The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-05-31
EARTH'S ELYSIAN FIELDS.
Glimpses Into Corners Little known
to the Busy Men of the World.
Life in the Canary Islands, Happy Commu-
nifty in the Eastern Archipelago-The
Land of the Laps.
Special Correspondence indianapolis Journal.
A TROPICAL ARCADIA.

A TROPICAL ARCADlA.
LONDON, May I9--The most important books
of the moment are narratives of travel and ex-
ploration. They divide the honors of popularity
with fiction. Time was when travellers tales
was a polite phase for lying But increase of
communication with distant countries and the
progress of discovery show us that the real won
ders of the world are stranger than invented
ones. and that the experiences of travellers need
not be exaggerated have this week had chat
with friend fresh from the Canary islands. He
is an English surveyor. With taste for ad-
venture and the necessity before him of doing
something for living, he resolved to go to the
Canary islands and grow fruit for the English
market.
IA lovely climate he said, ''and the place is
so cheap to live in that for f100 year live
with my gardener, horse of my own, he and
his wife and cottage-our expenses all told
The Canary islands belong to Spain and have
for 500 years. They are two days sail from
Madeira, and yet are comparatively unknown
l have just introduced into the work of garden
ing some English and American tools, which are
perpetual surprise and wonder to the natives
You can literally see things grow there. A bean
which set one night was two inches up its
bamboo stick the next morning I supply the
local steamers with fruit and vegetables, and
send lot of bananas to Covent Garden market
London. Canary wine, mentioned by Shak-
speare, was the production of these islands
The canary bird is a native songster, but in
its wild state is simply greenfnch. The canary
is the production of domesticity-it is bred and
reared in captivity. man and his wife can
live in a house and have good time on ESQ
($25O year on any of the lovely islands of these
sunny seas. The natives are of the old Spanish
stock, highly civilized, and very hospitable to
strangers. Arcadia is rest within the Canary
Islands," Ny friend is-in no sense a romantic
person, but NAH of business, matter -of-fact
Englishman and give you his slip" with every
confidence in his perfect reliability. "And here
is fact for you," he said at parting ''the disease
of consumption is unknown out there For years
I never in England or America passed through
winter without taking cold In the Canary
Islands 1 never coughed or sneezed, and the tenn
perature all through the winter weather does
not fall below sixty degrees"
LITERARY AND JOURNALISTIC STYLE.
Two of the newest books IF travel are just
issued from the press of Sampson Low e. Co.
The first is "a Naturalist's Wanderings in the
Eastern Archipelago by Henry G. Forbes,
Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society; and
the other is Under the Rays Of the Aurora
Borealis," by Sophus Trombolt. The latter is
translation by Carl Siewers. 81 trust you will
not kill me in the translation wrote Trombolt
to Siewers, "even if my ideas and expressions
may seem bizarre. LIE style c'est lhomme'
Upon this remark, (which is the beginning of
the preface), claim to wander away for a mo-
ment, tempted by the interesting subject which
it suggests-style. In these days of cable
dispatches and rapid writing the art Of literary
style is apt to fall into neglect. Journal
ism in America is feverish up to date, current,
restless, and conduces to daShing, smart and
more or less fippant style of writing. do not
say this in critical mood Of depreciation land
use the term fippant in its lightest and ARREST
sense), but as fact which strikes me by the
way. If the style bespeaks the man, it seems to
me that from a journalistic point of view it is no
less characteristic OF an entire people. Amer
lean journalism as matter of style is singularly
characteristic of America. The first condition
imposed upon an American journalist is that he
must be entertaining, and you cannot be enter
tanned in long sentences, in dscursive passages,
nor in style that is particularly reflective. On
the other hand, foremost English condition is
that you must be correct You must make no
mistake. The editor must not be troubled with
complaints in regard to your dates. You must
have a continual sense of the responsibility you
owe to your chief and the public. You must
not be fippant. Your style must be sober
and thoughtful. Scrooges protest to the
ghost Don't be fowery, Jacob is perpetual
editorial warning to writers for the London
Times To be fowery is to be light and hippant:
to be fiippant is fatal to any writer's engagement
upon the leading paper. There are indications
to-day, however, that the English press will
eventually effect an interesting compromise in
the matter OF style by annexing certain bright
features of American journalism and inoculating
its own somewhat prosaic methods with the live
lier system, the brighter diction and the shorter
sentences of the American writer. If, on the
other hand, certain leading journals of the
United States adopted little of the more sober,
responsible and serious style in their editorial
pages, the change, believe, would be of great
value in the formation and guidance of public
opinion. hope these suggestions may not be
regarded as heretical for l know that American
leader writers, from a newspaper point of view,
look down upon English editorials, which they
regard as clever and more or less learned essays
that belong rather to literature than to journal
ism.
THE HAPPY Cocos PEOPLE
And now let us turn to the romance of travel
as exempliied in the newest books of this popu
lar branch of current literature. Mr.. Henry o.
Forbes's ''Wanderings in the Eastern Archipel-
ago cover the years 1878 to 1883, and belong to
what may be called the more serious side of
travel and exploration They include exhaust
i've personal accounts of Batavia, the Cocos
Kuling islands, Java, Sumatra, the Moluccas,
Timor and adjacent countries of the Eastern
seas The student of natural history will find
in these pages world of interesting matter
set forth scientifically, but not without some lit
erary skill while the phiOSophic author does
not allow himself to pass over incidents of travel
that cannot fail to be entertaining to the gem
eral reader The story of the Cocos people is
the romance of an island entirely cut off from
the world, controlled and governed by an Eng
glish merchant, who, dying, left his mission to
his SON
The present proprietor, the third in success
sion by the sudden death of his father, found
himself. while studying engineering in Glasgow,
endowed with this extraordinary property.
Abandoning. all tho mara hitiouc plans hiS