NEW BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 12825, 8 June 1907, Page 7

NEW BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS.

"He was a marked man from th© first." This, we may remark parenthetically, is nothinj u*_au_l wi__ Mr Silas Hocking's h«roes. In "Ths Silent Man," his latest work, the hero, Marcus Grant, presents himself as an applicant for work at Starfill Cutting. His corduroy trousers were tucked up by moans of leather straps below the kne-s. "after th© manner affected by working men," his tweed jacket was much worn and ill-fitting; hia doth cap

was faded and weather-stained ; his hobniiled boots had seen better days. Ho spoke after the fashion of working men when be spoke at all, which was not oftener than necessary—and he was ready to take any kind of work. Once or twice, however, when taken unawercs, he spoke with the cultured accent of an educated Englishman. It is not until the end of the book that the reader ia let into the mystery. Marcus Grant is in reality Rupert Temple, son of Sir Charles Temple. He had been an officer in th© army with apparently a brilliant career before him, and waa sent out to take part in the operations in South Africa. There ho came to the conclusion that it was an unrighteous war, and conceived it hi* duty to resign his commission. His father thought h© was a coward, and refused to hove anything to do with him ; his lady love renounced him for the 6ams reason. Of course, in his new life he shows on many occasions that ho is no coward, he rescues his former fiancee from a burning hotel, and finally dies in an attempt to bring up some entombed miners from the underground workings in which an explosion has taken place. In fact, he behaves like one of Mr Hocking's' typical, improbable heroes, and the story is told with tho authors, accustomed briskness and skill. (London: F. Warno and Co. Christchurch: Fountain Barber. 3a 6d and 2a 6d).

In 'John Glynn: A Story of Social Work." by Arthur Paterson, we have a deeply interesting novel with a magnificent hero. John Glynn is a splendid teilow, six feet two inches in height, with s massive chest and shoulders, and limbs of exceptional power. "Though ho weighed fourteen stone, his step was light as a girl's, and ho could jump nearly his own height." He has made a competence in America, and he comes homo to London te engago iv social work in the slums. Ho joins tho 5.1.C.P.. the Society for the Improvement of the Poor, and commences operations in "The Nil©,*' then the training ground of the worst thioves in London. He had more than one method of winning their respect. How could the prizefighter, Tom Symes, for example, withstand him, when in a contest with the gloves, ho just knocks him out and then gracefully retires, remarking, "You are too good for mc, Tom," and so saves th© latter from being disgraced in the eves of his "pals." With all the sympathy of a woman, John Glynn is sensible enough to know that tho only way to help these "submerged" people effectively is to brace them up to struggle for themselves. Ho had a groat battle with a grasping, unscrupulous slum-landlord, the villain of the book, and thero is, of course, a lovclnterest to shed a glamour over the often sordid scenes. Altogether it is a fine, stirring book, with a good tone and a good moral. (London: Macmillan and Co., Limited. 2s 6d)

In "Doctor Gordon" Miss Mary E. Wilkins .hes strayed from her usual quiet paths of domestic life in New England into tho realm of sensation. We rather regret the change, because there are plenty of modern writers who can give us sensational stories, but few, if any, can approach her delicate portraiture of character and manners. Tli© plot is a little far-fetched. W© have a doctor in a New England town with an,invalid "sister," a pretty niece, and a good-looking assistant. It turns out that the "sister" is really the doctor's wife, who is dying of a painful disease, and th© reason for th© concealment seems hardly adequate te the ordinary reader. The crisis of the story 'comes when the doctor, unablo to bear his dying wife's agony any longer, urges his assistant te give her an overdose of an opiate. Th© assistant is unable to bring himself to do tho deed, and the doctor himself rushes in and administers th© drug. The patient dies, and thereafter ensues frightful remorse and misery on th© part of th© chief actors concerned. Tho pall is lifted only when the nurse confesses that sho had saved Dr. Gordon from putting an end to his wife's pain by herself anticipating tho deed. Tha nurse, in fact, had administered the narcotic, and apparently gloried in her work; what tho doctor had given te th© patient was too much diluted to do any harm. Th© book is a powerful argument against th© practice of "euthanasia." (London: T. Fisher Unwin, Adelphi Terrace. 2s 6d)

Australia in other days suggested to Henry Kingsley such good stuff as "Geoffrey Hamlyn," and "The Hillyars and the Burtons." The Australia cf the present is not, w© trust, te b« hold responsible for the disagreeable stuff in a volume called "Human Toll,'* by the author of "Bush Studies," Barbara Baynton. Her book seems, in fact, a pu:>ely artificial product. Ono imagin?a it manufactured something on th© principle of the pantomime writer, who. having set out what he wants to say in plain English, proceeds to change cvsry verb into its slang equivalent, and wrest every possible rhyme into a pun. Though Mrs Baynton disdains any idea of being funny, her effort is merely te change simple expressions into something strained and unnatural, and te sprinkle her pages with epithets sufficiently aggressive or profane. Even tho fact that the blacksmith shnt up on Sunday must b© thus painfully revealed: "No schoolboys lingered round Boh Robertson's (vclopt Robenson's" blacksmith's shop, ior this sleepy day no Insty throat Dellowed attention to the flaming tongues fanned from *ts blrodily blazing teeth." A dying man's last breath is described as "a chok>n_ squeal," that "sighed in a thwarted throttle," and "rose again suoeersivelv in a seething gurgle that forced hh mouth apart." In every detail of tho st-crry, "Human Toll" betrays a very bad case of the illusion that n*dy work must neoysarily be rtrong. To introduce only repulsive characters, to insist upon the'grimy and sordid element in human relation, te deny pjrace to childhood, and make even death vulgar—by such means tb© novelist hopes to disgui _■ her true lack of power in transcribing tbe actual Australian life. That this hysteric pen should have been accepted by reviewers afn/r as giving any accurate picture of town-ship ways, is distinctly unlucky for Au.ra--li.v We are not surprised that in the Commonwealth some good criti . have condemned the book, not only ns bad literature, but as a base libel noon the simple, cleanly bush. (London: Duckworth's Colonial Library. Christchurch, Whitcombo and Tombs, 2s 6d.) The following sixnenny editions -ire te hand from Mr Fountain Barber:— "Sir Rocers Heir." by F. Frankfort Moore (London: Hodder and Sto--crh-ton); "Fanny Lambert," by H. de Vere Stacpoole (London : T. Fisher Unwind; "Jan Vedders Wife," by Amelia E. Rarr (London: James Clarke and Co.. 1? and 14 Fleet street): 'The Sacred Nucrtret," }yy j_. T__ Fa neon (London : Hutchinson and Co.. Paternceter row); "Just Aa I Am." by M. E. Bradrlon (London: C. Arthur Pearson. Ltd.); '•How I Escaped." by Archibald Covering Gnnter (Tendon: G. nnd Sons>: "The Jesters." by Rita (London: Hutehinson and Co.): "Another Man's Money." by David Lvall (London: Tho Leisure Hour Library office), and '"Mid the Thick Arrows." by Max Pemberten (London: Hodder and Stoughton). .In the second number th© "Wtfita- _**_ " ai "teins the hifh standard •** ■_ *■• Irat lin-iW. It ©•ntrins wsek hvi af tbs Waitaki Boys' Hiyh School. and information about old nova. The illustrations are really excellent, and giv c B good idei of !' fo , at ™* school. We notice that the boarders have adopted the coatless and co larless Loretto costume, and we are told thnt the boys -revel in the freedom and realise thoroughly the inestimable value of the physical hardinaa_ that it foatera."

Th© "Pall Mall" for May is full . of good things, amongst them an article on Fielding on th© occasion of his bicentenary, an account of the Salvation Army's personally conducted emigration to Canada, an illustrated appreciation of Mr Haldane, an aocount of the great publishing house of Macmillan, and a suffragist's impressions of British prison lile. The fiction is well up to the standard, and th© nnmeer is altogether most readable.