Kansas City daily journal., 1896-12-28
ON OUR BOOK TABLE.
WHAT IS PRESENTED BY THE PUB
LISHERS THIS WEEK.
The Result of Literary Work as
Shown by the New Books That
Are On the Publishers
Shelves-Literary Notes.

''The Real Issue" By William Allen
White The fifteen stories in this volume
are nearly all concerned with the stren-
uous life of Kansas, and especially of that
part of Kansas that has been painfully in
evidence of late. Mr.. White is at his best
when he is dealing with that strange con-
glomeration of good and bad character
istics, the loyal, rebellious, kindly. savage,
intelligent, stupid Kansas Populist, poll
tician or "boomer," whose frailties he has
studied with an affectionate eye, setting
down naught in malice, but treating his
subjects with quiet and deXterous humor
that seems ever futtering on the verge
of pathos. On the whole the best tale in
the book is probably THE Story of Aqua
Pura." 1t is the history of a typical
boom" town, started by enthusiastic
Eastern men. In their sublime confidence
they set up electric lights, build great ho-
tells, public libraries and water works.
Then the drouth comes and blights hopes
and ambitions. 1t would be hard to find
a more effective piece of writing that the
swift sketch of the ruin left by the long
dry SPELL" The boomers" died or fled;
the great buildings went to wreck; only one
of the pioneers remained to mourn the
faded glories of Aqua Pura.''
1.-The Real Issue" is one of the best first
books of short stories that has appeared in
a long time, and it promises well for Mr..
Whites success in an extremely profitable
and difficult field. He will do well to hold
himself to his present environment. The
narrower it is the better for his art. He
has already done a service to his country
beyond his contributions TO literature by
reminding us that strenuous, blind, wrong
headed Kansas is the same Kansas that
flTEa1 NS-nfn of HnrrI Inc
human slavery. However far its people
may have departed from the path of sanity,
they are still true at heart-a generous,
honest and manly race. Cloth, 2l2 pages.
gilt top. Way & Williams, Chicago.
IAN Arkansas Planter" The forte of
Opie Reads character sketching, and char
acter sketching in the south, whose humanity
he knows by heart. Mr.. Reads latest novel
is called AN Arkansas Planter" and is
as full of spirit and humor as his famous
Kentucky Colonel which is high praise
indeed. John Cranceford, distinguished as
commander of one of the most stubborn
batteries in the Confederate army, is the
Arkansas planter of the title. He is what
might be known in paradoxical phrase as
roaring lamb" clustering in wild indig-
nation against imposters and the misguid-
ed, or unguided by him, in one breath and
invariably making amends in the next.
After verbal apology, or with 1t, practical
demonstration comes too. No matter how
feeble or pretending the rascal, good points
always were summed up with the bad in
Major Cranceford's cooler judgment, and
the good predominates, so that it may be
questioned after all whether justice or
mercy comes out best.
The opening lines of Mr.. Reads book de-
scribe his scene graphically. Lying along
the Arkansas river" he begins, "a few
miles below Little Rock there is a broad
CfH-trN lNr,,
of lordly race of men. They were not
lordly in the sense of conquest; no rustling
armor hung upon their walls; no ancient
blood stains blotched their stairways; there
were no skeletons in dungeons deep be-
meath their banquet halls. But in their
own opinion they were just as great as If
they had possessed these gracious marks
of medieval distinction. Their country
was comparatively new, but their fore
fathers came mostly from Virginia, and
their whisky came wholly from Kentucky.
Their cotton brought high price in the
Liverpool market, their daughters were
celebrated for beauty, and their sons could
hold their own with the poker players that
Travelled up and down the Mississippi river
On the vine-shaded veranda the
typical old planter was wont to sit, look
ing up and down the road watching for a
friend or stranger-anyone worthy to
drink gentlemans liquor, sir. He
hated the name of king, but revered an
aristocracy. New Orleans was his social
center, and he had been known to pay as
much as a thousand dollars for a family
ticket to ball at the st. Charles hotel"
On this fine old traditional stage Mr..
Reads people live and move.
The pictures are spirited and faithful to
the life. Some of the darky drawings are
capital, and the pages are covered with
appropriate Illustrations, keeping pace
with the text. DIR. Denslow has designed
O N OF fn~ hn h0A1 to-
with an Arkansas hut in the pale fore
ground and handsome lettering above
Cloth, 315 pages gilt top, illustrated. Rand,
McNally & Co., Chicago.
1.-THE Court of King Arthur" BY William
Henry Frost. This is called a book of
stories from the land of the round table,
1t is really a series of Arthurian legends
taken mainly from the versions of Sir
Thomas Mallory and the Mabinogion and
rewritten for childrens reading. The au-
thor conducts party of children through
England to show them the places made fa-
nous by these ancient legends. At st.
Pauis, London, the story of King Arthur's
coronation is given; then Carieon-upon-Us
is visited, and the stories of Lancelot and
of Gareth are told. At Cardiff, the young
folks have the tale of Geraint while going
through Devonshire they fancy that they
journey over the path that Enid rode"
Next Cornwall and Tintagel rocks the real
home of King Arthur, are visited, and there
their guide tells of adventures of Lancelot
and of Arthur, and of the loss of the scab-
bard of EXcalibur. At Camelford. where
they see a rock that is called King Ar
thurs Gravestone, the series of tales is fin
ished with the story of Balm. These in
clude. of course, but a small part of the
legends that belong to the Knights of the
Round Table. but they are enough to kim
die the imagination and excite the interest
of young people in those wonderful old
tales. The writer is evidently deeply i'm
bued with the spirit that Tennyson
breathed into the tales. He says in his
introduction: "Of all who have written of
King Arthur, the greatest Is Lord Tenny-
son. No one who writes of the Round Ia
BILE now can say just how much of the
spirit of his stories he owes to him. 1t is
easy for us to go back to the Older books
and to think that we are reading them
and learning all that is in them for our
selves but whether we know 1t or not,
| we are always reading them by the light
that he has given u.s." Cloth, S02 pages, il
lustrated Charles Scribner'S Sons, New
York. H. T. Wright, Kansas City.
.cAIy Village" by f. Boyd Smith, is
hook that will appeal with especial force
to persons of an artistic temperament. The
author is an American, a native of Boston,
who for many years has spent his winters
In Paris and his summers in Valombre, or
| in some equally quaint and picturesque sea-
coast village. He has thus come to know
the French peasant very intimately. 1t is
fortunate that coupled with this knowledge
,lo,,,5 l,a tha csDacity to interpret, in both