Page 6 Advertisements Column 2

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIV, Issue 8916, 3 December 1887, Page 6

ANNOUNCEMENT. APPROACHING NEWSPAPER PUBLICATION Of an original story by WALTER BESANT, The originator of the People's Palace for East London and the most popular British Novelist of the day. ( We are pleased at being able to announce to onr readers that, by special arrangement with tins author, ( the new story upon which Walter Besant is now engaged has been secured for original publication in the columns of the NEW ZEALAND HERALD. We are sure that our having secured the right to > publish a new work by so distinguished and popular a novelist will bo fully appreciated by our subscribers, who we trust will give the annoucement the widest possible publicity, and while extending the Naw Zealand Hkiiald's circulation, have the gratification, at tho story progresses from week to week, of comparing notes with their friends upon the characters and incidents brought before them by one of the highest intellects in the world of this class of literature, The title of the forthcoming story Is "H ERR pAULUS: HIS RISE, HIS GREATNESS, AND HIS FALLS," BY WALTER BESANT, Author of " All' Sorts and Conditions of Men." The opening instalment will appear in the NEW ZEALAND HERALD ON SATURDAY, DECEMBER 31, Personally WALTER BESANT, of whom a portrait appears abeve, is charming. He is genial, frank, kind-hearted, and helpful. His wide range of subjects makes him an admirable conversationalist, and besides !>eing & scholar, he is a travelled (englishman. Broad, shouldered, he has a distinguished carriage and manner. He was educated at. King's College, London, from whence he proceeded to Cambiidge and graduated Master of Arts with high mathematical honour*. Subsequently he occupied a Professor's chair in the Royal College, Mauritius. His literary partnership with James Rico produced in ten years more than a dozen novels and two plays, the names of which have become "familiar to our ears as household words." Besant';« best-known story, perhaps, is " All Sorts and Conditions of Men." which has already appeared in the columns of the Nkw Zeal.nd Hkrald and which is popularly believed to have resulted in the erection of the People's Palace for East London, recently opened by Her Majesty the Queen, the foundation stone having been laid a year before by the Prince of Wales. The author describes " Herr Paulas" as a story of modern life and manners. It treats of the rise, the greatness, and the fall of an adventurer, who will coma to London in order to trade on the crtdullty of the circle which live among3t Spiritualists, Mediums, Esoteric Buddhists, Occult Philosophers, Thought Readers, and so forth. He does so, performing feats which far surpass anything previously achieved, even by the most pretentious of charlatans. How these feats are accomplished the reader partly understands from the outset. How his purpose changes, and from an unscrupulous adventurer, pretending to supernatural powers, he descends to common earth again— how he confers the greatest benefits upon the family which receives him, and wins tue friendship even of those most hostile and suspicions of him, and how he finally departs, carrying with him the forgiveness and the sympathy of all—including the reader—will be discovered in the progress of the story, which Is full of incident and surprises. "H ERR P A Lu s " May be depended upon to afford a splendid literary treat. Few Novelists of modern times can compare with Walter Besant in the ability to write a really good, well conceived, boldly constructed, and admirably workeu-out story. His literary gifts are unique, and as the result of his vigorous fancy, brilliant style, and careful attention to detail in all that concerns his stories, we have a series of volumes which have built up for htm a strong and enduring popularity. WALTER BES ANT'S NEW STORY Will appear In the NEW ZEALAND HERALD COMMENCING SATURDAY, DECEMBER 31. RECENT PRESS OPINIONS. WALTER BESANT-A CELEBRITY AT HOME. "To the people Mr. Besant has just secured a palace ; he himself is content to reside in an unassuming semidetached villa. He is a stea iy, persistent writer, working every day, and always has a novel in progress or under consideration. A row of works on magic and mystery on the table have reference to the story which he is just finishing for publication in the newspapers.'' —The World. THE PEOPLE'S PALACE. " Seldom, indeed, h«s it fallen to the lot of a novelist to see the ideas sketched with a vivid imagination in his romances become realised in fact. Yet this is the happy fate of Mr. Walter Besaat. There can be no doubt that the People's Palace is largely due to the 1. fluence of that thoughtful and delightful book, ' All Sorts and Conditions of Men.' " Nonconformist and Independent. '' The pen is mightier than the sword aye, for the aword destroys. And spreads red tuin through the land and crushes hopes and joys; But what the well-directed pen can do the world's been taught, Since first the People's Palace rose, based on an author's thought."—London Figaro. THE WORLD WENT VERY WELL THEN. " A very powerful and fascinating romance."—The Literary World. " All the world reads Mr. Besant's books.''—Manchester Examiner. " One ol the pleasante.it of recent novels."—Court and Society Review. " Has much of the movement and rigour which one has learned to expect from the author."—Academy. "His books strike us as models of what novels ought to be. The story is powerful, pathetic, and original."—Saturday Review. "A racy and (setting tale, as well as another proof of its writer's rare versatility. The work ds.-erves to be read."Morning Post. " Mr. Besant's romances have fire readers to-day to any other novelist's one. Great tenderness and sweetness in his heroines is Mr. Besant's special forte."— New York Times. " The best romance which the author has produced since be began to work alone. We advise everybody who can enjoy a thoroughly good romance to read this one."Pictorial World. " Mr. Besant never produces a novel which is not warmly welcomed by all thoughtful readers. It is worthy to rank with the foromost works of the best British novelists."Scotsman. "In these days of sentimental, realistic, a-id school-girl novels, what greater compliment can be paid to a writer than to say he has produced a novel that is thoroughly pure, manly, and English Pall Mall Gazette. " Will certainly be classed among tho most imaginative, and we are inclined to think that it is also entitled to take rank as the most original of the now long series of works with which his bnsy pen has enriched our modern library of fiction." News. " Mr. Besant wields the wand of a wizard ; let him wave it in whatever direction he will i.e summons us as irresistibly to follow him to the v»nlshed world of sea-fights. crimps, press-gangs, fighting sea-dog.-, and yarns of the dead days of naval glory and slaughter, an when he toon us among the hopeless toilers, or built, Aladdin-like, a Palace of Delltht wherein the poor might walk with smiles at leisure." —Spectator. "Probably his best work. Full of striking adventure, and of admirable study of character. It has humour and pathos and delicate sentiment, but the tone is healthy ami manly throughout. Of the adventures It is difficult to say whether those by sea or those on land are the more exciting. Whether Mr. iteiant takes his readers to the Southern tea« or along shoro at Deptford or wapping, he c-tn always make them feel that the things he describes are real, and can quicken the pulso —Athenaeum. WALTER BESANT'S SPLENDID NEW STORY KNUTLBD "H ERR p AULus = HIS RISE, HIS GREATNESS, AND HIS FALL," COMMSNOEB ORIGINAL PUBLICATION In the NEW ZEALAND HERALD ON I SATURDAY. DECEMBER 31.