New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1896-08-30
NEW NOVELS.
JEWISH LIFE IN NETWORK.

YEKL STORY OF TILE 5mo NE Gg 1s6 G ApPle
ton & CO.
Nps GERALD. By Maria Louise Pool. Emo,
3D. 339 Harper Brothers
KING NOANETT. BY r. J. stimson. 70 mo- PIP
423 Lamson, Wolfe TO-
THE SEATS OF THE MIGHTY. BY Gilbert
parker I2mo PIP. 316. ID. Appleton CO.
For several wears in fact ever since misunder-
standing with the Russian authorities caused him
TO seek refuge in this country, MI A. 'anan mas
been a figure in the social and political HE OF the
East Side lie is a man OF energy originality anu
shirt and If it was not inevitable that he should
find his way into fiction it is at least natural that
v,hen ne did make UP his mind to write book II
should be worth reading. "Yekl' Is in the ruest
sense of the story OF TINS kind. IL Is VIII
Ten with conviction, and most conscentlously-in-
decd one Of tho best things about II Is that IL Is WIFI
ton with restraint The author has not attempted
70 excite his readers by obtrusive use Of rheto-
ric nor TO pamper their curiosity by vulgar hints
AZ melodrana on the contrary. he has tried just
to tell a simple story, in simple manner; to lay
before his readers without gloss reservation the
facts Of a characteristic episode in the history Of
the New York ghetto. and to leave the lnterprela-
ton of these facts to their Judgment
yekI Podkovnik a Russian jew. emgrates from
his native village to this country leaving his wife
and child AT home with his aged parents TO await
tho time when he shall be sufficiently established
I'm his new surroundings to provide them with a
suitable means Of existence. Arriving in Boston.
Yekl in due course makes his way to New-York.
and is discovered in the opening chapter OF Mr..
Cahan's story as a favored employe In sweat
shop. Further acquaintance with him shows that.
while he Is n man OF good impulses. his nature is
essentially weak and pleasure-loving Further
more these innate instincts have been asserting
themselves with increasing insistence ever since he
came TO New-York. In explanation OF this fact
there u.s. in the first place. the greater facility in
earning money and the greater freedom of social
Intercourse: in the second place. there Is the loss
OF the restraining influence OF his religion. Yekl
finds American life. as he comes to know it among
his Jewish countrymen Ill adapted to foster the
strict observance OF those rites which he had been
taught in childhood 1t can hardly be said that his
three years experience OF America has made him
patriotic but 1t certainly has separated him from
his old manner of life and its traditions. For this
reason. In part, his anxiety to have his wife and
child Join him daily becomes weaker and weaker
until IL tempted to suspect that he would
never have sent them their tickets were IT not
that his fathers unexpected death ;precpltates a
crisis. leaving him alternative.
His wife Gill arrives Ellis Island and Is taken
by her husband to her home in the ghetto The
meeting and the subsequent ride uptown graph
icaly described and turned to good account to
show the change which has come Yekls ideals
Ii t. not audable thing for husband who has
not seen his wife for three years to wish that she
had stayed In the old country but somehow while
one b,ames Yekl for his cOwlrdlce there is some
thing pathetic about his embarra ssment and his In
decision a. to what 10 do with this simple minded
tmid superstitious orthodox woman who stubbornly
refuses 10 the hldeous wig with which the
pious Jewesses OF her country conceal their natural
hair. She looks aghast at her husbands sinful use
OF money the Sabbath. Eventually Gill sue
cumbs, like her husband TO the lax manners and
customs OF the ghetto world. but meanwhile she has
proved her inability TO recapture Yekls affections
and has stood by in despair as he has day by day
drifted further and further away from her side
Finally she gives reluctant consent 10 divorce
and sees him depart be married at the Mayors
office to Mamie. the beautiful Polish girl with whom
he has danced and hlrted in the years before she
arrived There have been peasanter stories. but few
written in recent years more convincngly true
than this
Maria Louise Pools Mrs Gerald" Is so good tina /
II ought 10 have been better. In other words the
author il endowed wiki TWO notable faculties. On
the one hand she IL a realisi. close observer Of
rural New England ne and customs: and on the
| other she Is a romanticst with a leaning toward
meodrama Judith Grover is a s,rong-mnded pas
slonate girl upon whose shoulders falls the burden
| OF supporting and OF experimenting the existence
OF farmer family. thrown into poverty by the
fanced Illness OF Grover pere. This eccentric per-
sonagc magines that he Is afflicted with incura-
be liver and being unable. ne supposes. 10 de-
vote himself to the task OF bread winning and the
same time 10 lavish upon his health the attention
which he thinks II deserves. he renounces labor and
| leads a life OF elegant idleness. Meanwhile Judith
mortifies her naturally proud spirit and BY industry