The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1902-08-10

should make him wildly envious of the
possessor of the set. Most of the let
Iers are notes of presentation to various
Irlenos or Dickens and the labor of col
iecting them must have been long and
| patient one.
-
Inc American invasion of Europe and
tne resulting tendency of Europeans to
dislike the American invaders has resur-
rected the following story:
An American woman of wealth once
called upon Ouida in Florence.
| Say that / am an American and am
very anxious to meet her, she said to
the maid who took her card.
| The caller had scarcely seated herself
| before loud voice called out above:
| i won't see her. Tell her don't like
Americans
| The American woman stalked to the
stairway and called out:
We'll you ought to like them. They
are the only people who read your nasty
| books"
Whereupon Ouida came down, wei
| coined her visitor and the two became
good friends at once
The episode might have happened in
| connection With many English novelsts,
| though it probably would not. The
| Engl1shman whose books are selling well
| In this country has the kindliest feeling
for his American cousins and this feel
| ing is not disturbed by strong COMPETE
ton in the market of literary wares in
England OF all the fields of trade which
the Americans are invading, that OF
books has been thus far least trampled
| on. Neither is there much prospect of
| sudden change in this regard.
*.*
The Bishop of Limberick has decided that
Thackeray's Henry Esmond" is not a
good book for the young to read, and
has advised teachers generally to dis
courage its reading No more effective
way OF stimulating interests in Thack
cray could be devised, for the Irish
youth who learns of the Bishops dictum
A year or SO ago a Methodist Sunday
school official ruled Kipling out OF the
library. Within a few days not a single
copy of Kiplng was left in the book
stores of that town. Now and then
library puts out black list and the pro-
hibited books receive a deal of gratui-
tious advertising thereby. In many cases,
of course, the rulings OF librarians are
just and right, but it is a deplorable fact
that the publication Of such black lists
helps instead of Injuries the sale Of
books on them. There is a large public
which is attracted by the very prohibi-
ton, and there are always some publish
ers who are eager to take advantage
of this fact
Nearly everyone who reads is now and
then struck by the seeming unconscious
metre and poetic swing of a piece of
prose. One experiences a thrill of de-
light in noting this fact in Dickens.
Little Nell led her grandfather away
from London through the villages and
country and though the two were most
pathetic characters, the author often told
of their travels and described some of
the places they passed through in almost
pure verse Doubtless, if one were care
full in a search of this kind, he could
find many similar cases in present day
writing Indeed some one has taken the
first few lines of Ernest Thompson
Seton's story of the Kootenay Ram and,
without changing the order OF words in
the least, has made fairly good blank
verse of the passage:
80 in this land of long, long winter
night,
Where Nature stints her Joy for six hard
months,
The Spring Is glorious compensation for
The past. Six months arrears of JOY are
paid
, In one vast lavish outpour."
Kiplings much heralded story wire
leSS' ha coma and iC poiup through the
mill of criticism. Some hail the story
as a sign of the authors return to
power; others see nothing remarkable in
it. At any rate Wireless" as applied
to telegraphy, has little to do with the
tale, save that it furnishes a convenient
physical analogy to the idea of psychical
waves with which the story is mainly
concerned. One might point out some
Inaccuracies in Kiplng's description of
a coherer and it's action, but what's the
use The story deals with a consumptive
apothecary who, being placed in circum-
stances identical with those which Keats
experienced, reproduces one of Keats
poems.
1t is in this connection that Kipling
puts himself on record as literary
critic, when he says
MY lHIOdl Dub L "ANu NV 6NiP
TO moisten it lest l should break the
spell that was drawing him nearer and
nearer to the high water mark but two
of the sons of Adam have reached. Re-
member that in all the millions per-
mitted there are no more than hve-five
little lines-of which one can say These
are the Magic. These are the Vision.
The rest is only poetry!'"
The five lines are:
"a savage spot as holy and enchanted
AS e'er beneath waning moon was
haunted
BY woman wailing for her demon lover.
"Our magic windows fronting on the sea,
The dangerous foam Of desolate seas for
aye"
-"
Among the many wise sayings in Mrs.
Nancy Huston Banks novel Oldfeld: A
Kentucky Tale of the Last Century,
which the London Spectator reviews very
favorably at much length, the English
reviewer calls attention to one which
the Spectator offers as bone Of con-
tention to it's readers. 1t is that mo
really sweet woman has sense of HUI