The San Francisco call., 1895-12-01
"Gustave FIaubert as Seen in His Works

entitled .Madame Bovary" which ac-
tualIy offended French tribunals to such
an extent that the Partisan ANTHONY
Comstock prosecuted Flaubert for writ
ing an :. immoral book, while allow
ing Zola the freedom OF his pen. No
American publisher. however, has had the
business hardwood to translate it. As
personality Flaunert was odd and eccen-
tric. and as q writer not a priest whose
mission was to label and denounce sin, but
student of human nature, dramatist
whose business was to delineate the pas
sions OF men and women, and an anato-
mist whose sharp instruments were..meant
for dissection and not for carnal blood
letting.
Are any of my readers owners of or hold
memories of the Potiphar papers by Easy
Chair Curtis? If so, they can newly
whet their taste for sarcasm upon metro
politan and social life by reading dolly
Dillenbeck. lively story of to-day,
written by New York journalist, James
L. Ford. .,
The holiday contribution of Dodd, Mead
& Co.-also, like the Appletons and the
Scribners, housed in skyscraping stone
palaces on Fifth avenues Amelia Barr's
new novel named "Bernecia," an incur
sion into the London times of Jane Porter,
whom she much resembles in style and
nlot. In developing the latter she uses
The great reylyalist Whitefieid, who, saws
a biographer used by his preaching, to
drive member of his congregation into a
corner of pew, trembling, because be
thought the devil was after him.
Brentano has on his capacious shelves
veritably Uttered. says bronson Howard
AFT the club. and therefore, of course, liter
allv--a tale py the wife of ex-senator Blair
of New Hampshire which she names ssThe
Life and Love of Lisbeth Wilson," The
scene is laid among the granite hills of
New Hampshire in Puritan times, and the
pages are very Hawthorneish in style, but
not so sad as 'Scarlet Letter" was.
In novel-reading nowadays-and who
does not indulge in it?-S Salisbury, Rose
berry, Balfour, ana even the porpolse-Hke
Harcourt are noted novel readers; so was
Blaine. and so is Evarts and Depew. One
tonch of nature in a novel makes the whole
world kin-schoolgirls, fashionable mat
rons. statesmen, philosophers, jurists and
hank presidents. In novel-Ieading now
adays. 1 repeat, one cannot help thinking
how action and reaction in their tone dur
ing century has been equal, according to
a welI-known law of physics, Smollett.
Sterne and Fielding pleased generation
that the next one tabooed in favor of
"Hannah More" and that dreary four
volume goo goo novel of "Caleb in Search
of a Wife.
Bulwer, after he wrote "Allce and the
MYSTERIES, :" had to pull into the propre-
ties with What Will He Do With It?"
while the pendulums of propriety and i'm
Saltus. lola and George Moore on one
side of the ticks of the literary clocks and
| HowelIs and James on the other side. A
perrsal of Brentano catalogue lays bare
the wheels and striking machinery of that
clock. But its dial-plate will bear more of
| an examination when the holiday season,
absorbing the literary season, brings books
more into notice with the advent OF the
| gift season. For in that connection books
are supplanting iewelry.
The belle of the coming season is an
nounced and all the beaux are summoned
to do her homage. She is Miss Catherine
Duer. Familiarity known as Kitty. She was
| a prominent bridesmaid at the ducal wed
ding-tall, graceful, yet strident, and only
beautiful under the Bulwer line in the
poem of New Timon"-"her face broke to
beauty when she smiled" very knlck-
erbocker belle, for her ancestors have been
famous in New York from colonial times,
and one of the Whig colonial Duer bellies
married O Tory lord. Her relative, Will
liam A. Duer, was president OF our Co.
lumbia College. John Duer was a great
jurist, Denning Duer a great banker, and
her father is a commercial and society
magnate. All were "doers" of good deeds.
And society rumor saith. that Kitty hath
made a solemn VOW to wed only knick-
erbocker. But l fancy that if a Southern
Eastern or Western wooer, not Don
Quixote, nor riding a Rosinante. were to
spur into the Duer courtyard, eligible as
to family and means, and lay siege tC
Kittys heart, she would forswear hel
knickerbocker OATH
Does the rest of the Union know that g
recent police census discloses that this is
pre-eminently city of Western widows
1t seems that widows from all the States
come to New York to enjoy the independ
ence that it offers. and even with assent
OF Mrs. Grundy. The lady in mourning
or half-mourning carries here In New orl
thoroughfares, at matinees and in genera
society, credentials and passports emitting
her to do exactly what she pleases.
Mrs. A. M. Palmer, wife of the scholarly
manager and litterateur of the city, few
days ago perpetrated clever epigram in
deprecating at discussion about the Van
derrbilt and Whitney marriages the ten
cial supremacy and display ostentation
Said she, the fault is in social education
| for eyerv girl seems to be taught an am
| bition to stand at the head of her set
quite as at spelling bee in infant school
each girl aims to spell herself to the tor
| of the class. 1t may be SO; Squeers, In
| sNicholas Nickleby" Inculcated skill in
spelling with his pupils in Dotheboy's Hal
thus: SSmike, spell garden" and when he
had spelled it. added, "And now go and
| work il, it." So a New York fashionable
| mother NAV say to her debutante daugh
ter, spell Duke; and, although she may
! form the letters "dook," the mother will
| say. "Well, go to work and capture one.'
Our excise board. anxious for more
worlds than those containing Sunday
saloons, to conquer, are endeavoring to
force to the verge of liquor license the con-
fectioners, who manufacture and sell what
are slangingly called in fashionable circles
twink drops" That is when feminine
buyer does not wish to expose her fraiity
she calls for drops and gives the shopgirl
the wink. Which. being translated
means either gum or cream or chocolate
drop charged with brandy, whisky, rum
or curacao. The shopgirl brings out the
tray and quickly describes the contents Of
each subdivision. These drops are charm
ing stimulants during shopping or visitin g
hours and at matinees. Moreover, a clever
girl. invited to box or stall at opera OF
theater. can take some of these drops with
her and so prevent her escort from the
necessity of going out between acts ''to see
friend."> In pound of such drops are
contained six drinks, according to club
computation.