New-York tribune., 1903-04-04
SHORTHOUSE At YORK.
His ReserUed Life-He NeUer Sac
Italy.

The late Mr.. Shorthouse, the author of John
Inglesant," knew but few literary people, and
his work was uninfiuenced by other minds. His
natural reserve was intensified by a sad i'm
pedlment of speech concerning which he was
unduly sensitive He devoted to his wife,
and his two intimate friends were cler-
gymen of the English Church Although some
Of the most vivid scenes of his chief book are
laid in Italy he had never visited that coun-
try. He had however, talked much OF it with
his father Discussing the writing OF that IA
nous book THE London Times" says:
Because Mr.. Shorthouse obeyed to the let
ter the Horatian rule to keep his manuscript
by him for a term of years, there mas Deeh
tendency to look upon him as a man VINO
worked as the historian works, slowly. Ia
boriOusly. In truth. he was as much carried
away by his characters as Dickens. When
Dickens finished David Copperfeld' he felt as
if he had lost bit of himself. Mr.. Shorthouse
told one of his friends that while he wrote he
was so wholly in the hands Of John Inglesant,
he had identified himself with the religious
experience of the man. that he became a second
self. Sometimes the two selves quarrelled. In a
period when he was so to speak, outside MS
work, Mr.. Shorthouse had decided that his hero
was to spend the second volume in Italy; but
John Inglesant would have none of it, and the
two, creator and created, fought 1t out stub
bornly for a week At the end John 1nglesant
gave a grudging acceptance, and his reluctance
has made itself felt The second volume is not
good the first; but. knowing that this
struggle went and how it ended, one can
in looking at the book afterward that the
hero slowly warmed to his part, and the picture
OF Italy, If not equal to the handling Of Little
Gliding, must remain astonishing tour
de force. a parallel to Flaubert's deliberate ef-
fort in "Salammbo."
That John Inglesant" is typical Of OF the
great elemental inf1uences-that of the forest
is pointed out by THE London Academy"
Just as this book it says, as impregnated
with spirit utterly alien from that of the aver
age novelist. it expresses ideals that TO the
majority of US have become mere phrases"
Briefly, these ideals are, setting aside the
question Of religion, personal fidelity to per-
sonal sovereign and single hearted reverence
for one woman. These two ideals in themselves
revive an old attitude of thought toward his
tory. For, since Foltaire, history has ceased to
be the register Of courts and camps, and, in
sympathy with this democratic tendency, the
novel has passed further and further away
from romance and has drawn nearer and near
er to sociology. That the very word "chivalry"
has become almost too meaningless to be used
as a sneer is. Of course obvious, but this fact
also can be accounted for by the same general
movement. Democracy, which pulled the hero
from his pedestal, did not spare the heroine.
All men must stand little higher but there
must be no pedestals; women must have their
rights as sensible economic factors, but there
must be no exaltation. There must, in point Of
fact. be very little worship of any kind. Against
al tnls a very strong protest written. and
the protest John IngleSant"