Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1892-10-13
WITH PEN AND INK.



Main Travelled Road" By Hamlin
Garland, collection Of 'sSix Mississippi
Valley Stories," has nothing in common
with the usual volume OF magazine stories
harvested frop scattering fields into one
sheaf. An efnnestness Of purpose and
intensity Of con lotion runs through these
histories Of the Scl s3eauvrenness farm
life that reads rather as fierce indict-
ment against human society for its cruel
inequalities, than as fiction proper. Mr..
Garland bears traits both Of the political
agitator and the revival preacher in his
methods of hammering home his convic-
ton OF the brutal injustice of world in
which one man lives in a land of fair de-
light while his brother-the same save
for environment-plods his life away at
the tail Of plough-a life unlit by art,
unrelieved by recreation, common, sordid,
hideous. Like the revivalist who paints
the horrors of hell to scare his hearers
into better world, Mr.. Garland depends
somewhat upon his Imagination for his
effects. Not that he does not know the
life OF hardship which he depicts, for we
know from his own testimony that he
"too has felt the heat between the corn
rows"; but that by keeping his eyes
steadily upon the darkest and harshest
side of the life his picture is distorted by
the shadows which fall in unrelieved
gloom, without any of those cross-ights
which in reality minele with and brighten
the whole atmosphere Of existence. The
weary grind Of farm-life, as experienced
by the laborer, can scarcely be exagger-
ated, but the iarring Of evil sights and
smells is not the same upon accustomed
senses as upon those high-wrought from
contact with finer things and sensitive
with awakened sympathy. Even the
vivid memory Of actual toll, as it remains
in such mind as Hamlin Garland's, is
not fair criterion by which to measure
the miseries of the other farm laborers.
That Mr.. Garland should have climbed
from the engulfing mire of Western
farm, should have left the main travelled
road and planted his feet upon the
happier paths of higher life, is evidence
in itself of an uncommon capacity in the
man putting him at once in contrast with
the farm laborers whom he left behind
and whose lot he now looks back upon
with such passionate yearning commiser-
alton.
The purposefulness Of these stories is so
strong that unconsciously in judging the
book as a whole the mind reverts rather
to the separate problems suggested by the
various stories than to external matters
of style or artistic development. In
both these qualities the book falls short
Of excellence. The style is thin and
somewhat monotonous, especially in
descriptions Of nature does Mr.. Garland
fall into few often-used phrases. sug-
costing poverty of observation or re-
source. He uses language In as hap
hazard colloquial fashion as Kipling,
without sharing his sublime luck in
snatching up the telling word upon the
wing. For instance in speaking of the
many changes in small Western town
occurring during long absence, he says
the changes indicate the cease Of shift"
characteristic Of the West. Again in
describing rainy day in the country he
speaks Of the hens ''tramping" up and
down in the confinement of their coops.
Who with half an ear for effect could be
oblivious of the timed beat OF heavy feet
that the word tramp so irresistibly
suggests or attribute that sound to the
sprawling claws Of hens impatient foot ?
And again we feel this slackness of ar
tlstic grasp in his description Of man
with something unusually winning in
his brown moustache and blue eyes"
In this careless use of words and occas-
sional contradictions and discrepancies,
as when man is represented as milking
cow with mud-grimed hands-as if
milking COW were not disagreeable
enough without spelling the pail of milk
VAeA Ahuu VIC DEG VIC tIdCc VI clIllcI
hasty or iIl-considered work. With Mr.
Garland this does not appear to be the
result of idleness, but rather gives the
impression of being the inaccuracy and
exaggeration in the speech OF man un-
der strong excitement. And it must be
Admitted that in spite of minor defects
the central thought in each of the stories
is clearly and forcibly conveyed.
Two of the shorter stories in the book,
"Among the Corn-rows" and "Mrs. Rip
ley's Trip" are told in gayer vein than
the rest and pleasantly relieve the
somberness Of the others. There is every
reason to hope that this group of short
stories is the forerunner Of sounder and
better work. Here is man full of his
message, alive to the sorrow and needs of
people whom he not only knows but
loves; in these facts lie the kernel of
great work. To ardent sympathy, and
forceful manhood may be added, through
labor, the gift of adequate expression.
Bust Bows.
Bust bows are introduced in both morn
ing and evening dresses. They are about
six inches long, according to the figure,
and three to four deep. They consist of a
couple of loops with small tie in the
center, and in the evening serve as the