LITERARY NOTES

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 126, 24 November 1923, Page 17

LITERARY NOTES

Received: "The Justice-Clerk," by W. D. 'liyell, from Butterworth and Co. (Australia), Limited. "Over the Footlights," by Stephen Leacock, from John Lane, London. "Voices from Another World," by F. Gurthis, from George Allen and Uhwin, London. '

' "The Heroes;" by Charles Kingsley, and "Grimm's Fairy Tales," have been received from George Allen and Unwin, London. They are ideal books in this attractive edition for children, being liberally, illustrated in colour from drawings by George Soper, R.E.,'and full-page pictures in black and while. The print is large and well spaced, and a high standard of art is maintained in the printing.; Both or either of these bookß should ;be welcomed by parents as suitable gifts for children—good but not too sophisticated children.

"The Bible," by Rev. James Aitken, i s a series of lectures given in St. Andrew's Church, Gisboine,, and afterwards published in the .''Gisborne Times," from which the copy under notice is received. Mr. Aitken delivered these addresses, it is said in a note, without manuscript. In their present form they are described as in only bare outline. Even so, they are excellent condensations of much learning and are in a form easily assimilated by readers who have no time to study the subject,, possibly not much time ,to read the Bible itself and meditate upon it. Mr. Aitken has done a real service to those who wish to know something of how the Book of Books came down to humanity in its present form.

Jolian Bojer, the novelist, recently visited America under the auspices of "The Sons of Norway," and lectured mostly in Norwegian. Bojer's latest, "The Last of the Vikings," is perhaps pictorially rather than homiletically suggestive, so it is not likely that there will be a repetition of one experience he had last time he went to the States. Mr. Bojer was wandering in Brooklyn, New York, when he strolled into a church. He was rewarded; for, slipping into a back pew, hig astonished ears gradually convinced him that he was listening to a sermon on his own book, "The Great Hunger."

"Tarzan of the Apes" has been published in fifteen languages, including Finnish, Polish, Rumanian, Icelandic, and Arabic. This is probably a record in translations of a modern novel. Recently the story was serialised in France under the title of lie Petite Parisian.

There has just been found in London a new page of the famous "Livre d'Heu res," illuminated by Jean Foucquet, of which the greater part, 40 pages, is at Chantilly.v in the collection -of the Duo d'Aumale. Other pages of the book are scattered here and there. One is in the. British Museum, another in the Bibliotheque Nationals, and a third in the Louvre.

"Circular. Saws," by Mr. Humbert Wolfe, is a book of sardonic topical humour. We read in it: "The Prime Minister drew the council's attention to the difficulties presented by the Poets' Birth (Prevention) Bill" ; and this most unkindest cut of all: "Once upon a time there was a wizard who could find the truth in a newspaper. Fortunately, he was discovered and hanged in time, and since then nobody has dared to tamper with the liberty of the Press."

Giovanni Papini, whose "The Story of Christ" has set the world talking, denies to. Maeterlinck the fame that the lastnamed is supposed to have achieved. This is what the Italian essayist says of his Belgian contemporary:— Mediocre enough as a poet, Maeterlinck has not even any great aptitude for metaphysics, whatever his Irish and German admirers may say. He is a parlour scientist, a moralist for old ladies, a syrupy philosopher; a friar without, faith, a "scientist without clearness, a poet without imagination, a casuist for idle consciences, a faker of facile marvela. To read him after reading a great philosopher is like smoking opium after climbing a mountain. To read him after reading a, great poet is like drinking a camomile after a goblet of old wine.

In an article in the "Review," Ernest Boyd gives some interesting particulars of the book carts of Dublin. He writes: The parapet of the Liffy might -easily have been adorned, with boxes in the Parisian manner, but the dealers have since time immemorial annexed a narrow street off the Dublin quays and installed there carts on which their wares are displayed. It was from one of these ?;entlemen that Edward Dowden bought or four cents Shelley's "Refutation of Deism," the author's presentation copy to Mary Godwin, with his notes. No Dublin book-lover fails to inspect the carts at least once a week, on Saturdays as a rule, when they assemble in force. I remember a time when the far from attractive lane in which barrows stood looked like a chapter from Moore's

"Hail and Farewell," co numerous were th» faces of writer* and avtinti übntt names, iamiUtr but meaniogleij to deal-

era, were, or have since become,, famous. It was not long after the departure of, James Joyce from Dublin that I picked up a copy of "Madame Bovary, which ibears- his signature. Five years later, almost on the same spot, I found his copy of "L'Education Sentimentale.' Evidently, these two books were amongst the ballast which Joyce threw out to lighten his flight into exile and fame.

John Moriey had the fastidiousness of a scholar, not of a caste, says "The Times," and it will be remembered as one of the most ironic strokes of destiny that it should have been he who, with, a, sheet of notepaper to that effect in his pocket, was commissioned to inform the House to which •he had lately been raised of the proposal to create new peers who would have swamped it. None, however, who read his brilliant studies of the French liberators when fe *"* eared could hay« foreseen what fate held m store for him. Those books are loiig likely to remain read for the force of their style an d the wisdom which they contain. His "Life of Gladstone, when one remembers the conditions imposed upon him by the materials for it, and by his own want of heR y f J lth aoS ,that G'adstone held most dear, could have been writr«H yD ° *T c' Se< and more than one reader must have put it down with an increased admiration, if not for Gladstone, certainly for his biographer

x>h? wh'\ I>(?! lgvS VS^ n's autobiograES'dltl ' Bhf bar6ly comPkted before ncr death m August, are many delijrhtn tSTo 6? oir e gT£at- she *"• % instance, of a Commemoration Week at, Oxford at wbich Mark Twa £ t™; .7 if* Vel'- y ncrv °u« about Mark Sads"' l S)l Wr?t?\ "fc* 'undergrads in the galleries, who evidently adored him, bawled '«," incessanCand ITared^n 1 S° ™C\ hnmour *at L.™ Mr Clemens with his ready wit S.frf h ack- ? e behaved Hfie an angel however and was a miracle of Clara y'h T^k J°^ Se daughU Uara, had cabled that moraine «R- emember proprieties !' " S'

"T&-> reaf er? of, clev<* stories by Mr, 8r I a"thores* ? death. She was trm J ?; Eve/ ett ln Pri^e life, and the daughter of Lieut.-Colonel HuskisSr.mm»r" S eate=fc Buccess was "A Lost Summer,' the story of a man who lost his memory for a few weeks and forgot he had r een married. This story in serial for.n, fascinated and excited readers to su.::h an extent, that many letters were waived beg C ms for news as to sZ«f e"^ d! Curi9^ly, about the same time, there was a notorious case of a.man forgetting his name and identity.

* ?j ge Piin'y .' ln '"Ihs Seven Lamps of Advocacy,' just published; ■: shows how often, the wit-'of an advocate will turn a Judge from an unwise course where' argument or rhetoric would certainly fail. Lord Mansfield paid little attention to Jehgious hohdaya. He would sit on Ash Wednesday, to the scandal of some members of the Bar, whose protests made no impression upon him. ■ At, the, end of Lent he Suggested-, that the Court might sit on Good Friday.- The members of the Bar were horrified. Sergeant Davy, who was in the case* bowed in acceptance of the proposition. "If yb ur Lordship pleases; but your lordship will be the first Judge that has done so since Pontius Pilate." The Court adjourned until baturday. Ridicule to be. effective must be pointed, even extravagant, sayß the learned Judge. In combating the defence of act of God set up by an American advocate defending a client on the. charge of arson, Governor Wisher, for the prosecution, disposed of the theory of spontaneous combustion and succeeded in satisfying' the jury of its absurdity. "It is said, gentlemen - that this was an act of God. It may be gentlemen, I believe in the Almighty's power to do it, but I never knew of ilis walking twice round a straw stack to find a dry place to fire it, with double-nailed boots on so exactly fittin" the. ones: worn by the defendant."

The prayer that Guy Plummer offers up in the/novel, "West of the Water lower, has aroused much discussion. Harper, and Brothers, the publishers have received'many excited letters about it. The scene takes -place in. the back room of a drug store. Would a boy pray before committing an immoral act? That is a matter of no little discussion ' When interviewed on this point, Homer Croy, the author, answered: "That scene actually _ happened; it was transferred straight from life—the boy actually got down on his knees and prayed. It is- the one and only scene, however, that was lilted from life—the rest of the book is pure fabrication." It is a cjirious anomaly—the scene that is. challenged is the one that is actually true.

The current issue of the magazine Life, published in Melbourne, is well up to the standard of its predecessors in respect to literary treatment, and the diversity of current news. Dr. Fitchett writes the review of that importan work —as it concerns Great Britain, and the United .States-"The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page," who was American Minister at the Court of St. James during the war years, and who better understood the character of the English people than any other American Minister before him Dr. Fitchett quotes this illuminating sidelight on the late Mr. Page :—A welt known Englishman happened to meet Page leaving his house in Grosvenor square the day after the Declaration of War. He 6topped and shook the Ambassador's hand.

( "Thank God," the Englishman said, that there is one hypocrite less in London to-day." "What do you mean?" asked Page. "I mean you! Pretending all {his time that you were neutral! That isn't necessary any longer." ' ■ "You. are right!" the Ambassador answered, as he walked on with a laugh and a wave of the hand."