Evening star., 1936-01-08
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
Margaret Cermond.
IN QUEST OF LOST WORLDS. BY
Count Byron de Prorok. New York:
E. p Dutton & Co.

Count Byron de Prorok. New York:
E. p. Dutton & Co.
"It is the dead who have tale to tell"
reads the opening sentence Of Count de
PrOrok'S story Of the adventures and
experiences accumulated during fifteen
years of exploration in the lost worlds
wherein centuries ago remarkable CIV
ilizations thrived and exerted powerful
influences upon the cultural, religious
and political life of races whose history
is now being dimly traced by scientific
research through the oblivion of buried
centuries.
Count de Prorok had been doing arch
Biological work at Carthage for long
time when the desire to separate himself
from the limitations and restrictions Of
endowed institutional research resulted
from conversation with Stephane Gsell
of the Institut de France. Wise in the
ways of intrigue and preferment growing
out of official jealolsies and ambitions,
he followed his informal suggestion that
there were many things to be found in
lands where explorers and scientists were
unknown by saying: There's Antinea-
Tin Hinan. for example" 'Tin Hinan"
meant nothing to Count Prorok, but the
strange. musical int0nation Of its pro-
nounciation became Immediately fasci-
mating. Whether the singing name be-
longed to a man, woman or place,
he did not know, but upon learning that
Tin Hinan was the legendary queen and
the great-grandmother of all the Tuaregs,
and that she was perhaps buried some
where in the Hoggar, no further urging
was needed. An expedition Of less than
dozen men was organized and into the
oI. IyAonax. 4 ,atv faI fHn
burial place of the ancient queen and
tracing also the old caravan routes Of
the PhoenicianS and earlier peoples across
the desert.
Thus began the career Of Count de
Prorok as an independent adventurer
into other lost worlds and among the
mystic tribes of Tripoli. Egypt. Mexico
and Ethiopia. There are stories of en-
counters with hostile tribes; of jungle
fires, storms and the ever present peril
from beasts, snakes and savages: deScrip-
tions of the mystic ritual ceremonies of
barbarism; experiences along the trail of
Alexander the Great and also the Poison
Trail in Central America; tales of visits
to the tombS of ancient kings and queens;
of the discovery of a race of blood drink
erS and another of clay eaters. The
account Of the journey to the Temple of
Jupiter Ammon is especially fascinating,
as are also the visits to the Summer home
of Cleopatra and to the great slave mar
ket at Chat
Dead civilizations, dead rulers, dead
kingdoms tell their tales through research
and excavation, through degenerate liv-
ing races and through the mystifying
rituals of cults that have survived the
burial of their origin in the dim ages
before history began. The book is an
impressive combination of exploration
and adventure, giving a great store of
knowledge for the further enlightenment
Of the outside world and sustaining a
compelling interest to the last word 1t
Is generously illustrated with photographs
and each of its four sections is prefaced
by line map of the area explored.
THE MYSTERY OF THE SMOKING
GUN. BY Carroll John Daily. New
York: Frederick A. Stokes Co.
BY some inexplicable perversion of taste
that savors strongly of Objectionable
forms OF high-preSSure SalesmanShip the
writer's of titles for books and plays seem
to have agreed that in some instances the
proper course OF procedure is to give the
subject name that bears no relation
ship to its theme. Not one, but many
smoking guns figure in this tale of crime,
leaving victims of their yellow blue flames
scattered around New York City, and if
there is mystery in the story, then the
mystery is to find the mystery.
Racketeers are making a farce of law
and order in the big town, and Johnny
Zitto is climbing rapidly toward the title
OF czar of the underworld. JohnnyS
activities are we'll known and his hench-
men and stools are all familiar to the
officials, by sight, by acquaintance and
by their bad records. Yet every effort
for months to trap any one of them with
sufficient evidence for conviction has
failed. Zitto is rich, and what money
| cannot buy shot in the back from a
Sinking gunman will accomplish. Rack
eteering is thriving and gangsters are
multiplying.
Satan Hall, working independently and
directly for the commissioner of police,
| is assigned to get the goods on Zitto
and his accomplices. Captain Harring-
tons precinct is bad one. He has done
his best, but Zittos money or bullets
have frustrated him at every turn. He
Goes not resent the coming of Satan
Hall, but he fears for the life of that
steely, green-eyed terror of the gangster
whose aim is quick and sure, but whose
| notable strength is in eyes and in hands
that slap the faces of the toughest and
heaviest OF men and send them Sprawling
ignominiously upon the floor.
Chet Barloff and his brother rule the
| precinct, but ZittO rules the city. Matte
Hern, an attractive girl born and bred in
the criminal world. is the pawn in the
| game that Satan plays for the salvation
| Of the millions Of citizens who live under
the growing terror Of gangdom. He could
| love Matte If she would desert her world
| and enter his, but Matte believes i'm
| plicitly that her kind of crime is righteous
| and justifiable. So the war is on, Satan
| against the racketeers for New York and
Matte, and the whole of gangdom against
Satan.
Young Barlof is the first victim of a
| smoking gun. His brother meets a like
fate early in the game. Others follow
as Satan's work progresses and zittos
| plans 60 awry. Gunmen instructed to
| lead Satan into quiet places and finish
him off are found dead while Satan sits
| talking in Zitto's bar or Office. Men
| lured into traps for double le-croSSing Zitto
or rafting out" on him escape, while
one by one his ieutenants meet violent
| death. Rival gangs become involved and
| shooting becomes general.
Satan's methods are direct He knows the
criminals and he knows who thenumerous
| murderers are His job is to get them,