Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-05-20

committed by his psychic double The New
Jersey defendants plea may have been sug-
gested by an early reading of the book.
although this is unlikely. Certainly there
Is enough likeness between the two to make
the story unusually entertaining to students
of such problems, while 1t is an interesting
bit of fiction The main theme of MIR. kiar-
per is that the brain of a man is occupied
by the personality, that it often occurs Mat
this personality is so complex as to be ytr-
tually composed of more than one DISTINCT
entity. In case of what the psychologists
style multiple personality the DOMINATE
element occasionally obtains control. Or
forecloses the mortgage on the brain WHICH
1t holds by reason of its greater strength
Thus a man may pass from mood to mood,
as the word Is used, confusing his friends
by his variations of temperament. In real
ity his brain, according to the DR.. Yznaga
of the tale. is merely being occupied in turn
by different personalities, and under condi-
tons of extreme conflicts of the elements
the consciousness of each personality may
be entirely distinct from the other. Thus
person may do that as IA which he will
not as 'B" remember doing. DR.. Yznaga
declares that this is not insanity, as So
ciety and medical science assert, but the re-
suit of the war of personalities. Mr.. Har-
pers story is ingenious and entertaining
throughout. and it appears to have been
written with intense earnestness, with elab
crate attention to the arguments upon
which the theory rests, as though the au-
thor had undertaken a commission to es-
tabilsh his doctrine. This somewhat retards
the action as a story. while it doubtless
makes the book appeal more strongly to the
psychological reader.
A MADCAP CRUISE. By Oric Bates.
Boston: Houghton, Miffiin & Co.
washington: Woodward & Lothrop.
Two lively young men steal a yacht from
the uncle of one of them and scurry off to
the Mediterranean for the furtherance of the
romance of the nephew. They have an ex-
citing voyage and run into some interesting
adventures at Naples, one OF them as
sistlng in the delicate and dangerous job
OF smuggling art treasures out of Italy. The
romance having come to a satisfactory clI
max the young yachtsmen return home to
face the music and find that their bit of
piracy has been a factor in a large ard
important financial transaction. There is
not very much story, but 1t is told cleverly,
with lot of the salt SAVIOR of the sea in
Inc lines. In describing the seamanship
of the young pirates MIR Bates who has
evidently had experience. gets plenty of ac-
ton and life into his pages. He is the son
Of Prof Arlo Bates, and displays high
degree of literary taste, which may be ac-
credited to his fathers training For a
first novel this is a most creditable per-
formance, as TO both style and construc-
ton.
CASUAL ESSAYS OF THE sun; Edi-
torial Articles on Many Subjects.
Clothed with the Philosophy of the
Bright Side of Things. New York:
Robert Grer Cooke.
Habitues of the editorial page of New
York will rejoice in the appearance of this
volume of selections from that source. It is
better than scrap book such as many
conscientious readers keep, for it stands
for Sitting out of the purely ephemeral,
the timely" and offers nearly two hundred
specimens of that particular style of writ
ing which has made the Sun famous in
more than three counties. Some are long
and some are short, and they are both
grave and gay, fippant and sincere. They
treat of the Good Old Times 1.-The Infiu-
ence of Pie and Other Eatables on CiviIiza
ton Famous Men and Institutions
odd Age, Youth and Childhood, Poets"
English THE Ladies, Lovers and
Sweethearts.'' "Questions of Propriety and
Success in Life 1.-The Cup That Cheers
Natural History" Names" and Mere
Man, His Wife and His Mother-in-law."
Several occur under each group heading,
the arrangement being purely arbitrary,
without reference to dates.
LETTERS FROM AN OREGON RANCH.
By Katharine" Illustrated. Chi
cago: A. c. McClurg & Co
The breadth of the great pines of the far
west is in the pages of this breezy book of
the personality of the author is clearly
stamped upon the work She and her COM
panions, men and women, seek a new home
in Oregon, lured by real estate agents
glowing rhetoric. They find a place which
has the elemental factors to please their
tastes and needs despite the forbidding
state of the residence. The story of Their
hOmemaking. of their getting acquainted
with the forests and streams and pastures
of that beautiful region, is related in
s,,i- fnll II and
ture that charms the reader from the out
set. There are many little adventures,
some trifing. but illustrative of the trials
and hunors of life in a land of large pro-
portions The illustrations, reproduced
from photographs show oregon in its wild
est, grandest and most picturesque moods.
AN OLD MANS IDYL. BY Wolcott
Johnson. Chicago: a. C. McClurg e
Co.
Something of the temperament of TX
Marvel fingers in the pages Of this little
book although it is pitched in a different
key in the main from the "Reveries." 1t
is the diary-writing of n man who has
married late in life and who finds in his
wife and two daughters the sum of earth
ly happiness. 1t traces the career of the
family from the marriage of the parents
to the marriage of the children, incident
ally touching upon events of the life apart
and dealing extensively with the de-
VelOpment OF the little ones. tender
vein runs through the pages, and there is
much in them to interest and perhaps in
struct all parents as to the best means of
establishing between themselves and their
children the perfect confidence any SYM
pathy and efficient control that spring from
pure love.
A KNOT OF BLUE. BY William R. A.
Wilson. author of "A Rose of Nor
mandy" illustrated by Charles Grun-
wald. Boston: Little, Brown & Co.
Here is love story of kind to stir the
pulses of readers young and old who re-
spond to the appeal to the tender senti-
ments. 1t deals with a mans fickleness
and a woman's steadfast love. The knot
of blue was a bow given by Aimee de Mar
say to Raoul de Chatinac to wear in war.
He had been duped by a pair of conscience
less Adventures, and to regain his self-re-
spect he sought the front, the new world
where sharp swords and wits were needed