A NOVEL AND SOME STORIES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16277, 9 January 1915, Page 2

A NOVEL AND SOME STORIES.

I. —A NEW MARY JOHNSTONE. Many of Mary Johnstone's admirers will rejoice that iri her latent book, Tlic Witch," she has hied her back to the earlier manner of " The Old Dominion and "By Order of the Company." In comparison with these stories, with which she won the favour of so large and appreciative a public, " Lewis Rand" was counted a failure. Brilliant to a degree as bc.ttle books, " The Long Roll and ''Cease Firing" were in 110 sense stories for popular consumption; whilst " Hagar ' was in the main a piece of special pleading in the interest of woman's suffrage. But in "The Witch" this talented authoress makes direct appeal to her first public, and the story smacks of the fire and the geriiu,-; which distinguished her initial efforts in the Held of fiction. "The Witch" opens with a vivid picture of the death of Good Queen Bess. Thenceforward the storv moves in the times of King James 1, of Bible-revision and of witch-burning fame. Miss Johnstone has a wonderful talent for creating atmosphere, and the reader seems to live and move in what to modern eyes and to modern oars seem curious and wonderful times. The interest of the story centres around Gilbert Adrrhold, a young physician, and Joan Heron, suspectwl re»l. " Th- 1 Witrli," by Mt-rv Johnstone. London: OmetaNc and Co. (3s 63.)

spectively of being sorcerer and witch by the people of the little village of Hawthorn. The superstition born of ignorance and religious bigotry in which this village was steeped is painted bv a master hand; the zeal of the witch judge, summoned to try the suspects is shown in all its ferocity; and the sorry nlight of Gilbert and Joan, caught as hapless mice in a trap, from which there seems no escape, is such as to excite the most inlying compassion. The spirit of those Puritan times stands revealed both in the attraction and repulsion which it successively inspires. After a series of hairbreadth escapes, which alternate betwixt hope and despair for the hapless fugitives, the story ends in a note of gloom and tragedy. It would have been an easy matter to have stopped short at the more popular, h.appy ending; but Mary Johnstone's artistic sense insisted upon hero and heroine drinking the cup to the bitter dregs. Aderhold symbolises the emergence of real religion out of the slough of superstitious despond into which it was in imminent danger of falling; whilst Joan adds just that note of sublime faith which preserves the religious idea from sheer rationalism. Miss Johnstone here gives her public a clever study and an interesting story combined in the one cover, and it deserves, on its intrinsic merits, a wide circulation. lI.—AN OLD GEORGE MOORE. It may reasonably be doubted whether George Moore is known to the rising generation of readers. True, they may have heard of, and have possibly dipped into or 6kimmcd, "Esther Waters" ot "Evelyn Innis," but beyond that lies a blank. The scheme which Air Heinemann has set on foot of reprinting this versatile writer's early work is to be commended, more especially since to each volume is added a "Prefaoe" by the author. George Moore ie the equal of Bernard Shaw in respect of prefaces, whilst both are Irishmen. The latest volume in this reprint series is a collection of short stories depicting the Irish peasant and the Irish priest as thev are and live and move. In the courso of a characteristic and most amusing preface George Moore ascribes to these stories the source of the inspiration of J. M. Synge. Discussing " The Playboy of the Western World," Moore says: "Into an extremely paradoxical story Synge had brought real men and women, and, amazed, we asked each other, How it was that Synge, who had never before shown any sense of form should suddenly become possessed of an exquisite construction?" Somewhat egotistically he adds: " The history of ' The Playboy' was wrapped in unsearchable mystery until I began to read 4 The Untitled Field from this new edition, and found myself thinking that if perchance any of my writings should survive me for a few years, as likely as not it would be these stories. . And as this little vanity dispersed, I became more and more interested, for it seemed to me that I had come upon the source of Synge's inspiration. The Unfilled Field ' was a landmark in AngloIrish literature, a new departure, and Synge could not have passed it by without looking at it." In the same preface Moore amusingly says of Synge:—''lf he hadn't the luck'of the old boy himself in finding a lodging in a house in the hills of Wicklow, that was like as if it was made on purpose for him—a room over the kitchen, with an old broken, boarded floor to it, the wav he could see and hear all that w'asi going on. below and nobody the penny the wiser but himself. Lying flat on his belly, with an ear or an eye to the slits, he took in all that was said and done, and put it down in a bookeen with the stump of a pencil and made a play out of it." Whatever the source of Synge's inspiration, these stories, many of which have a direct relation the one to the other, show George Moore at his best. As medium not only for recreation and amusement, but also' as giving correct insight into the peculiar character and contradiction of the essential Irish, this book is hard to beat.