ABOUT BOOKS AND BOOKMEN.

Evening Star, Issue 10399, 21 August 1897, Page 2 (Supplement)

ABOUT BOOKS AND BOOKMEN.

Notes on Political Economy from a Colonial Point of View. By a New Zealand Colonist. London: Macmillan and Co., 1897.

This is a contribution to the literature of political economy by an anonymous author in the colonies who evidences having studied the subject deeply and considered the application of generally-accepted axioms to the entirely new conditions of the rising Slates ■which constitute so important an element in the British Empire. There is internal evidence in the book that it is the work of a practical politician, who, possibly in positions of responsibility, has had to wrestlo with the social and economic problems of tho day, and has a strong bias towards the doctrines of collectivism, although hesitating at adopting them absolutely. He has a _ facile pen, but his logic is rather of tho forum than tbe academy, and at times he would seem as if he were endeavoring to convince himself, as a somewhat necessary prelude to influencing the opinion of others. We may say at once, however, that tho book (which is little more as to quantity than a pamphlet) is well worthy of perusal by those interested in the subject, decidedly original in conception and treatment, and, above all, distinctly suggestive. The author discusses ' Individualism, its Rise and Fall’ (taking, it would appear, the “fall” for granted, which is still an assumption), ‘The Nation and Nationalism,’ ‘ National Wealth,’ ‘ The Creation of National Wealth,’ ‘Capital and Credit,’ ‘Joint Stock Companies,’ ‘Value and Price,’ and ‘ Exchange.’ Rather an extensive programme, it will be seen, of questions esoteric in character and difficult of comprehension in all their bearings by tho ordinary intelligence. The intention of the author, although somewhat obscure, may perhaps bo gathered from certain remarks in his preface, where hj? declares that the economic problems which present themselves to the conscientious reformer are complex and the difficulties great, “but we cannot fold our bauds and do nothing. The misery around and amoug us and the national safety forbid. The misery calls loudly for alleviation, and the alleviation must uot cease till every man from whom the nation claims allegiance shall be saved as of right from risk of degrading pauperism, which he is now too often helpless to avert. Freedom of contract iu the labor world will then become a reality, and a great step have been gained. Proper provision would also be made for that great mass of unemployed the variety of seasons and other unavoidable causes render indispensable as au industrial reserve.” Other reforms, the author affirms, especially iu the occupancy of land and in the control of the currency, will be needed ; but every step will be required to be deliberately weighed and taken with great care. There must be many grave differences, he says, as to methods and means before public opinion can be fairly settled and general acceptance of radical change secured. Political reforms, he considers, have so far cleared the way that the field in every English-speaking country is open for the most free and full discussion of social and economical problems. In this direction the author-declares that “ these notes are offered as a bumble contribution from one who ventures to hope that much reading and a varied experience have enabled him to give them a title to consideration.”

Prisoners of Conscience. By Amelia Barr, Fisher Unwin, London (per Braithwaite).

Liot Borson is a sturdy Shetland fisher, in whom the traditions of his forbears have become as strong as a creed. A curse rests on his house, and he believes that it will descend to his children, even of the fourth generation. He is the accepted lover of Karen, the fairest flower of Lerwick, and the niece of Matilda Sabiston, the richest woman in the island, who wants her for Bele Trenby, her foster son, who is wellfavored bat no mate for the handsome Karen. Karen prefers the fisher to the roystering sailor, and incurs her aunt’s deadly hatred, which takes a form that in old times brought many a good woTnan to the stake. On the eve of Karen’s marriage Borson meets Trenby on the edge of a morass, and when asked by the latter if the crossing place was safe he, in a moment of irritation at some unnatural remark of his rival, held his tongue, leaving the other to disappear beneath the waters of the peaty, murky lagoon. Matilda Sabiston, who had the power of second sight, taxed Borson with the murder of her foster son, and cited him before the Kirk Session, but neither the minister nor the villagers believed her. Borson married Karen, but the vengeance of the old woman pursued the young couple, and Borson, brooding over his crime, does not confess it to Karen till she is on her deathbed. She leaves him with a son, to shield whom from the effects of the spell of his terrible kinswoman he carries to the Irish const, and settles there as a fisher. Young David grows up a manly, ba-dy seaman, in whom his father. insiils the Calvinistio creed, but it proves wholly unsuited to his open, frank nature. He returns to the home of his father, finds his kin, constitutes himself the protector of his cousin Nanna, whom he would fain marry, but she, imbued with the feeling that the expiation of Borson has not been fully wrought, refuses to wed him. David then becomes mate of a Mediterranean trader, is shipwrecked, is rescued from a watery grave by a young Quaker, who teaches a less harsh and more humane faith than that in which he was nurtured. David finally settles down at Lerwick, and goes about and among the fishers, telling them of the faith that is in him, and how salvation is to be gained, becoming a preacher of the Gospel much to the liking of the humble folk, whose ways he well understood. The Kirk Session were moved to cite him before them, but the minister, knowing the good that lie is doing, discountenances the step and silences the disaffected elders. David’s ending was in the knowledge of the God whom he truly loved, for, like Elijah of old, no mortal eye saw his taking off. The home life of the Shetlanders is well told, and there are some fine dramatic passages—notably the appearance of Matilda Sabiston before the Kirk—in the book, which is nicely illustrated by Louis Loch, who specially visited the islands for the purpose.

Tht Monk of Mar-Saba, By Joseph Hocking. Ward, Lock, and Co., London (per Wise),

During a visit to the Holy Land the author of 1 All Men Are Liars ’ spent not a little of his time in the locality where stands the monastery of Mar-Saba, and studied the history, rules, and habits of its severely {esthetic inmates. From the materials thus gained he has woven an interesting story, in which the principal figures are a young Sbunemite who joins the monks because he fails to win for his wife a Mahomedan beauty, who is the belle of his native hamlet; Esther Morton, a Devonshire girl, who visits the monastery with a party of English tourists; and an Arab chief, who abducts the girl and succeeds in carrying her off to his lair. The Shunemite, now Brother Michael, overhears the Arab’s plot, and, forgetful of his vows, leaves the monastery, accompanies Esther into cap’ tivity, and ultimately rescues her, after a series of adventures that recall the incidents of a transpontine drama, and restores her to the bosom of her family. The recalcitrant monk goes back to the monastery, and is subjected to severe disciplinary methods "without being brought to a proper frame of mind. As a dernier ressort the Superior banishes him for five days and nights to that fearsome place the Cavern of Skulls, the terrors of which are enough to break the stoutest heart. Nearly dead with fright and hunger, he finds himself once more in the satisfying companionship of Esther Morton, who, in disguise, has penetrated his place of captivity, and is prepared to purchase his freedom in order that she may reward his fidelity and affection with her hand. The monk, however, is past human help, and he lives long enough only to seal with a kiss the bond that will make two hearts one in the great hereafter. Esther returns to England, while the ghostly dwellers at Mar-Saba pass thsir solitary lives, chastened by the remembrance that there had “ lived and died amongst them one who died for love,” bat who should never have been of their company, for—said the Superior—“ he was bom to love and to be happy.”

Pacific Talcs, By Louis Becko. Fisher Unwin, London. This is a collection of South Sea Island stories that for the most part first saw publication in the pages of the ‘Bulletin,’ to which-Mr Becke was a regular and highlyvalued contributor during hft residence in Sydney. There is no man living better able to describe the condition of affairs in the Pacific, in the days when the islands were overrun by Bully Hayes and ruffians of his class, than Mr Becke, who once that desperado as his supercargo,, and saw a good deil of the bold bucca icer who made his name hated for all time among the unsophisticated but trustful islanders. Many of their good traits are recorded in this volume.

Ring o’ Rushes. By Shan Bullock. Ward, Lock, and Co., London. A collection of stories of Irish domestic life in localities far removed from the busy hum of the cities, but where the human heart beats strongly aud the love of Fatherland will never die. Even tho author himself, with fame thick upon him and tasting the sweets of success in the world’s metropolis, sighs for the scenes of his youth, where—to paraphrase his own language—the feet spring lightly over Irish clay, the eyes feast ou rushes, hedges, and hills; you meet tho heavy-footed peasant on the highway and hear the brogue and the skirl of the curlews. Little wonder that people brought up in such surroundings love these barren hills steadily or leave their hearts there when going out into the wide world to seek fortunes. Many of the old-time denizens of these hamlets are reclothed in the flesh by Mr Bullock’s subtle pen, and your eye will moisten when you listen to his recital of their woes aud sufferings. Tais booklet is wholesome reading.

[From Our Special Correspondent.]

London, July 2. The descriptions of Jubilee Day in the London papers were for the moat part the merest “ reportese,” and quite unworthy the occasion. Each penny morning paper devoted from fifteen to twenty columns to the affair, and I suppose I must have waded drearily through several miles of print in search of a really satisfactory word picture. The best—indeed the only—account which was graphic without being bulky was that of Mr G. W. Stcevens in the half penny ‘Daily Mail.’ Mrs Humphry sent the ‘ Daily News ’ a rather interesting column of gossipy details concerning the Royalties, and Mr Carruthers Gould had some readable impressions in the ‘ Westminster Gazette.’ ‘The Times’produced an admirable leader on Jubilee morning, and tho ‘ Telegraph ’ a most marvellous one by Sir Edwin Arnold. Mention of the ‘ Telegraph ’ reminds me that their offices were the best decorated of any in Fleet street, the entire building being sv. athed in a sort of network of orchids and asparagus fern that must have cost hundreds of pouuds. If the Jubilee articles in the London Press were poor, what can one say anent the Jubilee poems ? Where, oh where, was the “divine afflatus” when Alfred Austin, Lewis Mortis, and Francis Thompson sat down to perpetrate their pottering versions ! The Poet Laureate might have been forgiven ‘Jam- on’s Ride’ if he could have risen to this occasion, but surely a more melancholy fiasco than his ode never soiled the pages of ‘The Times.’ A writer in an evening paper was so affected by it that he broke out in similar vein :

The lark got up, the mower wet his whistle, The cautious cattle ruminating lay, The donkeys—all that could were munchimr thistle, Just as to-day. The partridge hesitated in the heather,

Or loitered sagely in the standing corn, And birds of every sort and kind of feather

Chanted the morn. The fawn with strange persistence dogged her mother. ’ The swan among the cat tails preened her breast, And folded up in one way or another, Dreamed on her nest. And so on fur twenty verses. Then : These things were done in “eighteen thirtyseven"— By man and beast—just sixty years ago ; They happen even now in “ ninety-seven” Aloft, alow. Anil all these things have poet laureates noted, To turn them into metre for the times ; And then, as now, a silly public doted On just such rylimes.

“ Mark Tsvain” did the Jubilee procession for the ‘ New York Journal,' his remuneration being £SOO. Dean Farrar helped to do it for the ‘New York World,’ receiving £lO5. Directly after the Queen had left St. Paul’s the Dean went straight to the Athenseum Club and “knocked off” his column or so of copy in one of the quiet rooms there which the bishops love. All the London papers paid their staffs double salaries for Jubilee month, and most of the colonial journals of good standing made their correspondents special allowances. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule, and 1 hear of one or two employers who merely utilised the Jubilee to squeeze extra work without extra pay out of their servants. Tneso, however, are few and far between, the instances occurring chiefly in provincial towns. Generally speaking, everyone has been moved by the Jubilee to a little extra generosity. The result of the competition started by “ Q.” in the ‘Pall Mall Magazine’ has just been announced. Mr Couch offered a guinea to the person who should state correctly the name of “ the man {or woman) who is (or has been during the past ten years) master (or mistress) of the best style in English prose,” and at the same time he wrote his own selection on a piece of paper and enclosed it In an envelope. In the result 31 votes were given to Mr Pater, 13 to Mr Hardy, 12 to Mr Stevenson, 11 to Mr Buskin, 9 to Mr Lang, 7 each to Mr Fronde and Mr Barrie, 6 each to Mr Meredith and Mr Kipling, 4 to Mr Henry James, and 3 each to Matthew Arnold, Sir Walter Besant, Mr Conan Doyle, and Miss Marie Corelli. Curiously enough no one seems to have thought of Mr Henley, who eight years ago, when every enlightened anybody was reading ‘ Views and Reviews,’ would have taken precedence of Mr Lang. ' Oscar’Wilde is living at Dieppe, under the name of Sebastian Melmotte, and writing plays. He gained a stone in weight whilst in prison, and seems in excellent health and spirits. Some of his old “set” met him at the prison gates and escorted him to the Continent. They were not, however, particularly civilly treated ; in fact, the story goes that Wilde gibed first at one and then at another till they fled. Lord Alfred Douglas wrote “Dear Oscar” a letter, and the recipient tore it up, avowing that if he ever spoke to that “ dirty little cad” again he hoped he might get another two years. Lord Alfred’s messenger retreated in high dudgeon. Amongst Wilde’s present friends are one or two good and true men, bent on affording him every help. One of these wrote in a private letter :

I am not breaking a confilence when I say that Oscar Wilde s hard experience has had this good effect: that it has strengthened his mind and fixed him in the determination to be truer to his artistic self in the future. With his abilities he ought to do great and lasting work, and what seemed at first an unnecessarily harsh sentence has probably won back to literature an intelligence which was wasting itself in indolent luxuriousness. Art will now he all the richer in that this artist has regained possession, not merely of his liberty, but of himself.

Mrs Oliphant died of cancer at Wimbledon on Saturday after a terrible illness, borne with characteristic resignation, piety, and fortitude. She had suffered many troubles, and known crushing sorrow. Her husband died within a few years of their marriage, and iier three children predeceased her. Mrs Oliphant’s eldest son was a lad of singular promise, and inherited his mother’s literary gifts. He succumbed to consumption a few years ago just after doing some excellent work for ‘Blackwood’s.’ Mrs Oliphant herself slaved early and late, and turned out “ copy ” of a standard of excellence truly amazing when one reckons the bulk of it. In Mudie’s catalogue there are eighty-eight novels and ten serious works to her name. Many of the novels are absolutely masterly studies of middle-class life. Of coarse you have read ‘ Salem Chapel ’ and ‘The Perpetual Curate.’ The first is the better of the two, and will, I incline to think, live long. Mr Vincent and Phoebe and Tozer are unforgettable personages. Of Mrs Olipbant’a earlier books ‘ Madonna Mary 1 and ‘ May ’ were the most successful, and of her middle and finest period I like best ‘A Rose in June,’ ‘The Story of Valentine, 1 ‘ The Ladies Lindores,’ • Hester, 1 ‘ Carita, 1 ‘ The Son, 1 and ‘ Within the Precincts. 1 There is not one in this list

I would on any account have missed. Turning to more recent efforts, I recall intensely enjoying ‘ The Heir Presumptive,’. ‘ The Cuckoo in the Nest,’ ‘The Marriage of Elinor,’ ‘Kirsteen,’ and ‘ Was Lost and is Found.’ As a matter of fact, however, you may take-up almost any of Mrs Oliphant’s fictions without fear of being bored. Reference to the deceased lady’s life work would be incomplete without a word anent those wonderful ‘Stories of the Seen and Unseen’which I recently, discussed at some length in these columns. The “Little Pilgrim” whose adventures “beyond the veil” Mrs Oliphant so reverently and beautifully imagined was, of course, her own child. Let us hope that the series—now alas ! complete—may shortly be given to us in a couple of volumes, and in correct sequence. All tho tales command attention, but‘The Laud of Darkness’ aud ‘On the Dark Mountains ’ must chill even the hardiest sceptic. In the course of a most sympathetic article the ‘ Daily News ’ wrote.

Whatever she had to do she did. Her life of Laurence Oliphant, who was not related to her in any way, showed her power over subjects and situations in no way familiar to her. But there was no limit to the ranf;e of her industry. St. Francis of Assisi, Dante, Cervantes, Dr Chalmers, all came under her notice, and she produced readable accounts of them all. Original research was impossible with' the conditions in which she had to work. She wrote popular handbooks, and very popular they proved to be. Yet it may be doubted whether Sirs Oliphant ever received a really large sura for a book. She was not, except perhaps in some of her earlier stories, sensational. She did not drag theology into her novels. She was never immoral, and her characters could not be identified with social personages of the day. Her labors were appreciated, hef reputation did not in the least decline as she advanced in years, and she had no reason to complain of fickleness on the part of the public. But there was nothing to recommend her books except their own intrinsic merits, and that is in itself a drawback. Mrs Oliphant would not condescend to provide adventitious attractions. She gave good work, and she gave no more. It was characteristic of her that so far from courting she shunned society. Perhaps no popular authoress lived so completely out of the world. Her life was a singularly valiant and heroic one. Her sorrows only made her more unselfish, and she made the happiness of many lives. Her place in English literature is permanent, and she will never be forgotten by any of her friends. To the long list’of books which did nob catch on at first, but developed into big successes must be added ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.’ In ‘Longman’s’ for July Andrew Lang discloses that the early commercial fortunes of this masterpiece were unpropibious. The booklet was, ho tells, offered to the editor of ‘ Longman’s,’ who said he thought the story should be read as a whole, not by instalments. Mr Stevenson agreed, and the book was printed as a shilling novel. But the end of the year was approaching, and the railway book-stalls declined to take any copies of ‘Dr Jekyll.’ The novel was therefore held over till the following year, when the public scarcely purchased a copy. This was in ISS6, four years after the appearance of ‘ Treasure Island.’ The prospect was comfortless, when a long review of ‘Dr Jekyll ’ appeared iu ‘ The Times.’ “ Then, at last, the public began ‘to take notice.’ Presently the clergy found ‘ Dr Jekyll ’ out. They recognised a statement of St. Paul’s about the ‘ war in his members,’ and they reinforced the Apostle’s . remarks by the strange case and modern instance of ‘Dr Jekyll.’ Then all was prosperity. The moral did the business. The large churchgoing public heard that the book was ‘as good as a sermon,’ and came forward with their shillings.” The sale afterwards was, as everybody knows, enormous.

It really is rather an odd thing that the generation which gushes frantically over Barrie, Crockett, and lan Maclarcn should almost ignore George Macdonald; because, as an astute American pointedly remarks, “Macdonald was really the first of the kailyarders.” “Let any fair-minded reader,” he. says, “ compare ‘ Alec Forbes,’ ‘ Robert Falconer,’ and ‘David Elginbrod’ the novels into which George Macdonald has put his vision and interpretation of Scotland —with ‘A Window in Thrums’ or ‘Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush.’ The result of the comparison will show clearly who has the most valid claim to the proud title of the founder of the Scottish school of to-day.” Just so, but—if I may venture on the remark —Macdonald is altogether too Scotch for the average English stomach. A new magazine yclept the ‘ Anti-Philis-tine,’ which appears to be devoted to the nob overpoweringly difficult task of spiflicating Mias Marie Corelli and Mr Clement Scott, and also to praising up an unknown genuis named Stanley Waterloo, made its appearance last Friday. I fear I might have consigned the periodical to the w.p.b. unnoticed but for chancing on the following charming verses by Eugene Field. If they are, as they seem to be, new and original, you will thank me for the discovery :

LI TILE BOY BLUE. The little toy dog is covered with dust, But sturdy and staunch he stands; And the little toy soldier is red with rust, And his musket moulds in his hands. Time was when the little toy doe was new, And tho soldier was passing fair, But that was the time when our little Boy Blue Kissed thorn and put them there.

Jsow, don’t you go till I come,” ho said, “And don't you make any noise," So, toddling off to hla trundle bed, He dreamt of the pretty toys. And as he was dreaming an angel song Awakened our little Boy Blue ; Oh, the years are many, the years are long, But the little toy friends are true.

Ay, faithful to little Boy Blue they stand, Each in the same old place, Awaiting the touch of a little hand, The smile of a little face.

And they wonder, as waiting the long years through, In the dust of that little chair, What has become of our little Boy Blue Since he kissed them and put them there.

The ‘Street Railway Journal’ for July, which is termed an international number, gives pride of place to an article (profusely illustrated) on the electric railway systems of the world. The systems reviewed are the underground section at Budapest and the overhead sections in the suburbs of that city ; the systems of Bristol, Paris, Buenos Ayres, and Sydney. In the French capital the accumulator as well as the overhead is used; but in most cities the Thomson • Houston overhead trolly appears to meet with general favor. On page 397 the tramway systems of Dunedin are described,' and four views (the City from Heriot row, the Colonial Bank corner, the Mornington Company’s terminus, and the Mornington extension) illustrate the article. On another page we find a striking likeness of the manager of the City tramways (Mr D. R. Eunson). The ‘ Street Railway Journal,’ which occupies a high place among the technical press of New York, has an immense circulation.

The July pumber of the ‘Windsor’ has two excellent articles on cricket (referred to in another part of this issue), a talk with Val Prinsep, the painter, by Mary Dickensian account of the fetes in Berlin during the unveiling of the statue of the first William, who was King of Prussia, and a chapter on the wild monkeys of India. The serial matter is above the average. Besides four chapters of the ‘ Christian,’ Howard Hazell contributes ‘ For Love of Her ’; and Alfred Slades has something to tell anent the ‘ Fourteenth and the Flag.’ In the editor’s scrap book space is found for a pretty little poem from the pen of Miss Colborne-Yeel, of Christchurch.

On the twenty • seventh anniversary of Dickens’s death his grave in Westminster Abbey was decorated with flowers. The set of original water-color drawings to Dickens’s ‘ Old Curiosity Shop ’ and ‘Barnaby Rudge’ sold in auction in London "lately and realised over £6OO.

A curious example of the perils of novelists, writes James Payn in the ‘Ulustrated London News,’ occurred lately in the United States. A lady contributed a" storv to a magazine, describing how a veteran of the War of Secession devoted himself to the painting of an immense picture of the surrender of General Lee. Opposed by many difficulties in the war of poverty and discouragement, the artist was described as having just lived long enough to accomplish his task. By a truly artistic touch, the work in which his mind was so rapt was described as being mere rubbish. The authoress, in order to give the coping stone of reality to her story, described herself as having seen the picture. All this attention to details was unfortunate, for it turned out .that there was such a picture, painted by such a veteran, and he brought an action against the novelist for depreciating his genius, and gained a verdict for £375. The New York ‘Sun 1 is raising a fund for Mark Twain, and hopes to get £25,000.