Los Angeles herald., 1910-12-11
us Author Describes Los Angeles in Latest New Book

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says it is at all, but I've trampeds over
II a dozen times and he's got 1t all
right: got it down fine" When that
happens, then the reader who is not
himself a woodsman may make up his
mind to it that the author has CLEANED
his information in the open; that he
knows what he is writing about, and
that he has reported the country corr
rectly. At the same time, it is more
likely than not that the out-of-doors
commentator really never saw the par
ticular stretch of country described in
the story. Woods is woods, you see
just as pigs is pigs"
That's the kind of story Stewart
Edward White has written in 1.-THE
Rules of the Came" his latest novel,
lust from the presses. Before he wrote
It Mr.. White went first to Michigan and
into the fast-passing lumber district of
the upper peninsula. Then the story
brought him to California and to Los
Angeles. He followed where his plot
led him, as is his Industrious habit,
and he reported accurately and inter-
estingly what he found there. His
chapters on Los Angeles are penned in
humorous vein and are kindly critical
of urban follies, cults and business
methods as he saw them here. An out
of-door man himself, however, 1t is in
his descriptions of scenes and events In
the open that Mr.. White excels. He
has put his best work to date into the
new book and he has turned out
rattling good story.
The game" as Mr.. White phrases
it, is the numbering business, an in
dustry which, at first ance, would
seem to offer scant opportunities for
romantic fiction. They're there, though,
as this author has discovered. The
game" also is the forest reserve SER
vice. In fact, the game" is pretty
much any of life's worthwhile en-
deavors. In the story it begins on the
Ann Arbor gridiron, where Bob Orde,
the novels central character, is first
member of the team. then captain and
then graduate coach. 1t continues in
the Chicago offices of Weltcn e. Fox,
lumbermen, where the young man dis
covers that bucking a column of figures
is not so easy as bucking the line, and
It takes him finally into the Michigan
woods, where he finds himself as boss
of logging crew.
Once arrived In California. the story
takes on a new phase and one Of great
fpfo I1a xpOrlf nf fha for
estry service. This part of the yarn
opens with a vivid picture of mall
administration in one of the California
reserves where practical politics has re-
suited in the appointment of an incom-
petent and dishonest forest supervisor.
Significantly, this happened when the
reserves still were under the adminis-
tration of the interior department.
With their transfer to the bureau of
forestry conditions improve steadily.
The big cattlemen no longer are per-
mitted to "hog" the grazing privileges;
the power companies are not allowed to
encroach on the public domain; the
water sheds are protected from fire;
scientific methods work hand in hand
OF course there's a girl. She doesn't
appear until you are half way through
the book. but she's an unusual sort of
girl and she's worth waiting for, as
Bob Orde discovers. Somehow you
hope that the girl, too, has been draw n
from life, that somewhere there is just
that sort of girl, that she has been re-
ported accurately.
1t was ten years ago when Bob Orde
boarded a Union Pacific train in Omaha
on his way TO California. On the train
he met Los Angeles man, who said
to him:
You want to get down that way.
The towns a marvel. It's grown from
30, 900 to 100000 In twenty years; it has
enough real estate subdivisions to ac
commodate 100000; it has invented the
come-on house built by the real estate
agents to show how building is looking
up at Lonesomehurt; it has 1000 kinds
of architecture all different; it has
more fake stuff than any place on
earth-it's a wonder. Come on down
and III show you the high buildings"
Two days later, the train having
crossed the California line, Baker, the
Los Angeles man, continues:
There's lots of things you haven't
seen that you're going to see, now
you've got out to the real thing. Why,
right here in your own line: you don't
know what big pine is. Wait till you
see the woods out here. We've got the
biggest trees. and the biggest noun
tains, and the biggest crops, and the
biggest"
Liars" broke in Bob, laughing.
Don't forget them"
"Yes," the biggest liars, too" agreed
Baker. "a mans got to lie out here to
keep in practice so he can tie the plain
truth without straining himself"
If you believe with Bobbie B rms that
it would be a great thing should some
power the giftie sic Us to see our
selves as ithers see us, then MI. Whites
comments on Los Angeles, which oc-
cupy some twenty or more pages of the
book, will give you an excellent op-
portunity to try out your theory. Prob
ably you will not agree with everything
he has to say, but at least you will
recognize the justice of much of it and
the pictur sque quality of his descrip-
tion. Also you will recognize certain
of his characters and not a few of the
incidents he describes, many of which,
by the way, have happened more re-
Gently than the ten years ago claimed
for them in the story.
One feature of Los Angeles life which
evidently made a pronounced impress
sion on the author is the number of
queer cults and isms flourishing here.
Thus, he makes Baker say:
"You can get any brand of psychic
damnfoolishness you think you need in
your brsinas They 90 t all here,
from going barefoot, eating nuts. swi l.
ing olive oil, rolling down hill, adoring
the Lin tless Whichness, and all the
works"
In a foreword Mr.. White disclains
having drawn his characters from