"GLEN SLOKEN."

Otago Witness, Issue 2695, 8 November 1905, Page 81

"GLEN SLOKEN."

By W. Grant Stevenson.

London and Edinburgh : Sands and Co. Dunedin : Whitcombe and Tombs (Limited). (Is.)

These grey and fragmentary annals of an out-of-the-way Scottish hamlet are far from being the product of vaulting ambition. On the other hand, they embody more genuine impressions of reality than do many others of the writings produced by the school of "Kailyarders. " Effusive pathos and overdone humour are conspicuous by tbeir absence from these pages. The slender sketches are descriptive of village episodes of the most everyday sort — jealousies of the passing hour, mutual rivalries in small things, and the necessary tonic of small gossip and smaller events which, paradoxical though it seems, are the salt and savour of life in small and isolated communities. The collective feminine, and the up-growing offspring, chiefly boys, figure most prominently in the quietly amusing and unpretentious narrative. The men are "slow in the uptak', and canna see a thing afore their nose." It was different with the women, who were all set by the ears by the action of Mrs M'Nab. That lady had the brazen audacity to "gang to the toon an' never let on to a livin' sowl 'at she was gaun to buy a new kilt suit for her laddie Donald. ' ' This lack of confidence was an unpardonable affront, and Donald's appearance at church next day causes riot in the hearts of outraged matrons. The sly proceedings which result in every urchin turning out in new kilts on the following Sunday are described in a auietlv amusing way

that will be best enjoyed by ex-villagers of old Scotia and those who have had opportunities of observing life in such environment. These stolid, unheedful fathers, non-sentimental, practical, and gossipy mothers, and tricky, glib-lying young scamps of boys, for ever hatching mischief, as pictured, are truer types of character than many that have been trumpeted forth with undue insistence during the last few years. The author is a well-known artist, and a member of the Royal Scottish Academy.