ANIMALS IN FICTION.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIC, Issue 13388, 11 September 1907, Page 7

ANIMALS IN FICTION.

Pr.sid<;u ltoosevell (writes "A Mali "I Kent" in tin- "J'ritish Weekly I lias made i|iiii :■ a litllo s-ensation by his severe. mliciiiins 'if American nature writers. H--' is. ~f course, a famous hunter. and clce student of nature. -His chief grievniiks are about tin- way in which volt stork's are handled. Thus Jack London, in his book "Whiff Fang."" i ells the stow of a tight baivuii the nort!H:vi; woif. Whit: - Fang, ami a. bull-dog. 'ill' President observes that iho till.' is imiiossibh'. " Here is a great- wolf of the northern breed, its strength » such "«" with one litroke. ir can hamstring a liors ■ ur pit a. :;eer, and yet it is repiv.se 11 to I as ripping and slashing with long <.-eaiing sirokis again a bull-dug." a bull-dog not much more than a third lis size, and the bulldog which should lie in ribbon,;, keeps 0:1 tMiting. without, any appreciable injury. " 'flu-: thing is the very sublimity of absurdity. In such a light ill? chain. 1 for Ihe dog wouid I).' only oik- in a thousand. its " victory being possible only through g.-tting a' throat grip the instar.t the fight Marted." "Mr Tlimapson Sot-on.' says il * Rooms ve't. "has ma<te' interesting observations of fact, and- much of his iiction has a Iv.ll value. lint he 'shouid make it- clear that it is fiction, and not fact." .Mr Charles (1. D. Rob?rts "fails to consult possibilities in som? of his stone::. Thus he. tails a. story. 'On the "Night Trail.' which describes til:; battle between a- lynx and wolvtG. A man catches- e lynx in a trap, lies it up. puts ir into a b.if, and. swinging it over his shoulder, starts through the wood with his burden. (Tn the way tho man is attacked' by eight wolves that form themselves in a- twceist lit his front. He is armed with an ax.', and-as well as lie cari lie fights ofi his wolf assailants. 11l the crisis in ord r ;;> give, the lynx a- chance for his life the •man .slashes- the sack open, cuts the lynx's bonds, and sets it free. The lynx gocis into the fray with the wolves with -a sortof savage exultation. Several of tli9 wolves receive rsiashes which s-end tlieirt yelping out- of the battle."' ''Now,' says the President, "the tiling is so utterly ridiculous that any man who known the wolf and the lynx loses patience. Real wolves would have made fhreds of a real lynx within a twinkling of the time, th-ey closed in to the attack." Of Stewart Edward White, the President says that he :r> ore wlio knows the forest- and the. mountain and the desert, who puts down what lie sees, and lis ress the truth.