The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-04-23

call our attention 10 this glorious past, Lest we forget
 The halo round the heads of our vet | erans should be that of love love freely given, for as the author of these verses sings: Marked thy lot OCT other men, | In reading the Passing of the Confed- crate" the reader notes not so much the | form into which the verses fall; one notes rather that the writer strs in heart old memories, and fills our being anew with love and reverence for the old soldier, whose form with the pathetic droop of on- coming age too well reminds us. Aged | soldier, thou art dying"
 "The Betrayal" by Walter Neale and | Elizabeth Hancock (Neale Co.,, New Ywk), $l.50
 That MT. Neale is again inspired to write of Virginia surprises none; all are | aware of his zeal and love for his native state.
 l In "The Betrayal he has enrolled hs- tory in the service of fiction. He has chosen as the time of nis story the days l of the struggle between the readjuster and the debtpayer. :. | Virginia he tells us, was in her death throes at that time as a nation, with the ultimate destruction of her sov- ereignty forseen by some of her states men, when she was confronted by dan ger from within that threatened to break down all responsible government and to alter the characteristics of her people,"
 Thus the author in his introduction, ex- blaming there and elsewhere, what one sees to be the motif of his book-the be- trayal of the aristocracy of Virginia, of l those who have always borne the burden of government, and from whose ranks her famous publicists and statesmen have | always been recruited, and ruthlessly throwing the burden into the untried hands of peasants and negroes. l The scenes of the story are laid in par | lous times when Virginia was one vast | field of wretchedness and despair. | The. characters created by Mir Neale are distinct. vivid and intensely living. That many of them are closely drawn from life Is very apparent. Coniectures ] might be hazarded in various cases, but WIG refrain. One picture is unmistakable-- Gen. Timothy Murphy .who (we quote the author) although Confederate major-general known the world over as the hero of the Crater, immediately after the surrender had been compelled to re- turn to the peasant class in which he | was born and reared"
 l Virginia refused to countenance one who would Organize a party consisting of carpet-baggers, scalawags, negroes
 and those that formerly had considered themselves yoemen and peasants, a party | organized for and prepared to repudiate Virginias debt"
 Of the gentlemen of Virginia the au- thor writes 'Virginians who for three hundred years have been a people apart from all other peoples of the earth. Men
 have said I am an Athenan, I am a
 Roman, I am Engishman: but when l .....x
 who heard him understood that his was
 the SI-Ty of Greece, the grandeur of Rome, his the splendor of England-and
 more, sir; that his was honor of Viz ginia. How that honor was betrayed into the hands of negro and peasant makes the book. How her statesmen, the finest group of men produced by any civilization since the dawn of history, were to. vacate the seats of the mighty, to step down and out for the lowest to rule. MT. Neale elects to proclaim from the housetops Virginia's loss, Virginia 5
 shame It is a great question. Like | Banquo's ghost, it will not down, it will
 not cease to fire mems souls.
 Some of the incidents narrated will not
 prove pleasant reading for those who
 have created and maintained the illusion of social supremacy. These incidents will
 prove a social indictment and may play
 a part of reconstruction in the minds of
 some in regard to their valued assumption
 of pride of birth.
 The book bears the mark of patient and
 painstaking labor in gathering all the
 facts necessary for such a work The
 reader cannot peruse the book without
 feeling a confidence in MT. Neale's hon.
 esty and accuracy.
 Both in his novels and his historical
 work is evidenced the versatility of his
 mind and the variety of his talents is
 fully illustrated.