The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1897-04-18

and suave-mannered vaquero, the prosperous
ranchero, the hos pitable don and his vile. Oer-
trude Anterior has abandoned the time wnen
"the golden skeleton within the sleeping oody
of California had not been laid BARE ana IN
lieu thereof has taken up the life OF curious
anomaly in the shape of 15-year-old girl.
who reads Gibbou, Macaulay, Boccacclo and
Byron and speaks like diminutive edition OF
a Missouri backwoodsman.
AS q specimen of character portrayal Pa
thence Sparhawk is failure because of her in
stability and unreallty. We cannot imagine
this child of nature reared by drunken
mother amid the pastoral surroundings of
modern Monterey, associating daily with
girls of her own age in the local high school,
seeing nothing of the life in great city, be-
traying knowledge OF good and evil which
could be expected only in ancient dow
ager. Patience, as exhibited to US by her
chronicler. is young lady of few likes and
most pronounced antipathies. Thus. when
she is informed by her schoolmates that her
mother has been seen under the influence of
liquor and that "she regularly turned the
town upside down." this affectionate young
Californian, with spirit possibly incarnated
by the Castros and Alvarados of former gen.
Grafton, goes home to her parent and thus
gives her views:
81 hate you'll hate you'll 1t doesn't do any
good to tell you so, but it does me good to say
it,"
Verify, q case OF Elemental Hate, young
Caini
Mr.. Foord, who has taken much interest
in Patience, is DESTROYS of sending her TO a
sister of his, resident near New York. The
mother, however, raises the objection that she
is under age. The objection is overruled by
providential fire, which consumes the lady
while she is in a state of inc briation, and Pa
Doo
1 of Patience Sparhawk and Ger Times" and
with it all that portion of the story relating
to California
The novel under review is long one-by far
the longest ever written by Mrs. Atherton. In
far il relates to California, its scenery, its
women ana its characters, the work cannot be
called q success All who know and love Mon
terey that most picturesque portion of our
State, will note the anachronisms in the
book, the inaccuracies of her description
OF Carmel Valley and Bay. Far better
would it have been for Mrs. Atherton's repu-
tation writer had she amplifed one of her
shorter tales into & goodiy sized novel, bring
ing to bear upon 1t all the wealth of her re-
search, her power of description and her
knowledge of the early history of California
But she has neg lected the opportunity. In the
latter chapters of patience Sparhawk and
Her Times" we are introduced to the mys teries
OF the ooudolr OF the new OK society woman
Her most intimate thoughts and lingerie are
shown to the light of day in a manner crude
and unrefined. Her intrigues and scandals,
her vanities and her vices held up TO re-
proach in a way suggestive OF nothing higher
than 20 cents per inch in newspapers of the
\. J. So has California lost her first novelist
and most promising romantic historian,and in
this wise have her romance and her history
been forsaken for the base and the erotic.
How are the mighty fallen
EMANUEL ELIAS,