New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1910-05-21

by the author and his companions.
$40. DID. X Ia. The Macmillan Com
pany.
Nr. Eorarth has a record Of splendid
achievements in archaeological research
y but he writes with winning modesty.
lie writes also with the enkindiing ardor
& o. a man whose twenty-odd years OF
professional experience cannot discount
the romantic appeal made by the soil OF
antiquity In 2 charming Introductory
essay, wherein he offers what lie calls
the apology Of an apprentice. he tells
how he was better known at Oxford Tor
q gamester in a small way than Tor
ANYTHING else, and he relates much OF
HIS success in digging TO the gamblers
snstinct. At any rate, your true archaol-
ogist is, in the very nature Of things,
votary of chance.
He plods through weeks and months
Of appalling drudgery, but always he
is sustained by the hope that the next
thrust OF the spade may turn over an
Incompatible prize. Speaking of his
labors among Egyptian tombs, Mr.. Ho-
garth has this vivid passage:
I have dug for twenty years and set next
Gent sepulchres; but 1 still feel. as at first,
the f1utter OF poignant hope that the temp
may be virgin ana an
since thousands Of years. There lie the
dead raan's bow and arrows in their place
on his coffin lid string snapped and plumes
IN dust. ard there his stout stan and his
boomerang: the little Nile boaIS are
spropped fully manned oy his SIDE; ne 1r
the underworld are at their several busl-
nesses; and his eflgy, with his wife s staraos
least, one hardly ever opens Perfectly
virgin sepulchre. Some one robbed II on
the night OF the burial. ere the door was
sealed. Some malisn INTRUDER mas ruInpie go
those grave clothes down TO the waist IN
Guest Of the Jewels on neck and bseest.
rnd has trampled or overturned in his
guilty. haste the furniture beside the coffin.
But since he withdrew with his accom-
plices and sealed the door. all has been 81
until after four thousand years, poH come.
You NAV talk Of science and think of loot
IN, e me ne iSff the last Of the filling
from the shaft: but the first look into the
dirnness Of the sepulchre itself Will silence
tfen hardened robbers though they be.
md win silence YOU. Science and your
own slory ana the lust OF loot are all Tor
gotten in the awe which falls as IN fairy
hers where kings Of old time sit asleep
Yet next dav. or maybe the cav after.
e t n,ser re % me- ss n ose ou viii
riev cards IF an evening on its head If il
happens 70 he handy.
rs there not excitement in Mr.. Ho-
earth's pursuit? Even in these quite
informal chapters which touch but
lightly on few Of the salient episodes
in his career. he IS as interesting as any
novelist. The fact IL traceable in part
TO the character of his life work and IN
rart TO his temperament Evidently he
IS born wanderer. and. into the bar
gain. g oonnoisseur Of the beauty Of
nature The book is full Of brief. fleet
ing sketches Of lovely scenes, sketches
which take us into the very heart Of the
classical scene.
Of deep interest. too. are his notes on
native men and women. always intro
duced with a delicate feeling for the
background against which the latter
were observed He found the finest
types among the modern Hellenes at
Castellorizo. in Lycia. There YOU Will
find Praxitelean heads in the flesh" he
saws. find the oval face, with brows
spread broad and low beneath clustering
hazel hair. Gray-brown almond eyes lie
wide. deep, long and liquid; noses stand
forth straight and faultless; upper lips
end cflins are short. and mouths mobile
and fine They showed him one of
their schools, occupied by fifty rnaidens,
leach fit TO bear Athenas peplus.' but
with incoherent thanks he and his COM
rades miserably fed. "Who were We,
he asks, that we should patronize
choir Of goddesses?" He adds. however,
that there are signs in the formation Of
s1e1
traits, OF racial deterioration. and some
Of the best, because most Illuminating.
Ct his Cretan pages are those in which
he characterizes the decadent children
Of a once supreme civilization. Mr.. Ho-
garths cuTiously searching sympathy
for humankind, aided by his scientific
knowledge, gives peculiar authority TO
observations Of his IKE the following:
The peasant Greek IS neither brute nor
butterfly: but this he is-a man who is es-
sentialy inert. a man born physically out
worn. The whole race. as if seems to me,
fast IN the forefront OF mankind very long
ago and now is far gone in years; and in
snto the sfaeov Of what what hss been. into S an
air IN which men would rather be than DO.
Simple though the Zakriotes were
they showed often in their talk that they
knew themselves well enough TO be pre-
occupied with this very question Of their
racial decay. Why, they We're forever
asking re, had the Greeks fallen out OF
that front rank In which the schoolmaster
told them they once marched? How came
the B7roafisns or Europe 10 be now, ma
ton for nation and man for man, so su-
perfor 70 the once Chosen Race?
He does not labor these matters, and.
Indeed, they crop out only in the most
casual fashion. but they do a good deal
20 heighten the general interest of his
book. He tells US also something about
Turkish life, and in his Lycian chapter
paints touching picture Of the little
village Of Dernnre. once known as Myra.
Or a day that harmless little place got
itself measured" by order OF the Porte.
That meant that a commission OF three
officials set about measuring the village.
with view TO readjUsting its contribu-
ton 10 the Imperial Exchequer, and. I'M
I'll their report was accepted and the final
notification Of assessment was ordered
no buildings OF lands could be touched.
Two years passed and nothing was done.
The village was frozen as by q spell
and Il practically ceased 10 exist
There are other incidents Of a kindred
sort which il would be interesting to
quote, but the authors archaeological