The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-02-25

of the characters and scenes, is small, , Second-rate dollar house in Chicago which seated only-and that by "a miracle of packing '-67S people, and consequently had to be run with the utmost economy. The performances given there were not exactly musical comedies; they were just Globe shows" and the pretty, more or less Undressed chorus of some two dozen girls was a very important feature, and perfectly well aware of the fact. Six of the tales have to do principally with members of this chorus especially with a young woman named Hazel Dering, who first appears in Brunette Medium with a problem which the wardrobe mistress unconsciously solves for her. and later has the leading role in Heart of Gold" :" the longest and most conventional story in the book. Hazel her friends and foes from w. Ransom Lord. owner of tho theatre and generally known as The Boss" down to Cissy Blake. the chorus man who in "The Spring of the Year was presented with an opportunity and did not make very much of it-though as the manager declared, You certainly got to hand it to that boy for nerve!"- are a slangy, friendly, thoroughly disil- lusloned and on the whole very likable lot. Jimmy Wallace the dramatic critic, some will remember, is one of them and appears in several of the stories as a sort of deus ex machinae.
 He plays a minor but very useful part in the best and most artistic story in the volume, "The Redeemer." It tells of an incident which happened at Sammy's one Christmas eve-Sam- mys being little restaurant whose proprietor "grasped and put into eff feet one thoroughly practical distinc- tion-the distinction, that Is to say, between the sort of girl that chorus crir1S mn ha thoU sometimes are and usually get the creditor rather discredit-for being. The atmosphere of this story, it's hold on the readers interest, the illuminat ing little touches and clever handling of situation which might easily be made banal; more than all, the way in which the characters are lightly in dicated rather than drawn, render this notable tale. Not quite so good, yet not very greatly inferior, is 'The Real Dope" a tale of contrasted ideas and standards, wherein speech which the charming, well bred and attractive young natron Bella or any of her friends would have yawned over" proved altogether too much for Amber Lyston of the chorus. Amber, who could thrill with sympathy for the woes of the virtuous and persecuted heroine of melodrama. yet had skulls at her feet"-to quote Jimmy Wallace-the skulls being those of the men who had loved her, is admirably portrayed. And well drawn, too, is Spencer Ayres, a most difficult type to delineate successfully About third in order comes "The Only Girl"-an excellent tale this, by the way, for the stage struck young woman but lacking something of the freshness and distinction of the other two. Muriel Scott, the society girl who wanted to be a dancer and found out that having stage career did not mean doing something in an agreeable way. when you happened to feel like it." has in- numerable prototypes Only they do not all have the fundamental good sense with which she was endowed under the layers of vanity through which truth had some difficulty in pushing, and the wit to apply les son as she did.
 THE SHINING ADVENTURE"
 By Dana Burnet. Harper Brothers,
 publishers, New York.
 In The Shining Adventure" the au- thor. Dana Burnet. tells story of children and grown-ups, of humor and poetry of democracy and charity, of royal titles and aldermens platforms and it all takes place in Gramercy park and O'Connor's alley, New York city The book has a charm all It's own but if YOU try to stick it into