Evening star., 1929-12-01

Sunday the general outlook the famil-
lar modes of speech-you know them
all. But hardly ever have you had
them presented you In a body and
through the keen understanding and
clear sympathy Of an Anne Parrish.
Every minute bubbles with laughter;
once in a while the laughter Is bit
wry-but In the main it Is good and
hearty and conducive to q truer. under
reader himself really Is, or herself
There Is, 1t seems to me, but a single
flaw in this clearly competent and in
teresting novel. Anne Parrish has mis-
handled the "faun." dreamy lad,
impractical and often impossible, loving
to steal away by himself, as true
faun would, and only in solitude really
being himself. A rather pathetic lad
upon the whole, clear misfit In the
ordinary run of the village life. Had he
lived otherwhere he would have been
a poet, perhaps or a painter. At any
rate he calls for a deeply sympathetic
understanding-and he does not get
this. Anne Parrish Is too taken up With
the fact that this particular boy pro-
vided her with an irresistible opportunity
to play of her own wit, her own sense
Of fun, her own widely recognized power
to please the company. And so, hav-
ing made the boy perfectly right in his
future role of "faun," she appears to
have been led of into the rather ma
ternal tendency to spoil her offspring
by an indulgence of herself. And 80.
almost fatality ensues. The "faun" Is
made-not quite but almost-the goat"
instead: Too badl For 1t was a lovely
chance!
DREANIERS OF EMPIRE. BY Achmed
Abdullah and T. Compton Paken-
ham. New York: Frederick A. Stokes
Co.
Adventure, romance and historic
truth combine here, in the hands of
that dramatic Story-teller, Achmed Alb
dullah and his collaboration, Mr.. Paken-
ham, to give several hours of absolute
enjoyment, The reading over, you will
fall into the child's game of choosing
the best one-the best to you Is it the
story Of Cecil Rhodes that you delight
most in? Or. is IL the strange ad-
ventures of that man who was stranger
than any OF his eXperienceS-Sir Rich
ard Burton, who dreamed in II Lam
guages?" Or Is 1t another who spreads
marvellous life out here for the en-
thrallment of the less daring, the less
active in their dreamings? Gen Walk
er, nearer home, no farther away than
and thrill you law-abiding citizen that
you are. And here are other sorts of
adventurers-Charles George Gordon,
pursuing dream of Christianity as he
adventured in China and the Sudan;
Lawrence, who spread before his life
as its guide and rule a vision Of JUS
tice for the world itself And here are
others, and others-yet, after all. it
Is much in the way OF the telling that
a story lives or falls away into un-
interest and forgetting. When it comes
to that particular point, there are
hosts OF readers who will eagerly agree
with me that when it come to round
ing adventure into fullneSS of daring,
into shifts of quick hazard, into the
glamour OF romance, into a portrayal
OF mere man as quite super being
now and then, why. at such 1unctures.
1t Is Achmed Abdullah who can do ali
this much better than-well, any one
else who, just at the moment,
comes to mind. Did choose my ia
vorite story here? ! did. Cecil Rhodes
Is mt to be any ones hero, any ones
man of men. A finely inspirationaI
romance, this one of Cecil Rhodes
ife-and death. And all the others are
nne. both in subject and In a beau
tifully understanding and dramatic
projection. ''@r - '5''s