The times., 1897-06-27

IN the pOckeGdDle iItle ivory s>r4'es
comes q new story by Thomas Nelson Page,
1t is called THE Old Gentleman OF the
Back stcck,- though it Is rot neaily 20
long q its name. In fact, Il is quite short,
end can easily be run through in an hour.
And pleasant hour you may speni with
this pretty story.
In texture IT is idyllc. 1t has the sweet
ness and heartiness OF Tiackmore and TX
Marvel, and you feel yourself IN perfect
glow of warm love for all the dear PEOPLE
IN the book. This is, however, one of the
endearing charms which Mr.. Pages read
ers find In all his writings
So far as the story goes there is not much
of il. 1t is the manner and not the matter
thatis so el:cioiIsiy attractive. The oldgen-
tleman, whose black stock is his salient
mark Of identif cation, is n fecluse in
great old-fashioned house in great
2 ol,I-fashioned yard. He does, however,
make friends OF the young man VIII o
tells the story, and when the young man
brings his sweetheart to see the cid gentle
man of tie black stock Just before death,
it is revealed that the girls mother was
his first sweetheart, but he was vain In bis
YOUTH and she lifted him into unbroken
lachIeiho The old-fashioned house and
the olti-fa shioned yard are hequeathed to
the girl and there in the sanctuary of their
old friend they go to live the life of per-
fected love, where i,sappointm had so
long held gloomy court
Mr. Page may resent this recounting of
his story he well may. He might resent
any, foI it would be impossible to transfer
the charm of his lines to other words than
his own, especially those wherein he tells
of the countfy-carriage-load of sweet girls,
the finding of the lost baby boy, the pro-
posaI un der the tree and the scenes in the
old house while the old genulemau's light
was flickering out. The phonetic orthogra-
ply of child prattle is splendidly handled
The author places US under especial obli-
cations fol his solution OF the spelling of
the familiar affirmative grunt, which he
renders: .'&h-hmh' That has always
been "a stumbling block In the path of the
perfect speler, but Mr.. Page arran cement
Of m S and his seems to signify the sound
to nicely.
There is one passage in the book which
Is put in the old gentleman mouth, and
&c is given with apology for him and what
he says, but ii is repeated here in the he
lief that many who read it viii suspect,
with the writer, that it is part OF Mr..
Pages literary credo:
When you find a sincere man in q
hook sir said the old gentleman of the
black stock, he is like a sincere man in
life. You know him at once, and he is
rara avis The old ones were sincere
Shakespeare, of course, because he knew
the human soul and could not help it. 1t
was as if he had stood face to face with
God and dared not tell anything but the
truth. Milton was sincere because he wasa
fanatic. Bacon, because he was too wise
not to he OF the moderns, old johnson
was almost the only essayist Who was
sincere and that was his value; you could
always count on him, "a clear and vigor-
Gus man who saw straight, and told what
he saw"
The others were nearly all posing,
writing for popularity or some other misera-
ble end Why, SIR he said, L have
piles of them / VIII not even put on my
SHELVES. / viii not admit them 10 the
oompanionship OF gentlemen. The poets, at
least, try to do something; some of them
do. Goldsmith was sincere because he was
poet: and Wordsworth was
~ asked him about Carlyle and EIner
Son He admitted the sincerity of both:
but Carlyle he did not like, because he was
ill-ten;nered and sour, and was always
steering at others. Jeremiah, without his
inspiration or occas on, lie said OF him.
HE is not a gentleman, sir; and he has
never forgiven the world or himself for it
Emerson he put on d much higher plane;
but though he admitted his sincerity and
ranked him the first American lite. .ary
man, he said he did not read HIM He
breaches too much for me, he said, 'and he
is all his texts. When / want preaching /
go to church He liked his poetry better
than his prose, though he declared il was
hardly verse:
After all, he said, the best OF these
essa yists, to me, is the first, Piutar rch,
and next to Tim the secCnd-Montaigne.
rlutarch is as modern as if ne had just
written, because he knew human nature.
1T is always the same. Montaigne drew
from him. and the others from Montaigne.
They have all pillaging each other ever
since hc wrote. lie was man who knew
himseltas he was ,and had the senseand the |
courage to be truthful. Montaigne was
not so great as Plutarch because he was |
less spiritual. But be knew the human |
heart. Why, sir he added, with unwoBted |
enthusiasm, i am enough like Montaigne to |
be his embodied spirit. When ] read Men
taiPne i feel as If were reading myself. |
III Is pleasure 10 me TO Know That they |
are the two which we know, absolutely,
Shakespeare read. You cannot get .n3in |
nowadays TO tell you what he really feels |
or thinks. Feeling has gone out of fashion: |
everyone Is trying TO repress his feelings, |
and he does not think at all. Why, sir, |
we are all trying to say what We think |
our neighbor thinks. =" (New York: Charles |
Scribner Sons. Washington: Rrentano.D |
In "ABaud's Masterpiece the author |
Walter Cranston Larned, has written a |
medieval romance of the Pyrenees His /
hero IS a young painter apprenticed to ane |
of the painter monks of the church of the |
Templars at Luz IL had had few encoun-
ters with women, the customs of the time \
dssociating social intercourse between |
young men and young women. He was IN
love with and devoted TO his art, but con.
scious of some absent element whici, would |
raise and ennobie, vivify and impress his
work. He fails in love. He feels the new
and desirable sensation. but it is not spir-
itual, as he had anticipated. 1t is the car
nal Then hegins the battle within him |
for The supremacy of the two poles OF his
art. the seasuous and the spiritual
Mr. Lamed has sketched his tale In the
true spirit of medieval romance. Its tone
is like a fresh note from the mountains.
iss breath like the soft air of the hillside
He has achieved the desi rable atmosphere,
but he has fallen short in his finishing
strokes. In places heis redundant unneces-