BOOKS OF THE DAY

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2764, 6 May 1916, Page 11

BOOKS OF THE DAY

ANATOLE FRANCE ON THE WAR. j .To, tli6,;longj series-of works by the famous French 'writer, Anatole France, which have been published by Mr. John Lane, has now been added a volum'o entitled "The Path, of Glory. 51 A new departure, however, is to bo noted in the presentation of the original French text of the articles of which the book is composed, following translations by Mr. Alfred Allinson. Before the wai fcl. Thibaud, or Anatole France, to employ the psoudonym"* by' which ho is-j So well known, was an anti-militarist, a philosophic Socialist, a believer in and exponent of the gospel of non-interven-tion,' of international of' peace conferences , and the liko. For him, as for so many others in France, England, and elsewhere, wlio regarded life from a purely philosophic standpoint,'too often ignoring the practicalEide of life, the war must havo been a rude awakening'. To-day, Anatole France, as .is shown, by, more than ono .essay - in this book, deems it the one paramount object to be striven for and gained ;by that outraged civilisation of which 'France and. her Allies are the. champions, that the. military power of Germany must bo utterly and permanently broken! .From"the opening and' title' articles, a Christmastide message to the French Army, 1. tako the following eloquent sentences:— -

■Victory is sure. But we must go far for it;',we must pursue it to the very heart of the Germanic! Empire. This necessity is proclaimed not .only by v the daring spirits amongst lis ■ it is felt/ by tho moEt peace-abiding minds, the g'entiost souls. Tor nil' own part, I (.0.11 boast that from the ■ first ' day of thewar I liav(s said there, must be no stopping half-way. Friends, to the, end that, you may not. have fought and -suffered to no avail, tljat tho blood of sons and the tears of mothers may not have flowed, in vain,, we must destroy from base to summit this military power of Germany, and strip this baibarian nation of every possibility of pursuing' its hope of a. World-wide empire, the monstrous dream that at this hour is iplunging,'Europe in fire and slxi'jgK'er. "lis a .great task, but what - deathless praises, what blessings;.. will beheaped on your ■ Siead-s for having accomplished'. it!;- You wiU\ have- guaranteed . _,tho security ana greatness of yotr country, you will lw-vo delivered Europe from an. rtsolent, Monaco and ® 'perpetuai danger. -. . You,:■will have re-established the freedom and the rights of nations; founded ;a harmonious Europe, made possible the : conclusion, of stable peace, based'on Sight ahd'KodSoii, a true peace, a peaceful peace. And you will be dear to your kinsfolk, and. bulk large in History. Oh! may. Jthe. sacred fire of our hearths go. through the cold dark night to bear to you in the trenches, its comfortable warmth, and sparkle' joy-, ousiy:in'your,hearts.

Elsewhere, this volume, in a letter written to. an' American correspondent, 31 • /-France''' emphasises tho importance of that oiie great, essential, a real, not a shaiu,; or. half-peace. He,sayis:' • ■ All; parties in Prance—Socialists, Kfation-nJistt-.Radicals—are united m one and the 'same' thought; one feeling, one purjicsc: to freo'.Europe by shattering the 'formidable instrument, of oppression which Germany has forged, and-whioh .for forty years has weighed, an iniquitous'burden, on our' Old .WorMit'i-'-X.'-vUS-.lbvof Peace too' well to give ; . hor 'a, .cheap and-'ignominiou-s crecie: lve-love .'her too: woll not to desire her great aiid pure ind radiant, assured of. a. long destiny. - . For me, wero I told' that Frenchmen werQ. .suffering themselves ■to be seduced bj'-'the'veiled phantasm-of a villainous -Peaco, I would j)et:ti«2 our Pai-liament to brand as traitor 'to our country any man .who should -propooe f> treat with the,enemy, so.long as the foe still occupies - d. poriion of. ouj- -territory and.that,of Belgium.'-''' •

_ "What a contrast, is there.not, in these Burning--' words .ol'; patriotism of-'the ■great' French writer '.-to' ■ the- pusillanimous and perverted arguments of "men'-' such as Bernard.. . Shaw, whose- first thought, it, would .seem,, is to sneer at and belittle.' their -.to find excuses" for a ' deadly ar.d treacherous foe, and to preach a. peace which wonkr bo the veriest moclcery, delusion; ' The! book' ' coiitaiiis ' 'some flratnatically-ivritteii war. 'sketches, ' an , Ingeniously imagined classical parallel, "After Herodotus," and other interesting ;.and is dedicated to tho memory-of.' tlie late Pierre Aubarbierj who, under the nom de plume of Jean Pierre Barbier, had, though "only twenty, begun-to make a distinct-, mark-of his own in French literature. Ho diei} .011 the field'of battle.on December. 26, 1914.. 'A fine photogravure portrait of Anatole France, from an. etching "by Edward Oberlin,' serves as a frontispiece, and a portrait' of M Aubarbicr is also given. (New Zealand price, ,65.) , ,

AUSTRALIAN BYWAYS. "Australian ; Byways," by Xonnan Dunfi'.n (Harper and Bros,,- N.Y.; per D. 0. Ramsay and Co.); is described on the title page as "The Narrative of a Sentimental Traveller." • The-author,. an ' American, who h.as already more than one bcok of travel—in the Holy Land and elsewhere—to his credit-here again proves : himself a thoughtful, observaiit writer, whose sketches of life on tho West Australian goldlields, in the back-blocks of South Australia' - aiid Queensland, and of European and native life in New Guinea, displa.v, as a rule,, considerable originality in their point c-f viow and choice of illustrative detail, and are one and all eminently, readable. Like so many other travellers in Western Australia Mr. Duncan was greatly impressed by the unfailing optimism and patient. determination of. the wandering • prospectors, and the broken down "old hands," who. still hang around Veserte:! fields, dry-blowing for long hours every day, only-to ho rewarded by very oeca- , sional "specks." His 1 charcte-r sketches of diggers, wa.v-baek shepherds, camel drivers, bush publicans, and bush missionaries, and-, of so L many other types of back-blocks inhabitants are "sharply : etched and eminently convincing, being none the less welcome in that they are ■ so often tinged with a humour ail the more pleasant in that it is, unlike-so much that passes" for humour ' with Americans, unforced. Here and there, the tragic side of life in the endless des- ' ert wastes of the West is hinted !at. "■ Death from thirst is''too often tho, lot. of the ever..adventurous prospector.

They strip themselves, poor wretches, in their desperate wanderings, and stripped! to the skin the trackers find them— 6tark naked, their hands bloody with digging, their eyes wide open and white, their tongues swollen cle.au out of their mouths. Nor nro theso deaths occasional. They are frequent. It is a dry land-rail these wilderness miles. No rivers water it. There are no oases. A rainfall vanishes like an illusion. Travellers beyond the tanks venture recklessly. The.v must chance the rainfall; and, failing the tare rains, they must find water in "soak 6" and gnamma-lioles', or perish in their tracks—the "60<tk" being' a basin Ecoopcd in the sand at the base of a granite rock, and the gnamma-hole a great cavity in the granite, from which the. last rain lias not evaporated. And all this water is illusive; it fails or changes plao?. being here and there—'hot at/all—as tho eeasons Tun.: .A punctured .water-bag .is Eentence oi;-death. . ' The black trackers and aboriginals rarely perish of thirst. They detect sources of supply which, to the average European, are unknown. A.bushman friend of the- author enlightened him as to some of the devices by which tho natives find the precious liquid. V

A black tracker (ho said) once turned in t™tempt from the corpse of a man who Sad died of thirst.. lis had no pity; ho ppat his abhorrenc* at the stupidity of the dead wretch. . Tho man had died within arm's length of water—the moist roots of some small desert tree. In tho departs to the north-east 'of ■ us, . mid-

contintnt, when sun and dry winds suck tho moisture -from ; deep in tho ground and all'the -world runs dry—the "Boaia". and gnamma-holes . and ■ most sccret orevices of the trees and rocks—the aborigl-. nals draw water from these roots by cutting them into short lengths, and letting them drain, drop by drop, into a wooden bowl. But the worst may come to- tho ivorst: there may be no "water-trees"--or the roots may shrivel and dry up. What thenf ' - "Ah, well," eaid the bushman, 'they do with ■ what thoy havo." • What have they?; "Ah, well, they lick the dew from ihe" leaves and grass." ' , The chapters in which Mr. Duncan relates his experiences in New Guinea are equally interesting with his descriptions of lifo in the' Australian interior, some of his stories'as to. the strange beliefs and stranger customs of the Papuans, even when living under European rule, and after being educated at the mission schools, being decidedly piquant. As to the worldly cunning of the professional sorcerers a magistrate acquaintance of the author'told him the following curious story: The sorcerer whispered in the ear of a doomed native that an enemy had purchased his death. "However, he is a moan man," the sorceior added, "and did not pay me very much to kill you." Of course, the doomed native promptly paid more for his Immunity than the enemy had paid for his death. "This man has rewarded me verj largely to dispose of you," ■ the sorcerer now informed the enemy, "and. I fear that I can tfccompliah nothings to save your life." And the startled enemy «aid, "Ha, ha, but I will pay more tlinn that." How long the transaction might have gone on nobody knows, for if was at this. poiht that tho extortionate sorcerer was taken into" custody on the information of a cunning friend of both his victims;

■ Mr.- Duncan's book, which contains a larne number of vigorously-drawn pictures in colovtr and black and white, from original sketches by Gebrgo Harding, is an extremely interesting addition to the literature of Australian travels.