Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-09-01

of all children, regardless of the economic
TO encourage child bearing and the ere.
alton of healthy citizens"
What economist is responsible for the
SUGGESTION" owen wanted to know.
Kathleen Norris" said I. 81 do no,
think she would call herself an economist.
She Is novelist who would perhaps be
willing to call herself a sociologist. for
she has written two or three sociological
novels. One deals with the divorce ques.
ton, another with the servant problem
and a third with the importance of liv.
ing within ones income. Her latest
novel, Martie, the Unconquered,' in
which she proposes endowment of
motherhood, is a study in the question
of self-support for girls. She deals with
family of three sisters, one of whom
had been Tilted and was becoming an
old maid. The two younger girls had
terror of spnsterhood Their family
did nothing to train them for self-sup-
port and also did nothing to make them
socially pleasing to the young men in
sort of a laborer because she would
rather have him for a husband than
remain unmarried. Her babies-she had
four of them-are endowed by an old
physician, a friend of the family who
wishes to make an experiment in sociol.
ogy. The husband himself finally studies
medicine and rises in the world. The
other sister, Martie, after a love affair
that came to naught, had quarrel with
her father and ran away to earn her own
living as nurse maid, but instead mar.
ried cheap actor. The marriage was
not success and after a time the hus.
band dies. The novel leaves Martie as
a sub.editor of woman's magazine in
New York. She had fled there from he,
California home because just on the eve
OF her marriage to the richest man in
town New York man who loved her
had come to see her and she had dis
covered that she loved him. There could
be no marriage, however, as he was di-
vorced and she was a Catholic"
1T must be a pretty dull story with
so much economics in it," said Ames.
But it isn't dull. Dorothy would like
it and so would Doctor McFabre. Mrs.
Norris has the storytelling gift and she
has achieved the art of creating the illu
sion of reality so that you get the i'm
| preston that she is describing actual per.
sons and events that happened while she
was looking on. Characters like hers
| can be found in every American com
| munity. And families in which the girls
are allowed to grow up to drift into mar
| riage, If fortunate, and to remain old
maids if an eligible man fails to appear
are common. Everyone knows a Martie
who faces life with courage after having
made failure. Many widowed Marties
are courageously supporting their chill
dren and doing their best to recover
from the effects of the wreck from which
they might have been saved by theil
| parents. The purpose of Mrs. Norris is
to prevent such wrecks If possible. Hell
remedy is economic"
| "She doesn't go deeply enough" sait
| Owen. Social wrecks of this kind are
due to spiritual rather than to economic
causes"
"Yes, I think that is true as a genera
| proposition" said l. But after all, 4
the economic problem were solved Il
would be easier for the spiritual forces
to work"
GEORGE w. DOUGLAS.
MARTIE, THE uNCoNouERED. BY Kathl,e
| Norris Illustrated by Charles +. Chambeft