Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1912-04-13
BOOK REVIEWS.


"A CHILD's JOURNEY WITH DICKENS:
BY Kate Douglas wiggin. author Of
"Rebecca of Sunnybrook' Farm.
etc Boston: Houghton Mifflin Com
pany.
TT RITH the magic phrase "Wnen
L was little girl as De-
AA( ginning, Kate Douglas Wig
wv gin goes on in most engag-
ing way to tell of riding In
the car with Charles Dickens from one
local point in New England to another,
when he was on his last visit TO the
United States. That the little girl had
lived on the Dickens stories, and that
her small life had rounded into its first
great tragedy the very night before this
meeting because "of course. three from
the same family could not go to hear him
read in Boston," prepare one. somewhat,
for the ecstacy of this purely prov1den-
tial coming together on the train. 1t Is
an inimtable picture-the child huddled
against the water cooler as the only
point from which to see her beloved man,
and her final involuntary slipping into
the seat made vacant beside him while
he was looking out of the window. Then
MS DleSS Soul, WneTe OlO you
come FROM" Then the splitting out, pell-
nell, of her full cup of information, that
she came from Hollis, Me-. and that
woman in Hollis had never heard of Bet
sey Trotwood. that she had read all OF
his stories but two-and David Copper
field six times-that her mother heard
him read, and so on and so on into
rapturous talk about dozens of the Dick
ems people The big man said, 80 you
wanted to come to my reading, did your
f.
pity, said, when she could for tears.
Yes, more than tongue can tell. When
she could look up into the kindly face
beside her the eyes of Dickens. too, were
shiny, and our own feel shiny in read
Ing about it. 1t is an exquisite thing.
One wonders why Mrs. Wiggin did not
write it long ago. Very likely she could
not. Dear experiences take their own
time to ripen. Certainly she has never
written a more perfect thing, nor one in
which childhood holds purer essence.
THE CRUZ. A Novel, BY Charlotte
Perkins Gilman, author of Women
and Economics" etc. New York:
Charlton Company.
Brieux. in his play. Damaged Goods -
and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, in this
novel. turn literature over to the service
of a special line of social education. Play
and novel alike concern themselves with
eugenics. Where Percy Mackaye in TO
morrow" dramatizes the positive aspect Of
this subject, using conscious selection as
the direct means of race improvement
Mrs. Gilman, and Brieux as well, approach
its negative side to show the effect of I'M
fit marriages on racial advance.
The setting of this story may be found
in any modern community. Its purpose
takes definite shape in one of the several
courtships through which it moves along
the current of social interest in lifehke
and entertaining incident The center Of
this movement is the wooing of a young
girl by an attractive, unframed, self-suf-
fcing youth of the small-town type, in
whom ignorance has already eonspired
with the urge of life to rob him of
both physical and moral fiber. So far,
this author only follows other writer's, a
conspicuous two or three of these. But
at this point she steps into an even more
solitary open of literature, using the novel
as means of plain instruction for the
benefit of young men and women, poten-
tial fathers and mothers. on the subject
of disease in its relation to offspring. This
is a heroic and innovating measure, one
which a feW-a very few-serious and
courageous people, bent upon presenting
the supreme lesson of the future at a
time when 1t can serve purpose, are
working out, through the story and the
reading drama as their only means of
reaching those whom it can beneht.
Broadly. no one doubts the need of such
instruction Its method, however, Will be
the subject of long dispute and longer de-
lay. All inforpation upon this matter is
sealed either in technical and forDiddlng
volumes. or in the breasts of shrinking
and Mortified parenthood. In order that
there may be no mistake about the mis-
sion of her novel. Mrs. Gilman, In its
preface says: This story Is. first, for
young women to read; second, for young
men to read; after that. for anybody
who wants to-.
THE PIGEON: A Fantasy In Three
Acts. b. John Galsworthy, author
of Strife" etc. New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons. Washington: Wood
ward & Lothrop.
AS Caesar in the ancient world divided
all GauI into three parts, so Mr.. Gals
worthy with equal propriety divides the
modern world also into three parts for
the purposes of his new play. Here In bis
drama stand sinners, reformers and one
: who merely loves his fellow-men "a
complement in fair proportion, one must
admit that at the present instant gathers
up pretty much the whole of humanity
Apart from the excellence of this drama
as drama, apart from the richness OF ltt
originating personality, one does not
gather anything of Interior motive in the
= way of definitely designed preachment
If Mr.. Galsworthy is reformer he /:
not one by way of sermon He seems
here simply to be making pictures of hu
man beings massed according to the spirit
OF the first dozen years of the twentieth
century. warm pictures, rich in the col
ors of the virtuous and the unvirtuou:
alike. What one draws off from the play
aside from its qualities as good human
stuff and good drama is that the reform
er, according to his lights, will go OF
reforming in the between-whiles of quar-
reling with other reformers, that the sin
ner, according to that which in him is
will go on SHINING, and that one here
and there-long distances apart, and al
most as scarce as hens teeth-will b'
found just loving folks as they are, know
ing in some subconscious way that every
body is doing the very best that he can
being exactly what he is. In some infer
entail way one learns here, too tina
whatever is to be done will be done b.
this infrequent man who genuinely love
his kind.
THE TERRIBLE MEEK: A One-ac
Stage Play for Three Voices; to b.