NEWS AND NOTES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14103, 3 July 1909, Page 4 (Supplement)

NEWS AND NOTES.

A shilling edition cf Mr. and Mrs. Williamson's most popular.'. novel, " The Lightning Conductor,"'., is to be published ; atthe end; of this month ; by Messrs. - Metbuen. -;-:_. Sir Arthur P. Douglas, who has long resided in New Zealand, ris the author of a volume on the Dominion whit.-h will shortly appear in Pitman's All Red' series. T Messrs. Duckworth, of London, announce for immediate .".' publication ; a new volume, which is of special interest to Aucklanders;- viz., a further Fairyland incursion by Mies Aimeeßrightj illustrated by Harry -Rountree. ; Miss B. E. Baughan,!.who recently published her third volume of poems in this count : was one of the earliest poets of Royal Holloway College,one of the largest intern ,college« in England, which "was declared open by ' Queen Victoria in 1886." It is unlikely that Mr. Meredith will have left anything in the : way of , autobiography, s for that idea * would not have appealed" to him. ; But in his correspondence, if he : preserved it, '% there should be the contents '■ of \ a brilliant i and " valuable book. ; v '■;'■;•..:■" /-, . ■> ■:■'■'-'' :: \ :, "\ ' Three American novelists, Mrs. Margaret -bcland,.- Dr. Weir Mitchell, arid Mr. Owen Wister, '. arc writing stories on the superstition of 13 at;table—the superstition that if 13 sit down' one, will die within a year. The stories are. to f appear successively in the; - Century, - unsigned ■{.- in ■ •'■ each», case,- so that readers may .guess at the identity of each -,; author. :: Perhaps Mrs. ;, Deland,.; Dr.; Mitchell, and Mr. Wister, who, presumably, are not superstitious, know that there was at one time a Thirteen Club in London. ■: With > a- ■ novel .which Mr. Umvin ; announces,; Mr. de Vese Stacpoolej quite one of our best writers of fiction, will complete ia trilogy of books dealing with the »,tropics and the' East. "The Crimson Azaleas" was the s first of these, "The Blue Lagoon" the secondhand the third, not less happy in its title, is called "The Pools of Silence." ; In the first two stories-Mr. Stacpoole brings I Japan and Polynesia to Europe, with a poetical truth suggestive of Loti. In "* The | Pools of Silence" he does the same for | CentralTwo Australian writers, Mr. Albert Dorrington and Mr. A. G. "Stephens, collaborate ; in a novel which Messrs. Mills * and Boon announce. Mr. Dorrington is now in England ■ pursuing literature, and finding at least the little oatmeal. Mr. Stephens has been in the Old Country, and he edited a (capital anthology ,ot Australian verse. They christen this story. by a name which there will be no mistaking, ''The; Lady Calphurnia Royal." She is the widow cf a ! pasha shot m a duel in the Bois de Bou iogne, the scene with which the story opens, ' The conclusion is in Queensland— a long i jump but then it is a long story. ! * It would seem that Mr. Hall Caine's new I story, "The White Prophet," is to be pubI lished' at 3s 6d in cloth:and 2s 6d in paper '■ covers, "This may or may not prove :an | important new departure," says Dr. Robertson Nicoll, who announces it in the British Weeklv. " Mr. Hall Caine," he adds, i "claims, I believe, ;to have destroyed . the ! 31s 6d novel, and he is now aiming at destroying the 6s novel.";; If Mr. Caine makes the claim here mentioned,, it must be based on the fact that his " Manxman" was published at 6s in 1894, shortly after, the circulating libraries issued their famous ukase ion the " three-volumer." But really there ' had been; many 6s novels in one volume before then. , r Posterity's liistorian of our modem wars is likely t to suffer from an, embarrassing richness of ; material. -The number of books written by combatants in the South African war was amazing; arid now it seem6-likely to be rivalled by the library of Russian accounts of the struggle in the Far East. A few days ago General Kuropatkin's remarkable memoirs, suppressed .in Russia, were published in English; Some time before we had the narrative in which the late M. Eugene Politvosky, chief engineer in Admiral Rojdestvensky's squadron, described the voyage:"' From Libau* to; Tsushima." ; Of the battle, fruitful iri lessons of. naval tactics, Captain Semenoff has given us an account. The land operations in the siege of Port Arthur have been depicted by M. Nojiue. Now' one of the few remaining gaps in the story is to ,be filled by a book which tells of ; the naval warfare about Port Arthur and the dispersal of the Russian fleet by the Japanese on its attempt to escape to.Vladivostok. Captain Semenoff is again the author, and the value of his well-known account of Tsu-Shima is the best* recommendation :for the new book. "Rasplata" is'its title, which means "the reckoning" or " paying the score." ;It is in substance an. officer's diary during the blockade of Port Arthur and trie stages of Admiral Rojdeetvensky's voyage.;. When the Russian fleet made its ill-fated sally and was dispersed, Captain Semenoff's ship, the Diana, was much damaged,: but : contrived to .escape;^ to the southward, arid made Saigon in safety. Hurrying home from Saigon, Captain Semenoff arrived just in time <to sail with Admiral. Rojdestven.sky round the Cape and take part in the final battle.; . ;. ' ' . Closer Union :By Olive Schreiner. A. C; Fifield, 44,, Fleet-street, London.— Schreiner, the ■ famous sister of the Premier of Cape Colony during the Boer War, has been silent for long, but indicted this eloquent " letter on the ."-. South .African Union, and the Principles of Government" ;to'* a Transvaal journal in advocacy of the cause, of : Federation, . and against Unification. The question is of comparatively little, interest in our Australasian communities, where all'■• political divisions are merely "political conveniences, but ■it has great meaning -in ; South Africa, > where there . are not only diverse European nationalities, but opposing and ?. alien races. Olive. Schreiner attempts to outline the conditions essential to absolute justice between all these provinces, colonies,.nationalities, races, ; factions,, and phases obviously impossible ; task. But with all its necessary; inconsistencies, paradoxes, and contradictions, . the little : book >is .worth reading by v all who admire fine English and appreciate earnestness.