Page 7 Advertisements Column 4

Press, Volume LIII, Issue 9522, 15 September 1896, Page 7

BUSINESS NOTICiSS. THE "WEEKLY PRESS." i NEW SERIAL STORY. yN THIS WEEK'S ISSUE OF THE "WEEKLY PRESS" COMMENCES THE PUBLICATION OF A NEW SERIAL STORY, BY lAN MACLAREN, THE MOST POPULAR NOVELIST OF THE DAY. "KATE CARNEGIE," BY lAN MACLAREN, Author of " Beside the Bonnie Briar Bush" and " The Days of Auld Lang Syne." Readers of the other works of this most popular of modern authors will be delighted to be afforded another chance of following the fortunes of the residents of that famous village, Drumtochty, which has attained as wide a celebrity as the ■■ Thrums " of .T. M. Barrie. Lan Ma-Lahex's previous stories have had an extraordinary and almost unprecedented sale throughout the English-' speaking world. More than 70,000 copies of " Beside the Bonnie Briar Bush," and 60,000 copies of ••The Days of Auld Lang .Syne " have been sold, , and so great was his popularity by the time the latter book was published, that his publishers cheerfully allowed him a royalty of 2s per copy, so that he has already received £6000, and the book is stiil selling. This is not to be wondered at, when the nature of the stories themselves is considered. They so impress the reader with their absolute truthfulness, that one could be sure, if he did not know, that the author was a child of the village he depicts, and that as a loyal Scot he has the deepest love for his country and her people. And yet they are so written that they appeal as strongly to those born South of the Tweed as to the author's countrymen, of which their immense circulation in England is ample proof. sSpeaking of his previous works the London "Spectator" says :—"As an artist in Scotch character, of the sort that is found in country villages, Mr Maclaren has no superior among his contemporaries, ambitious and able, as several of these are." The "Athenaeum," referring to lan Maclarkn's "The Days of Auld Lang Syne," says :—"Mr Maclaren has done a good piece of work. There is a depth and force as well as tenderness in the writer's appreciation of country life in his native land." Another journal remarks :—" lan Maclaren's stories are as fine an interpretation as we have yet had of tlie real inner spirit and life of rural Scotland. . . . His pictures are marvels of idealistic charm— their charm is their truth. The author knows the people as only a Minister or a Doctor can: he looks with a keen eye, tempered with kindliness and humour; he uses the tongue of the people as one to whom it is native—he plays with it, and it becomes picturesque, delicate, pathetic, pregnant in his hands."

Lan Maclaren's hand has not lost its cunning since he wrote the books referred to by these critics. All the charm of his previous work will be found in "KATE CARNEGIE," which, indeed, we venture to assert, contains some character sketches unrivalled for beauty in his whole gallery. The character of Kate Carnegie herself, the daughter of the old Indian General, and the descendant of an ancient Highland family, with her wilful beauty, her pride of race, and her womanly tenderness, is one of the finest portraits Mr Maclarkn has yet drawn. The young minister, Carmichael, is another example of the author's power of character drawing. The finest piece of work of this style, however, to be found in "KATE CARNEGIE" is the magnificent old minister, Dr. Davidson, in whom lan Maclaren has given us a character simple, strong and touching, which is worthy to live with the great characters of fiction. Along with these are a host of inimitable subordinate cliaracters, with some of whom, such as Hillocks, Drumsheugh, Dr. Maclure, Mrs McFadyen, the "sermon taster," John, the " minister's man," and others, lan Maclaren's readers are already well acquainted. THE FIRST INSTALMENT, A Liberal One, APPEARS THIS WEEK, "KATE CARNEGIE," BY lAN MACLAREN, Author of " Beside the Bonnie Briar Bush " and " The Days of Anld Lang Syne," IS NOW BEGUN IN THE " WEEKLY PRESS."