The Portland daily press., 1900-08-18


one figure. that of Mrs. Bobby Short,
which it is quite impossible not to recog-
nize as thinly disguised portrait OF one
of Boston's social celebrities.
A young western girl who is visiting
rel atives in that city gives her impress
sions of Boston and the Bostonians
whom she meets. There is a light vein
Of good-natured satire in these pages
which is sufficiently amusing to those OF
us who know our Boston, and which
hurts nobody.
The writer Is disposed to insinuate that
the proper Bostonian is 'born in Sum-
m er street, reared on Beacon Hill, and
married into the water side of Beacon
street, - as we'll as lied upon Saturday
beans and the Boston Evening Tran
script, the journal which directs all well
trained Boston minds and morals"
Miss Allston prates of Boston Music
Hall and the puritan1cal spirit which
urged the Pilgrims into form of Wor-
ship bare of ornamentation. She de-
scribes the Symphony rehearsals and
those who attend them. She holds up to
the gaze. of her readers Mrs. Bobby Short
and her circle of Satellites, and she
shoots tiny arrows no bigger than pins
at the fads and fancies of that delightful
and most provincial of cities, Boston
Anent ''that browning possession of
Boston, its library" she writes: up
the noble stairway, guarded by couchant
lions, then went, sitting down for a
few admiring moments to rest my eyes
upon the soft-tinted marbles and the
mural pictures of Puvis de Chavannes on
one side, and on the other the court
where the misunderstood Bacchante
poised for a short time in all her unsur-
passed beauty. 1 saw her but once, and
have only an exquisite memory of the
most perfect modelling and incarnate
loveliness ever rejected by exponents of
frozen virtues" There Boston How do
yuo feel nowS
OF course the little volume has it's love
story, and there are many dainty illus
trations, evidently reproduced from
photographs of Boston streets and Boston
public buildings, which are quite charm
ing and add much to the attractions of
the book.
Cap and Gown: as one would judge
from the title, is a collection of short
sketches selected from undergraduate pc
riodicals Of recent years. They are very
creditable productions and the book will
have distinct value for students or
graduates of the various colleges and uni
yersities OF the United States. They are
all prose articles and range from the
'Bowdoin Quill'' to the Leland Stanford
University ''Sequoia." +" cortland: Lor-
ing, Short & HARMONY
Among the Harpers' latest publications
is Beatrice -Whitbys novel Bequeathed,
which is greatly praised by the critics
The Awakening of Mary Fenwick, by
the same author is a charming story, and
1 am sorry to find myself quite disap-
pointed in the new venture, which to
my mind is rather commonplace and
ordinary, not to say crude and fairly un-
grammatical, while it has not been i'm
proved by the blunders in printing which
are frequent and obvious. 1t is a triste
tale, vague and sketchy, leaving quite
too much for the readers imagination in
filling out the slight plot-and there are
no depths except those which one con-
structs for ones self. The writer never
analyses her characters or their motives,
nor is there the slightest suspicion of
humor in her deIineations.
When, however, Miss Whitby reaches
page 217 she begins to warm up little to
her workout one feels no more interest
in Letice than one would in a Dresden
China Shepherdess; and Gilbert is so col
Orless that the whole story has fade
tone which is really depressing.
The style too is rather inconsistent,
and it is somewhat of a shock when Miss
Whitby is in the midst OF a pathetic par
agraph anent the, first and false lover,
and the second, who was faitfhul-to be
told that the new man could never play
first fddle'' in her life.
Others of the Harpers' portland; Lor-
ing, Short & Harmony recent pubI1ca-
tions are Lady Blanche's Salon, by Lloyd
Bryce; The Meloon Farm, novel by
Maria Louise Pool; and The Conquest of
Arid America, by William E. Smythe.
Mr.. Bryce's skit is full OF gay, and rather
bright repartee, and has some dainty and
pretty fancies streWed over It's pages.
Lady Blanche's Salon consists of the
man who tells the story, and is Lady
BIanche's platonic lover; Of Sir John,
who is the backbone of the book, and for
the rest there was a positivist of the
advanced Spencer school, an unfrocked
priest, Parsee who wore purple tur'
ban, and who had about him an atmos-
phere of far away lands and religions, a
Jewish rabbi, one artist who could paint
but not talk, and another artist who
could talk but not paint. Curiously
enough in the book the artist who could
not talk, talks: and the artist who could
not paint, paints Lady Blanche's por-
trait. There is also among them drama
tist who had had six plays damned, and
decade poet, responsible for the failure