The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-10-28

/ of Miss Nancy, but enormously wealthy, /
/ almost in her clutches. but she cuts a
( date to 90 to church with him one
morning in order to hirt with Selden
with whom she is starting love affair
and so loses the prize.
The story Of Lily Bart is indeed a
new kind of hard luck story Never
was there a girl more hOOdOOed, from
the beginning of her career, than she
! Before the story opens she had been
wOoed by an italian prince, rich and
the real thing but had fiirted with
! his stepson while the marriage settle
/ ments were being arranged ana lost
him and she has a thousand just such
I narrow escapes from success. as she
7 has been taught to see it. OF course 1T
! was usually her own fault AS one other
friends said she laid all her plans
with the greatest care, spent weeks or
/ months in leading up to her coup and
! then on the very day when her pres
! ence was demanded to win the game,
: she ran away or took a nap or did
/ something equally disastrous. The
reason for this was. undoubtedly, that
/ she had in spite of her training, some
/ natural normal impulses, some vague
| STRINGS toward love and happiness.
( But she has learned her lesson we'll
/ enough so that she does not for long
lose sight of her essential purpose, the
/ ensnaring of a rich man who viii
establish her permanently IN that state
/ of luxury and splendor for which she
feels she is prominently suited. With
such guiding principles, and such
/ limitations to her ambitions, il is not
surprising that Lily Bart seems some
/ times lacking in the ability to Judge
moral values, but at her weakest, or
most sordfd she inspires pity and even
/ liking. Perhaps it is only the SYM
pathy which we always give the I'M
| der dog in books No doubt a Lily
Bart triumphing through her ques-
tiOnable meth DDS would appeal, to us
/ less in fiction, just as she would appeal
I to US more in life. It is strange how
much difference the medium of our
acquaintance makes. Lily is fOrsaken
and despised by all her friends be-
| cause she fails, although that is the
very reason why the readers of her
| chronicle forgive her.
Mrs. Wharton holds apparently a
/ purely impersOnal view of her heroine.
/ She does not excuse, nor does she
| condemn her nor the social order of
! which she is the product. She pre-
| sents her case, mildly but lucidly and
/ lets the reader be her judge. 1t is not
always a nice case she makes out for
/ her heroine, but o. she IS so human,
/ that poor Lily Barti When have we
/ had another character as human, an
/ other woman as completely realized in
all her weakness, her self-deceptiOn,
/ her sel6shneSs, her baSeneSs, her
futile strivings after nobility, after
courage, after honesty and happiness.
At her best her goodness is perhaps
/ only one of those evanescent moods
: of vague longing that comes in a rare
moment of spiritual exaltation, but
/ her worst might have been so much
worse. and with, undeniably, so many
| eXtenuating circumstances, for her
/ temptation was surely great Mrs.
! Wharton has made this girl so real to
US, that the suspense of waiting for
her final decision in the question
which will settle her moral as wellias
her material fate, is so painful as to
| be almost unbearable.
The House of Nrirth has not the con
ventional happy ending, but that no read
er of Mrs Wharton would expect, unless
1t were also the logical ending OF all the
passable solutions of poor Lily Bart's
problems, no doubt the author has chosen
the least bitter and cruel The author
| was at much pains through many chap
tiers to make US see that there were two
Lily Barts. the Wroldly one and the other
one that Lawrence Selden knew. They
could not both triumph. For many pages
we saw her drifting toward an unworthy,
ignoble end, which it seemed impossible
she should escape, and when this tragedy
IS ayerted we feel only thankfulness, re-
CARELESS of the means of escape.
w WIS W s}T her Lily basi Is lost to aa U.s.
cacy, her rare and precious charm, but
the other Lily is left tflumphing, at the
last, over all the evils EfI9E have beset
her IN her victory over herself. and say
lng her love whole out Of ths ruin Of ner
The House of 1Iirth, by Edith Wharton.
Published by seribner's, Price $3.50.
A new fall book of importance and like
" TO attract widespread comment is The
Brothers War, by John c. Reed, which
little Brown & Co, Boston viii publish.
/ and other causes of the war between the
north and the south and contains VaIua-
bic information regarding the present con
dltion OF the south and the negroes living
IN II MI Reed is prominent attorney
at-law of Atlanta, Ga, and the author of
The Old and New South"
The Wheat Princess is the title Of
book by Jean Webster, just published by
the Century Co. Marcia Copley, is as
pretty, attractive and lovabIe as an Amer
lcan girl can be. Life at the Villa Viva
lanu, where the family of Marcia s uncle
taxes up summer residence. begins very
comfortably, grows picturesque, and de-
Felops rather thrilling incidents, for Mar
Cld HtiAlonalre father in America has
cornered the wheat market; and the Ital-
ian peasants, their heavy burdens render
cd almost Unbearable by the scarcity of
! bread, grow angry over the luxurious life
ana careless generosity Of innocent Mar
cia and her relatives OF course Marcia 3
/ lovers have their part in the plot; and the
most interesting of all the men we meet
IN the pages OF THE W heat Princess is
an American Of strong italian synpathies
Mlo, N ADDITION to being a man well
worth the knowing and well worthy of
80 cis ) loving. reveals an interesting
sloe OF 4taly S me and problems. There
IS no question that The Wheat Princess
IS romantic and facinating reading.
Edwin L. Sabins delightful sketches of
poynOod nave been published in bOokfOrm
BY the Baker Taylor company, New York.
Iney are among the most refreshing and
original stories of boy life ever published
and every one win find his boyhood vivid
/ " before his eyes as he reads them. The
book IS prOfusely illustrated by pictures
by Frederic Dorr Steele.
Octave Thanet, in private life Alice
French, is well known to readers OF short
stories and her new book, The Man of
the Hour" just published by the Bobbs-
Merrill company will be welcomed. AS
may be guessed from the title, the book
IS OF a philosophical turn and therefore
different from the usual Thanet story.
Born and educated in New England, Oc-
taVe Thanet has lived most OF her mature
IRE IN the west and south Fate led her