The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-03-12
BOOKS WORTH READING

"The Prodigal Judge" by Vaughan Kes-
 ter. Dobbs, Merrill Co.,, Indianapolis l $1.50.
 l A companonable book
 A nourishing book.
 | A mans book.
 A book rich with the ripest humor. l A book of redemption.
 | A book where justice takes its inevi- l table course.
 A book wherein mercy opens the road | to regeneration.
 | A book truly American: s the great southwest bred types more distinctly | American, less localized, than were bred | in any other section of our great country, so this story laid in that section pie
 lures a life and characters most distinct-
 ly American.
 | The plot of the story, if what seems | so exactly a segment of real life can
 be labeled plot, moves leisurely. thouga vigorously, to an end that is in truth
 what the author names 1t: a beginning. l It is the spirit of the. book that holds | interest and invites recurrent thought; a | spirit immanent to the body-plot as soul | to it's envelcping garniture of flesh; q | spirit of yigor, warmth, sweetness and | light.
 | Every character shows signs of being | right smart alive" and some will come mighty near winning a crown of immor- | tality.
 The boy, when he first appears at the old house, the Barony, dragging long rife and demanding with the undoubt- ing regality of childhood: sir. l want here old spotin' rife" is what he re- mains a natural, sane, wise little boy, winning his way straight to readers hearts as to the hearts of Uncle Bop Nancy, Miss Betty and the judge.
 Uncle Bob Yancy of Scratch Hill would be sui generis save that there is still extant so many of him. rather-so much of him-in the men of the hills and noun tains, the still places that the noisy march of civilization yet leaves to our country Much of him rather than many of him, for Uncle Bob. in his excellent entirety can be found only in these pages, there 1t is safe to prophecy he will enjoy a long life. Mountain man real but -super"-lank and lovable. un- consciously wise and humorous; scarcely a word is put into his mouth but will stay fixed In remembrance deep as those "dints" which his knuckles made in the door iamb" Uncle Bob Yancy-"sim- pie and direct and fit for any company under heaven except that of fools.''
 Impossible to depict by bits of quota tion the delight to be experienced in the acquaintance of the Earl of Lambeth (commonly called Chills and Fever), his Polly and their brood on the raft-all heirs apparent to titles, red hair and squint eyes.
 Many a Yankee has been brought from bleak New England to make or to suf- fer hardship in a new land-never one who will bite so tenaciously into the tablets of memory as the derelict print CT, Mahaffy. Damned Yankee" and friend loyal to death. Degenerate drunk ard of scrupuous honesty. Bitter, sneer- ing, carping Down Easter-reaching to the heights of sublime devotion, dying a heros death for his friend.
 The book, as has been said. is a mans book therefore the heroine, Betty, is drawn with no more clearness of outline than are or need be those shadowy sub stances of women that all men adore and pursue A fair, indefinite outline into which every man may readily fit the form of the one to be worshiped after his own fashion.
 Above all towers the colossal and corpu- lent figure of the judge himself, with gross and battered visage that told it's own story" yet an ardent and unfaltsr- ing apostle of hope One mightier than Micawber More chvalrous than the gentle, but belligerent knight of La Man cha More magnificent than Sir Charles Grandson, more courtly than Sir Roger de Coverly, more lovable than MT. Pick wick Imprisoned in the jail which he has just dedicated with fulsome ora tion he. is yet a philosopher. When, with the assistance of his friend and a horse thief. he has broken jail and is fleeing from reca pture and the end of wellrope, he Is light hearted and consid crate for others. When brought sudden ly in frayed coat and limp stock into the prisence of life "opulent and full," he is more than equal to the occasion. His nearest acknowledgement to the paucity of his garb, when goaded 10 such admission by Mahaffy, is that his appeal was more to the brain than to the eye" When later he was doomed to meet the great crisis of his life Tight ly habited in a bed quilt draped about him like a Roman toga." he was yet found to be clothed in native dignity and haloed with hope.
 What in Gods name have I,' cries the prodigal judge, If I haven't hope? Take that from me and what would I be? Why. the very fate I have been fighting off with tooth and nail would overwhem me. I'd sink Into unimport- ance-my unparalleled misfortunes would degrade me to a level with the common est. No, sir, I've never been without hope, and though I have fallen I've al- ways got up. Don't drag me back from the portal of hope.'
 The judge lived to see his own sal vaton, "a costly thing, bought with the blood of his friend" lived to enter the portals of hope-there he was destined to find also creditors. aggressive and de- termined,' there nevertheless he lived with splendid air of plenty'- there he found leisure to begin that great book which he chose to call "The History of My Own Times.'
 The dramatic situations in the story are many and they are clearly visualized.
 The tragedy of Charlie Norton's death Is related in utmost simplicity with no effort after effect, yet 1t stands-haunt- ing as a thing witnessed with the eyes of the body: Morton, leading the horses, had reached the edge of the oaks when from the silent depths of the dense wood came the sharp report of a rifle. The shock of the bullet sent the young fellow staggering back among the messy and myrtle covered graves. For a mo- ment no one grasped what had happened. only there was Norton who seemed to grope strangely among the graves. :"
 The author has spread a wide canvas Nay, more, he has painted a fresco wide as the rotunda bounded by the horizons rim. He has shown us all the rich and reckless life of the new southwest Of that period of our history, when the War of the Revolution was growing tradition al, when the war between the states was as yet undreamed of. when wild plans of great wealth secured by vil- lainous means were rife. when the incit- ing of instruction of slaves was chief stock in trade of bold conspirators. Vaughan Kester has depicted the first steamers af1Oat already running the