The Portland daily press., 1900-10-04
CONCERNING BOOKS.

a striking figure among bh9 Wf1Uers u
modern fiction, and there is to be found
in all her books some emotions . if not
''a moral"
The Frederick A. Stokes Company
portland: Loring, Short & Harmony has
Just published her latest work; which Is
a SEQUEL to The School for Saints, and
bears the name of the leading character,
Robert Orange. The book is strong,
keen and inc1sive, crisp, bright and
original; an exhaustive study, political,
philosophical and religious, and yet, to
my mind, Mrs. Craigle is at her best IN
lighter vein.
Each woman of the story has promised
to marry the wrong man, which makes
plot OF elaborate complications. All
emotions experienced by the various
characters are gathered up and assorted,
carefully analyzed, labelled and classified,
and, while 1t is certainly very interesting,
one occasionally wishes the author had
been somewhat less interpretive. There
is also a lack Of harmony in the work,
although it is SO clever.
Two of the characters are traglcally
disposed of at a convenient season, LORD
Reekaye being thrown from his horse
and dying in consequence, while Robert
Orange kills CastrilIon In duel, ana
aftsrward becomes a Jesuit priest.
OF this novel Mr.. Clement Z, Shorter
SAYS. in The Sphere: ''It is a triumph
of intellectual creativeness, and it has
held me captive from cover to cover" p"
From the same publishing house we
have, with the exception of novel to be
published next year, the last work OF
Stephen Crane.
The present volume is entitled Wounds
in ths Rain, and contains eleven war
stories, vivid, striking, and wonderfully
even neutrality-suspicious..
The same qualities that dominate The
Red Badge of Courage, the book which
made its author famous, are to be found
in these stories, which are familiar to
most readers through their appearance IN
various magazines. They are the result
OF experience and observation, free from
dry details and both thrilling and excit-
ing. One might find them almost too
appalling were 1t not for the vein OF
humor, the keen sense of the ridiculous,
which has saved Mr.. Cranes tales of
battle from being too narrowing and
horrifylng. portland: Loring, Short &
Harmon.
Among the autumn publications OF
Messrs. Harper & Brothers, (Portland:
Loring, Short & HARMONY we have: From
India to the Planet Mars, by Theodore
Flournay; Hypnotism in Mental and
Moral Culture, by John Duncan Quack-
enbos; The Dishonor of Frank Scott, by
M. Hamilton, and Wh1lom71IIe Stories,
by Stephen Crane.
NJ. FIournay has made a thorough and
careful study of a case of somnambulism,
his subject being MademoiselIe Helene
Smith Already he writes, ''science
has disclosed the existence of a hidden,
subliInenaI world within each individual
being,'' and it Is the investigation OF
that part of the individuality of Helene
Smith which our author has undertaken,
both for his own satisfaction, and in the
interest Of the Society for Psychical Re
search of which he, professor of psych-
oIogy at the University Of Geneva, is a
member.
The translator of the work, Mr.. Daniel
B. Vermyle, says in his preface: 1.-The
Importance of the subject and its Intense
interest lie in the fact that psyehlcal re-
search hints at a possible solution, by
means OF the same methods which science
has been accustomed to use in the physi-
cal world, Of the great problem of man S
future destiny, of an answer to the ques-
tion asked By Job four thousand years
ago "Jf man die, shall he live aga1n?''
and which has been repeated in vain by
every generation of men who have since
Inhabited the earth''
NJ. Flournay describes the childhood
and youth of Mile. Smith, her Initiation
into spiritism, the seances, and spontane-
Gus automatic phenomena, and her intro.
duction into, and experiences of, the
Martian Cycle.
It has been revealed that Helene Smith
has already twice before been on this
globe. Five hundred years ago she wai
the daughter of an Arab sheik, ana be-
came, under the name of Simandine
the favorite wife of Hindoo prince
name S1yronka Nayaka, who reigned over
Kanara and built in the year l4O1 tbs
fortress of Tohan 1raguiri. In the las
century she reappeared in the person O.
the illustr1ous and unfortunate Marie
Antoinette. Again reincarnated, as
punishment for her sins and the perfect
ing of her character, in the humble cir
cumstances Of Helene Smith, she in Ger.
tain somnambulistic states RECEIVERS the
memory of her glorious avatars of old
and becomes again for the moment Hin
doc princess or Queen of France.
By virtue of her medium1stic facultie!
Mile. Smith has been able to enter Into
relation with the people and affairs O.
the planet Mars, and to unveiI their mys
teries to US. She is CONTROLLED" BY on,
Leopold who is in reality CagIostro, the
renowned magician, who was madIy. In
fofT fc1 Will