Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-07-12

dawdlins tribe Just looking of at nothing for
days on end, and only smudge Of paint to
show for idleneSS SO wanton, even sinful.
However, we are not interested in Michel's
old SINS In his story Of the old days instead.
Michel ate and drank and slept and breathed
the airs and every mood of Cape Cod. He
knew its slightest change Of face He knew
all about its daily commerce with the Atlantic,
now raging now surging in . tidal monotone,
now lying wide and open to its dalliance, with
the vast cloudland above it. He knew the peo-
Pile, too, the hsherfok, the deep seamen, the
women, the boys and the girls. 1t Is Of all
these that Michel tells US, sitting beside him in
the standardized mill tower
He grows friendly and near. So the love story
gradually sits through the more prosaic re-
memberings. Tragic, unhappy that story 1t
fares across the to Brittany, fits to Paris.
Always an incompleted story, one of unfulfl-
ment.
Glad to elude its heartache its betrayal in
actuality-for this is a long-ago love story
one Is more than satisfied just to be remem-
bering along with Michel things that have lost
their deepest poignancy. their bitterest thrust.
Richly tranquil, happily reminiscent, Michel
goes over the whole of his life and that OF the
people around him. Now If he had been the
good seaman that clearly, he should have been
we could not have had this soul-and-body
legend Of that uniquely audacious adventurer
into the sea, Cape Cod. Luckily, as 1t turns
out Michel was an idler. Something OF q fall
artist and by virtue Of this lapse Of good New
England intent readers bound to gain
many happy hour in Cape Cod, In its facts
and traditions and effects.
fine story. Mary e. Waller is well worth
waiting for.
CALL HER SAVAGE. BY Tiffany Thayer, au-
thor Of Thirteen Men" Illustrated by
Lloyd Coe. New York: Claude Kendall.
A BIG story. brutal story. A true story.
Big by virtue of it scope in human nature.
Brutal because human nature is at bottom
just that. True-well. true because Of the
two preceding essentials
It begins with the covered wagon. With a
company crossing the plains to make a new
settlement. Men, women, children, horses, cat
tie, food, seed for new fields graphic pic
ture as real as the fact itself could be to any
onlooker. An Indian attack-not entirely de-
Structive but of q nature to reshape the course
Of the emigrants. Finally a settlement and in
the course Of time sort of neighboring with
nearby tribes. This, an essential point, since
here came the impregnation of savagery that
Is made to account for many things in the
career Of the young woman who serves, finally,
to carry the matter forward into the present,
where judgment must be passed upon her.
The earlier parts Of Mr.. Thayer's novel give
o picture Of the new West. OF business sue
cess to the family under consideration. A
typical account Of what happened over and
over again to capable and courageous pioneers.
and wealth. Here is the background for the
young woman, granddaughter Of old Silas cap
tain OF the caravan. Daughter Of his girl and
her husband? No, not quite that. Instead,
the fruitage Of q moonlight madness with the
young and beautiful brave, down by the river
side. So Nasa, the true heroine Of the story,
Is, IN fact, half savage. Peter, fine business
man and lax lover, never dreams that NaSa
Is not his girl-damn her! So, money and the
city and dress and men, Europe and America,
FaWy mn
take common hand with Nasa, the young half
Indian
To be sure, you are going to condemn her.
That's what we are for, we Of the good old
Puritan stripe. And you are going to slash
right out against Tiffany Thayer for letting
such . girl get into his book But, what would
YOU? Here she is, literally half-breed, 30
circumStanced as to have a recognized place
right in our midst-our midst mind you. For
. long time We hardly notice her, since all the
young folks are clearly mad, and living up 30
the part. But soon IS manifest a deep sim
certify Of lawlessness about this girl that is
rather terrifying.
perfect sequence of inheritance here Nasa
is not only half Indian but a quarter Of her,
at least is imperious old Silas her grand
father leading his caravan into the West, put
ting the fear of himself into his followers, into
bands Of prowling Indians besides. A heavy
endowment for NaSa, but not in the least an
unlikely one. An overhead program laid out
for the girl that, in any other day than this ope
OF 1881, would be counted as preposterous and
unthinkable.
It seems to me that Tiffany Thayer has gone
a long way back for his running start into the
manifest fact that Nasa-od Silas and Indian
father as her strict accounting-is not so ire
mendously different from many q girl Of the
moment who can lay claim to such savagery
only as rests at the bottom of human nature st
self. Better look into 1t before jumping Tff-
fanny Thayer. The young man may be serious
Of intent, admonitory Of mission, as he Is Ger
tainly Of q constructive talent, Of an illluni-
mating genius in the nortraval Of n single mo.