The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-11-29
Literary Lights and Shadohs
BY S. MAYS BALL

.srhe City of Encounters" by Horace
 Hazeltine. CMitehell Kennerley.)
 The proposition in "The City of En- counters CNew York, which worried Mir. Horace Hazeltine, was something like this:
 "John Brooke sat on the side of the bed and stared dreamily, abstracted and unseeing, at the empty fireplace across the room"
 John had just arrived in New York; on his way from Honolulu via Frisco to Boston, where he intended entering the employ of his rich uncle. Between Chi cago and New York terrible wreck oc- cured to Johns railway train-awful things are likely to happen in, between or near those two cities-John had been bunged up, not very much; he had been able to rescue the always present lovely maiden, and then as always failed to find out what her name was. There have been no doubt 1000 books written on just that theme to-wit: d man meeting @ lovely woman and from that meeting be- coming so excited he trails off, back to the woods, without finding out the young persons name.
 In this case John Brooke leaves the superlatively beautiful woman and pro ceeds on his journey to New York and Boston. Of course, John was much wor- ried that he had acted very pie-faced- muttly but he had agreed with and to himself confdentially that under the same circumstances any mutton-head would have done just as he did. At the time of the paragraph quoted above, the open ing of 'The City of Encounters" John had arrived at a hotel, the Hotel Astor, where he was pointedly staring his fate in the face. After a good bit of staring and moralizing, for which there was hard at a nrDpppdS open up his valise, wash up, get some thing to eat and best of all, wake up. When he opens the valise which the DOT ter of the wrecked Pullman car had given him as his own, he finds in the satchel no collars. cuffs or toilet articles-sim- ply sl1S2OO in crisp currency.
 In the satchel John finds not clue to the ownersh ip of this money: $11S,20O is quite a bit of dinero as the Mexi- cans say, so when John found it, the book necessarily is compelled to de- vote quite a lot of space to Johns moralizing-on the subject as to what must the poor chap do? Find the man or woman whose money he had been given? If so, how? The next morning the papers announce the finding of a dead body on the tracks, near the wreck which is identified as that of John Brooks. His uncle from Boston comes over to New York and tn- forms the morgue that the body was in life his dearly beloved nephew.
 This is the introduction of the story. From the time that John Brooks de- cides to hold the aforesaid $1lS,2OO until he can locate the rightful owners, of course he doesn't wish to turn the money over to the wrong people-he had better keep it than that of course; but after he settles in his mind that he would place this fortune in safe de- posit vault troubles begin or at least action does
 When John takes a walk up to Gen. tral park he meets a charming woman who is the very picture of the rescued maiden of the railway wreck, but diff ferent girl. This girl figures of course very much in the book all through the story.
 John has stolen from him the re- ceipt he held from the safe deposit company for the s11S2OO. The pursuit of this money begins the very day after he met the charming girl in Central park.
 Now, the first point Is. what would you do if you found or had given to you $11S,200 in pretty. nice, sweet, lov- ing bills, with no marks of identifica- tion on it? Would you try to find the owner or sit steady in the boat?
 The above is simply the beginning 
 Encounters" The diagrams drawn in the above covers only what might be called the overture" to the story. From this overture" you can see that great many things must have happened afterward, when John Brooks changed his name to John Moore"-so much in deed that it is well nigh impossible to outline further.
 At any rate "The City of Encounters" Is just about the most exciting keep you-on- -the-go, not up-to-date, but up- to-the- minute, eth riller" you could find in many day. It is a book that you will wish should you take it up, to finish at a sitting. It Is a winner, of it's kind all right, all right
 "The Yellow God" by H. Rider Haggard.
 Couples Leon Co)
 If you are like this reviewer you will have been wondering as he did what on earth or under it had become of our old