The times., 1898-04-17

! outpOSl VI Inc anu
! The Lagoon" One of these, THE Re-
! turn" is a somewhat wearisome psyche
! logical study of very commonplace man
| whose wife has run away from him ana
who has some unexpected emouons on
| that account. In the midst of these emo
tions the wife returns, and there Is some
| attitudinizing, without any especial rea-
/ son in it, and that is all there Is In the
| story. 1t gives one the impression that
| Mr.. Conrad was simply trying his hand
! at something in a new line TO see whether
or not he could do it, and the indications
| are that he could not, and had better
! leave it alone in future. The Idiots is
a weird and grewsome murder story, with
some unpleasant preliminaries to the
murder. The two really original features
| of the book are "Karain" and AN out
post of Progress" The scene of the first
is laid in the Eastern Archipelago, Karaln
| being savage chief who visits, at lrreS-
ular intervals, the officers on board snip
anchored off his coast, and is hnaily IN
! duced to tell them the secret Whlch Is
| making his life burden. The description
of this land and of its monarch is as good
| bit of word-painting as any III the
| book and worth the space of quotation:
The bay was like bottomless pit OF intense
! light The circular sheet OF water rejected "a a
luminous sky. and the shores enclosing IL maui !
an opaque ring of earth floating IN an eihpll,,
ness Of transparent blue. The hills, purple and
| arid, stood out heavily on the SKY; their SUM
mits seemed to fade into a coloured trembie as OF
ascending vapor; their steep sides were streaked
! with the green of narrow ravines; at their foot
! lay rice fields, plantain patches, yellow sands
torrent wound about like dropped thread.
| Clumps of fruit trees marked the villages; sim
| palms put their nodding heads together above
the low houses; dried palm-leaf roofs shone
afar, like roofs of gold, behind the dark colon,
nades of tree trunks; figures passed vivid and
vanishng the smoke of fires stood upright above
| the masses of Towering bushes; bamboo fences
! glittered, running away in broken lines between
| the fields sudden cry the shore sounded
plaintive in the distance and ceased abruptly, as
| if stifed in the downpour of sunshine; a puff OF
breeze made a flash of darkness on the smooth
water, touched our faces and became forgotten.
! Nothing moved. The sun blazed down INTO
| shadowless hollow of colors and stiffness.
1t was the stage, where, dressed splendidly
! for his art, Karain strutted, incomparably dig
nified, made important by the power he had
| to awaken absurd expectation of something
| heroic going to take pace-a burst OF action
| or OF song-upon the vibrating tone of a wonder
| ful sunshine. He was ornate and disturbing, for
one could not imagine what depth of horrible
void such an elaborate front could be worthy TO
| hide. He was not masked-there too much
life in him, and mask is only a lifeless thing;
but he presented himself essentially as an actor,
as human being aggressivey disguised. His
| smallest acts were prepared and unexpected, his
speeches grave, his sentences ominous like hints
and complicated like arabesques. He was treated
| with solemn respect accorded only in the ir
| reVereHt West TO the monarchs of the stage,
and he accepted the profound homage with sus-
| tanned dignity seen nowhere else but behind the
tootlights and in the condensed falseness of some
! grossly tragic situation. He seemed too
effective, too necessary there too much of an
essential condition for the existence of his land
and his people. to be destroyed by anything short
OF an earthquake. He summed up his race his
| country, the elemental force of ardent life OF
| tropical nature. He had its luxuriant strength
lts fascination; and like it, he carried the seed
| OF peril within.
In many successive visits we came to know his
stage well-the purple semicircle of hills, the
| sum trees leaning over houses, the yellow sands
the streaming green Of ravines. All that had the
crude and blended coloring the appropriateness
almost excessive, the suspicious imrnobity of
painted scene; and it enclosed so perfectly the
accomplished acting OF his amazing pretences that
the rest OF the world seemed shut out forever
from the gorgeous spectacle. There could be
| nothing outside. 1t was if the earth had gone
face alone in space. -
Some ten years ago he had led his people-a
sefatch sc lot OF wandering Bugis-to the conquest
| OF the pay and now in his august care they had
iorgotten all the past, and had lost all concern
for the future. He gave them wisdom. advice
reWard punishment, life or death, with the same
| serenity OF attitude and voice He understood ir-
rleatlon and the art of war-the qualities of weap
ons and the craft of boat building He could CON
@ ceal ms heart; had more endurance; he could
SWIM longer, and steer canoe better than any
OF ms people; he could shoot straighter and NO.
gotiate more tortously than anv man of his race
ane"' at ne was an adVenturer OF the sea, an out
! .ast' d ruier-and my very good friend | wish
nun a quick death in stand-up fight a death in
| sunshine; for he had known reu1orse and no,ror
aIta iJ JI man IN can demand more from life. Day
| aIter gay he appeared before u.s. incomparaby
laithiui TO the illusions of the stage and n slIn
SET t,Ii me night descended upon him quickly like
shadamtg latiirg curtain The scanned hills became black
sindao"s; towering high upon clear sky: above
the1n. the glIttering confusion of stars resambled
MAD mag turmoil stilled by 4 gesture; sounds
ceased, men slept. forms vsnished-and H. 70
ailty OF the universe alone remained ,narIo,
thing OF darkness and glimrners ma si'uS
Ihe story of Karain-how he wac
haunted, day and night. by an invisible
presence which made him fear m he
alone, how he came TO the white men IN
take shelter In their unbelief and how
ne hhaliy went back to his own people
with charm which they gave him for
! protection-is told by Mr. Conrad MIR
an appreciation and insight which make
lt very real. The story would he i'm
proved by some condensation. for n is
one OF those essentially dramatic +bings
winch are spoiled by becoming in the Least
talky- But it is original for all that
anu interesting. 5The second story of the
ends of the earth, AN OUTPOST of Prop,-
ress, describes the lives and advantnres
OF two men stationed for the purposee Of
| the great trading company, all bv tban,-
| selves, In an African wilderness with no
one able TO speak English within rnanv
miles except one native from Sierra
Leone. ms native, who was alwavs
called Makola, but maintained neverthe-
less that his name was Henry Prica ;, &;
one of the most lfelike Characters NJ
| Conrad has drawn. This native left
alone at the trading post by the daatb of
the white man who established II duaIt
alone with his family, his acconnt
books, and the Evil Spirit that rules the
lands under the equator. He got on very
Weil with his god. Perhaps he had pro-
pitiated him by a promise of more v5bita
men to play with by-and-by"
And then arrived the two mon Gov
Her and Kayerts, who are the subjects
OF the sketch. The pace would have
been nice one for a missionary anxious
to do good, or student of anthronoIopv
elhholosy' or some other ology; it was
not good Tor the two men who were put
there. They We're not students or mis-
sionaries; they were just ordinary men
without any particular characteristics
and II is beautiful and horrible to see
how the teller of the tale keens ac
count of them as they slough one civil
iZed custom after another and revert
10 the original beast that is in them
me tragic and unpleasant end of the
story Is only natural. This tale is dra
matically told and needs no condensa-
ton. 1t has moral-several in fact
one for great trading companies. and
others for men In general If Mr.. Com
rad can do more tales like this he viii,
eventually become great There is
plenty OF material waiting in out-of-
the-way corners of the earth for men
who can describe 1t, and this man. who
must have been something of a wander
er in his time, seems to have the power
and the inclination for this kind of work
(New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.
Washington: All booksellers. $125)
"PriscilIn's Love story,