Evening star., 1933-05-28

ford Rupert Brooke, DR.. Axel Munthe. Krupp
Of Essen and Joseph Conrad, but the larger
number Of those mentioned with capital letters
are little known and even the author sometimes
fails to recall much about them. The places
he writes about most lovingly are those around
the Mediterranean.
GIBBON, by c. M. Young. New York: D.
Appleton & Co.
THE brief biographies of famous men and
! women published by Appleton & Co. are
of great service to readers of biography-and
they are rapidly increasing in number-who
are not drawn to the large, exhaustive biogra-
phy perhaps in several volumes, and who want
authentic facts combined with gifts of style.
Some of the previous biographies in this series
are: "Voltare" by Andre Maurois; Julius
Caesar" by John Buchan Leonardo da Vinci'
by Clifford Bax; Mozart" by Sacheverell Sit
well; "Queen Elizabeth" by Mona Wilson;
Mark Twain by Stephen Leacock, and St.
Augustine" by Rebecca West. Other volumes
are to follow-many of them, we hope. sill
houette of the roly-poly figure of Gibbon forms
the frontispece of the present volume and
indicates the rather absurd and fussy per-
sonality which he is reputed to have had. In
spite of being ailing child and youth. he
absorbed education at Westminster and Oxford,
and at 16 with "the dignity and the self
satisfaction of martyr" announced his con-
version to the Church of Rome. At 18, study
ing In Switzerland he was reconverted to
Professionalism He wanted to marry Suzanne
Curchod, afterward Madame Necker, at Lau-
same, but his father objected and, after two
hours Of reflection, Gibbon yielded "Un-
luckily for her, Gbbon a born bachelor"
He also born eccentric and seemed slightly
ridiculous to all who knew him. Though his
personality was laughed at, his work has
dured. His first work. the Essay on the
Study of Literature" was written in forid
French when he was % and dedicated to
Suzanne. 1t did not destroy the general opin-
ion that he was dilettante. The first volume
of THE Decline and Fall of the Roman EN-
pire" was completed when he was &c. shortly
after he had become member OF Parliament
It ran through three editions Immediately and
Gibbon found himself we'll do. famous, popu-
lar The last lines of the last volume were
written in June, 1887, when Gibbon was so and
his health was already failing. The impair
tiaty and balance of the ideal modern his
torian are not to be found in the Decline"
and Mr.. Young says that Gibbons work would
have been greater If his sympatheS had been
more perfectly adjusted, if "hiS scepticism, SO
wakeful when the virtues of the saints are
alleged had not slumbered over the oft-repeated
tale Of Byzantine vices" Perhaps Carlyle's
dictum about him does him the most kindly
justice: "Gibbon is kind of bridge that con-
meets the antique with the modern ages. And
how gcrgeously does it swing across the gloomy
and tumultuous chasm of those barbarous CEN
turies."
PRINCE CHARLES. BY Compton Mackenzie.
New York: D. Appleton & Co.
COMPTON MACKENZIE, whose literary
~ reputation is based on his novels, especially
the serious representative phases of modern Eng
Ish life including Carnival" Sinister Street,
Sylvia Scarlet" and Sylvia and Michael"
and the delightful pastoral tale of legend,
fantasy and reality, Fairy Gold" has brought
to the writing of this biography of the Stuart
prince who might have been Charles III of
England, but not because of the Puritan
revolution, the same literary deftness and story
telling qualities which won him success a
novelist. None in that tragic line of royal
Stuarts not even the Queen of Scots herself,
has given to the stage of history so tragic a
figure Charles Edward Louis Philippe Caslmlr
Stuart who is known to the majority Prince
Charlie a childhood full of bright prom
Use, youth Of energy and daring, prime that
but for fortunes malice might have shown to
the world another Alexander, a maturity of
restless masquerade, an embittered middle age
fading slowly into disillusioned senescence-
such in brief is the tale of his life" Charles
Edward, known the Young Pretender, was
the son of the Old Pretender James Francis
Edward, who was the son of King James II of
England. During most of his life, as during
that of his father, Jacobite plots nourished
hopes of second Stuart restoration. From his
refuge the continent, he came forth in 1745
to lead an invasion of England, landed at Erska
in the Hebrides, entered Edinburgh and held
court at Holyrood. At the battle of Prestopans
he defeated the soldiers of George II and pro-
ceeded. southwark into England Prudence (of
his adherents) induced him to retreat and, after
another victory at Falkirk, he was overwhelm-
ingly defeated at Culoden, near Inverness, and
for months remained hidden in the fastness of
the Scotch Highlands, with price of $4,000
pounds his head. He finally escaped to
France but is supposed to have visited England
secretly on several occasions for the purpose
of conspiracy. He died in 1885, in the same
plaz0o in Rome where he had been born. This