BOOKS AND BOOK-MEN.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume IX, Issue 19, 7 May 1892, Page 474

BOOKS AND BOOK-MEN.

Lord Randolph Churchill’s letters from South Africa to the Daily Graphic have proved a bad speculation. They were paid for at the rate of £2OO per letter, and were certainly conspicuous by the absence of correctness in regard to statements, terseness in style, and general interest. Mr D. C. De Waal, a sturdy burgher and a member of the Cape Parliament, was the travelling companion of Mr Cecil Rhodes duiing the three months spent by the latter in a rapid journey from the Pungwe to Bechuanaland and back to Cape Town. He is at some pains to expose vaiious errors into which Lord Randolph allowed himself to fall. ‘ Mashonaland,’ says Mr De Waal, ‘ is the richest land in South Africa.’ He also says it is a mistake to think that the Cape is English and the Transvaal Dutch ; they are both English Dutch and Dutch-English.

From Fort Salisbury to Fort Victoria there is a broad expanse of magnificent pasture land. The crowning absurdity of Lord Randolph’s letters is his report that this land is devoid of water, and that the grass is sour. The region which he praises is absolutely valueless on account of the presence of a poisonous tulip. Another fatal mistake of Lord Randolph’s was his refusal to accompany Mr Rhodes to the lost city of Zimbabye. This is situated fifteen miles from Fort Victoria, and is certainly one of the most wonderful relics of antiquity in the world. It is described by Mr De Waal as ‘ a great empty city, built round a rock or citadel in the centre of the ruins like the Acropolis at Athens. I should say the circuit of the eity is five miles. It belongs to the Chartered Company, and should prove a goldmine to them.’ There is not a trace of the old population of some 50,000 to 100,000 people. A building as large as the Coliseum at Rome—the Temple of the great Phallus—occupies the centre. The original inhabitants were evidently gold-smelters. There is no doubt that when Mr De Waal finds time to write his book on Mashonaland, from the mateiial which he has already in hand, t>nd from which these notes are taken, he will have a host of willing readers. Just now this part of the world is exceedingly interesting.

Dr. Conan Doyle’s ‘ The White Company’ is pronounced by competent authorities to be equal to some of Sir Walter Scott’s historical novels. It is well and amusingly written, and though the fair sex do not play an important part in its pages, yet there is sufficient mention of them in various guises, from the stately dame to the dainty maiden, to attract every variety of reader. The brave and pugilistic little knight, Sir Nigel Loring, is a favourite from the beginning, and Dr. Conan Doyle has cleverly conserved his identity throughout the story. Another work by this author ‘ A Study in Scarlet,’ is not nearly equal in style to ‘ The White Company,’ but for all that it is very readable. The story is exciting, rather sensational,and introduces a murderer, whoapparently-vanishes from the earth. The description of the founding of Salt Lake City and the Mormon religion is an agreeable change from the account of the murders and the detective’s chase after the perpetrator thereof.

The wife of Count Tolstoi recently had a private interview with the Czar. She desired to call His Majesty’s attention to the severity exercised by the Russian censors respecting her husband's works. The Czar promised to consider her prayer, and an after report has it that he has already issued an order that less criticism shall be put nt work upon the writings of the celebrated novelist.