Evening star., 1937-11-20


from the archives of the Spanish,
French, Italian, German, Russian and
American governments have been ex-
amined for material
OF these, Senor Ferrara says in his
foreWard that no one except himself
| has Learned what is contained in the
documents in the American, French
and Italian archives" 1t will be un-
derstood from this that his work con-
talns hitherto unpublished revelations
What stands out is an attempt by
| Spain to revive in a new form the
Holy Alliance type of federation among
the European states, the aim of the
new group to be protection of mon
arches everywhere and presentation
of an unbroken front to the demo-
cratic governments of the world.
The book is enlivened with excellent
comment and written with telling di-
rectness. 1t should be interesting to
any one. 1t should be irresistible to
students of history.
A PEDLAR'S PACK BY Elizabeth
Goudge. New York: Coward
Mccain, Inc.
IN THIS volume of Is stories Miss
Goudge, author of "A City of
Bells" reveals once more her unique
talent for being saccharine with an air
of literary accomplishment Whether
it is that air, or whether it is the sac
charinity, Miss Goudge seems to
| please. She has the charm of the
nice" human being; it is so much
easier to accept her than it is to be
convincing about why you reject. Yet
the reviewer does find under her
smooth and gifted writing a much too
sweetish mentality.
The present collection of stories
seems to fall within these structures
Beyond that there is little to say of it
except, of course, that it contains
three selections which have as their
scene the Channel Islands, that it
wanders from English countryside to
quaint old London bookshops and that
its characters seem like stage people
enactng pastoral with somewhat
unsteady scenery. But let us cease, lest
We be unkind.
o, HENRY MEMORIAL AWARD
PRIZE STORIES OF 1897. Edited
by Harry Hansen. New York
Doubleday Doran & Co.
The stories in this years volume of
this series are not as long as they
| Tilu hapa in
Beyond that. the reviewer sees nothing
whatsoever to say about the selection
Collections of best" and prize
stories have always baftled her. There
are so ptifully few even good stories
published in our magazines that to
select volume Of definitely superior
ones is obviously practically impossible
Yet, every year, out comes these collec-
tlons-and not only do they claim that
the stories included in them are the
finest Of the year-they also attempt
to tell why. 1t never makes sense
In the present group the first prize
is given to Stephen Vincent Benet's
The Devil and Daniel Webster"
which the reviewer has already men
toned in these columns as a fine tale
Beyond that there is nothing to be
said of the collection. If. however
you are curious second prize was
awarded to ITO Those Who Wait" by
Flick Moll and third to THE Fury
by Robert M Coates.
ASPECTS OF SCIENCE. BY Tobias
Dantzig. New York: The Mac
milan Co.
HE former Kaiser was walking
with his sons in the imperial gar
dens at Potsdam one autumn night.
Father" asked one of the boys.
what are the stars?'
The stars, my SON. responded the
Emperor, are medals which We have
graclously bestowed upon the Almighty
for His great services to the Hohen-
zollern dynasty
This story related by DR.. Tobias
Dantzig. professor of mathematics at
the University of Maryland, in
ASPECTS of Science" is an admirable
statement of the theme of the book
He tells the story of mans intellectual
progress away from such a naive out
look on nature.
Kaiser Bills explanation of the
heavens was only relatively more ego
tistical than that of the whole world
a few years ago, 1t still is the attitude
Of the majority of mankind
Slowly and painfully the human
mind has moved away from the
anthropocentric outlook on creation
a progress attended step by step with
burnings, stonings and whatever other
tortures could be devised. Creation
has been a man with space and time
placed around him for his con-
venience-not space and time with
a man dropped into it.
Gallileo, Copernicus, Newton and a
host of others struck at the founda- =
tions of the naive concept 1t re-
malned for the mathema atlcianS of
the middle 10Th century to show the
way out of it. 1t remained for Elm
stein and his followers in the present
century to lead the mind through
the door Reimman and MinkoWski had
| pointed QUIT. R. H.
THE ENEMY WITHIN. BY Capt
Henry Landau. New York: G. P.
Putnam's Sons.
&TILL pending before the Mixed
Claims Commission are American
claims against the German govern
ment for damages in connection with
the $40, 900 900 explosion on Black Tom
Island, in New York Harbor, July 80
1916, and the $17,0O0000 fire in a
shell assembly plant near Kingsland
N. j.. on January II, 1917
1t is, of course, the American conten-
ton that these disasters were the work
of German saboteurs. The Landau
book is the story behind these two
most spectacular acts of sabotage
and, incidentally, behind many other
acts Of German spies and agents in
the United States before our entrance
into the World War.
In his book Capt. Landau, who was
NJ