NEW PUBLICATIONS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 65, 18 March 1911, Page 13

NEW PUBLICATIONS.

VARIOUS NOVELS, "Spell Land: The Story of a Sussex Farm." By Sheila Kaye Smith, author of "The Tramping Methodist," and> "'Starbrace."' London: G. Bell and Sons, Limited. Four or five years ago Miss Smith's first novel was received with unanimous praise by the Home press as in the front rank of the year's fiction, and' "Starbrace," in the following year, was acclaimed as worthy of its predecessor. With a wide knowledge of English literature and cultured taste the author combined a love of nature and English rural ecenery, and an. insight into character rare even among the best novelists. Her stories were of the Sussex region in the late eighteenth century; the first vividly picturing the religious turmoil when an official and unspiritual ecclesiasticism was roused to active antagonism by the Methodist revival, and the other a tragic story in which highwaymen and fox-hunting gentry of th& day played important 'parts. In "Spell Land" the scenes are still in the agricultural districts of Sussex, but the period is more than a hundred years later, for the South African War is among the contemporary subjects of discussion. The first thing that will strike the reader of many novels is the beautiful English and felicitous phrasing of the author, whose style is exceptionally simple and direct, and absolutely free from affectation. Next, the absence of stereotyped forms and cant of the hour, and the, almost uncanny insight into human nature, notably in the three characters to pass closely ' under review. There are no familiar conventional "situations." the author's vision is too true to compel the device of falling back on lay-figures • the drama is one of life, love, and strife among folk for the most part homely, ' uncouth, and uncultured, but whose inner lives are laid before us— their weaknesses, temptations, and sins, their repentances and remorse : in all charity ; nothing extenuated, nought set down ia malice. There ar© sins vulgar and base, brutality, rough kindnees, faithfulness, and the reverse; but never an attempt to blacken the picture — never a sneer. With singular faithfulness is certain crude popular theology depicted — "James Shepherd's God" whose "doings" all misfortune and disaster are devoutly believed to be, and whose implacable "vengeance" is his leading characteristic, is nearly ac weird a figure as James's young brother Claude's "devil," a threeheaded composite from his precocious readings of Bunyan, Milton, and Cary's Dante; but the author lets the characters speak for themselves and reveal themselves ; she is far too wise or too artistic to dictate; nor in the old experience that selfishness and sin ueoesGarily brings pain, does she lapse into unprofitable sentim^ntaMsm, or abate one jot of the inevitable tragedy to spare the reader's feelings. There are fine passages which only a woman could have written. An original character is the unorthodox preacher who thinks that the world holds only about a hundred books worth studying, who loves Blake and is saturated with Swedenborg's philosophy of this life and tho life beyond — a philosophy which, in his case, takes the shape of very effective and practical helpfulness. "Spell Land' 1 is a book that no .reader of fiction should miss — one of the novels that will bear reading again and again. s "The Pilgrim." By Arthur Lewis, author of "Wind o' the West." London: William Blackwood and Sons. This is apparently the author's first novel, "Wind o' the West" being a volume of poetry which had a cordial welcome from lovers oi the muse. Music, poetry, and romance seem to be the favourite pursuits of our Cymric author, and in his fanciful story of "The Pilgrim," one Davydd ap Owain, who for his sins — very venial, even in the eyee of the stern pontiff when confessed — had joined in his native land a band of pilgrims to tho eternal city, there is much of "the light that never was on sea or land." ' The book can scarcely be classed among historic novels, and one who would reconstruct the society of Rome in the days of the redoubtable Hildebrand, more than eight centuries ago, may quite reasonably claim wide scope for his imagination. The young pilgrim Davydd — more resembling the scriptural Joseph than his royal namesake — and whose surpassing virtue was almost excelled by his modesty, was brought into unexpected prominence by gallantly defeating an attempt by assassins on the life of the Pope, and was raised to high honour, for which his learning and administrative ability eminently fitted him. Of course he had enemies, and was almost as unfortunate in winning the unsought affection of an ambitious patrician lady, quite ready to condescend to take a partner of such personal and intellectual attractions though of humble rank. On the very eve of the intended nuptials the perjured enemies prevail, and Davydd is consigned by the Pope to a gloomy prison in the fortress of St. Angelo, where he languished eight years. During that time many troubles and changes had gone over Rome, and Pop© Gregory, practically a prisoner, retired to the same fortress, a rival filling his chair. When the Norman Robert restored Gregory, his ticops, as is well known, pillaged and burnt Rome, inflicting ruin such as the ancient city had never before known, and in the general anarchy the prisoners, including Davydd, found their liberty, and long-delayed happiness came in the end to him and to one- for whom he still cherished a warm affection, and to whom, after much tribulation, " the pilgrim " is united. Frankly a romance, the book is not to be judged as a story purporting to be a picture of the times. "The Race Before Us," by Guy Thorne, author of "When it was Dark," etc. London : G. Bell and Sons, Ltd. Mr. Ranger Gull apparently keeps his patronymic for smart "society" •iLories with no discoverable moral : as "Guy Thorne" ne is oppressively didactic and dogmatic, and the text from which he borrows his title of his new book stands out prominently on his title-page. Moreover, an entire chapter of twenty-two pages "Words for the Timid" (convenient for skipping) with text 1, Cor. VI. 20, and oLher Scripture passages cited, is devoted to the elaboration of his message, 'the message is not new. Thoughtful folk who make no great religious professions deplore and discountenance ths degradation of athletic sport by the blend of the gambling element and the greed of gate-money, and surely only a> very smal] section of the Christian world can still cherish that form of Manicheanism which would condemn all wholesome exhilarating physical snorts as snares of the evil one. Unexceptionable as the author's object may be, we doubt whether Ms advocacy of any reform i.» to be desired. His English is intolerably slipshod, his style hysteric, his- characters inhuman, and he seems to know no degree below the superlative. The undisciplined imagination of "When it was Dark,"' its irreverence and more than questionable ethics, have perhaps not been equalled in hii> Liter fictions,- but his details aie Zolaesque, and he describes household equipments' and pictures like an appraiser. There is little beauty in his love-passages, and little. t6 suggest reality in his picture of natuie or human, nature,

which are set in distorted perspective. This latest book opens with an ugly episode of_ the murder of a nobleman by a quack in the "high-frequency" room of the electrical-treatment department of a, fasliionable hydropathic establishment, and there are unedifying details of the life and death of a drunken and profhgate nobleman. There is much snobbish exaltation of the aristocratic caste and contemptuous reference not only to "Nonconformist" preachers (including one represented as having an international leputation for Greek scholarship), and to "colonial bishops." There -are assertions intended to startle, such as "Our Lord was an Athlete i" which will not bear examination. The story is a strange tangle of sporting, eccentric theology, and intolerance; it is implied that the work has occupied the author, on. and off, for three years, and it seems, after all, to have been finished in a hurry, for it is left at loose ends. Nash's Magazine for February is a notable number. It contains the first instalment of a new story, "The Common. Law." by one of the most popular authors of the day, Robert W. Chambers, and, as if this attraction weie not enough, the illustrations are by Dana txibson, who has returned to the field of black-and-white in which he has already won so many laurels. In a special advertisement, the editor of the nia-gazane states that the proprietors have paid Mr. Chambers "the unprecedented price of three thousand guineas for at *?P ng ? lts alone of the n °vel, and Mr. Dana. Gibson two thousand guineas for the drawings. Mr. Paul J. Eainey gives a very interesting illustrated narrative oi his recent expedition to the Arctic Circle in quest of big gams, when he reached the 79th parallel, 640 miles trom the pole. Well' equipped, and with not only camera, but kinematograph recording apparatus, he secured some notable pictures, a number of which are reproduced. Mr. C. H Meltzer has an appreciation of Mr. George Grey Bernard, some of whose powerful sculptured groups are illustrated; and there are some good contributions in torm ot short stories and of verse