The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-08-26

an opinion either one way or the other way.
She was then simply very little girl, sitting
| open-eyed in the gloom, and listening to many
things which she often interpreted wrongly.
| They on their part kept up kind OF SNUG
| faced pretencc OF concesling from her informa-
ton in detail of the widespread crime, which pre-
| tence may have been more deliberately dangerous
than 70 nrets9ce st all THUS al her home train
ing fitted her to recognize at once IN Jimmie
Trescotts manner that he was concealng some
thing that would properly interest the world
| She set up a scream: ooh! OH On! Jimmie Tres
| colts writing to his girl! Oh! oh!'
And anybody can prophecy what hap
pened.
Another scrap of character analysis Is
in the very last story, which will be de-
| light to all the unorthordox for that 1t
| gives an absolutely unbiased picture OF
Sunday schools. This will in Itself pre-
vent the possibility of Mr.. Cranes book
| ever getting into Sunday school libraries.
In due time they entered the Sunday school
| room. where a with benevolent minister's
| stood on a platform and said, I'VE will now sing
| No SS-Pull for the SHORE, sailor pull for the
| shore " Ard as the obedient throng burst into
| melody the man on the platform Indicated the
| time with 4 fat white. and graceful hand He
was an ideal Sunday school superintendent-one
| who had felt hunger or thirst or the wound
| OF the challenge of dishonor; man, indeed,
| with beautiful fat hands, who waved them in
! greasy victorious beneicence over a crowd OF
children.
Then we are told how this class OF small
| boys was directed to pay attention to the
fourth verse of the seventh chapter OF
| jeremiah:
Trust We not in lying words, saying. The :enn-
pie OF the Lord. the temple OF the Lord, the tem
| pie OF the Lord are these
This they were asked, one after another,
TO explain.
"why-now-it Means said Homer, with
| grand pomposity born of a sense OF hopeless ig-
| norance-''it means-why, it means that they
| were in the wrong place"
| NO" said the teacher. profoundly, cit means
that should he good, very good, indeed Tat
is what it meals. 1t means that we should love
| the Lord and be good Love the Lord and be
| good That is what it means"
| Lucid, this. for religious and moral
| training. And the fatal sharpness of Mr..
Cranes dig lies in the fact that in all
probability everyone who reads these
lines will recognize the teacher and the
teaching. But all the same, the Sunday
school superintendent are not going to
approve Of his truthfulness. the less for
the fact that he penned these tales while
suffering from the disease OF which he
eventually died. 1t was shocking levity,
no doubt. but the stories sound as II the
author enjoyed writing them, and perhaps
it is Just as well that ridiculous things
should be sifted out of the Sunday schools
| if possible. At any rate, the artistic con-
science of the writer of "Whilomville
Stories is clear. They are good stuff,
and will add joy to the world. (New
York: Harper & Brothers. SL50)
THE Joy of Captain Ribot," by A.
Palacio Valdes. is a translation from the
Spanish made by Minna Caroline Smith,
with preface by Sylvester Baxter. 1t is
highly recommended by Mr.. William
rbn tn binL lie
considerably superior to any American
novel. The average American reader will
hardly agree with this. although the story
! is certainly dainty one, and told with
great artistic skill and fneness.
The scene is laid in Valencia, and the
hero is a ship captain, while the heroine,
Cristina Marti, is the wife of a civil en-
gineer Mr.. Baxter says that he thinks
"A Married Woman would have been a
good name for the story, since, according
to the statement of its author, ''it is a
protest from the depths against the eter-
nal adultery of the French novel" This
may be, but to the Anglo Saxon reader it
hardly seems as if the protest against i'm
morality were the SILENT quality OF the
book. as compared with the work of Bal
FAC, for instance. To be sure, CristiHa
remains virtuous in thought, word, and
deed, but the possibility OF her being
otherwise obtrudes itself so every page
that the suggestions are little disagree
able. Captain Ribot frankly admits him.
self, all through the book, to be her de-
voted lover only restrained from declar-
ing himself by the fact that the lady does
not wish him to. Her virtue may be ir-
reDroachable, but how about his? In this
country we still retain fragment of the
idea that it is a mans business TO keep
out of arrangements of this kind If POS
sible, even if the lady shows herself will
ing; and certainly an American novelist
would hardly present his hero as following
his married inamorata around and express
ing his emotion after she had distinctly
given him to understand that she did not
like it. 1t may be that this sort of thing
is due simply to the childlike frankness
of the Latin races, but wherein does it
render Spanish novels superior to those
OF America? (New York: Brentanos)
THE Flower of the Flock" is an English
novel, by W. E. Norris, in which is re-
corded the interminable courtship of an
American widow by a young English aris-
tocrat. The lady is much too good for her
adorer, who seems to be good for abso-
lutely nothing but spending all the money
he can lay his hands on, including some
which does not belong to him, and looking
toward other people to get him out of his
scrapes. The only refreshing thing about
the denouement is that there is q prospect
that the aforesaid flower OF the flock Mr..
Charlie Strobe. Will have money enough
in American stocks and bonds to last him
some few years before he is Obliged TO ask
his devoted brother Sam to pay any more
gambling debts. New York: d. Appleton
& Co. $1,000
Comrades True by Annie Thomas. is
a novel something like badly mixed game
of chess. The author is obliged to ar
range and re-arrange the relations of her
characters several times before she can
get them properly mated, and some of her
moves seem really to have no reason what
ever in them. Among these is the one
which involved the marriage of her hero
to plain, elderly, commonplace rich wo-
man whom he does not love. so that he
has to be made widower before he can
properly marry the heroine. She, in he
mean time, has become engaged and dis
engaged to another man. 1t is a very
much mingled state OF things altogether.
New York: f. NJ. Buckles & Coz
Literary Notes.
"Mooswa, and Other Animals" is the
title Of q new book by W. A. Fraser.
Coming at an opportune time in the in
terest awakened in China is a color book