In An Easy Chair.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13828, 13 February 1909, Page 2 (Supplement)

In An Easy Chair.

BOOKS AND WRITERS.

"The Harp of Life" is that fingered by the hands of love. Yolancle Burgoyne is destined for the cloister, but on the eve of taking vows she overhears Richard Herries telling Mother Superior how changed life, had become since he learned that Lucy Gaskell returned his love. She becomes conscious of her own love for David, the brother of Lucy, and nothing can reconcile her to the' -thought of a. conventual life, and eventually she is permitted^to return to the world. All unconscious of the effect of his words, Herries finds, in the death chamber of his mother, that"he is "called" to the Church, apparently to make amends for the robbery he has unwittingly committed, ami Lucy is left with the memory that sometimes "human hearts dream of the Divine Life." The story is simple, and direct, but we are not convinced that the man who had loved so passionately

could turn from the woman who had aroused that passion without a greater struggle than is indicated.

Nothing easier than for a house to acquire the reputation of being haunted, even in the absence of uncanny.manifestations. Dickens shows -us' the children of the street clustering round the keyhole of the Old Curiosity; Shop to look for "the ghost." within a few hours of Quilp's removal of the goods and the desertion of the house. And a. correspondent used to live, in a ; house near the centre of a provincial town, one room of which was believed- by some to be haunted' solely becaivse the iron shutter that closed its window on the street side was never raised. The simple explanation was that this Window was bricked up behind the shutter to secure privacy for the ground-floor room in question a. drawing-room lighted from the garden on the other side. '

"The Terrors of the. Album ".musthave been more general in the middle of the last century than they are, now. The Volume had embossed pnges of various colours, and showed alternate literature and art—original verses and drawings of ruins and bridges heightened with white chalk. Girls presented it for contributions so universally that Charles Dickens was on one occasion much astonished to find none forthcoming. He had actually brought with him some verses addressed to a beautiful maiden, on whose parents he. was calling, and he carried them away again. Sending them to Jjpr by post, he wrote: "I had meant to put these lines into your album, but you, who do nothing like anybody else, did not projduco' one." The letter lies before' me, adds our correspondent, and the gallant verses.

A Loudon paper says:—"lt would be natural to suppose that the book trade this Christmas has been a " house full " affair. Alas, no! It has not been a very prosperous book winter—indeed, the whole book year has not been up to an average —and that" for reasons too numerous to mention here. No doubt the main reason has been the "tightness of money," about which- business people have been complaining for sonic time. Even at this date there are many who regard hooks as luxuries. If they must choose between books and motor-cars, why, they Vplump for the latter luxury. Just think how many books for Christmas gifts could be bought" for the price of a motor-ear—-how many copies of. that ideal Christmas, gift, the People's Edition of Lord Morley's "Gladstone"!

"Together" is less a novel than an exposure of the artificial life of the American moneyed classes. In construction it leaves much 1 to bo desired. The lives'of a number of married couples are narrated at some length, with the result that the reader is remorselessly jerked from household to household; but throughout the hook there is a note of deep earnestness that commands the attention. Mr. Herrick has seen the illusion of the worn-out dictum, "All men are born free and equal, > ho has seen more—that a highly-strung, pleasure-loving wife given to "emotional friendships" with men is scarcely likely to be the mother ol children capable of holding their own in the - struggle for existence. "Together" is a significant book that may be read with profit by English as well as American wives.

In one of his dialogues with Dolly, Carter defines marriage as "a trial: for the man and an opportunity for the woman." Mr. Herrick seems to- have arrived at the so,me conclusion, and- if he has taken some two hundred thousand words to tell us what the cynic convoyed in less than a dozen, it is that we may see for ourselves what he lias seen, and judge as to the justice of his verdict. The marriage of the hero, John,and the heroine, Isabelle, was full of promise; he was destined to become a vice-president of theAtlantie and Pacific Railroad; she a. handsome girl well qualified to rule over lu's household and' assist him in his career. This is the ideal: in point of fact they drifted apart, but eventually out of disaster is born domestic peace. Isabelle sees at last what a wife may become to her husband, and the house is no longer divided against itself.

The tragedy of ! 45 is as romantic a setting as a novelist could well wish, and Aliss Peck has made much of her opportunities. In "The Sword of Dundee" it is Agnes Leslie who saves "Ronnie Prince Charlie" from the bloody hands of the ruthless Cumberland, her adventures coinciding with those of Flora Mac Donald after Culloden. Her devotion to the Prince is that of a subject, and not a, woman. Her love is for Donald Cameron, but she willingly sacrifices all,'even her reputation, in her eagerness to servo the Stuart cause. Her charming and fascinating personality brightens every chapter of the history of the calamity that befell the clans after the short six weeks that followed the Prince's landing in Scotland. The story is weH and sympathetically told, and the period is singularly well realised.