The Arkansaw traveler., 1889-10-05
A BUNDLE OF NOVELS.
New orleans Times Democrat

Orleans Times Democrat
 Time was when "serious" people looked upon the work of the fabulist moral pitAll scarcely less dangerous than cards or dancing. In our day, on the contrary, Thackeray's much quoted remark that novels sweets relished by all who have healthy tastes, seems to have been taken to heart This is a novel reading and novel-writing age, and most of us have come to believe that fiction If not taken in inordinate quantities, Is wholesome Not only ls the novel stop-gap or pleasant play mate for a holiday, but it has it's benefcent uses-rest- ing the brain harassed by those "unquiet thoughts that careful minds invade" and giving haf fOrgetfulness in waking hours of the pain that pursues dimly through the dreams Of the night and brings It's quarry to bay at daylight.
 Here is a bundle of these sweets in smart paper covers of diverse ints and designs Let us turn the pages of Not as Other Men," and see what pleas ure is to be found therein. The hero Virian GTeshdn, soon steps upon the stage. He has ga certain stately, stage-like grace'' and wonderful physical beauty but the details of his lovelincss not given, for he Is "A difficult to describe" All women adore him-al men are jealous of him, but some mystery enveops him, and his acq uaint- ances are wont to whisper to each other: There Is something lacking in this map" and they say 1t in italics, too, which makes 1t all the more blood curdlinR. Every seven years, some strange power impes ViciaR to visit his unce who lives secluded in Cornwall, surrounded by electrical apparatus and all sorts of internal machines being aided in his mysterious works by his companion, AaRdhar Ram, an Oriental.
 Virida is conscious that he is "not as other men" and sometimes questions his uncle; but the old gentleman and AdRdhar Ram shake their heads and hint at some dark secret. Aandhar Ram has a weird way of appearing to Tivian at the dead hours of the night, In the most unlikely places, apparently for the purpose of telling unpleasant home-truths and making gloomy predictions He bids Viridn beware of love but unfortunately the young man has already wooed and won Lady GLddys FGae, stately beauty pure and chaste iceberg, and almost agreeable and interest ing. After some weeks of happy courtship, busi- calls picidR to London, and while there he allows himself to be kissed and embraced by fash ionable siren with arms 'as supple as silk and as strong steel" Of course, this episode is addi- tional proof of his unlikeness to other men. Let hasten on to the sad iadle. Lady Giddys can- wall desperate man, and demands the solution of the mystery of his being. Then all Is revealed. That diabolical old gentleman, with the aid of AGRdhGr Ram, had manufactured VtUiGn but being amateur in the art of creation he did not know all the ingredients that go to the making of 6 man, hehce that something lacking, and the sity that Vtci0n should come back every seven years, to be reinforced with "electrical energy" This being told to Vtrian, with much cheap scien- tifc talk, he gives wild laugh-"Ha, hal will never return ln-and vanishes from the scene.
 Perhaps "Nature's Greed" may be more to the purpose. Natures creed it appears, is not hard to follow. If you are woman you must hate your husband If 6 man, you must fall in love with some other mans wife. Whatever your sex, you must ejaculate at intervals, "Why was ever born? Why does nature impant feelings in breasts strong as death, and then call them sin2" Mona the hero inc of this novel, after stormy childhood, marries
 man she does not love in order to prop the falling fortunes of her house. Her wicked husband often hox ax<1 .lxot