San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1892-11-26
AFTER THE WEDDING.
Amelie Rives' New Story, Seq
uel to "Ihe. Quick or the
nnaHoD

from the Boston transcript.
1t is pity that so much has
been said about tbs personality Of
Amelie Rives that her name on
the title page of a book almost
irresistibly sets a reader off on the
track, of all the incidents and anec.
dotes that have framed this
meteor.like creature who flashes
her way across the sky of letterN
now and then, then drops flaming
into deeps of effervescent silence
to echo the tone if not the
words of her grand manner. Here
comes a SEOUL to "The Quick or
the DeadW 1t has not been much
heralded. It's title tells it's story
barbara Dering." Of course
Mrs. Pomfret ceases speedily to
be a widow when Jock comes
back after two years. He finds
her out of doors reading Thomas
a Kempis in vain to cool her hot
heart of longing. She holds him
off for a day or two, slipping her
height and dilating pupils and the
thick red gold of her hair out of
the door with a supple movement
just as the long-baffled Jock
thinks he has her in his arms.
But, in spite of the "vague and
half.realized dread which trickled
in bitter drops through the delici
Gus gushing draught of love and
sympathy" she does not pull off
her dead Val's wedding ring until
the end of the sixth chapter. 1t
"came off in her hand with aleap,"
and she turned and thrust it out
to him." Of course he looked
"masterful." He gazed steadily
into her eyes and walked her over
to the open fire, then-'Here," he
said, putting the ring into her
fingers, "throw that into those
hottest Goals there" She did so
without flinching, and they were
married in a month, but they did
not Give happy ever after"
And here Amelie Rives turns
priestess for all the old woes of
wOmankind and makes pure and
powerful plea for the highest type
of marriage, although Barbara and
Dering do not arrive at anything
more than hope of peace and con
tent ami genuine truest daily hap.
piness together, happiness fed
from all the springs of life, and
with the constant assertion that
all these springs must be fed by
sweet waters from the heights or
there is 10 draught of healthy
human happiness for any man and
wife. Barbara and Jock fight it
cut emotiOnally, in their tremend.
Gus fashion. Barbara has anguish
es of lOngings for Walls old gentle
ness. Jock gets ugly enough to
taunt her with the sort of soft
fools she used to manage, and he
is mOrtalIy jealous the next year
of Barbara's baby girl, although
conscious the hour he first sees
the little one that his wife is dear.
er to him than ever before. The
author makes a sort of apology
i'm the early Christian-father sense
of the world, quoting on the title.
page Plato reporting Socrates in
these words:
"Every discourse, once written,
is tossed about from hand to
hand, equally among those for
whom it is in no wise fitted, and
it does know to whom it ought
and to whom it ought not to
speak. And when misunderstC cd
and unjustly attacked it always
needs its parent TO help it, for
unaided il can neither retaliate
nor defend itself"
The most interesting character
III this book is Eunice BTansby.
She is more like the sort of
women that New England is used
to, although she, as well as Barba.
IA Dering, lived in Virginia. But
there is here shown a women of
intense feeling married to an I'M
loving husband, and the way Fun.
ice dares to live and grow after
meeting Barbara and the CONVEX.
satiOns of the two women are full
of that power which the editors
of the Atlantic and of Harper's
Monthly found in Miss Rives'
work in the early days Of her
writing for them, before she took
the hit in her teeth so to sneak.