The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-07-26
Literary Lights and Shadohs
BY s. MAYS BALL.

as women are alWayS-well, but what s the use? Mrs. Baughman takes the book of Genesis and interprets it to her read ers-in very plain way, too, too plain to put in this review. The authors ex- planation as to just what the tree of knowledge of Good and evil bore as fruit which poor Eve, long the scapegoat of ages, did eat and made Adam eat-this review cannot fully explain, but you can be sure that Mrs. Baughman does and fully. 1t always seemed so strange to some people the question as to why Adam didn't decline to eat the fruit but not so to experienced men, on the contrary. Let pretty woman offer the average man a dose of carbolic acid and tell him that it Is good; the average man would drink it and demand more, and be heartily dis appointed If he didn't get any more.
 Mrs. Baughman has high ideals-good things to have and to live up to. It is with the idea that by reaching women who have "caused all of the trouble of this world" (poor put-upon menD that the author hopes to make love not a physical emotion, but a spiritual one. Good luck to Mrs. Baughman. When she finished that undertaking there is wait ing for her the construction of a rail- way to the Planet Mars.
 County Residences in Europe and Amer
 ica. By Louis Valcoulon Le Moyne
 Doubleday, Page Col
 One of the handsomest books published in years Is Country Residences in Flu rope and America" The purpose of the book is to describe what the author con siders to be the most interesting country residences in various parts of Italy, France, England and America. These residences are taken up in chronological order, beginning with the villas of Italy. then the chateaux of France, then the English, and finally the American places, endeavoring to show the relationship of one to the other and how the later ones were the outgrowth or development of the earlier and also to show how much in the landscape architecture as in the other arts we are indebted to antiquity By antiquity in this book is meant not great antiquity, but more particularly the times of the renaissance in Italy and the Elzabethan age in England. County life as we know it today Is a comparatively modern development. Life was too tur bulent and unsafe in early times, and for security people were forced to live in fortified castles or within city walls, and broad open lawns and gardens were al- most unknown. The places selected to be described and photographed in this beautiful book are chiefly private resi- dences, but occasionally public places or chateaux are included. The author has treated the residences described as 0 whole, including with the house the drives, the courts, stables, entrance gates, sun dials, fountains, as we'll as the gar dens the terraces, by-plans of the places, showing location of those features, and a sectional view, usually through the middle of the house. and garden show ing the different levels of the terraces and the house and fountains, etc., in the elevation. The interior of the houses are not shown, only so far as the exterior has been affected by it. and the outlook from 1t. The photographs-unus fine they are-were taken, and the drawings made, in most instances, by the author. These have been done within the past two years and illustrate the present con- dition of the place. There are seven Ital- ian villas five French chateaux, P Eng fish places, and 12 American places shown in this beautiful book