The New York herald., 1922-05-07

lived to the icy uglineSs Of the peni-
tentiary fate takes him. and there he
remains until he Is II. His next
step is to a barge, and bargee he
remains for some six months or
more, and then he begins the upward
climb that takes him to the charm
ing home OF a Cambridge coach, to
that university. and eventually into
the ranks of professional occupation
in London, the meeting with Viola,
daughter of rich man and an ultra
exquisite mother. and the marriage
OF the two. imminent on the last
page.
This is the bare outline of a re-
markable book, rich in texture and
feeling, full of varied individuals,
moving easily from the misery and
confusion of the slum to the deli
cate loneliness of perfect interiors
and magic gardens.
But Jim is more than a man who
makes himself. He is one of those
who mean to remake the world. He
is a reformer, not dapper individual
from the outside, who looks at what
is unsatisfactory and what is evil
and what is bitter hard and does a
great deal of talking about these
things, but one who moves from the
inside, from intimate knowledge and
deep experience, and who Is inter-
ested in the facts, not the theories.
Jim was as active against the sins
of his own people as against those of
the capitalist class. He wanted to
build character more than to COM
pass hours of ease and plenty of
food for his friends. They did not
like this. But he was an orator, a
man who could speak with fire from
the convictions within him, and he
was also eminently fair. So they
listened to him and even believed in
him. Something like Mark in when
Winter Comes" in the fact that he
could see both sides of a question, he
yet knew what he was after.
For Jim knows the lives of the
dock workers and the injustices, the
hopeless conditions under which they
struggled for the breath of life.
Here was a fact, and he set out to
see what he could do about it. He
spent years in organizing the first
strike they had ever had. 1t failed,
but it was a warning to those above
and a beacon to those below.
There is more to this book than
the mere story of Jims life. 1t shows,
by means of Jim. what a breath of
actual truth can do to wornout insti-
tutions and age old traditions. Most
persons live by rote. Gradually they
come to think that rote is God and
right and the world and all that
matters. They think this so hard
and so successfully that it imposes
itself on all about them. Life be-
comes rote.
But rote did not exist for Jim, and
he was able to do without ii. A few
perceived this, and for them life be-
came something real. Jim made them
understand many things and find
fresh values for other things. Sec
ond hand things showed up for what
they were; second rate things took
their proper place. Here was an
honest man, in every act and thought.
AS the sun puts out a candle, Jim
put out the pinchbeck opinions and
insincere convictions that had held
but he is also sensitive, especially for
others. And he is keenly alive to
beauty. Beauty takes many forms
and has strange powers. 1t is really
beauty that Jim is after from the
first, beauty for the world as well as
for himself. Honesty and cleanliness
and straight thought-these are
beauty. And so is knowledge and
understanding and sympathy and
love. Jim's first conscious awaken
ing TO beauty was on seeing a king
fisher flash through the air as he
strolled along the towing path one
dew wet morning in summer while
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