NEW PUBLICATIONS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 154, 29 June 1912, Page 15

NEW PUBLICATIONS.

A CROTCHET CASTLE OF TO-DAY. " Views and Vagabonds." By „■ R. Macaulay (author of "Tho Village Captive," etc.). London: John Murray. (Whitcombe and Tombs.) Miss Macaulay is a new writer, whose thiee or four books have been received with unusual admiration by the foremost critics. Upon her seems to have fallen, in large measure, the mantle of Peacock, in his later and mellowed style — though she does not, like him, intersperse urbane satire of typical "cranks" with lyrics. As •with him, her strong point is a keen eye for personal oddities, and the characters reveal themselves more by conversation than acts, and are grouped in eucli a way as to emphasise their whims and eccentricities. It is more than ordinarily interesting people with which the "book opens— or. more correctly, they aro so well depicted as to become so. Benjamin Brunter is an energetic, studious and industrious youngj man, loving above all things haid work, and desiring and half expecting to convert the world ti> his own doctrine.' He meets a brother and sister with quite opposite views, travelling in a pedlar's van. Benjamin, •with independent "means, earned his living at the forge from choice; tho others, from pure love of vagabondage, had taken to the road. Benjamin, win> belongs to tho wealthy and stylish Brunter family, is a kind of thorn in their side, -especially when he weda Louie, an illiterate and poor girl with very objectionable relatives. He is an enthusiast who thinks life too serious a business to he enjoyed — a notion to'which many, not avowed ascetics (in the Tace for wealth, for example), are too prone to incline, and which the author wholeheartedly combats. Benjamin's wife cannot understaiid his ideas, and finds little happiness in the match, her dis-' comfort aggravated by patronising and officious relatives of her husband and their rich (and idle) acquaintances, who 'would fain enrol her among Suffragettec, aefathetes, and faddists ,of every hue. The travellers with the van, through a legacy, come into possession of a mansion and great ' fortune, and, being nothing but grown-up children, squander all among mendicants and confidence-folk in a fashion that demoralises the countryside. The pieces on the board are curiously played; though the changing positions are handled with exceeding skill. Benjamin, after a, temporary separation from his wife, and in the midst of his futile career. of attempting to compel scoffing, open-air audiences to his gospel of hard work and political honesty, rushes into a burning house, thinking that his prodigal friends are within, and escapes half-unconscious and in intense pain. The chapter " Ashe* on th© Winds," in. which the fire is described, contains some cf the finest passages in the book. • But the three chapters following, and closing the novel, seem to be remarkably inconsequent. Awaking from a swoon, after the fire, and thinking his vagabond friends (who had no principles, and whose lack of principles he had hated) dead, he found "how much stronger a thing is love than hate."' So a new Benjamin emerges, "condemning nothing, tolerating aft," is reunited inth Louis and dwells in peace in a queer household 'of incompatibles. On the whole, " Views and Vagabonds " is a notable book, and thought-'compeilirif;. "The Wisdom of Waiting." By Mabel Ince. With a frontispiece. " London: G, Bell and Sons, Limited. A new writer, we suspect, for no previous works by the same author figure on the title-page or ;n publishers' catalogue*. But it may fairly be assumed t that should novels from the same hand' appear in future it will be a strong re-, commendation to the judicious reader. Simple, but original in plot, admirably conceived and as admirably written, and devoid of any "problem" in the conventional sense, the story grasps the reader's interest so effectually through over three hundred pages that no chapter, or even page, is likely to be missed. Lettioa's unreasonable and domineering grandfather refuses to permit the advances of Michael Ltesimer, and the couple are secretly married in London by special license, the bridegroom having promise of k good opening in Ceylon. A letter by the morning's mail on the wedding-day cancelling the promised appointment ' calls the impecunious young man to a less desirable post in Ceylon, which, however, requires immediate acceptance by cabje, and departure "at once." The pair agree that in the circumstances and prospects of domestic trouble— added to the fact that for a time the bachelor quarters, occupied also by an> assistant, would be impossible for a married couple, the wedding shall be temporarily kept secret, the- bride returning to her grandfather's home, where one of his daughters, Lettice's maiden aunt, is housekeeper. The story deak with unforeseen, misadventures and misunderstandings which prolonged thft parting, that was to have been so brief, to years. It would be idle as undesirable to attempt further to outline the btory. A feature of the- book is the admirable gallery of characters with which it furnishes the memory of the fiction-reader. The irascible -old admiral, whose inexhaustible theme is the egregious incompetence of other folk \n ail" they undertake; the charming Lettice, who under the burden of a difficult secret and. deferred hope which in years of silence almost ceases fo be hope; Michael, tho hot-headed and rcdhaircd Kelt who, in "Tho Botany of Ceylon," seeks solace during years of disappointment and doubt; Lettice's legal cousin Charlie in London, who adorns his chambers with fashion-plates of ladies with small mouths and big eyes (drawn by his sweetheart).; and the well-meaning! but blundering parson, Mr. Fardell, all are excellent in their way. The author has a fund of quiet humour; especially good is her picture of the London lodgings for lady students and workers in which Lettice found a temporary retreat, and the "rumpus" which the terrible admiral made when he intruded upon, bar in that highly proper establishment. Briefly, "Tho Wisdom of Waitirlj" is a capital story, which any one may read with icnjoyment. "Lucrezia Borgia's One Love." By H. Crahame Richards, author of "Richard Somers." William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh and London. Mr. Richards's name should awaken pleasant recollections of his book issued by the ijame publishers about six months su;o — the vivid and stirring htory oi the Hampshire soldier of fortune, Richard Somers, the daring and astute adventurer who outwitted the great Cardinal Richelieu, did good service first for the •Crown and afterwards for Cromwell in the Civil Wars — verily a pleasant rascal. For this time the author, as his "fore-n-ord" sajs, has "for stage the Italy of four centuries since,, a springtime world if you recall Angelo and Romano, Raf,fael and Cellini, da Vinci and tuneful Ariosto, yet a most indifferently depraved one if you acicept the moralist's dictum." For four centuries tho Borgias, and Lucrezia esg eoialij , have been bywords of historians and romancers — of Lucrezia he now stands out not as an apologist, but as a vindicator — "her evil destiny id was to bo shrouded in tho mist* of * her evil brother's evil-doing." In tho task he has undertaken he has full Kcope, for tho historic imagination »o freely «xcicited in his earlier novel; but it may

be questioned whether it will make equal appeal to the British reader. For though he maintains that "it is to do Lucreziii Borgia bare justice, to succour, as it were, beauty in distress, that I beg you' to step back through the centuries. . . . It's no more than an appeal to your chivalry, good sirs, and to your merciful charity, deal- ladies ! I pray you will nab ignore it" — the whole subject is so unspeakably horrid thai, whether the judg. ment ot' the generations regarding personal merit or demerit be just or unjust seems to matter little in these days, and to be scarcely fitted for light literature. The author's style is, moreover, highly coloured and often unpleasantly exuberant. The most reticent of novelists — and Mr. Richards is not reticent — could not avoid pioturing much of the ugliness of a repulsive condition of society. For a reader of normal tastes, whose; nerves are in average condition, the first ko chapters, or twenty-si*, pages, will probably be quite enough— if not more than enough.