Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1892-06-30

W
thusiasm of specialist breaks bounds
and takes to print. Books OF this sort
form class by themselves. They are as
different from books written to order by
the LITERARY sharp" who carries his
mental kodak about with HIM and pops
at whatever picturesque material" may
fall in his way, as cheese from chalk,
just SO different in nutritive value. The
genuineness and ardor with which the
man who writes because he must, not
because he can, arrests attention. 1t is
the voice of sincerity, not the voice of the
charmer, which must be needed. 'The
Rescue OF an Old Place" is narrative
full OF spontaneous humor and charm, OF
the loving labors of the author and her
husband to plant forest and garden in
the sterile waste OF an abandoned Massa-
chusetts farm, which had been first
cleared about two hundred and fifty years
before. Very insufficient material, a
professional writer of "write ups" would
say, fora volume Of nearly three hundred
pages. AS matter OF fact, the book is
interesting from beginning to end, full of
practical wisdom, won, as it were, before
our very eyes in the record OF the failures
and triumphs Of the tireless experiment
ers. Nothing could better exemplify the
indomitable New England character than
the CHEEKY fight of these Eden makers
with the obstinate intractable soil of their
abandoned farm. With them moral sup
port is drawn from the belief that their
"three inch oaks" above whose micros-
copic roots they bend in tender solicitude,
in century or two, may be worth
WHILE" But there is very little time for
passive tenderness; the joys of forest
making in New England are the joys of
battle. Against the wiles and wicked
ness of the rose-chafer, the wcb-worm,
the borer, is breathed the fire and brim-
stone of another day, the WITHDRAWING
instinct, by the great law of the conser-
walton OF energy, is changed into beetle
crushing, worm-smashing, insecticidal
fury. This witch-burner once removed,
after describing various deaths she has
condemned her enemy to of the "linger-
ing and humorous sort with boiling oil in
it," such as the Mikado describes, winds
up her diatribe against" the brute, y ''the
villainous web-worm," by saying: "He
arouses in the gentlest breast desire to
STAY this future parent of thousands; he
undermines the character by stirring up
sentiments of virulent hostility in other
wise peacable souls; he becomes a
menace, not only to existence, but to
Christian character, by developing the
savage instincts OF our nature land, there
fore, on every ground, both physical and
moral, he is an enemy of the public peace
who should be taken in hand by the au-
thorities and be doomed to extermina-
tion."
To us in Western Washington, who,
too, are fighting, not for forest but
against one, this book is both droll and
suggestive reading. In two hundred and
fifty years will native Washingtonian be
planting and tending baby hemlocks hall
foot high, watering their dropping tas.
sells with tears of disappointment; per-
haps echoing this wall: at is hard
enough to persuade Hemlock to grow,
anyway, but if beast is lying in wait to
devour it, we may as well give up al
together?' Isit possible that our throng-
ing giants, two, three, four, hundred feet
high, packed, wedged and massed into
almost impenetrable forests, can ever be
burned, blasted, logged or rotted to des-
truction? After following the heroic la
bors OF the rescuers of an old place in
their efforts to start forest that after "a
century or two may be worth WHILE" it
is impossible to wave away these thoughts
with the sordid truism that 1--WE will not
live to see it,"
(Houghton Miffiin & Co Boston. Mess.
Why is no magazine of the first class
published in the South? This question
has been asked by those who have re-
called the list of Southrrn writer's who
contribute SO largely to the Northern
monthly magazines. What long list it |
is! G. w. Gable, James Lane Allen. |
Frank Hopkinson Smith, Col. Richard
Malcolm Johnson, Joel Chandler Harris.
Harry Edwards, Thomas Nelson Page.
Sidney Lanier, Robert Burns Wilson.
Maurice Thompson, Viola Roseboro,
Matt Grim, Miss Murfree, Mrs. Burton
Harrison, Amelie Rives, Marion Har-
land, Elizabeth Bisland and host of
still lesser lights dwindling into the fire.
flies of local newspaperdom. But if the
list were twice as long and thrice as i'm
posing the South would still be quite as
far from having great illustrated
monthly. A magazine of this sort is one
of the most elaborate and highly evolved
products Of modern manufacture. It
took New York about fifty years to bring
the art OF magazine making to its present
perfection, and in the slow process talent
was drawn from every part of the coun-
try, until today is gathered there great
army of skilled specialists whose whole
support is derived from work upon the
great illustrated magazines.