A MAN'S BOOK

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 123, 26 May 1928, Page 21

A MAN'S BOOK

"Prospectin' Fools." By A. M. Chisholm. London: ' Hodder and Stoughton. Quaint diction in dialogue, humour everywhere, and a tang of wood smoko and dank trails make "Prospectin' Pools" the best of reading for that largo class of adventurers who take their blood and sweat second-hand. It is a plain talc of three episodes in the lives of "Skookum Bill," a lovable bachelor giant without principles, and Sam Dobbs, a weather-beaten old partner, whose brains frequently avert catastrophe. When they can't help it they work, but only to acquire a grubstake. Thciv adventures bring close the lure of elusive gold and the spell of the gre^t woods and silent streams, while the sacredness of partnership is ritualised in all phases of experiences. Incredible prospecting tales abound in the mouth, of Dobbs, but once the partners are really led to a rich placer find up on the sides of a mountain by an old billy goat. Their endeavours to outwit Tonk and Aubichon, two equally firm but' less scrupulous partners in the field, meet with varying success. Pathos is provided in the tragic end of ."Little Sister of the Stars," a squaw whose ugliness passes imagination, but who falls in lovo with Bill. Bill is a materialist, but draws thfe lino at -taking advantage of the girl, though he cannot understand, love at all. He has no compunctions in trying to ' find through her the secret of a wonderful gold discovery, of which the misshapen little orphan is the only' one aware. In strong contrast to' the humour so frequent in the book is the description of her saving of Bill's life,at tho cost of hof own, and the emotions roused in the phlegmatic bachelor. Eventually the partners strike it rich and visit the cities. Here is a vignette of an awakening after a night out: "Ho was cold, but his hand encountered no blankets. With a. dull wonder he raised himself on an elbow, and realised the pearl and rose of sky before sunrise. He was in the great outdoors, as represented by a vacant lot grown with weeds, and as a dumping ground by the tidy citizens of Vancouver. In a recumbent form close by he recognised his team mate, Gates, who lay. in deep slumber, his head pillowed "on an insufficient ash heap. ' One hand, carelessly outflung, rested and secmo'd to bestow a last, lingering caress upon a largo striped eat, whose earthly course was run. The cat had passed beyond the Veil. It had passed some time before. Its freed spirit was, one with the cats of the Pharaohs. Its lips were drawn back from its teeth, showing a chastely palid tongue tip. From its last long sleep it seemed to grin sardonically at the futility of human awakenings." A chuckle in every page1, here and there a thrill, and always interest, await,the . reader.—W.B.