GOOD SIR JOHN.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19107, 27 June 1930, Page 8

GOOD SIR JOHN .

Week-End Books.

Phoebe Gaye ,

By

E. J. BELL.

rjif jis IS THE SECOND HISTORICAL ■*- novef from the pen of Miss Gaye. Last year she gave us that excellent story. "Vivandiere." which attempted to show the Napoleonic campaign in Russia. The chief character in the story is Julie, the . young vivandiere, whose doings we follow with interest, especially the romantic part dealing with her love for a lieutenant of dragoons. This book was a remarkable piece of work considering that Miss Gaye is still in her earliest twenties. The new story, “Good Sir John,” is the life story of Sir John Falstaff, 1343-1413, the notable character in Shakespeare’s plays. Miss Gaye tells us that John was the son of a sullen peasant girl who was employed on the estate of Sir William Falstaff in the North of England. Fourteenth Century England with its lords and ladies passes before us. We are told: There is gold in the dinner service and golden goblets to drink from in the King’s Palace. But there is never much gold in his exchequer, for most of the gold has gone, in a long and glittering stream, into the coffers of the Pope. The boy, John, grows up, he lives in a dark and dirty hovel, and at night human beings and pigs are. herded together inside. At five years of age he was a fat and rough boy, and very soon after this was left an orphan, the Black Death being responsible for this. We next find him living with a band of monks, but not in sympathy with them: in fact he became a serious problem to the good brothers at Selby. Ere long he returns to the home of the Falstaffs where he settled down as if he had been born and bred in the place. He was fond of all sorts of tricks, he was a true bully and managed to give his halfbrother a bad time. Later on, John joins Sir John Mowbray and embarks for France with the Black Prince. On the way over there is a scene on the vessel and more trouble for the lad. From the battlefields of France this young rascal returns to London, and we find him flirting with ladies, married and unmarried. Back again in France, young William Falstaff gets killed after acting rather gallantly, and John, who was drunk, gets the credit and is knighted by John of Gaunt. Now he goes the pace still more and becomes a fat, drunken rascal whose face was familiar at every tavern on the road. Miss Gaye’s description of Sir John is not a pretty one: “Fat surrounded him on all sides. . . . His cheeks, now blotched and scarlet, hung looped like curtains upon a stage, drawn apart sufficiently to disclose the vulgar tableau of his nose and mouth. His eyes, hedged in between frosty brows and ruddy cheeks, seemed craftier than ever.” Old age now creeps on and death approaches this old villiain. Interesting figures of history pass before our gaze and we come to the end of this story, a story full of vivid scenes admirably describedSuspect. Gerald Fairlie. p'OR those who love adventure and thrills let me recommend this new story by Gerald Fairlie. On his first flight an aviator is forced down by engine trouble. .He gets the engine going again and rises quickly into the air. Upon looking round he discovers that he has a lady passenger in the machine. How did she get there? Who is she? The reader will find the answers to these questions by reading the book, which is full of thrills from beginning to end.