THE BOOKMAN

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 144, 19 June 1915, Page 16

THE BOOKMAN

" Marriage by Conquest. " By Warwick Deeping. Cassell and Co. This is a capital story of the seventeenth century. The sword in those days ■was mightier than the pen, and played I its part in private affairs as "well as in the settlement of international accounts. Hence the burly gentleman, Sir Richard Heron, blessed with a fine wrist and a roaring temper, found it easy to keep the ground clear about the lady of his choice. There were many stu'tons for the widow's hand ; but they all quailed before tho combined effects of his tongue tvnd his bword. " Conquest prior to nuirriago seemed easy. But just as diplomacy may av«rt •wars, there is a virtue in sound good sense and a. clear con--science; and that is what the novel is all about. Heron fails to conquer He is defeated by a new squire, a man reared upon books which, though they have fed his brain, have not weakened his muscles; and John Plambard provides a pretty puzzle in. manners for the little Sussex community when he uses his fist* with gusto, but refuses to touch a sword. He 5b a great Tiero, for ho is not beaten even when all his neighbours call him coward. There is, of couree, only one result. Tho widow, who has been enfchralk'd K^Tiis reading and his wrestling, marries him very, willingly ; and, in the eternal justice of pleasant fiction, Heron's wild friends are the very mou who pitch him out into the cold night. The tale is a very rousing one, built ingeniously and told very well ; and it is one of those stories which readers do not care to la-y down till they have finished them. "The Healing of Nations." By Edward Carpenter. London : George Allen and Unwin, Ltd. As a compendium of arguments pro and con. the war, this book is valuable ; the arguments, indeed, are much more illuminating than the author's conclusions are convincing. An analytical mind and akill' in arrangement go to make a good summing-up oi the evidence, but not necessarily a good judgment, and it is in the former department that Mr. Carpenter renders his best service. In the working of such a mind, really ripe counlusions will not be reached till the facts are mellowed by time. For the present, however, a reader may receive much assistance from the author's summing up, without being at all impressed by his attacks upon secret diplomacy or his somewhat vague ideas as to the "healing process" that is to break down conflicting nationalisms. How premature it is to prate about international Socialism after the militarist example set by German Socialists, who even repudiated Liebknecht in_ 4he Reichstag! These German Socialists may end up as international saints, but, like Peter, they first have many tribulations to endure. It is satisfactory to see that so entirely impartial a judge as this author cannot deny that Germany is the "immediate" cause of the war. Rightly or wrongly, ho blames the German commercial classes even more than the Junkers." LITERARY NOTES A new edition of "The Death of Ivan Ilyitch, and Other Stories," by Tolstoy, is being made ready through Mr. Heinemann. Messrs. Harrap are to issue a "History of Wales." by Mr. Gilbert Stone, vrrth an introduction by the R"t. Hon. Ellis J. Griffith. "The Story of the Hohenzollerns" is a volume announced for immediate publication by Messrs. Jarrold. The author is Mr. G. Sheridan Jones. A recipe for married happiness, a formula for domestic content, and a solution of the divorce problem — these, says Mr. J. M. Dent, the publisher of the book, are the leading subjects dealt with in his forthcoming new English version of M. Henry Bordeaux' novel "The Awakening" (Les Yeux gui s' Ouvront). Adjutant-General V. A Souhomlinov is comparatively unknown in Englishspeaking countries, but under the title of "Russia's War Minister" Messrs. Simpkin Marshall will shortly publish an important book on the life and work of the man who, has made the Russian Army what it is to-day. Mr. Austin Dobson, who has written little for some years past, sends some verses to the Spectator on the present phase of the struggle. He entitles them "We hope to Win" : — "Wo hope to win?" By God's help, "Yes ; '■' Though of the "when" no man may guess, j Since there must yet be weary strain, joy, alternate pain, Till victory come, at end, to bless. But there are other wars that press, I Wars bred of fulness and excess, Which — if we would our plan maintain — We hope to win. ' There is the war with selfishness — A sluggish fiend that doubts distress ; With hearts that fail and lips that feign ; With voice and drink and greed of gaiu— These are the wars in which, not leas, We hope to win. In hie book on "The English Essay and Essayists," Mr. Hugh Walker thus sums up what he considers to be Addison's limitations: — "Johnson's famous injunction to the student of style to ' give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison,' is too often remembered without Johnson's qualification. It is addressed by him to ' whoever wishes to attain an English" style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant bub not ostentatious.' So" qualified, the advice is sound ; but it leave 6 possible another judgment, which in fact Johnson hae pronounced aSb. A style of which this may be said may yet be destitute of the highest beauties, and Addison' s i« destitute of the highest beauties. It is a far safer model than Johnson's; but Addison never wrote nor could have written anything equal to the letter to Chesterfield, ft is incomparably safer than Carlyle's; but there are passages in Carlyle as immeasurably beyond AddiBon's highest flight as the eagle's flight is boyond tho sparrow's." During the Napoleonic wars French prisoners in Britain fought, for lack of something better to do. The numbers of the officers were a good deal thinned by the prevalence of duels. In noticing Mr. Abell's book on the subject The Times cays: "R. L. Stevenson has been at pains to show the dominion exercised by the duello over the imaginations of prisoners.. This was the case in most of tlje prisons, and all the parole towns. It helps us to realise the stagnation of life, and the exasperations that ruffled the surface amid these barren truncated existences. Two officers on parole at Reading, beinjg able to procure only one fowling piece, took alternate shots at one another at about fifty yards until one of them was seriously wounded, whereupon the other one carried him upon his back to his lodging. One evening at Stapleton a naval and a military officer quarrelled over a game at marbles. They fought next morning in the chapel with pieces of iron fastened on tho point 3of wooden foil*. The ag-grwoor-JSae Wte&i tfeo uttrvivp?.

after being tried for his life for murder, was acquitted. Garner.ay describes a wonderful fight between a Breton 'tough' called Lange, and a negro bruiser, of Hciculean piopoi'tions, known ac PetitBlartc." Mr. John Murray is publishing the important scientific work, "Life Histories of African Game Animals," which exPresident Roosevelt has written in col1 laboration with Mr. Edmund Heller. This work is based on the experiences of that famous African hunting trip which Mr. Roosevelt nude on the conclusion of his last term of office as President. George Philip Baker, the author of "The Magic Tale of Harvanger and Yolande, " a medieval romance which a number of critics have praised extraordinarily for its beautiful gallantry, executed the official address to King George Yon his coronation ; he has lithographed, painted, and designed ; written busily since the age of eight ; published his first book in 1914. He is in his thirtysixth year.