PAN THE ETERNAL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19292, 3 April 1926, Page 7 (Supplement)

PAN THE ETERNAL.

STEPHEN MCKENNA'S LATEST. "Why has the devil a cloven hoof ?" asked Professoi" Shapland at the dinnertable of the great. country house, Natoby, in the new tenant, a rich American, had gathered together a distinguished party, to celebrate " a real old-fashioned Christmas." But the guests, for the most part the restless, sceptical, questing type produced by war and postwar conditions, are out of tune with the serene certitudes of Christianity, and prepared to sell their souls for a now sensation. This they hope to find in a return to Nature, to Arcady and the piping of the great God Pan. The party divide on i the question of the desirability of such a return, and as the voting is taken, a blinding glare dazzles their eyes. Lord Escott's car dashes up to the door and the notorious " Pbnch" Escott enters, accompanied by pn uninvited,' but very charming guest, iVlr. Stranger. Tlio subsequent return to Nature and the. part played ir it by Stranger are described with frankness and at some I iigth; and the rejder as he ends the book can feel no doubt either that the author is on the side of the angels or that he has solved the problem set by the Professor in the opening sentence. The book is cleverly written, but was it worth writing at all ?