Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-03-28
THE LIBRARY TABLE
BY shs Booklovsr


The aspiration of 9 parent to give
his children better education than ne
has himself enjoyed is usually consid-
cred praiseworthy and far-sighted, but
shere may be many modifying consid-
erations, such as the quality OF the
offspring and the common sense Of the
parent. Such considerations as these
are illustrated in the family novel Of
Gustaf Hellstrom, "LAcemaker Lekholm
Has an Idea" The Swedish lacemaker
Pehr Anders Lekholm, veteran hero OF
the Slesvig War. lives and carries ON
his trade in his native town. He was
the fourth Of the line. for father and
son had piled their craft in the town.
1t was, in its way, an aristocratic craft.
tnasmuch as in his time there were not
more than "a lacemakers in the whole
kingdom. Neither Pehr Lekholm
nor his father was dependent on
casual orders for his earnings, like most
of the other lacemakers in the kingdom
lace and fringes for drawing-room sofas.
plush chairs and collins. All that had
to be done was to go up to the regi-
mental office once q year, bow to the
quartermaster and submit q sealed en-
velope containing q tender, neatly writ
ten out by the copyist at the court. Of
justice, for the delivery of lace and
braid for uniforms to his majesty the
King and his government. It was,
strictly speaking, a matter of form.
Pehr Anders Lekholn, like his father,
grandfather and great-grandfather, was
the only lacemaker in the town."
4 ~
Unfortunately, Pehr Anders Lekholm
is not very happily married and his
unhappy marriage is the cause of his
great educational idea. His wife was
Augusta Charlotte TOPPER, daughter of
q German assistant surgeon in the
army, and herself a musician of some
excellence. She feels herself conde-
scending in marrying the lacemaker.
and only his buoyant self-esteem pre-
vents him from discerning her attt-
tude for some time after the marriage.
The awakening Is rude when he dis
covers that the townspeOple gossip
about Fru Augustus wearing the
trousers" To assert his masculine SUI
periority he comes home drunk from
meetings of his craftSmens asSocia-
ton and flies into RACES at every provo
cation. in order to intimidate his wife.
But all this seems inadequate. Then
he has his great idea. His brother,
to be ready to leave and to become
an apprentice in some trade. He talks
to the schoolnaster and determines to
send oscar to the university and make
Of him student, minister. "A
Lekholm with university degree. That
was something quite new in the his
tory of that family of craftsmen, a
thing he himself had never dreamed
of for all his power Of imagination.
His only brother at university What
luster would he not cast upon the
family name! His brother, o.
car, q clergymanl" So the fiery little
man Eliminates and dreams and before
he has finished he sees himself as the
founder Of an educated line of LEX
holms. His children shall be edu-
Gated; he has two at the time, but his
imagination pictures q goodly number
of educated sons. The time will come
when he shall walk the streets Of his
native town fianked by sons who are
not lacemakers, but clergymen, judges,
university scholars, surgeons. Mean
while he win put his wife in her place
and show her what the LekhoIms are
or what they are to become. SO he
goes home and shouts so loudly at his
wife, IT am not the fool you think
am" that he awakens the two of his
prospective learned children who are at
that time born.
The temperamental instability Of
Pehr Anders Lekholm Is accompanied
by incurable optimism. He sees large
and not very far ahead, so he Is an
easy victim Of his idle, disSipated
brother, Oscar, who has none Of the
qualities for scholarship. Thus 1t hap
pens that when the sons Of the lace
maker are grown there is no money left
for their much talked-of education and
they are obliged to make what entry
they can into the working world. Their
careers are not uniformly distinguished
and their mother, the embittered old
Fru Augusta, attributes their lack Of
success to their inheritance of foolish
optimism from their father and musical
ability from her-a bad combination,
she considers it. Only one son, Carl,
the mathematician. as he is called, car
ries on his fathers idea Of an educated
family. Thwarted In his desire for q
university education and knowing his
mathematical ability, he is obliged to
enlist IN the artillery, where he never
rises to be more than a sergeant-najor.
So he sets for himself the goal of edu-
eating al his four sons. He says to
them as they approach the university
age: I'VE decided to sacrifice the pleas
ure Of our lives to your future. We give
up great deal for 1t. And we have to.
1t isn't easy to bring you up as your
mother and I agreed that we should on
a sergeant-mator's pay. We both have
to work from morning to night to earn
extra money. And so you must do your
duty as WE'LL Do you understand" In
this generation the father is steady, de-
termined and self-sacrificing, but quail
ity is lacking In the sons so the LEX
holm family remains without the dis
tinction of higher education.
Stevenson lovers reading the frag-
ment of 'Weir Of Hermiston" are filed
with a regret which Is almost pain that
what would probably have been Steven
sons most mature and best work was
cut short by the sudden death at vail
ina. To lesser degree one must re-
greet that Retrospect" by Arthur
James Earl of Balfour, never came to
completion as an autobiography. Its
"reminiscences are so rich and its style
so finished that 1t might have been
great biography. Lord Balfour's life IS
treated by himself with gently ironical
analysis, without undue egotism. His
memories of his boyhood are especially
interesting. He says of his mothers in
nuence: She never surrendered her
own convictions as to the inestimable
value of her central religious beliefs.
This point of view, If rightly repre-
sent it, may have lacked theoretic I'm
ish, but it appealed to me in 1866, and
after more than so years reflection 1t
appeals to me still"
II
For the 10 or IL years of the Great
War period / was in q position to fol-
low with the fullest knowledge avail
able the march Of supreme events, ("
writes Winston Churchill in the preface
to the new one-volume edition of his his
tory Of the World War, entitled 1.-THE
World Crisis" ~ rest myself with con-
fidence upon the facts, figures and con-
illusions which these pages set forth, !"
he continues. 1.-THE individual volumes
comprising the present edition have
been reprinted in at least seven Ian