Evening star., 1924-08-23
The Library Table
BY THE BOOKLOyER

phasls to the personal aspect of everv
event they record Things nearly
| always happen to people. IL thew
| happen to prominent people the in
'erest is heightened. This is ono
reason why the biennial volume Of
Who's Who in America" is of such
prime Importance in every newspa-
| per Office, why it is found in every
| library and is indispensable to most
public officials and TO many others
| The thirteenth edition of this re-
| markable book has recent1y bAen
puoilshed- 1t contains biographical
| sketches OF moro than 5000 -nota-
! uie hVlns men and women of the
| United States" in it's 300 pages. Two
classes OF people are included
those who by their achievements are
| considered sufficiently distinguished
| ana Well known, and those who are
| arbitrarily included on account of
| oliiclal position, civil, military, naval.
rengiouS or educational The CON
| densed sketches Of such Persons. to-
| gether with their addresses, make the
book widely valuable.
! The present edition of Who's Who
| in America" like certain OF it's
predecessors, contains studies of the
| educational advantages enjoyed by
the people whose biographies are re-
! corded therein, in which generaIiza-
lions are made on the kinds and de-
greeS OF education and on the enyi-
rohment, heredity and occupations
| that have been factors in the lives
! of those who have been included in
| TINS dictionary of cotemporary biog-
raphy- 1t is significant that, so far
| as educational equipment is record
| ed, out Of every 100 persons in
c!uded II attended college and 81
were college graduates. 1t would
therefore appear that college train
! ing increases threefold ones chances
| OF being included in the American
| Who's Who" High school education
or its equivalent accounted for an
| additional Il per cent of those in
/ Guided, whereas less than 8 per cent
| of the "notables' had only a gram
| mar school education. The study of
| occupations Of the fathers Of those
! Included shows that nearly so per
| cent were born on farms or in viii
| lagos and that a little more than 20
! per cent were born in large and small
| cities; but in proportion to popula-
| ton, the cities furnished more than
| twice as many "notables" as the aver
! age, and six times as many as the
! farms. Furthermore, on the basis OF
all cases where the occupations of
| the fathers are given, it appears that
| 20 per cent of those included were
| fatheTed by professional and busi-
/ ness men, less than % per cent by
farmers, and less than l per cent by
| laborers. Clergymen's sons and
daughters make up more than II per
| cent of those included, which means
| that on the basis OF population they
contributed twice as many as did or
| dinary professional men, 50 times as
| ma II a F.,,- q
as many as did unskilled Iaborers.
! These studies indicate that a large
! share of the "notables'' of today have
come from certain relatively small
groups of the population. They do
! not indicate whether this is attribu-
! table TO superior education. home in
! fiuences, thrift or other training fac
| tors. or to heredity. They do show
| that thus far at least few foreign
born have achieved the rank of
| "notabIeS."
! May Sinclair, having firmly estab-
| lished herself in the front ranks OF
| fiction writer's and having within the
I last few years made excursions into
! philosophy. has now become a poet.
| The Dark Night" is free-verse mar
| rative in which Miss Sinclair employs
her usual fiction method of displaying
in the minuteSt details the thoughts
and emotions of her characters. Nei-
ther action nor physical appearances
! form the interest of the poem, but the
| souls of the three characters, Monica,
| Victor and Elizabeth Yet there is
! enough action so that a decidedly dra-
matte situation develops TO which the
| blind Victor, the pleasure loving
| Monica and the suffering. purified
| Elizabeth react in their several ways
Miss Sinclair's description of Monica
suggests Walter Pater's famous de-
sCription of Leonardos Mona Lisa
Monica is only Is, when Victor says of
| her:
| She is not young and she has lived
a thousand times;
| She has looked a her own image in
the water of the Nile;
| She was the first courtesan who
waited At the STREET. corners Of
| Ninevah.'
| Supporters of Russian bolshevism
| in this country will find a difficult
| hurdle in Capt Francis McCullagh's
! book, THE Bolshevik Persecution of
! Christianity" The author, formerly
an officer in the British intelligence
service, is able to speak from that
firSthand evidence which is so rare
among visitors to Russia since the
revolution, as he sat through the
whole trial of Archbishop Cieplak and
took copious notes, besides having
access, it seems, to the notes of the
Soviet stenographers. His informs-
tion first appeared in dispatches TO an
American newspaper and has since
been published more fully in this
book. Capt. McCullagh says of the
Cieplak trial that it proved clearly
that the bolshevik government is
determined to destroy all religion,
- L,
witnesses were members of the Com
munist party and that there were no
witnesses for the defense. OF the
murder, or so-called execution of
Mgr. Budkiewicz he says that, al
though the Reds have attempted to
keep secret all details, he has OBJ
tained from a reliable source the
following information: He was strip
ped naked and made to traverse d.
dark corridor leading to another cell
lar, where an experienced eXecu-
tioner was awaiting him. On reach
ing the end of this corridor Mgr
Budkiewicz found himself in a room
which was suddenly lit up by a
powerful electric light that made the
unfortunate priest blink and stag
ger back awkwardly. Before he had
recovered himself the eXecutioner had
shot him througS the back of the
head, and the bullet coming out in
the center of the face, had rendered
it unrecognizable." His body was
buried with the bodies of nine ban
dts which had been awaiting inter
ment.
In "The Life and Confessions of
Psychologist" by G. Stanley Hall,
who died recently in his late seven
ties, he confesses that he loved prize