The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-03-02
"A "TRIP TO LOFTS I,AND.n

By Archie Bell. With 56 illustrations.
 The John Lane company, publishers,
 New York.
 Archie Bell, the we'll known and popular writer, has done pretty bit of word painting In his book, "A Trip to Lotus Land"
 The reader is made to feel the in- definable spell of the land which cen ters in the snowy cone of F'uji, until we can scent the cherry blossoms and hear the gentle voices of the geishas It Is not merely a book about Japan. It is a piece of Japan itself
 The purpose of the book, which is beautifully gotten up pictorially as well as otherwise, is to convey to tho reader something of the joys of six weeks tour of Nippon.
 The writer declares that it Is en- tierly unnecessary to live in Japan to know the Japanese or to see and know their attractive country.
 The author says definitely that he found a six weeks residence in far away Japan ample time for what seemed to be rather leasurely pii- srimage through the country during which not only the Thigh spots'' of the routine and itinerary tourist were visited, but also a number Of the most interesting "out- of-the-way" retreats that are frequently overlooked by the personally conducted' tour people.
 MT. Bell disclaims the idea that his book, "A Trip to Lotus Land" is in any way guide book" saying at the very beginning that MT. Phillip Ter rvs Japanese Empire and the ex- cellent publications of the imperial Japanese government railways make other guide books superfluous; but at the same time "A Trip to Lotus Land" gives great deal of very valuable in- formation to the tourist who is seeing Japan for the first time.
 "FRENZIED FICTION.
 By Stephen Leacock The John Lane
 Co.,, publishers, New York.
 stephen Leacock has never before been half so charming or half so humorous in any of his clever books as he is in "Frenzied Fiction"
 It is book worth while in these war days when we want something to take away the gloom and the sorrow of the worlds sadness and laugh we must if we read this book.
 Among the amusing sketches is the one which has to do with gardening; raising vegetables has become a war time measure so to speak, and MT. Lea cock tells us that he was "one of the legion of men-quiet, determined, resolute men-who went out last spring to plant the land and who are now back.''
 He continues:
 With me-and I am sure that speak fer the others as wel-it was not ques- ton of mere pleasure; it was no love of gardening for it's own sake that inspired us. It was plain national duty. What we said to ourselves was: This war has got to stop. The men in the trenches thus far have failed to stop it. Now let us try. The whole thing we argued. is plain matter of food production. If we raise enough food the Germans are bound to starve. Very good. Let us kill them"
 He goes on to draw the charming pie ture of those April days:
 There is sort of farmer-like geni- ality in the air. One spoke freely to strangers. Got your tomatoes fn?' one man would ask another. used to think that brokers were mere sordid. calculating machines. Now that I have seen whole firms of them busy at the hoe, wearing old trousers that reached to their armpits and were tied about the waist with polka dot necktie, I know that