Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-02-25
MINISTER JOURNALIST
WRITES FIRST NOVEL
Peter Clark Macfarlane Puts a
Hero Through the Trials of
the Small Pastorate

Conditions which make life disagreeable
Tor pastors in more or less small par
ishes are relentlessly exposed by Peter
Clark Macfarlane in his first novel, Held
to Answer" Qittle, Brown & Co.. New
York and Boston). Mr.. NTacfarlane. in
the course of varied career. which has
made him one of the best paid and most
interesting special magazine writer's in
the world, was a clergyman, having
charges in California and the Middle
| West He knows whereof he speaks, and
doubtless some of his searchingly per-
ceived and keenly etched portraits Of
characters had life sitters. His hero is
stalwart Californian, who is deposed
from his church by a congregation that
misunderstood, He is finally vindicated Of
culpability for crime of which he was
totally innocent, but the blame for which
| he bore in order to shield another and
prevent the death of the real culprit's
sanity, invalid mother, from sudden
shock. 1t is indiscreet, of course, for
clergyman to visit the apartment of
fascinating actress, even after prayer
meeting and for the laudable purpose of
promoting her salvation. Msconstruction
follows John Hampstead's action. But he
is a better, finer man and pastor for his
ordeal by fire. And Bessie. noble type
of American girl, is all the more loving in
that he is more worthy of love.
The book is notable for its insight into
parochialism and for its vivid style At
: times the authors language seems too
fowery for common daily use. Vigor
would be promoted by lessening vividnoss.
But the novel is very readable.
John Trevenna has departed from the
realism of the novels which have won for
him fame for fantasy that is as attrac-
tive as IT is unusual, in "Moyle Church
Town" "a. A. Knopf. New York;. Mr..
Trevennas partiality for genre studies Is
again in evidence in his new romance. but
gives in favor of quaIntness of characteri-
zation A good deal of fairy lore and
much about Devonshire customs and su-
perstitons are incorporated in the work.
1t Is remlndful more than anything else
in recent literature, of James Stephens
"The Crock of Gold" There is more OF
story, but the same curiousy developed
atmosphere pervades, In style and other
wise the new Trevenna book is wholly
delightful. 1t is unique in a day devoted
to the novel of plot, adventure, detective
astuteness and sexual trigonometry.
1t is to be suspected that the author of
81 Pose" (MacAIillan Company, New
York;, who signs herself Stella Benson, is
a very young person. Only person of
that description would have had the cour-
age to produce so seriously impudent, so
BfaNely gay DOOk with n Gardener as
the hero and a Suffragette as the heroine.
1t is a romance of two young people Who
Did Not Care About Anything. or at least,
pretended not to. They are sarcastic with
each other i'm England on shipboard, and
i'm the islands of the Caribbean Sea until
the 31Oth page, when some feeling begins
to be manifested in a shame-faced British
way. There is much clever characteriza-
tion: for instance, there is a clergyman
who says, "Yerce, yerce' and there are
many snappy and pert little epigrams.
An individual of Vacuous type is the
Hon. Sam ThoTnhill, who figures as the
hereof Cyril Harcourts novelized comedy
"A Pair of silk Stockings (Dodd, Mead
& Co, New York;. AS a matter of fact
there's nothing at all heroic about Sam,
unless it be his attempt to obtain an eX-
planatory interview with the wife who di-
vorced him because of his supposed ''go-
ings on" with another woman, He hides
himself in a closet of her bedroom, whence
he is ignominously dragged by another
guest of the fine old English house in
which the action of the story is staged.
Overpowered and then trussed up with a
portion of his ex-wife's most intimate
lingerie, Sam finally escapes, but his eX-
plot unjustly involves that young lady
and an army captain who had made love
TO her before her marriage, The pair
of silk stockings" however prove the
means not only of clearing the innocent,
but of reuniting the divorced couple,
There's plenty of fun in Mr. Harcourt's
tale, even if 1t is not altogether con-
vincing