Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1927-07-19
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
I. G.. M.

Tarbot.
I've just finished reading a story in
The Sunday Star about few war
left-overs" out at Walter Reed. Pic
lures of some of the boys go along
with the story itself. And each of
these "1eft-overs" looks in his picture
to be about as much Of one whole man
as prairie settlement resembles a
town after a Western cyclone has had
a regular go at it. No town at all, as
matter Of fact, but a bedlam of scat
tered timbers instead and broken walls
and the general wreckage of that
which only a few minutes before had
been a planned and ordered commu-
nifty. A cyclone, though, is at least
one lap ahead of war in that 1t does
not specialize exclusively in human
destruction. It takes life, to be sure.
and sometimes in stable numbers.
but it's mood Is, in the main, a large
and Olympian one, satisfied with a
single furious moment of wild devasta-
ton. and then on it's way. Wars ex-
elusive purpose, on the contrary,
reckons directly upon overwhelming
human slaughter.
This group of Walter Reed boys
stands for millions of other young sol
diers who beat the war out by so close
shave as to count, indeed, for
clearly dubious victory. Here, maybe,
is a youth with one leg gone or both,
another with an arm missing or a
hand, and there are others upon
whom the insidious work of poison
gas is still busy in some malign effect
upon brain and body tissues. Yet, what
a cheerful set this is! All smiling and
buoyant, all with will to come
back to complete recovery that is
sheer establishment to the outsider.
And one hunts for the cause of so gem
eral an optimism in a situation that
is, certainly, not Haunting any silver
lining of very high promise. A sense
Of security is. I believe, the answer to
this riddle of hopefulness under cir
cumstances so pitifully untoward. The
Government is bulwark behind them.
Uncle Sam has passed into the nearer
role of an understanding and CRATE
full father discharging debt of honor
to his disabled, and even partly dis
abled, defenders. So these will never
so hungry nor ragged nor unsheltered
and, should occasion require, they will
receive the best that medical science
and expert care can give. They are
safe and secure in this respect and,
feel sure that such sense of security
accounts in marked measure for the
courage with which so many of these
broken men face life.
y \ y
High time for me to be at work, so
I reach out for the task at hand. 1t
is book. a queer customer of book
that would stand no ghost of show
in the fashion parade of publications
that adorn the windows of popular
book stores. A fiat, thin, spreading
book, bound in stiff paper upon whose
front is the title in handwriting,
Jerry Tarbot's Book" Author, print
err and bookbinder all in one, Jerry
has in this undertaking achieved
departure from the usual run of
books that is of the very essence of
publicity, novel advertising bent upon
money returns. Let us hope. For
the purpose of this book is that of
every book that has been written-to
secure wide reading and many sales.
At it's outset. this is a war story.
1t is the personal record of man at
the front, at exactly the same front"
that has been made real and bitterly
familiar to readers by Laurence STALL
ings and Dos Passos and Thomas
Boyd and Leonard Mason and other
soldiers with a turn for telling the
world something of the actually of
war. The story soon shifts from
trench to hospital and in the course
of short time to America and an
asylum for the insane. Free from
this, there begin the wanderings that
here project one of the strangest of
quests. Nothing less than himself is
that for which Jerry Tarbot is search
ing. Somewhere in France" the who
he was-name, place, family-fell
away from this soldier into the deep
abyss of war. Inevitably thereafter
such loss became a haunting shadow,
importunate to recognition but too
elusive for any substantial seizure.
The story goes on with the record Of
a job of work here and another one
there-not very competent work, one
gathers, since a half-man, or less, can
hardly compete with laborers of sound
and husky bodies. There are recorded
here occasional returns to the hos
pitaI, indicating the incapacity Of this
man for the business Of earning even
scanty living. Singularly imper-
sonal and matter of fact, the mar
rative goes on opening up gradually
to the growing interest of outsiders
in the strange case of Jerry Tarbot.
hand and finally the Government
itself oils it's machinery of search and
identification. And the story ends in
a climax that would make the ever
lasting fortune of melodrama in the
hands of playwright or novelist. At
the last moment of that particular
session of Congress a hearing was
set for Jerry Tarbot before the proper
committee. And Jerry was on hand,
as was also a stable audience. Now
the chairman of that hearing was a
fellow soldier, who, coming back
from France all safe and sound, was
rewarded by the political preferment
Of his congressional district. A good
omen for understanding and SYM
pathy at least. Ladies and gentle
men," said this chairman, II am
going to show you this day that the
man known as Jerry Tarbot is fake
and a crook, instead Of being the VIC
I will show that he has never forgot
ten who he really is and that he
never served in the war. I have the
report here"-and so on. Such is
the climax of Jerry Tarbot's own
story. In fact, Congress adjourned in
a few hours after this little side play,
leaving Jerry Tarbot-but. here is
something better to read, not pointed
iy better for Jerry Tarbot, but better
for the rest of US who want to get
away from that meeting of the COM
mittee sitting in behalf Of Tarbot.
Here is a letter from Gen. Hines, di.
rector Of the Veterans Bureau, to
this man: II am extremely sorry to
have to inform you that all efforts
which the bureau has exerted to the
present date have failed to establish
your identity as member of the
military or naval forces, and I am
sure that you realize that although
there Is every indication and belief
that you were in the service during
the war and that your present dis
ability is a result of such service, the
bureau has no authority to extend the
benefits of the World War veterans
legislation except upon the discovery
a. M Jdopfif7c tion IF essential record