The sun., 1918-11-10
gets it. We have liked it rather better than the
parallel pages in JOHN FIsKE.
washington and His Colleagues"

w dSnlnStOn ana Ills SOlledSueS.
HENRY JONES FORD writes the book on Washing
ton and His Colleagues, a chronicle of the adminis
trations of WASHINGTON and JOHN ADAMS par
ticularly lively and entertaining Notwithstanding
also, of course The opening chapter portraying the
difficulties and puzzles of White House etiquette in
the first Administration will not exactly drive read
ers from the book! How Mrs. WASHINGTON ate the
dessert made with rancid cream and made no face
for politeness sake; how New York bellies tall
couture nearly the cause of setting her head
afre; how WASHINGTON sought and got advice on
entertaining is not the way to bore the reader.
We like best two bits as follows
"The night before the white horses which WASH
INGTON used as President to be taken out, their
coats were covered by paste of whiting, and the
animals we're swathed in wrappngs In the MORN
ing the paste was dry and with rubbing gave
marble gloss to the horses coats. The hoofs were
then blackened and polished, and the animals
teeth were secured"
And this from the end of the book:
"A Jerseyman who had expressed a wish that
the wad of a cannon fired as a salute to the Pres-
dent, had hit him the bulge of his brooches,
was fined 800" What roundabout ways of say
ing things they had in those days.
THE Forty-Niners"
A better person than STEWART EDWARD WHITE
to write the story of The Forty Miners could not
have been found. And he makes the narrative, in
credible truth that it is, more exciting than widest
romance The forty miners did find gold at the
roots of bushes and did pickup $4,000 or $4,000
or even 900 in ten days without working espe-
cialy hard. WHITE puts the whole panorama
before you and goes into the story of San Fran
cisco and the Vigilantes. He tells it in way that
will make any reader of any age forget everything
round about him for page page, especially where
he tells of JAMES KING of William and of the exec-
ton of JAMES P. CASEY and CHARLES CORA
"The Passing of the Frontier"
EMERSON HoUGH has written number of semi
historical books about the West, such as The Story
of the COWboy and The Story of the Outlam, a
study of Western desperadocS. He is an eminently
fit person to have written The Passing of the From
tier, in the Yale series. He puts before you the
range and the rider, cattle trails the Mines Indian
wars, cattle kings and the homesteader He tells
you how the cowboy rode and why his saddle was
such; who the robber bands and how they
were broken the record of the land-prairie, ranch
fencing in, railroads. cultivation is unrolled as if
from a scroll on which set of rapidly shifting
scenes had been painted And Mr. HouGH sees
quite clearly that the thing which made America
was the Americans and that Americans were bred
in the pure strain, while we had a frontier Over
its passing he permits himself few words of in
SORROW that is natural aud right;
but America must keep the courage and hardihood
Of her frontiersmen and We believe, there is good
chance that she will
Abraham Lincoln and the Union"
Writing of Abraham Lincoln and the Union
NATHANIEL W. STEPHENSON imposed on himself
The task of assembling facts to answer Just two
questions: Why was there warf Why was the
Lincoln Government successful2 There was war
because we had raised up two nations with only
political bond to unite them. The Lincoln Govern
nent was successful because the Battle of Antietam
was followed within five days by the Emancpa-
ion Proclamation. We do not say that these are
'ul answers but they are important parts of the
answers Mr. STEPHENSON supplies. 1t is an excel
ent book, with notable art of piercing through
complexities to get at the heart of a matter
The American Spirit in Literature"
BLISS PERRYis The American Spirit in Litero-
ure declares the existence of an American litera-
ure as DISTINGUISHED from ENGLISH literatnro n,