El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1899-11-25
THE LIBRARY
TABLE

Il Written Especially for the HERALD. s.
SSS~SS~ -v~0~2
THE HELPERS, by Francis Lynde. Pub
lished by Houghton. Miffiin & Co., Boston
Price. $l.5O.
II would be difficult to find kindlier
little heroine than Constance Elliott,
in this story of Francis Lynde's. Her
fate it is to be interested in one of
those characters that novelists of to-
day are fond of portraying, a very i'm
perfect man. Mercifully TO the little
lady who is all that the reader could
desire In the way of q heroine, the
hero redeems himself before the story
ends.
When one goes over the list of the
popular novels of the day, one Is sur
prised to note in how many is the hero
q disappointing character. 1t flies
right In the face of the deep seated de-
sire of the human heart-that heroes
should be ofslofty and noble character
and only villains do black deeds. In
''The Gadfy," the hero is miserably,
lsboriously. painfully, Historically bad,
SO that it requires all of ones patience
to 60 back to the reasons for his turn
ing from gentleness and love, to try to
understand him and bear with his
story.
''The Celebrity is another popular
book with . lsmentably weak hero.
Doctor Weir Mitchell's new story
1.-THE autobiography of a qusck"-in
the Century Magazine, introduces US to
q Q hief character who bids fair to be
one whom We would not tolerate in
our drawing rooms outside of the mag
azine covers, and even William Dean
Howells. who is slower than time, has
caught the fad and introduces q
little of the shadow of wrong doing In
the white light of his bero's heroics.
The writer's will probably urge that
this is character study, that in truth
the human character. is sadly imper
feet and that it is false to life to
portray the hero as scarcely less than
divine. Nevertheless, though they
may try to write truly, yet there is
something wrong in their stories, for
they leave very bad taste in ones
mouth--as lifeitself rarely does. Thack-
cray could write up the littleness of his
characters, and though we protest and
call himS cynic, yet we know in our
hearts that the human character is
capable of just such vanities, but at
the same time 1t is capable of the
highest truth, courage and devotion
that poets or writer's have ever told
and higher yet, for the whole story of
human virtue has not yet been told.
It takes no less than q genius to
make him less q hero. Lesser novel
lists would do better to stick to the
good old-fashioned plan of letting the
hero do the heroics, have william to
do the black deeds and sufficiently
heroine who will prefer
the good hero to the wicked villain.
At any rate one is obliged to the
writer of '"The Helpers that the
friends of the hero are go loyal to him
and that in thesend he proves so. worthy.
Mineral English, " as the girls call
the miners slang, is the chief con-
of the book. It is a story of
our west and of men who mine for
gold, of reckless days in Denver and of
hard work in the hunt for mineral in
,he territory that pays it's tribute of
earth wealth to that city. There are
successes and failures OF course, but
.he vinorous uostern life onoroy and
he spirit that refuses to be beaten,
ire in all of the characters. and they
truggle through financial troubles |
md those crookednesses that are ne
ess airy in the path of true love, until |
comes.
The author dedicates his book to
compassionate men and women with |
his earnest greeting:
FOrasmuch as it hath seemed good |
a the eyes of many to write of those |
Kings which make for the dishearten-
ng of all mankind, these things are
Vritten in the hope that the God-gift
# loving Kindness, shared alike by |
amt and sinner, may in some poor
q easure be given its due.
AS was said in the beginning, the
eroine is as kind and gentle and low
ng as the heart could desire, and her
weet influence saves the book, as it
oes many of the characters.
"Quien Sabe?, "the new Ell Paso High
chool magazine, is clean, attractive,
nd full of news of the pupils of our
chools. This enterprise of the schol-
re- is very commendable. The work
1volved in getting up their magazine
very month will be profitable in more
avs than one. It shows the right
nj rit and ahonld ha anonnronad