"CORINTHIAN DAYS"

Evening Post, Volume CIV, Issue 26, 30 July 1927, Page 21

"CORINTHIAN DAYS"

"Bold Bendigo," by Paul Herring. (London: Sampson, Low (through Rob-

ertson and Mullens, Melbourne.)

There is one person at any rate living in Wellington who, as a boy, saw Bendigo the prize-fighter and heard him preach, and that with force and rough eloquence. The occasion was a great revivalist meeting held at Greenwich, and Bendigo the man no doubt was more of a draw than his message. He was then a little old man, slightly bent, with very rugged features and cleanshaven. His eyes were bright and expressive. Some present at that meeting no doubt had seen Bendigo in the ring in his palmy days, and were perhaps a little curious to see how he would shape in the pulpit. This same Bendigo is the hero of this novel, which in some respects is reminiscent of Jeffry Farnoll and Sir Conan Doyle in their treatment of the bare fist pugilism of the past. But Mr. Herring has exercised to the full the novelist's privilege to temper truth with romance. He does not profess to be a historian, but he does give fairly accurate accounts of Bendigo's smashing exploits in the prize-ring, and of some other famous fights. He brings into his story Ben Gaunt, Jem Ward, Deaf Burke, "Brassey," Squire Osbaldeston, also John Gully, M.P., who abandoned butchering for fighting and the ring for politics and horse-racing. The love interest is not quite overlooked in' this interesting novel. Perhaps it was thought the novel without a woman in it would never sell. However, 3.L.5. has proved the fallacy of that idea. There is plenty of "fight" in "Bold Bendigo," stories of classical battles of the prime, and all is most graphically described. The story carries Bendigo to his zenith as a pugilist, and ends on a note of triumph.