Evening star., 1920-12-26

THE East DAYS OF THE ROMAN
0y& By George Gustav Telberg
AAds Robert Wilton. New York:
! George Il Doran Company.
AsaT Ekaterinburg, on the night of
~ July 16. 1918, in the basement
: IL of Ipatieffs. house. his prison.
1ussNicholas II was murdered-he
aend his wife. their four daughters, their
son. q nan-servant, maid-servant. ana
DR.. Botkin- Yankel Yurovsky. a. red. led
the ent1ng squad. claiming for himself
the privilege of slaughtering the ex-em-
perur and his son. The bodies of a.
victims were loaded upon lorries and
taken. by night, several miles oustde
Of the town to an abandoned iron
works Preparations had already been
made for their coming-hundreds OF
gallons Of petrol several & n%hdreds Tnd eds,os OF
were hacked into bits. subjected TO
tho chemicals and fire, and then
thrown into the iron pits. Such, In
substance, is the hideous story. Soon
of E1katerinburg by the Kolchak gov
ernment This government immedi-
ately took steps to investigate the
circumstances surrounding the ex-em-
Omsk tribunal took the depositions
that constitute the first part OF this book
of evidence. Two Of these six witnesses
looked on at the crime, one OF them
Enthusiastically taking part in it. The
others formed part of the emperor's
household. Their testimony recon-
structs the daily life of the imperial
family from the time of the emperor
abdication to the Imprisonment at
Ekaterinburg. The SECOND part i Of
the evidence to critical analysis and
continues the story beyond the
slaughter of the Romanovs to IN
clude the later Investigations that un-
covered the final disposition of the
Ekaterfnburg prisoners. Mr.. Wilton,
as correspondent of a. London paper,
lived in Russia for sixteen years. He
took an active and unremitting part
in following clues to the particulars
of this monstrous crime. The chain of
evidence. leads back to SverdloV, the
Red Tsar of Moscow. to Lenin, to
Berlin. ~.Such is the official story OF
it may have been, can surpass in hor-
rible details and in diabolic concep-
ton.
A CYCLE OF ADAMS LETTERS; 1861
1865. Edited by Worthington
Chauncey Ford. Boston: Houghton.
Miff1in Company.
The period of the civil war is covered
by this cycle Of Adams letters. During
this time Charles Francis Adams, jr..
served as an officer of cavalry in the
army of the east Throughout the
period, also Charles Francis Adams. his
father was minister of the United States
to Great Britain. With him, in the
capacity of confidential secretary. was
another son. Henry Adams. This Situa-
ton gives the source and indicates the
character of the correspondents In hand
The fresh seizure of these letters upon
the readers attention and interest. de-
10 E,yf pfrsr inp hafUHan
them and him, constitutes their drst
outstanding. feature. Underneath this
appeal of vigorous personality there
lies a substantial historic content whose
forgotten situation. On the one hand,
these intimate and Informal letters set
out, afresh, the official and CONNER
cial attitude of England toward the idea
of secession and the movement OF the
south in that direction. By incidence
alone they Indicate the firm and patriotic
position of our minister in. this perioo
Of English disaffection toward the union
A hundred sidelights mark the char
acter and extent of this disa1ecuon. as
they, indicate also the state Of English
affairs generally at this point. On the
other hand, the letters from the front
of war give innumerable pictures OF the
daily life Of the soldier in the years
from 1861 on to the close OF the war:
From beginning to end it is the vivid
and vital quality Of the correspondence
that moves one back to an almost literal
partaking Of the ideas and actvtleS
that marked this momentous ana cr1ocat
period -
LINCOLN; The World Emancfpaf0f:
BY John Drinkwater, author OF
abraham Lincoln" etc Boston:
Houghton, Mifhin Company.
After his impressive and successful
play, Abraham Lincoln" John Drink,
water. in his power Of intelligent and
sympathetic conception in his ART OF
dramatic Interpretation. must pc &C.
counted an authority on the supJect OF
the great emancipator. In TINS Voiume
inheritor and the embodiment OF those
characteristics and ideals that have
marked the progress OF the Angio,S1xon
race and that have, moreover, denneo
the influence of this race upon the gem
eral advancement of mankind. From
this point Of view he presents Lincoln
as the symbol of that unity which |
should bind together indissolubly the
two great representatives of that race
Great Britain and the United states |
Interesting and suggestive.
SWEET ROCKET. BY Mary John
ston. author of ITO Have and to |
Hold" etc. New York: Harper & |
Bros
In rare and fugitive moments Of spe-
cial clairvoyance one knows himself |
to be, not an individual complete in
himself, but rather. to be the sum OF
all that has gone before him-hts
ancestry, all mankind, the animal life
that is slowly lifting to his present
plane, the growing and reproducing
things Of inanimate nature, the solid
earth itself. the stars and the great
immanence that we have to call God.
This idea of unity, Of tho oneness OF
man with the whole of life, il the idea
that Miss Johnston sets as the founda-
tion of the little story in hand. In a
beautiful. and beautifully remote cor
ner of the south stands the estate OF
Sweet Rocket" Here are grouped a
handful of people, who have more
poignant and more continuous pos
session of this sense of being a part of
the world and of all life than the ave-
rage man or woman commands. The
little drama is built to show the practi-
cal application of this idea, to limit 1T
to the confines of a possible seizure by
the spirit, to show its effect in an
enlargement Of ones grasp Of life, and
in an increased certainty and COM
posure of attitude. A poetic and
beautiful creation that is highly gug-
gestive and stimulating.
AERIAL TRANSPORT. By G. Holt
Thomas. London: Holder & Slough
ton
After q dozen years Of study ap-
piled to aircraft as an element in war
fare Mr.. Thomas turns to 1t here az
an element in commerce as means
of transport Stating the essence Of
the problem as that of speed, the au-
thor moves out .from this starting
point to give a practical discussion of
the ways and means by which the SUBJ
r 5ect OF aeronautics may be made to