Evening star., 1927-10-01
THE LIBRARY TABLE
By the Rooki0rev.

boarding school forms each Autumn
a book club to insure the reading of
few good books during the Winter
even though small incomes prevent
the buying of many books and multi
farous duties make difficult frequent
visits to the public library. Each
teacher buys one book, at not too high
a price, and the 10 books thus pur-
chased form q small club circulating
library At the end of the season each
teacher keeps her own book or
trades" are arranged If tastes differ
sufficiently. For this season the books
have already been selected. All are
non-fiction, as the new novels circu-
late about boarding schools Of thci"
own momentum.
The first book selected was r. Z.
Lawrence's "RevOlt in the Desert
because one teacher felt that the life
of a sheik in the desert would be
pleasant mental variation from
daily life with 'jeunes files and that
stirring Arab fights and intrigues in
tho evening would alleviate the bore
dom of college preparatory drills in
the classroom. 1.-THE Next Age of
Man." by Albert Edward Wiggam,
was chosen by the biology teacher,
an enthusiast who enjoyed seeing her
own subject treated sensa tionally. \
Gevotce of biography and admirer of
British craftsmanship spent more than
her average allowance and bought Fl.
A. l.. Fishers James Bryce" The
teacher who had married sister liv-
ing in South Africa, whom she hoped
to visit as soon as her savings per-
mitted, purchased Trader Horn" the
life story of an old South African
peddler, told by himself and edited by
the novelist, Mrs. Ethelreda Lewis.
Richard Halliburton's 1.-THE Glorious
Adventure" was supplied by the Latin
teacher, with intent to take the whole
club on 81 vicarious Winter cruise in
the Mediterranean. Because she con-
sidered it desirable to make an effort
to keep informed on the main cur
rents of our national life" quoted
from an ADVERTISEMENT another mem
ber of tlsa club chose Men Of Des-
tiny" by Walter Lippman. Love Of
gossip, whether Of the twentieth cen
tury or of colonial days, prompted the
selection Of the new edition Of "San-
parallel of "Pepys' Diary" One who
loved artistic style, entirely apart
from the subject matter, added ID. II.
IIawrence's Mornings in Mexico"
The new edition of Edward Everett
Hale's "a New England Boyhood," a
picture of cultured family life in the
early nineteenth century, and Lewis
Brownies "This Believing World
popular survey of the worlds great
religions, completed the list.
X X X 4
Rivaling Llewellyn Powys' descrip-
tions of Africa and it's people is a
book by Sarah Gertrude Millin, "The
South Africans" Though not fiction,
it is as varied and interesting as the
authors South African novels, in
which, as in this book, her thorough
knowledge of the Dark Continent ap-
pears, The history of South Africa.
from the semi-mythical coloniZing
visits OF the Phoenicians to the period
Of Cecil Rhodes, Jan SmutS and the
Boer War; the geography of the four
provinces of the Union or Soutn
Africa, the Cape Colony. the Trans
vaal, Natal and the Orange Free
State; the archaeology of such places
as the Zimbabwe ruins; the various
races in the country, their religion,
education, trade and social customs,
and not least the remonace of rancn
and mine, coast and tableland, river,
mountain and jungle, all form part
of the book. The dark races In AFRICA
make an interesting study, and MRS
Milsin describes the descent from the
north Of the Kaffir tribes, Whlch
heIped the whites to extermlnate the
aboriginal Hottentots and busnmen.
The KafIirs today work in the mines
and as house servants.
X X X Il
The mysticism and idealism found
in the writings of TagOre and other
Indian writer's leave Katherine Mayo
cold and unbelieving, in the hght OF
her recent economic Investigations IN
India. which are described in ner
book, Mother India She quotes
from Tagore regarding the Hindu
ideal Of marriage: For the purpose
of marriage spontaneous love is un-
reliable: its proper cultivation should
Weld the best results ana tne
cultivation should begin before mar
riage. Therefore from their earliest
Years the husband as an idea IS held
up before our girls in verse and story
through ceremonial and worship.
When at length they get the nus
band. he is to them not person, but
a principle, like loyalty, patriotism or
such other distractions" To trans
late this philosophic ideal into the rule
of actual practice Katherine Mayo
further quotes from the "Purana,"
the Hindu Bible: There Is no other
god on earth for woman than her |
husband. Be her husband de- |
formed, aged, infirm, offensive in his
manner; let him aso be choleric, de- |
bauched, immoral. drunkard, gam
bier; let him frequent places OF Ill |
repute, live in open sin with other |
women, have no affection whatever
for his home; let him rave like luna |
tic; let him live without honor; let |
him be blind, deaf, dumb or crippled; |
in word, let his defects be what they |
NAV, let his wickedness be what it |
may, a wife should always look upon |
him as her god, should lavish on him |
all her attention and care, paying no |
heed whatsoever to his character and |
giving him no cause whatsoever for |
displeasure." The facts set forth in
Mother India" go to prove that this
teaching of the "Purana" is by no |
means a dead letter in India and |
Katherine Mayo cautions against "ac- |
cepting, at their face value to us, the |
expressions of Hindu speakers and |
writer's" like Tagore. She says: ''As |
to the theory of the matter. let that |
be what it may. AS to the actual |
practice of the times, material will be |
recalled from the previous pages Of |
this book bearing upon the likeness |
of the Hindu husband, as such, to |
loyalty patriotism or any imper- |
sonal abstraction"
X X *
The debt owed by Anatole France |
to a woman is told in '"The Last
Salon: Anatole France and His |
Muse" by Jeanne Maurice Pouquet, |
translated from the French by Lewis |
Galantiere. 1t was in 1883 that Ana
tole France first met Nine. Arman |
de Caillavet, who had in her home |
ON the Avenue Hoche established a