Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-09-10

| A book with a pink cover, coming
| in the mails, reminded us that Charles
/ Boni's Paper Books had completed
| their first year.
! designed and carefully made, within
| the reach of any reader" these paper
| backed volumes have indeed accom-
| plished what their editors intended.
| General readers who did not sub
| scribe may now purchase these books
at book stores, and we do not know
| where one may get greater value Tor
| so cents.
The dozen volumes which are upon
| our home shelves are: 1.-THE Golden
Wind" by Takashi Ohta and Margaret
| Sperry: Frederick the Great" by Mar
garet Goldsmith; "Dewer Rides" by
L. A. G.. Strong; Prosperity: Fact or
| Myth" by Stuart Chase; Commando,
by Deneys Reitz; MY "reminiscences
as a Cowboy" by Frank Harris; The
Master of the Day of Judgment BY
an anthology; THE Return OF the
Hero" by Darrell Figgis; BY the
Waters of Manhattan" by Charles
Reznikoff; "All in the Racket" by
William E. Weeks, and Margaret
Fuller" by Margaret Bell.
There you have IL books of which
no publisher need be ashamed; the
fact that they have paper covers de-
signed by Rockwell Kent endearS them
to many. The covers are, in fact, card
| board, heavy enough to be durable.
With ordinarily careful handing they
are as serviceable as cloth. The only
| fault which the critical might find with
them is that in the longer books the
pauer inclines to be thin, the type
small and the margins too narrow.
X \
In our opinion the prize Poems"
issued in April, Is the most dis
tinguished book of the list. One mas
to be genuinely fond of poetry however,
to annreciate it. it is so filled with a
mixture of poems in both the older and
the modern forms. All of it had been
printed before, but the collection OF
so much fine verse in so compact a
form was a service to the American
poetry lover. Our two favorites in the
book are 1.-THE Chinese Nightingale,
and "The Ballade of the Lost House.
These are poems in the older manner,
with terminal rhymes, although cast IN
a rough meter. as far as line length
is concerned.
FREDERICK the Great" Miss Gold
smiths biography, was olsappoint-
ment to this reader, although no less
an authority than Harry Hansen OF tne
New York World says he liked 1t very
much. To us it was incomplete, in that
too much space was given to the youth
off the subject and far too little to his
mature wears. the years which made
him "the Great" The effect this biog-
raphy had upon us was that the author
had grown tired either of her subject
or of the physical task of writing, and
had suddenly brought her story TO a
halt
"Dewer Rides" by L. A. G.. Strong,
is a novel which was published several
wears ago in England, but never before
put out in this country. 1t deals with
the English countryside, the evil spirit
of which is called Denver" In charac-
terization this book Is especially salts
factory. 1t has something of the Hardy
ring to it and does not suffer, by COM
parison, with the magniflcence OF the
Mayor of Casterbridge.' This Is book
which is long enough, In sheer writing
bulk. to give the reader sense of the
passage of time and the growth OF
lives in 1T.
"Commando," by Deneys Reitz, Is a
personal history Of participant IN the
Boer War. The introduction Is by Jan
SHUTS. Each book in this series, by the
way. has its introduction. Some readers
have a great dislike for introductions,
especially those which attempt TO tell
the reader how good the work Is. Sucn
readers feel that volume ought TO De
permitted to stand on its own merits
The writer here has no such grudge
against introductions All that he asks
of them is that they refrain from but
tering' the author With words OF fatu-