IN BOOKLAND

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 8 December 1928, Page 16

IN BOOKLAND

A .book of sporting verse called “A Handful of Heather,” by Air Will A. Oigilvie, and illustrated -by Air Lionel Edwards, is announced by Constable.

Mis® Bose Browne, the daughter of “Roilf B'Oldreiwo-od, ’’ author of “Robbery Under Arms’’ and other Australian .novels, has learned thaft her book, “Reminiscences of Rolf BoMrcwood, ’ ’ has been accepted b\ r Hiutchmeoii. 'The volume, which will be illustrated, will be published early in March.

“Daisy, Princess of Pless,” by herself, which Air Murray announces, is Colonel Cornwallis-West’s elder daughter’s reminiscences of one of the most interesting and varied lives ever lived by a .woman. The Princess’ book, which ends dramatically in. November, I9IS, covers 25 yeaTs immediately preceding the Great War, and has tihe merit of being founded on her personal diaries and on, letters 1 she- has- written ■and received.

From ‘ ‘ Reminiscences of an Old Civil Servant,” by Sir John Arrow Kempe: Queen Victoria, used to, fix the order of the K.C.B. on the chest of the recipient with a safety pin. On one occasion the honour was given to. an Indian. Rajah, clad in a tight-fitting golden gown. Her Majesty, in pinning on. the Order, took up a fold of his skin with the garment, and ran the pin through it. The Rajah had the nerve to make no sign until he got out of the presence, chamber, when he promptly fainted.

Miss Beatrice Grimshaw has finished, a new story of the Pacific, “The Paradise Poacher's, ’ ’ and it will appear with Hurst and Blackett.

Air Edgar Rice Burroughs has written. another Turzau story, “Ta'rzam., Loud of the Jungle,’ ’and it is announced by Cassell.

Aliss Helen Waddell has received the A. C. Benson medal awarded .by the Royal Society of Literature for her book. “Wandering Scholars.” The author, who is the daughter of U Presbyterian clergyman, is the firs k. 'woman tto receive this distinction. „

J. K. McDowall, secretary of tihe Scottish Football Association, whose death was announced recently, was well known in literary as well as sporting circles. His “People’s History of Glasgow,” written in 1900, very popular. He was an authority on Burns, and an enthusiastic collector of stamps and coins.

“The E-ariy Life and Letters” of Walter Hines Paige, formerly American. Ambassador in London, shortly to .be published by Heimemamn, deal with 'his achievements in the literary world as an editor and publisher.

Early next year “The Plays of J. AI. Barrio,” collected in a single volume, will be published. ,

Sir Almeric Fitzroy’s “History of the Privy Council” is to be -issued. The author, who was for many years clerk, of the Privy Council, enlivens, his book with curious episodes from the Council records.

Alargarct Kennedy, the authoress of “The Constant Nymph,” is engaged on another novel in her Cumberland home. In private life she is Mrs Davies, the wife of a barrister who was formerly Lord Ixford’s private secretary.

Dr Robert Bridges, the Poet Laureate, is finally revising what is said to be his most important long poem. Dr Bridges is in. his Ssth year.

A tale of the old ‘ : wrecking days ’ ’ in Cornwall is told 'by Sir John, Arrow Kempe in his ‘ ‘ Reminiscences of ain. olid Old Civil Servant”: The Rev. R. S. Hawker, author of “Asad Shall Trelawney Die,” who used to shock his congregation by appearing in lobster-col-oured garments, was preaeMng one Sunday alt Mcxrwenstow, when a man put his head in ait the door and. called out “Wreck!” The .congregation immediately sprang up. Hawker raised his voice to stop them, came down from the pulpit, and went .to the door. Tucking .up his brown Armenian cassock, and calling out, “Now we’ll start fair,” he set off .running to the scene of the wreck, to. keep his wild congregation in order.

Here is the author of “The Jungle ’ ’ as Mr Bloyd Dell presents him in “Upton Sinclair: A Study in Socialist Protest’’: Most of Upborn Sinclair’s personality is expressed in Ms social-revolu-tionary interests and activities. Upton Sinclair, “the person,’ ’aside from these activities, is a slight, wiry, greying figure, an, early riser and hard worker, keeping one or two stenographers busy aid day; an excellent' tennis player, an eager talker; self described as easily ‘bored, naive and impersonal; dealing with “.griefs, troubles and failures ’ ’ by putting them into the ibook he is writing; sometimes sceptically interested in spiritistic phenomena. . . . . wearing the cast-off clothes of a rich young friend, precisely as when he was •17 and living on £l/2/6 a week; always in debt, never hesitating to borrow money for some project which he regards as far the benefit of humanity; always hopeful of enormous success in each new project, each new book; very boyish, impulsive, trustful, stubborn; fondly regarded as impractical by those who love him.

A bronze plaque with Celtic border, erected at Krnmaird Cottage, near Pitlochry, was unveiled recently to commemorate the residence there of Robert Louis Stevenson in 1881. It was there he wrote some of his most famous short stories, “Thrown Janet” and the “Merry Men” being among them. Professor Blyith Webster, of Sit: Andrew’s University, in performing the. unveiling ceremony, said that at Kinnaird. Cottage Stevenson found ideal natural surroundings. The stories lie had. written there gave him mastery, and admitted him to familiar company—to Wandering Willie, to Tam o f Shanter. Were they not right to. set up a memorial to him where lie first used the vernacular and claimed Ms kin?