"FREEMAN OF STAMBOUL"

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22392, 13 October 1934, Page 4

"FREEMAN OF STAMBOUL"

" Freeman of Stamboul: Being the Memoirs of Professor Freeman." With Frontispiece. Sydney: Angus and Robertson. (7s fid.)

A glance at the outside wrapper of " Freeman of Stamboul" reveals a tempting array of sub-titles—Dis-covered de Rougemont in Australia; 4.D.C. to General Gordon in Palestine; Lived with R. L. S. in the South Seas; Travelled with Gypsies in the Levant; Lived with Bedouins and Served on a Slaver; Attempted to Elope with a Mohammedan Girl; Suppressed a Mutiny at Sea: Lived for Six Weeks in a Hollow Tree.- "These arc but a few of the more prominent and exciting adventures related in this book." A more detailed study of the volume can but confirm the expression of the. reader that Mr Freeman is one who has lived a life built of adventures enough for six men. It would be a hopeless task to endeavour to give in the space of a 'few paragraphs even a bare outline of all that the author has experienced. It must be for the reader himself to discover that, and he will have plenty of opportunity to marvel at Freeman's exploits. A chapter pi' more "than usual interest' to' New. Zealaiiders is that'which, recounts experiences in, the Taranaki district in l ' search of oil during the summer of 1893. The account of the manner in which he and several others were duped and finally swindled out o£ a large sum of mouey by two suave Scotsmen, MacPherson and Anderson, provides absorbing reading, the more so because the author makes it quite clear throughout the 21 chapters of his memoirs that he is a clever business man and one who is not easily fooled by the glib tongues of strangers. Yet he lost £IOOO in a neat and wellplanned swindle. Mr Freeman has a racy style and can maintain the ..interest to the last. His writing is colourful and convincing, but he has the unfortunate trait which is so difficult to keep out of autobiographies—he does not hesitate to inform everybody .of his business, capabilities, his success with the opposite sex, and' his generally-superhuman faculties. Such phrases as." •• .and: I ;liave always •heen a lightning thinker,"-" she was passionately in love with me" grate somewhat harshly on the ears of less fortunate mortals who can never hope to be what Mr Freeman is, if we are to believe "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth " of " freeman ofStamboul." G.V.W.