The sun., 1919-10-12

iiOHy Ihdlhtu W HiSl utSIcc VI hlcldAy
finish. His prose is beautiful, often witty
and sparkling, and beneath its liquid pur-
ity runs sense of usefulness and pathos
that might be lost by the casual reader.
The man is an authentic poet at times;
such stories as The LdareIs and the Lady,
almost novelette, by the way, The Prince
IN the Fairy Tale and Dead ViOIets, all
included in this new volume, prove it.
Realism at its starkest is seldom touched
by him. The nearest approach to it in
this book is "The Back of Bohemia" q
rather vivid bit that goes farther into the
sordid mistakes of life than the writer is
wont to travel.
The characters that Merrick uses often
est in his stories always lend themselves
easily to both pathos and humor. They
are, for the most part, actors, artists,
poets, men who desire the idealistie as
poets of life more than their daily bread
and undoubtedly get them oftener. Fig
ures that the world generally finds rather
comical and soon tires of become real and
important in these stories. Outlining a
short story is always a dangerous task,
for the episode is generally impossible to
adequately compass in less space than the
author has used, but the description of one
of Merricks short stories may serve as a
hint to his method and materials.
Dead Violets is one of the finest things
IN bn hnot- ord 20 H. L.
water marks as writer. "'f you ever
want me, write to me- I'D come to you
from the end of the world he had said;
and she had answered, 4 shall always
want you, but shall never write, and
you must never come She was married.
So they part, he to an artists life; she
to her husband. But every year for five
years be sends her bunch of violets on
her birthday. The first year he loves her:
his emotions the second year are less vivid,
and the succeeding years find him sending
the flowers with cold heart and chiefly
because he feels that she viii be disap-
pointed unless she receives them. But as
the flowers come to the woman each year
she welcomes them with smiles and tears,
believing that he loves her still and know
ing that she loves him. Then they meet
again. She is unhappy and he, thinking
it duty, tries to warm up the dead EN-
bers of love and asks here to go away with
him. She does start, but his actions, his
coldness, his evident reluctance impress
the truth upon her. She understands that
love is dead and returns to her husband
There is package for her there that has
been redireeted from Paris. Opening it,
she finds the yearly bunch of violets.
Owing to the delay in the mails they are
quite dead.
That is all there is to the story, but it is
told with such a poignant touch, 80 SIM
ply, and yet so subtly calculated to awaken
he tenderest emotions that its success
IS quite complete. The transience of love
plays its part time and again in these
stories, sometimes wistfully, sometimes
With gentle humor. Occasionally is there
he vital material of tragic forces, such as
he pathetic and surprising situation in
The Ldurels and the Lady. Here a little
lrab lives the life Of great actress, lying
to make a blind poets last
months happy. She even convinces him
hat his pitiful book of verse has been
making up laudatory notices
o read him. 1t is all done with that
inc touch removing the theme from
,athos.
If we except Conrad in Search of His
7outh there could be no better introdue-
ion to Leonard Merriek's carefully fin
shed art than this new volume. In it is
ii that makes the author a distinctive
anne among English writers to-day, ten
erness, poetry, irony as gentle as spring
ain, and that undefnable sixth sense that
nows the secret of the short story.
he NAN WHO UNDERSTOOD WOMEN.