Evening star., 1937-07-31


the reviewer will quote the sole in
cluded work OF that fine local artist,
John Lee Higgins. 1t is called Wild
Horses
Never again wild nag on the prairie
To court the little brown mare in
the grass.
No click OF small hooves bounding
from the sorrA
To rendezvous in sheltered noun
tain pass.
Never a mad, wild stallion in the
coulee
Marking its spoors upon the tor
tured turf,
Wheeling about with lusty neigh and
Whitney
Majestic and wild-eyed as plunging
surf.
mo cleaning teeth to touch the brown
mares launches,
Nibble its withers, nip its sharp
ened ears.
Brush its flanks and race it down the
canyons,
Sudden as hawks to stoop and sink
their spears.
20 you may find mares nest in a
fable,
A misty filly loping in wild grains,
A wide-winged stallion soaring in the
ether.
But never again a wild nag on the
plains"
ESCAPE TO THE PRESENT. By Jo-
hannes Steel New York Farrar
g. Rinehart.
SINGLE TO SPAIN. BY Keith Scott
Watson. New York: E. P. Dutton
g. Co.
THE troubled condition OF Europe
in the recent past and in the
instantaneous present is brought be-
fore readers this week in the two
books listed above Escape to the
Present is the story Of Germany since
the war by another unhappy ex-
patriate. Single to Spain" is the
story Of fighting in the Spanish civil
war by an Englishman who enlisted
Ito fight fascism' and served some
weeks in the famous International
Column. Both are sufficiently de-
pressing works
Escape to the Present" is in the
form OF an autobiography. The au-
thor belongs to the generation which,
when the World War broke out, was
too young to 60 to the front, but old
enough to- be given military training
and to listen thinkingly to the war
military caste old-school German,
patriotic, proud of the Fatherland. but
given to cultural and humanistic
thinking His mother was an English
woman, who. though her husband
fought steadily through the conflict,
WAS dutnully ostracized by her Ger
man neighbors.
When the father returned to his
home he told his young sons that the
German Army had not been beaten
in the field, but "trampled to pieces
by its own officers, who stole and
whored by its own generals, who were
incompetent and vain: by pack OF
poliacians, who were like vultures; by
bunch OF jackass diplomats, who
never told us in the beginning that
We were up against q world in arms"
And with that statement the old mans
energy seemed to die. He retired into
disillusioned musing and young Jo-
hannes was left to assume responsible |
ity for the family.
His story Is the story of youth faced
by an empty world, and 20 must be
taken as typical OF the case OF much
OF postwar Europe. To be sure, he
met the almost hopeless conditions
with exceptional energy and ingenuity
But the conditions were those that
faced thousands Of young men whose
gifts were only ordinary, and through
his struggles it is possible to visualize
world i'll bankruptcy, as far as ideals
or opportunities went.
Herr Steel first speculated on the
Black Bourse and managed to make
a small fortune there during the days
OF the imitation Of the currency. After
that he secured post as sort Of
economic spy for the Weimar Repub-
lie. His duties were to 60 into foreign
countries and discover what oppof-
tunities existed there for German in
duStry and-if that might be-clear
the way for German trade expansion
by any convenient means. bribery be-
ing the commonest one, apparently.
With the collapse Of the republic he
was offered post in the Hitler gov
ernment and the promise that, If he
obeyed orders he would be undersecre-
tary Of state within five years. He re-
fused. Within few days he was kid
naped by Storm Troopers carried to
a vacant house outside Berlin and
kept there nine days What fate was
being held for him he did not wait
to discover, for he saw chance to
escape and took It, He fed to England
and subsequently came to America,
where he found work as journalist
and lecturer II there is any hope
for the West, he says, 1t is in this
country. He has married an American
and taken out his first papers.
His story is solidly the story Of
oSI Oi lutO ilc
course Of the nation. rs he sees it. has
been accompanied by an utter loss Of
political honor, faith and idealism
But this, he adds, is substantially the
course Of all Europe. On the other
half Of the world, the future lies
toward the East. he declares The
nations Of Europe he writes, will be
rent aSunder and not borders but
concepts Of society. OF social order, will
constitute the boundaries of hostility
On the continent Of North America,
similar development is possible, but
not automatically necessary, and can
be prevented. This is so because the
economic premise here is fundamen-
tally different :" And he says that
in America class consciousness, as
it exists in Europe, is unknown. There
may be connection somewhere.
His is a sombre book and TO read it
is TO wonder at the course Of history.