The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-10-25
Copyright. 1908 By J. W. Muller.
 All RfOhfo Raaarvad

All Rights Reserved.
 Bulwer.Lyton showed his genius for choosing attractive sujects when he selected the theme of this novel. His- tory has few. examples In which human seihshness falsity. weakness. strength and honor portray themselves so open lY and sharply as they did in the Wars of the Roses Tn that period the false and the traitorous changed sides again and again as circumstances made 1t profitable. Others surrendered glory and ease to embrace literal beEgary rather than to break their faith or forsake principle.
 To the modern American reader The Last of the Barons" will be in- teresting because it treats q period in English history when a great change came in the principles of government Tn degree, the end of the great Barons in England was like an ending of States rights. The semi-inde- pendent rule of districts and baronies was extinguished and England began to develop into a nation with its gover- nment strongly centralized.
 Buiwer-Lytton engaged in a vast a. mount of research to get his historical incidents right for this book-and then took vast liberties with the facts that he discovered.
 Warwick, the King Maker. had placed on the throne Edward of York Edward ", the handsomest. the gayest the bravest Prince in Christen- dom, and the falsest and most treacher- ous. barring his noble brother of France.
 King began to scheme to weaken his creators power. It suited him i'll to perceive that the masses were far quicker. to shout "A Warwick" or "A Neville" than they were to shout the fame of his house of York.
 Richard Neville, Earl of Salisbury and of Warwick, stood colossal among the Iron images of the age. Kinlier in pride, in state, In possessions and in renown than the King himself he held the allegiance of the two ex. tremes of English society--the great Baron and the humble rural class who saw in him the greatest of the ancient Normal chivalry, though they did not realize that he was doomed to be the last.
 To play against him Edward courted the class whom both the Barons and the masses despised and hated--the merchants and others who were even then forming the middle class, destined to be more powerfud than masses or barons or kings.
 Edward joined familiariy, yet with. out losing his dignity, in the feasts and diversions of the traders. Ht even conferred the Ringhthood of ths Bath on some, much to the displeasurt of the naughty men of arms.
 He added to their anger by conferr. ing more and more distinguished hon. ors on his wife's house of Woodviiie despite the fact that many of thai family had supported the side of Lan. caster in the Wars of the Roses. 4 selfish and hungry horde they were with a few brilliant figures among them to set out the rest in still sharper relief.
 So. altogethsr. Merry England was fl anything but merry mixture. witf only a few men like the Earl of War wick studing the good of the countr, rather than their own, while evei their ideals were dimmed by cast, pride. love of war and dense ignorance for the King himself could not read ol write any too huently, and science wa, esteemed by all as witchcraft.
 "Necromancers" and witches werl hanged and burned piously-a fac which did not, however. deter tn Queens mother the Duchess of Bed ford, from keeping necrornancers O her own for every purpose from mak ing gold to manufacturing charm against her enemies.
 Among these was Adam warner, scientist degraded by royal commanI into becoming an alchemist. He wa a creature of genius, born into al age when genius was curse to tn possessor The descendant of lin of knightly ancestors, he had spent hi entire fortune in trying to perfect al invention of which even he could gues the purport but dimly in that dim age Impoverished, he still clung to tn fantastic engine that he had fashione' his mechanical" as he called 1t. hi familiar demon as the populace terme' it. In this mechanical" this thing o vapors and strange noises, was con cealed nothing less than the germ o the steam engine.
 Attacked at last in a moment o superstitious fury, his life and the If of his daughter, Sybill. were save only by the timely interference O friends, and finallyby his transfer t the Tower, where the Duchess of Bed ford set him to work to make gold.
 There Sybill was seen by Lord Hast ings, who then stood in a position second only to that of Warwick, Hand some, admired,no less intelligent tha \