New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1904-02-07
FICTION.
Il Story of Southern Hatred and
LOCe.

THE DLLyERAN yIE, By Ellen f flssEo"w win
vi SIG. Doubleday. Page Co.
q Bros.
THE MIS- -RULE or. THREE. BY Florence War.
with Eight illustrations by Caroins
Fughunl- limo. nil. SDa Wych co.
Tho author OF The Deliverance" gives her
reader A pleasant surprise. Here is story OF
life Ira modern Virginia. and. be II said with deep
appreciation there is not single battle scene In
it For sounds of war. for portraits OF two Gai-
liant young fellows fighting for the North
the other for the South. and both adoring the
same girl, we look as n matter OF course Forth
with Miss Glasgow proceeds to show that she Is
after all, capable OF rising above routine we
really grateful to her. fer OF late years the
Southern romance Of the sort which we have
Just Indicated has become something like
plague. Every novelist treating OF the South
in the cos seems to have felt II incumbent
upon him TO babbie sentlmcntally OF fearful and
wonderful types OF chiyalry." OF beautiful but
strangely idoiic heroines. and OF utterly prlgSfsh
heroes THE Deliverance' has been written
along different lines II Is tinctured. TO be sure
with a little OF the old superstition We are
vOucLsafed glimpses Of certain Southern types
which for the life " Us We cannot find al All
plausible. But the CfHlTA SllAAlaOn
gether credible and Interesting one. 1t Impli-
Gates "a broken-down family whose possessions
have leca acquired through fraud by a coarse
scoundrel who formerly occupied a dependent
position on the estate. The Blakes live I'm the
humbl,st circumstances. while "Bill' Fletcher.
their d-spoiler. lords 1t over their ancestral
acres The Oldest member Of the fallen clan is
blind and aged woman whose misfOrtunes are
kept from her by her devoted children One Of
the latter. Christopher Blake, is the hero OF the
tale. huge young man whose good breeding has
not saved him from the coarsening OF nature
unat follows long brooding thoughts OF
revenge Blake is resolved to pay or the debt
Of hatred that he owes to Fletcher. and the book
is concerned chiefly with events that flow from
his urcompromising attitude toward his enemy.
The story is admirably told Miss Glasgow
has realized some IL not all OF her characters:
those which are OF most importance in the action
81 the novel clearly and consistently drawn.
The fact is that the pale colors In which the sub
sidiary figures are sketched DO not much matter.
They cannot diminish interest in young
Blake and the Fletchers. The heros rage comes
TO the surface the slightest provccation and
while has behavior sometimes has n brutality /
about At calculated to make the reader vince, II
Is made 10 seem. on the whole. very human He
sinks deeper and deeper into black moods and |
allows himself TO do unworthy things. but for
h'se he atones in Il fashion that may not be |
wholly convincing from ethical point of view, |
but which Individually serves to round out the /
narrative IS the novel reader with a romantic |
turn OF mind would want it to be rounded out
Miss Crowns Judgment" is a study of one OF !
those episodes which have not exactly the dig |
nifty Of tragedy. but which. for those who have |
TO pass through them seem tragic enough In all |
conscience The incident with which the book |
starts is one OF threadbare antiquity. A man has
had a shameful passage in his life and has con- |
cc3led il from the girl he is to marry Old love |
letters come up out OF the past to threaten his
Eappiress and while his father is disposed to let
the errrng lover dree his weird his mother |
rad his sister are keen upon saving him from |
catastrophe. With her characters facing this |
posture of Affairs, Miss Brown endeavors to read |
into the subsequent events Of her story a kind |
OF moral lesson. showing that while II ID good for