Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-02-17
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL.

! the chorus would in a musical comedy.
The reader almost hears them singing.
X X X
Jane, however, does not bother her
pretty, although slightly untidy, head
a bit about these things. She comes
through these pages as a real girl, con-
vincing, natural. She is "potty," as she
calls it, on her Mr.. Bryan, and that is
all there is to it.
When she sits for her artist friend in
the nude she is as virginia. and pure as
she Is later in the hotel room in which
she waits for him in vain
George, as we have Indicated, is g.
rather decent chap, and has no inten-
ton whatever of getting himself mixed
up too closely with "the pathetic little
thing" as he calls Jane
The reader will not look upon Jane in
quite so pathetic light. The fact that
George did (and the author did IS
another indication of the somewhat
artificial character of the molding OF
this novel.
But Jane energies from it as real,
because she does not look upon life
from a theoretical standpoint, but from
the very solid, although sometimes
sordid one of tea and toast and dishes
to be washed and floors to be scrubbed.
She knows. as we all know when we
are honest, that no matter how grand
and fine the hotel it must have a back
entrance where the garbage and ashes
are carried out at last.
She knows, in the end, that dreams
are one thing and life another, and that
seldom the two shall meet. Her search
for Loves Bliss, as she calls 1t, cap
italized title she got from "the pic
tures,'' is very human, very real, and
altogether convincing.
The thoughts of Jane and her sister
upon this and related subjects will be
discovered by many reader to be their
own naive musings upon such matters,
here for the first time put down in
black and white. Every one will have
to read 1.-THE Water Gipsies" for him
are originals, but we believe he Will
agree with us that they are.
X X X X
Jane knew hundreds Of movie titles
and subtitles by heart, could sail a
small boat like a veteran, could wash up
dishes with the best of them and walk
out spooning with the worst.
All the time, however, she was a
clean minded little thing who knew what
she wanted and couldn't get it. She
took at last what she could get. She is
scarcely dramatic, even when she
pushes her husband off the boat.
1t is her very matter-of-factness
which makes her real, one with all of
us. No one can say what he will do in
a given situation. Some persons, faced
with fire, begin to scream like wild ami
| mails and afterward have no recollection
whatever Of having done such thing.
Others react to bad news by jumping
| up and down in one place, but later
! have no memory of 1t. Approached by
| a fast-moving motor car or onrushing,
clumsy street car, one man will begin to
swear violently and in loud tones, the
while leaping for his life.
Jane is never quite sure OF what she
will do or say, but one thing she is sure
of-that is, she is "potty" about Mr..
Bryan, and no doubt about it. The
reader, and the author, and finally
Jane, realize that "class" is 'class"
and that Mr.. Bryan did right after all
in continuing down the hotel corridor.
This book has no illustrations of
Jane, and it needs none, for she is
here to the life, and just as natural.
No. not twice, just the same, the real
thing There is here, too, much Eng
lish life that Dickens never knew. Some
of it he could not know-horse and
greyhound racing, and barges and skit-
ties, motion picture houses and modern
eating palaces. They are excellently, if
somewhat artificially presented, but be-
hind them ALL and far higher, stands
Jane Bell, servant girl and human
being.