the bald human necessity
From "The Tu-Tze's Tower." Copyri^lit, Iftii.i, by H. T. Coates & Co.
"l WILL NOT DO THIS, IT IS NOT MANLY."
from captivity among the mountain savages.
The tale is a weird one, full of the improb-
able, and set apart with marvellous adven-
tures, with touches of the humorous and in-
sight into life among the Chinese and the
missionaries in China that give it interest
apart from the moving incidents of the nar-
ration. Into the life of Winifred, the reader
in told, broadened by travel and rich in ex-
for choosing a mate, were unknown to her,
when she encounters the masterful Tu-Tze
and recognizes that every woman has an ar-
rogant dream of being loved with barbaric
fierceness and volcanic passion to give her
the new sensation whose quest keeps the pa-
tient world in spirits. Thus it was that when
Michael Traquair appears before her that she
recognizes his chivalric qualities, but to him
2(58
THE LITERARY NEWS.
[September, 1903
pours out her heart passionately, exclaiming :
"I know your civilized world well and deep-
ly ; its awful pain that no knowledge compen-
sates for; its progress which crushes God's
flower under the rail and man's soul under
its conventions ; its tenderness for its own
sickly nerves which it thinks tenderness for
The MS. in a Red Box.
We find "The MS. in a Red Box" a stir-
ring, fighting tale of the time of the Stuarts.
Charles i. had granted to one Cornelius Ver-
muijden a Dutchman, authority to drain the
meres, embank and stop the rivers, of a dis-
trict in the northeast of England in contempt
From "Marie Corelli. ' Copyright, 1903, by Geo. W. Jacobs & Co.
MARIE CORELLl'S BOATMAN AND PUNT.
the brother man it cannot see suffer physical-
]y, but will hound to every other death or sui-
cide it need not see. Perhaps my own nerves
are sickly, for I cannot stand it. Perhaps I
judge wrongly and shallowly, but as a woman
thinks, so is she." In "The Tu-Tze's Tower"
the author has been as fearless in the enuncia-
tion of this theory as her imagination has been
unhampered by respect for the probable in
working out the incidents of her story.
(Coates. $1.50.) San Francisco Chronicle.
of the wishes of the landowners and the needs
of the peasantry. While the work was pro-