The record-union., 1895-05-03
''FADIFICATION" OF new THINGS.
Free Lance" is Very Much Disguised
With 1t.
Sharp Thrusts at Some of the Fads of
the Day and Some Literary
Productions.

in the application of electricity or the
latest method of committing suicide
characteristic off these self-conscious. in
Prospective bipeds who occupy the earth
contemporaneously with us is their pre-
dilection for fads. Like the men OF
Athens. we are always seeking some new
thing. and future historians will refer
with wonder, no doubt, to those strange
people who lived at the end of the nlne-
teenth century, who were consumed Win
an Unsuitable appetite for novelties. and
tormented with deep soul-yearning for
the very newest wrinkle.
To what does your taste inclins-to
science? Permit me TO say, dear sir, or
madam. that science is not without its
fads. Take, for example, the noble art
of healing. There is Brown-Sequard' s
Elixir of Llfe-old men to be rejuven-
ated with more startling results than are
shown in the pictures of before and
after" taking OF the patent medicine ad-
vertisement; women in the sere and
yellow leaf to regain the bloom of youth s
spring time, their shrunken forms to
take on again those graceful curves
which, "Oh, bosh ' somebody says,
Talk of Brown-Sequard to the last
generation"
Well, if you will none of the elixir,
there is Koch's tuberculosis. That dread
scourge of humanity, consumption, is to
be swept from The earth; those terrible
bacilli tuberculosis are to be routed horse,
foot and dragoon; science, with giant
strides Nonsense! tell us of some
thing hoary, mosS-grOwn, mOldy, ii you
will, but don't go back into the limbo OF
exploded notions SO far as that" Con-
slider, then, diphtheria anti-toxine. "Oh,
now you're talkingW Horse-serum; in
ject it under the skin of babies and
snatch them from the brink of the grave;
one minute, before using, in articulo
mortis; next minute, after using, Justify
crying for the maternal fount, or, rather,
the bottle poor little victims of modern
progress Yes, wonderful thing is that
serum; all the babies get well, they say
those 1t doesn't kill.
But perhaps you are not interested in
matters scientific; you prefer TO make a
study of social conditions. Here you
shall find hobbies galore. There is
Looking Backw ward' - Horrors.
man, Rip Van Winkle is speedy along
side of you; talk of back numbers, why"
- Well, ii Bellamy won't do we can
easily look farther. All, there is the
capital letters and all. and much joy may
you get of her.
Are you interested in literature? There
is "Trilby"-take her also. Take her
in season and out of season. Take her
for better, for worse. Take her for
breakfast, lunch and dinner. Take her
boiled, stewed and fried. Take her I'D
libitune, ad intfpitunt and I'D nduseunt.
Yes, take her, and while you are about it,
for goodness sake take her 80 far she can
never get back.
The ideas embodied in fads are often
good. II is not the new things that one
finds fault with. but it is the silly en-
thusiasm displayed over them; it is the
crazy harping on them by newspapers,
magazines and individuals; it is the
apotheosis, or, if L may make word, the
ratification of them, that it fatiguing.
1t is q fad at present to be up In current
literature. You DON'T have to know Ad-
Olson and Ruskin; you don't have to
know Carlyle and Emerson; but you've
got to know Kipling and Conan Doyle
That Pass, ,"and Du Maurier, if you want
to be considered at all up TO date.
Speaking of current literature, it is said
that one OF the San Francisco papers pays
q great deal of money for its stories.
it paid very much for story it has re-
Gently been publishing, "The Third Vol
ume," it got sadly cheated.
One doesn't mind yawning over novel
of HowelPs or of any of those literary
fellows who eschew the sensational, but
when an author starts out with the
avowed intention of giving US something
truly and delightfully."- horrlfying, and
then puts US to sleep, 1t is little too
much. 1t is stealing ones time under
false pretenses.
In an alleged sensational story we eX-
pect the characters to be wooden, the
conversations to be inane, and the situa-
tions to be wildly Improbable, but we
are ready to forgive all that if only we get
a rafting good plot with a bloody mys-
terry, and beautiful young woman, and
a deep, deep villain, and plenty of hair
breadth escapes, and a little artistic de-
tective work thrown in.
But this Third Volume gives never a
thrill nor cold shudder from the first
chapter to the last. 1t is not good enough
literature to deserve q place in high
class periodical, and it is not bad enough
for the columns Of the ''Cham bermaids'
own" Being fit neither for the home of
the blest nor the regions OF the damned,
it was cast into San Francisco daily.
An accusation of stealing ideas should
not be made rashly, for, as Inventions
and discoveries are often made almost ST.
multaneousiy by individuals living in
different parts of the world, so the same
brilliant thought on any subject may oc-
eur to different persons independently.
Then, too. experience shows that writer's
not infrequently deceive themselves, be-
lieving something to have sprung from
their own brain, which, in reality, has
been acquired elsewhere and lain DOR
mant Besides, everything has been said,
and all that one can hope to do in repeat
ing it is to give it g smack of his own
individuality. That, however, some-
times is everything, for, as 1t Is written,
the bee gathers sweets from every flower,
but the honey is his own. or, to quote
Lowell, He says it first who says it
best"
Notwithstanding all this, the spirit
moves me to say that there is plagia-
rism in 1.-The Third Volume' SO raw. so
crude, that one feels like blushing for the
plagiarist. 1t is q repetition OF the old
witticism found in every school rhetoric,
and ascribed, l believe, TO Sydney Smith.
That humorist, in speaking OF married
couple of whom the husband was very
effeminate and the wife. very mannish.
remarked that they were extraordinary
nicepeople, he was so ladylike and she was
such perfect gentleman. The author of
1.-THE Third Volume recites this as
something original. Oh, fie, after that
you should be compelled to initiate the
dramatic act of one of the gentlemen
mentioned in your story who made
gesture of despair and plunged into the
darkness" He reappeared, however.
IGNIS FATUUS.
A poet sought name
He brought the love-notes of bird,
The purling OF a stream snow-born,
To serve his song-all sounds morn
OF spring brings forth there might be heard;
Then he awaited fame
None listened to his lay.
Abashed, he looked for larger themes
He sang of mortals' joys and fears,