The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1918-10-20
By DOROTHY SCARBOROUGH.

book that has real pathOs and real humol
without seeming over sentimental, and is
exhilarating TO read because it reveals faith
and courage and optimism. The characters
are fighters. undaunted and heroic, though
they are not in the army in France. They
are the people who stay at home in Eng
land and bear the burdens of war, endur-
ing the hardships, living over the heart
break and carrying on" with never q
thought of surrender or Of defeat. Other
writers have pictured the valor of soldiers
at the front, but Mrs. Buckrose shows US
the heroism of the ordinary people, the
great middle class, the silent legion who
bear the sacrifice and toll at home.
Mrs. Buckrose is known as the author
of various novels, but this war story gives
her a new and stronger claim to recogni-
ton. With the quick sympathy Of a
woman she uneoyers the hearts of persons
in quiet villages, in seaside resorts, IN
country places, showing how the war has
come home to each Of them.
There is Mr.. Simpson, whose only son
has fallen in battle and whose business
has collapsed, so that at past middle age
he must work for thirty shillings week
under a man who was once his office boy.
"In the room beneath the girls attic Mr..
Simpson lay by his wife under bedclothes
made extra large to accommodate the
hill created by his figure; he Directing,
as he always said, to 'scrapping for the
blanket Toward dawn the hilloek
heaved and Mrs. Simpson said softly:
awake, SamP
ayes
"'Been awake longf
".Oh, bit. Not long, lied Mr.. Simp-
son.
"'You're bothering about the business,
of course. 1t is hard on you, Sam, after
spending the best years Of your life in
building it up from nothing
"Lots in the same box said Mr..
Simpson. 4 don't pretend to Ike it, Of
course But there it tsp"
Mr.. Simpson is out on his Waterman
duty at night when an air raid comes.
"'Wel stick it out il we starve. Well
stick it out if we die in heaps. We must
beat 'em. We must beat emp he NUT
tered, trotting along with his jolly round
face that was meant to be 80 kind all
congested and his eyes giaring through
his spectacles.
"Then he looked up and stood still. The
faint red glare which is usually over a
city after dark had given place to a
pageant such as Mr.. Simpson had never
seen before. Great searchlights swept
across the deep blue plain Of the sky
where all the stars were shining bright;
below lay the darkened streets, and
among the stars, as it seemed, was pale
golden thing like pencil that the god
of battles had cast down after signing
the doom of the world. Just so it looked
lowering over Flodmouth, with the splen-
dor of all tie searchlights turned upon it.
HE stared up, rooted to the ground,
and the Zeppelin seemed to waver
uncertainty, as if the men steering it were
blinded by the swords Of light. Then it
began to sail away, growing less and less
against the wonderful blue and silver of
the night. Mr.. Simpson heard a great
shout go up-the shout Of deliverance,
and he began to run again, waving his
cap, with his bald head exposed to the
night breeze"
There is Mrs. Simpson, who is "won-
derful,' the neighbors said, but whose
hair is whitening and whose frail health
is growing frazier all the time, though
she smiles cheerfully at her family and
goes about her tasks Of unaccustomed
drudgery. The young girls, too, con-
cealed their griefs and sacrifices under
merry jests. There is Mrs. Wilson, the
woman with the flat feet and "the rather
flat footed mind which so often and so
curiously goes with them" She, too,
has her troubles bravely borne, as has, in
foot nvcryhodu IN tha uillo1o Tboro 20