The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-09-14

conditions, it might even be said that they were worse sufferers than he.
 Yet it was not the aforementioned MT. Beverley Sands wno began the trouble, nor any one or his immediate companions, but another and an older person, one Edward Blsckthorne, Esq, of King Alfred's Wood, Warwickshire, England" He was an elderly and a famous novelist; Beverley Sands was a young, and presumably to be famous American novelist who wrote book of which MT. Blackthorne heartily ap- proved. Wherefore the English novel; ist wrote to the American and express ed his approval at considerable length.
 Beverley Sands at once replied in a letter which explains Blackthorne's en- thusiasm to flattery; imitation is said to be the sincerest r1attery, and as Beverley Sands writes in the same
 style and manner as Edward Black
 thorne, it would appear that he must
 have moulded himselr upon the older and more famous man. These two let | ters started the trouple-trouble Of more kinds than one. For Edward Blackthorne had garden--a very | charming one, to judge by the descrip- l tion--and in the garden bank of ferns l while it so chanced that Beverley Sands 1 had written an eloquehr description or woodland scene in Kentucky, "a cool moist IOT0Sl Spol, WucI olH WCio | many, many ferns. Would he Ed | ward Blackthorne requested, be so very good as to send out 70 him in Eng
 land some of the root-stocks of those | K Kentucky ferns-of course, at MT. | Blackthorn's expense? A simple-seem | ing request truly, but one of many consequences. For those ferns, The Emblems of Fidelity" have a marked l effect upon the lives of several people. They break up matrimonial arrange
 ments, separate friends, have share | in bringing about the demise Of an l elderly scientist, and SO influence MT
 Beverley Sands that his behavior pres l ently causes certain persons to have l grave doubts about RIB sanity. He himself declares of those ferns: "They | have found us out they have played
 upon our weaknesses, they have exag- gerated our virtues until these became
 vices; they have separated us and set us going our divergent ways"
 l MORE OF E. K MEANS"
 By E. K. Means Illustrated by Kemble l G. P. Putnam's Sons publishers. New | York city.
 More of E. K. Means" by Dr. Means | himself, is the second volume of his de- lightful wit and humor containing fur. ther selections from pr. Means mimi | tabl, stories of that strange bleding oi humor and pathos which goes to make up the Louisiana negro. All our old | friends are here-the "Revun' Vinegar Ats, Figger Bush, Hitch Diamond | Skeeter Butts, Col. Tom Gaitskill. Sher. if Flournoy and the many others; and
 we also are pleased to meet de quaint.
 ance" of new ones equally interest.
 1.-THE SEE-SAW."
 | By Sophie Kerr. Doubleday, Page and l Company, publishers, Garden City N. Y.
 The Crosseys had been married sol | five years when the story, "The See Saw" opens. Harleth is drinking more l than is good for him, and has already been more or less conspicuously at l racted by more than one woman, from l whose charms he has always returned l to his really very lovely young wife | But with the beginning of the novel Har- l eth. who always does nrec'Selv what hs pleases, with no consideration for the
 ain or pleasure of any one else, falls 'nto the tolls of handsome, schemins 1 girl who has lost her money. who wants ] 10 make a rich marriage, and who does | not hesitate to set her Snares for tht 1 husband of an old friend. It is becaus. I If misunderstanding that Marcia a | ast leaves her husband; but 1t is a mis l 'rderstandng that Harleth could easily
 have cleared up. if he had not childshly 1 ost his temper instead.
 Whereupon che divorces him, and he l marries the other woman because hs l thinks it is his duty and he is un. happy and ashamed. and 1t does him l good Then, when his new wife an. nounces that he is going to get a di- vorce and marry more "amusing" mar | who will take her to live in Paris liar. leth goes back to Marcia who receives him as hereinbefore described
 l That is "The See Saw"
 THE HIDDEN VALLEY"
 By Muriel Hine The John Lane Con-