The Portland daily press., 1897-10-30
GOOD BOOKS PLENTY.
In Spite of What the Growers Saw Iiter..
ry Riches Are Increasing All the Time.

In spite OF what the Growers Say Litera-
| ry Riches Are Increasing All the Time.
IL Is the fashion of the age-this age
and every other-to lament loudly and
long the decline Of literature. A writer
Is without honor in his own day, and
probably there was as much moaning
over the dearth of mental refreshment in
the days of Thackeray and Addison and
Steele and Pope and Wordsworth, and
even Milton and Shakespeare, as there is
now, says the Chicago Times Herald.
| There are no histories written now"
croak the critics. There are no essays, no
poems worthy of the name, no novels. 1t
Is nothing that the age has produced
Carlyle and Herbert Spencer and Huxley
and Tyndall, and Browning and Mere
dith and Tennyson and Longfellow, and
Flaubert and Stevenson, Tolstoi and Kip
ling, to say nothing of lesser authors,
who, If they do not live forever, have
done much to entertain, refresh and up
lift. For, no matter what futurity may
say by and by, or individual taste declare
now, jrst the novelists, Hall Caine, and
Mrs. Steel and lola and oBourget. yes
and Barrie and CUTLER Couch and Ebers
and Henry James and Howells and Dav-
idson and Craddock and Miss Wilkins
and a, hundred others have wrought a
signal work in these last few years, and
one that ought not to be disparaged or
moderated. No one can even glance over
budget of new books, such as comes
every week-a budget including reprints,
If you like. and trash by the dozen vol
umes-without being struck by the resi-
dunn of valuable writing there remains
after the process Of discarding.
Look at the biographies, histories,
books of travel, like Nansen's North
Pole" and Miss Kingsley's and Sir Har-
ry Johnston's books on Africa; the dozen
prominent books about India, colloquial
and didactio; recollections of distin-
guished men and women; books on Eng
lish writer's, such as Henley and Andrew
Lang and Saintsbury can write and have
written. Some of the new compilations,
like Stedman's Anthology" are of i'm
mense value, and the labor itself shows
scholarship and literary discrimination.
Look at Donald Mitchell and Dudley
Warner, and the benefit their dignifed
labors have done in others literature, to
saysnothing Of their own brilliant efforts
in the line. Look at the hundreds one
has forgotten for the moment to name,
and call our age, our decade, or our year
barren!
A good novel is boon to thousands,
and OF good novels-that is to say, enter
tanning and sagacious pictures of life
either idealized, to be uplifting or made
real, to prevent too much conceit with
the world as it is-there have been many
this very year. Not to be statistical
which heaven forbid-to have produced
"Quo Vadis,' "The Christian" ''On
the Face of the Waters,' est. Ives"
"What Maisie Knew" "The Sowers'
and dozen other sucs-mosu of which
are out within the year-is enough dis
tinction for a modest twelvemonth.
We are SO used to books coming out all
the time that we do not know how to ap-
preoiate them. If every budget sent from
the booksellers does not contain at least
four or five readable novels, solid his
cory by an eminent authority, a book of
travels in an unknown land, two sets of
wonderfully clever new poems, we
who cannot write graceful sentence fall
to lamenting and crashing our teeth over
the decay of writing
And France has hardly been mentioned
Look at that race of critics, springing
and sprung; those even who have made
criticism literature. Why, publisher
here has just announced bunch of BIZ
ographies of French critics, not one of
whose names is really familiar to our
public. Who that does not read French
knows of the. work of Edmond Scherer,
| Ximenes Doudan, Saint Marc, Girardin,
Gustave blanche and Ernest Besot? And
how many of those that do read French
in this country do know much more than
| those namesp D'Annunclo and De Maui
PEASANT and Coppee and Halevy and the
her story tellers we know, because of the
nature of their work, and the numerous
translations that very nature has called
forth; the best work of Flaubert and
Daudet and Zola and many of the French
critics is known only to the literary herd.
To own that one has merely touched
upon modern names and modern work
Of writers Is to make an argument in
favor Of the ages literary achievements
Look at the lists in the libraries: look
back at the hours you have spent In really
interested communion vicariously with
authors. Think how your own neighbors
as it were-Octave Thanet and Frank
Stockton and Mary Wilkins-haye de.
lighted you; how John Fox, Jr., makes
you long for the next Harpers; how Joel
Chandler Harris-it is shame not to
have mentioned him earlier-and Henry
Fuller and Mrs. Catherwood and so MANY
more have contributed tosYour utter SYM.
pathy or your contradictory, sense. Think
of Lieutenant Peary's book, and Nan.
sen 8, and of Mahan's marvellous Life
of Neison," and Of the scientific volumes
by the hundred weight you, dare not try
to read, Nearly every one has come ont
this year. Max Nordeau has made Won