NOTES ON N VELS.

Evening Star, Issue 13031, 15 August 1908, Page 11

NOTES ON N VELS.

' [By F.S.G.] Mr E. F. Benson's 'Sheaves' is no longer a new book. Indeed, a second rupply has already been unloaded on Dunedin, and Mr Braithwaite (who forwards a copy) describes its sale as "steady." To tho accomplished novelreader, if such term may be used, a new novel by the author of ' Dodo' is an event in the literary year; yon are sure of earnest and sometimes brilliant workmanship, and subtle characterisation, and in almost all his works—in fact, in all save that unhappy Christian Science excursion, ' The House of Defence'—you will discover the something more that makes the good novel. ' Sheaves' is a decidedly interesting novel, full of Benson's cleverness and illuminating glimpses of character. As cilways, the minor characters are particularly good. Canon Alington, the goodjhearted clerical prig, sly Mrs Owen, happy, practical Peggy, that monstrous child of self-sufficiency, Ambrose, these are Tevealed as perhaps no other of our writers could reveal them. Then there is Edith, the principal character, a widow of forty-two, whose best years have been strangled by a drunken husband, and Hugh, the boyish young singer who falls in love with her and marries her. These two tenderly-drawn characters supply the motif of the story, and to be frank, it is just with the motif, and with its entirely inadequate fulfilment, that our quarrel lies. You are tortured by Edith's constant self-ques-tion —can such love as theirs be perfect? " Why," says Peggy, the outspoken, " you are seventeen years older than he. What does that matter now ? Nothing, of course. But think, darling, just think. What of ten years from now—the years that will but still be bringing nearer his prime of life." Thero you have Edith's after selfcommunings, and the problem Mr Benson sets you. And he answers it. or rather loaves it unanswered, by killing Edith of consumption before the" question really assumes any importance save in Edith's self-tortured mind. It is hard not to convict Mr Benson of having written very splendidly about nothing. It was only a few years ago that the short story became an actual means of personal expression to our Enclish writers. Even now, perhaps, this puzzling art is mly in a tentative stage, for though most of our writers of fiction have mastered the art of writing magazine stories, these generally, thank tho Lord, find their birth and their grave in the magazines. Our national temperament seemingly does not run to sharp definition of ideas and verbal conciseness, and that, rather than mere technical difficulties, has kept the short tale out of our literature. On the other hand, that wonderful, eager, American life, making tomething new from an old speech and a «t of old traditions, has produced half .» dozen writers who have made the short ~tory almost great. Henry James, despite his deliberate indirectness, which seem to be a serious handicap, is perhaps the greatest master of them all in brief and delicate suggestion. He has the grip of essential tragedy. ' The Beast in the Jungle,' a story from the series published under the title of ' The Better Sort,' is a fine example of his work. It deals with that obsession, not so rare in nervous disease, in which a man lives in fear of some terrible visitation—of some beast which might at any time leap for his destruction. With a woman, to whom he confides his heart-shattering secret, he drifts into an intimacy which makes her his protectress. It continues till death's hand is upon her. Then she understands, though she will not tell him, what she believes the dread to be. Only she hints : "I'm with yon—don't you see?— stiM- ... I haven't forsaken yon." He does not see, but when the woman was der.cl and the beast had leaped—then he saw. "The escape would have been to love her; then "he would have lived She had lived . . . since she had loved him for himself; whereas he had never thought of her but in the chill of his egotism and the light of her use." Kipling, with his power of intense vividness, of insistent concentration, gave the shov: story a great vogue in England Fewer readers have heard of Joseph Conrad and yet it is doubtful if even Aipling wrote anything as fine as the purple patches in 'Typhoon,' a descriptlon,of * Earner in an awfnl hurricane I in the China Seas. It is one of the most terrible photographs of the mad rage of wind and sea that has ever been produced on paper, and against it, stolid, triumphant, stands the nnheroic figure of the stupid sea. captain, Mac Whirr. Here are a couple of samples. Jukes is down in the engine , room communicating with the captain on the bridge through the speaking-tube : The voice that kept the hurricane out of Jukes s ear began : "Take the hands with you. ... and left off suddenly. "What could I do with them, sir'" A harsh, abrupt impervious clang exploded suddenly. The three pairs of eyes flew up to the telegraph dial to see the hand jump from ' Full' to 'Stop,' as if snatched bv a devil. And then those three men in the engine room had the intimate sensation of a check upon the ship; of a strange shrinking, as if she had gathered her- j self for a desperate leap. "Stop her! ' bellowed Mr Ront. Nobody—not even Captain MacWlrrr wno alone on deck had caught sight of a white line of foam coming on at such i height tliat he couldn't believe his eyes-1 nobody was to know the steepness of thn* sea and the awfnl depth of the hollow the hurricane had scooped out behind tne running wall of water. It raced to meet the ship, and. with a pause, as of girding the loins, the NanShan lifted her bows and leaped. The flames in all the lamps sank, darkening the engine room. One went oat. With a tearing crash and a swirling, ravine tumult, tons of water fell upon the deck' as though the ship had darted under the foot of a cataract. Down there they looked at each other, stunned. "Swept from end to end, by God!" bawled Jukes. She dipped into the hollow straight down as if going mv : the edge of the world. Tii? engine room toppled forward mwemgly, like the inside of a tower nodding in an earthquake. An awful racket, of iron things falling cane from the stokehold. She huw on this apoalling slant long enough = for Beale to drop on his hands and knees and bciin to crawl as if he meant to fly on ;-!l fours out of the engine room, and f • Mr Rout to turn his head slowly, rigid, cavernous, with the lower jaw d-;nping. Jukes had shut his eyes, ;r:<\ his face in a moment became hopele-d yblank and gentle, like the face <;■ a- blind man. At !-<t fihe rose slowly, staggering, as if she had to lift a mountain bows. Mr ! -out shut his mouth; Jukes blinkc-i : and little Beale stood up hastily. "Ai '.her one like this, and that's the la of her," cried the chief. He ?d Jukes looked at each other, and ti: same thought came into their heads. The captain! Everything mils* have h—n swept away.. Steering gear gone— :;:ip like a log. All over 'directly. The clang of the telegraph gong soothed th»;n instantly. The black hand drooped in a flash from "Ston" to "Full." p Again, Jukes see 3 upon the white flash of another high sea two pairs of davits leaping black and empty out of the solid blackness. The boats were going. He poked his_ head forward, groping for the ear of his commander. His lips touched it, big fleshy, very wet. He cried in an agitated tone : " Our boats are going now, sir." And a-?ain he heard that voice . . the frail and indomitable sound that can be made to carry an infinity of thought, resolution, and purpose, that shall be pronouncing confident words on the last day, when heavens fall and justice is done—again he heard it, and

it was crying to him, as if from very,' very far—"All right.' . . . Can't be helped. ... What can—expect—when hammering through—such—bound to leave—something behind—stands to reason." The last story in ' Typhoon,' ' To-mor-I row, is a curiously imagined masterpiece of lonely tragedy. It and 1 the other two tales, 'Amy Foster' and 'Falk.' place the . author in the first rank of writers. I NEWER NOVELS. ! The following list of newer novels is forwarded to me by Mr" Braithwaite and Mr Stark. 'Dr Ellen,' a new American tale, was received on Wednesday. 'True Stories of Crime ' —Arthur Train. ' Wolfvillo Folks '—Alfred Henrv Lewis. 'The Orphan'—Clarence E. Mulford. 'Three Miss Graemes'—S. Macnaughton. 'lrish Neighbors'—Jane Barlow. ' The Child of Chance'—Maxime Formout. 'Florence o' the Orange'—Agnes .mi Egerton Castle. ' Sandy Carmichael'—C. J. Hyne. 'Radford Shone'—Headon Hill. 'Galahad's Garden'—G. B. Burein. 'Three Girlsand a Hermit'—Dorothea, Conyers. 'The Scarlet Runner'—C. N. and A. M. Williamson. 'Old Mr Davenant's Money'—Frances Powell. ' Dr Ellen '—Juliet Wilbor Tompkins. HOW SIX GOOD SELLERS END. "Do you love me?" "I think you may believe it when I 6it i here at four o'clock in the morning listening to a silly boy talk nonsense over a telel phone wire." | " But I want to hear you say so!" I " But, Central | "I tell you Central has other things to do!" | At this juncture the voice of Central, jaded and acidulated, bioke in curtly: "Are you through?" She raised herself in bed triumphant, radiant. '* My soul and my heart," she paid aloud, speaking quickly, "thank God for it all! Ah, good-bye my Hugh! Morning—it is morn;ng!" Dawn had come. A sudden light dawned in Moira'6 eyes. They flashed triumph upon the Hermit. " Then it has been a success after all," she cried. "Oh. I perceive, - ' he said sadly, "that I shall never be able to criticise the wisdom of your idea." But he snuled contentedly. They did not know that half an hour had passed sine* the coming of the quiet step, and the three women, and that the supper was hopelessly ruined. They knew nothing —and eveiything; they had learned the great happiness. * |

The old man clung to them piteonsly; C 'l have waited —waited—waited; but you have come at last."

"Yes." said May, and tho music of her voice satisfied the heart which had waited so vainly and to long. "We have come to you and to each other at last."

" Go down and tell him how noble I am." she commanded. "It wont last. I'll ba nasty again in a week. But lam enjoying my own strength of character just now." Ellen looked at her in wonder. The smile was an honest one; her amazing gaiety was in full possession. "Give me that green book out of my bag before you go," she said, sitting up with energy. " It's about Arizona."