The Bookshelf.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLIII, Issue 11, 15 September 1909, Page 46

The Bookshelf.

By

DELTA.

BOOKSHELF NOTES AND COMMENTS. THERE can be no greater argument shown in favour of an education in which the humanities play a leading part than is evidenced by so many members of the learned profession, and especially the members of the legal profession, turning to the gentler art of literature as a relief, either from the barrenness of the harvest which the legal profession yields to less fortunate individuals of her harvesters, or as a solatium to the sterner labours of the law. Sir Charles Darling, who has been judge of the King’s Bench Division of the High Court of Justice since 1897, and Conservative member for Deptford from 1888 to 1897, is one of the latter individuals, and while choosing literature as a recreation has elevated it to a high art. From time immemorial evidence has existed that the most successful members of the legal profession have been men of ready wit, infinite resource and executive ability, who were often better acquainted with the Greek classics than with English literature. But seldom, indeed, do we find learned judges unbending to the extent shown in the extremely vivacious verses appended below, entitled “ The Print Shop.” and included in a little book of verses which bears the somewhat infelicitous title of “On the Oxford Circuit.” Estampe galante. I’st so you name This somewhat free and easy etching, Of mondain Abbe, sprightly Dame, And Cupid at his bowstring stretching? Monsieur, who leans the hand to kiss Of Madame, at her toilette sitting, Affection she affects to miss— La mere, who bends intent on knitting. "L’Escarpolette.” How indiscreet, The French might say —we English, shocking— To swing, till slippers fly from feet, In skirts that show such length of stocking. “Lc billet doux”-—a motif trite— All see the subtly hidden letter, The ink, too, is a trifle light, Before the fleuron it were better. The coloured plate, by young Le Prince, That shepherd, Diane’s nymphs alarming— ■ Where Jaminet improves Lawrince Beauvarlet, after Boucher, charming! Other of this brilliantly facetious writer’s publications are “Scintillae Juris,” “Meditations of the Tea-room,” and “Seria Liido.” Apropos of the many books that have for their theme the failure of marriage and the faults of the marriage law as it now stands, we reprint, as echoing our own views, an excerpt which has been taken from “The Cage,” Mr. Harold Begbie’s latest novel, and which we shall review fully in a later issue. Mr. Begbie cays: —“Marriage has given woman her position of honour and respect. To preserve that position is essential. Likq music, woman either exalts man or degrades him. . . . Civilisation is the work of men, but it is in the hands of women. . . . . I believe that discipline is more essential than gratification. . . . Isn’t it possible to exaggerate the wretchedness and to attribute to marriage the misery which is really due to quite different causes’ You spoke about people tied to each other in one house. In the words of Miss Potter, They did it themed ves! That remark of hers can be developed. I don’t believe that any difference can be irreconcilable between a man and a woman who have been married. They may make it so, but in fact it is not. It is inconceivable that any feud should be everlasting and hopeless between two people who have been man and wife. There must be somewhere, on one side or the other, the materials for a good understanding. Then the question follows, Is it better for them that they ehould fly asunder and follow their own inclinations wherever they lead, or that they set themselves to fulfil their vows, practice forbearance, seek points of agreement, and make the best of each other?” A new book by Lucas Malet, daughter Of Charles Kingsley, and author of "The

Wages of Sin,” etc, her father’s favourite aphorism, is announced as shortly to be issued, and is entitled “The Score.” That delightful, if seriously disposed writer, writing under the nom de guerre of “Alien,” is giving, in “The Red Funnel,” a sketch or interview with some popular author. In one of the recent numbers we noticed one of Mr. Tom Gallon. Now, Mr. Tom Gallon, ever since we read his “Christmas at Poverty Castle,” has been a very special favourite of ours. To begin with, he reminded us of Dickens, and that was passport enough to entitle him to our regard. Afterwards, we liked him for himself. Alien went to call upon him at his home in St. John’s Wood, where he and Miss Gallon, his sister, have pitched their tents together. At fourteen he began to earn his own living in a business house in a poor part of London. Afterwards he acted in the respective capacities of clerk, usher in a private school, and private secretary. His health breaking down, and with but £5 in the world, he started out on a walking tour through England in search of health, and under these circumstances wrote “Tatterley.” With “Tatterley” he arrived, and at least the bugbear of poverty, though it has provided him with experience, has ceased to fetter his ambitions and his real vocation. But, though popular as a writer of humanitarian novels, he has discovered that “the play’s the thing,” and no author in England to-day is more s'ought after as a playwright. If looks count for anything, a recent portrait of him in “The Bookman” shows him to be, if gentle in spirit and strenuous in warm, human feeling, decidedly frail in physique. New Zealand Writers. The inquiry so often and so invidiously made of late as to whether there is such a thing as a New Zealand school of writers has, we think, been satisfactorily demonstrated by Mrs. Searle Grossmann in a splendid address delivered by her before the Lyceum Club in London. The Lyceum, as no doubt a great many of our readers know, is a woman’s club, whose membership includes nearly every woman artist of note hailing from the colonies, who find this club invaluable, as, in addition to the ordinary privileges of membership, it undertakes to place upon the market the wares of those colonial writers who, primarily because the sale of their work in the colonial market is restricted, seek a wider outlet. Mrs. Grossmann, though not, Sve believe, eolonialljf-born, has, since her residence in New Zealand, on every possible occasion used her pen, which is an uncommonly versatile one, in unstinting praise of New Zealand, its people, and its institutions. And though we do not wholly agree with Mrs. Grossmann as to the merits of some of the poets whose work she eulogises, we feel sure that whatever doubt has hitherto existed in the minds of honest inquirers as to whether a school of New Zealand writers exists, it will be effectually dispelled. For Mrs. Grossmann has made out an exceedingly good case indeed. While regretting that the length of the address makes it impossible to insert it in full, we append at least the cream of a paper that is more than ordinarily interesting on account of its local application. In presenting her address, Mrs. Grossmann said: — The subject of “New Zealand Writers” has not been fully introduced to the British public, although a very slight sketch was published this February in “Cassells’ Magazine.” If we are to find appreciation and encouragement anywhere, we know it will be amongst Imperialists. Their leagues and societies show such generous hospitality personally to colonials, and have such a strong sense of the newer, saner meaning of an Empire of peace, that they cannot fail to extend their generosity to the infant literature of the Dominion. There will in time be a nation, and there will be literature at the antipodes. Anti-Im-perialists are doing their best to make both, while in their plastic stage, hostile to England by carping criticism, but against their attacks we have to set the untiring efforts of Imperialists to promote fellowship and . to strengthen the natural bonds of race. But even friends may ask whethet* there is anything like a school of New

Zealand writers. There is only an infant at present, but the infant is alive and its life is its own. In deciding whether a country has a national literature there is one test: Could its writings have been produced in any other country, or have they some vital connection with the land and its story? The distinctive marks of New Zealand verse and prose are the enthusiasm for progress and the desire of reform, especially notable in the Utopias and in a good many of the poems. Next there is the New Zealander’s love of Nature, which is quite different from anything found in twentieth century English literature. It is not simply that we get tussock, fern, raupo, tui, and bellbird instead of the English oak and ash and ivy, nightingale and swallow. There is a special New Zealand sentiment between poet and earth. Nature dominates man and man conquers Nature alternately. Nature seems vaster than man, and yet he is subduing it. The New Zealander’s love is still something of the conqueror’s and the fighter’s. And the rapture of discovery is in it. Amongst the first generation we get an intense sensation of exile, but that is already passing aw’ay, and the native-born colonials have as sincere and deep-rooted a feeling of patriotism towards the island Dominion as their forefathers had for England or Scotland. Another “distinction” is that there is less art and more Nature. More spontaneity and less polish. The literary work has the freshness of all new things; it suggests spring, open spaces, youth, and the continual outlook into the future; English poetry is autumnal, and suggests shadows and seclusion and antiquity; it is contemplative, while the colonial is more emotional and active. But in spite of these differences, there is a most noticeable continuity with English (and especially with older English) literature. This is not the case in Australia, where amongst the non-imi-tative group there has. been a violent breaking away, whereas in New Zealand there is a gradual moving off from the common origin. Australian w’riters are un-English; that is scarcely ever true of the New Zealanders. This resemblance is not due so much to imitation as to the fact of many similarities, especially in the important matter of climate and the insular character, as contrasted with the continental character. Australia up to the present is ahead' of the Dominion in the development of a distinct art and literature. The speciality of New Zealand has been the building up of a new social system. Its best poet. Jessie Mackay, is an ardent Socialist, a moderate Feminist, and a Prohibitionist. Besides this drain upon its energies, the fact that there are four small centres, each equally absorbed in its own local interests instead of one predominant centre, makes it exceedingly difficult for a local poet or novelist to get any publicity. Then even within the Dominion local writers have to compete with a large mass of English books imported every season, with all the

prestige of London publication. The result is that there is not a single professional author of any kind—novelist, poet, or scientist, or historian. There is just one compensation—books are written for the love of writing;; nothing is manufactured to suit demands; the authors “simply pipe because they must.” The best representative of New Zealand’s infant literature is its poetry. But it must be remembered that it comes out of a simpler phase of life than is possible in England. Some of the best is more like folk songs than like the elaborate work of scholars. It is not necessarily a failure because it is different from the poems of Mr. Austin Dobson or of Mr. Stephen Phillips. It does not belong to the same class, and it would be absurd to compare the two merely as inferior and superior. Some of our poets are inclined at their worst to run off into versified prose, an occasional tendency of Thomas Bracken’s. But some of them are travelled and cultured men and women, and the standard of education in the Dominion is remarkably high. The earliest noticeable poem is Domett’s “Ranolf and Amohia,” a lengthy narrative. Browning called it “a great and astonishing performance of very varied beauty and power,” and Tennyson found in it, “intellectual subtlety, great power of delineating delicious scenery and imaginative fire.” As a very large specimen of poetic topography. “Ranolf and Amohia” is excellent. It is the sort of book you enjoy reading when you are on the spot described, and never think of reading at any other time. It is the work of a colonist, not of a born colonial, and represents a preliminary stage. Thomas Bracken was a colonial by nature, and he is still the most popular of our New Zealand poets. He versified simple human feelings in an unaffected and matter-of-fact style, which, easily pleased a democratic public of traders, miners, shearers, and artisans. His best known poem is “Not Understood,” the gist of which is in the last verse— Oh, God! that men would see a little clearer, Or judge less harshly where they cannot see; Oh, God! that men would draw a little nearer To one another. They’d be nearer Thee, And understood. “Sturt’s Last Letter” is on a pioneer’s theme, and is especially appropriate to this subject, if you will rank amongst other unrewarded pioneers those of colonial literature. Do heroes always wear the crown they’ve won? Do honours always wait for pioneers Who brave the Arctic snows and tropic sun. To earn out greatness for the future years?

i ‘The same theme is treated, though »ery differently, by Miss Jessie Mackay, in “The Gray Company.” In •‘The March of Te Rauparaha” Bracken reached his highest level, and it is also one of the best pieces of Anglo-Maori poetry that we possess. iMoan the waves as they wash Tainui, Moan the waters of dark Kawhia, Moan the winds as they sweep the gorges, Wafting the sad laments and wailings Of the spirits that haunt the mountains; - Warrior souls, whose skeletons slumber Down in the caverns lonely and dreary, Under the feet of the fierce volcano, ■Under the slopes of the Awaroa. The war chant has something of a Maori ring, but. unfortunately, the Red Indian, who got into literature before the time of the Maori, is always being thrust into every representation of our native race. New Zealand has given birth to one Singer, who is now taking her rightful place throughout Australasia—Miss Jessie Mackay. Her verse may have faults, may be unequal, but it has pure lyrical inspiration, and very few poets in or out of New Zealand have that. You do not know where the fancy and the music come from, nor where they will go, nor what they will touch on, but they stir and penetrate like a passing wind or a perfume, like the song of a bird. There is the same rare quality, not to be analysed or grasped, that there is in Christina Rossetti’s lyrics, though Miss Maekay is more simple and less polished. It makes her poetry quite apart from anything to be found in Domett or Bracken. ■ Take the poem which she calls “A Folk Song.” The name is suggestive, because her best lyrics have the qualities of the truest and loveliest folk songs of Scotland and Of Germany. I came to your town, my love, And you were away, away; I said she is with the pal e white saints, And they tarry Iqng to pray. Or take the childlike and antique simplicity, blent with reflection, in the "Heart of Mary”: — Mystery, mystery! Dove upon love! When the rose of high Heaven Came down from above. (He drew not the Levite Nor lord by his grace; And Mary, the sinner, Was given the place. No kingdom, my Lord, But the greatly forgiven, Who begs but to serve When the good ask for Heaven. “For Dove of Appin” is one of the most sincere and heartfelt poems of texile in the language, and it comes naturally from one of the “far-wandered” Mackays, who, as another song of hers tells us, were “reft away” from Strathnaver. It is as if some austere Covenanter had told his heart out in these lines: But it’s O for hame and Appin; The heather hills o’ Appin! The thousand years o’ Appin, where the leal men lie! The bairns will tak’ a root By the mighty mountain foot; But we, we canna sever; It’s no for us whatever; We hear.nae earthly singing, But it sets Dochaber ringing, An’ we’ll never smile again I’ the sunlight or the rain Till our feet are on the lang east trail — The siller road to Appin; East awa’ to Appin— The siller Toad to Appin, runnin’ a’ the way to God. But though Miss Mackay’s imagination goes to the land of her forefathers, she belongs also to the New World and shares its energies, activities and its hope Of the future. Miss Mary Colborne Veel is of all our Colonial poets the nearest to England in feeling and the most correct and polished in style. Though bom in the Dominion, she is at heart an exile from England, and one of her finest poems is Emigrant,” with its refrain:— .In an English lane > Where the primrose patches blow, MAnd the sweet spring rain j Mangs jewels high and low.

Dora Wilcox stands between the Old and the New Worlds in divid'd moods, looking by turn each way. If you want the new, ardent optimism and the suffering spirit of the pioneers you. will find it in Miss Mackay, but if you want the feeling and colour of our plains and hills, and especially of Banks Peninsula, it is truest in Miss Wilcox’s verse, as, for example, in “The Dast of the Forest”: — Hast thou not heard, O white man, through a troubled dreaming, On some still night, when all th l world lay stark, Sharp through the silence, moaning by the sea, and screaming Of night-birds in the dark? Mr. Reeves, as a poet, combines English culture and a knowledge of English modes with an appreciation of New Zealand and its task. Of “New Zealand” he sings: — God girt her about with the surges, And the winds of the masterless dep, Whose tumult uprouses and urges Quick billows to sparkle and leap. Mary Richmond belongs to the same class as Mary Veel, and is as completely English as if she had never been in the colony. Arthur Adams, on the other hand, belongs wholly to New Zealand, and is in exile anywhere else. Mis dominant note is patriotism. A number of New Zealand poets are mentioned, but Mrs. Grossmann considers them so nearly equal tha t it would be invidious to single out which should rank highest. But she specially eulogises Miss Baughan’s “Shingle Short,” Mrs. Glenny W’ilson, Johannes Andersen, Professor Wall, and Herbert Church. The Maori as a prose theme has found its most realistic exponent in Judge Maning’s account of Hone Heke’s war; in Mr. Elsdon Best’s tales of the Urewera; and in Sir George Grey’s “Polynesian Mythology.” In poetry that deals with the Maori, though the legends are often truthfully reproduced, the Maori atmosphere is lacking. “Those who could best preserve it are the graduates and scholars of the Young Maori party, and it is a pity that they have not yet felt inspired to interpret their race to the world, with its savagery, its dignity, the fancy that even in its grossness has the charm of preHomeric myths of Greece.” A country that has so often led the van in social, economic, and political reform is bound to have contributed its quota to the literature of Utopia. Out of a world-wide list, two can be claimed for New Zealand, Butler’s “Erewhon ” and Swenven’s unique “Dimanora.” The scene of the former is laid in New Zealand, in the latter the scene is laid in the mythical Island of Progress. Besides “ Erewhon ” and “ Dimanora ” there are Mr. Watson’s “Decline and Fall of the British Empire,” and Sir Julius Vogel’s “ Anno Domini 2000.” New Zealand novelists worth considering are much fewer in number than the poets, says Mrs. Grossmann and “ G. B. Lancaster” (Miss Edith Dyttleton) heads the list. We heartily . endorse this opinion, in spite of her Kiplingese tendency, and think her work would rank high in any country. Mr. Satchell’s work is favourably commented upon, and richly deserves it. His “ Elixir of Life,” published a year or two ago, though startling, and imaginative to the last degree, was a splendid piece of work, which, had he been better known, must have brought him fame, if only for its originality, Marriot Watson is a New Zealander, mentioned by Mrs. Grossmann, that has only contributed one novel descriptive of New Zealand to its literature. But Mr. Marriot Watson cannot, with strict propriety, be included in any list of New Zealand writers, as, though he spent 13 years of his early life, and received his education in New Zealand, he was born in Melbourne, and lived there until he was nine years old. Mr A. Adam’s “ Tn Tussock Dand ” is remarkable for its wealth of description, while Alien’s (Mrs. Baker) work shows that true New Zealand feeling for nature in its grander moods that is foreign to twentieth century writers. Tn the descriptive and topographical class, Mr. Reeve’s “Dong. White Cloud” is, in its own line, a classic both by style and information. Tn the hearts of New Zealanders Judge Maning comes first; his books are so full of life —and such life—grotesque, comic, savage, picturesque. There are two long passages which are quite unrivalled —his Maori version of the Treaty of Waitangi and the war, which might have been

written by a Maori, and the weird, ghastly, humorous and pathetic- tohunga seance, which 1 commend to any future novelist of New Zealand. Dady Barker’s “Station Dife in New Zealand” has the unaffected charm of all her writings. There are some good histories, e.g., Mr. A. Saunders’ “History of New Zealand.” Another specialty has been books of natural science, each one an authority on its own subject:— Buller’s “Bird of New Zealand,” Kirk’s “Forest Flora of New Zealand,” Daing and Blackwell’s “Plant Dife of New Zealand,” a handsomely illustrated volume on New Zealand entomology by V. G. Hudson; Drummond’s “Animal Dife of New Zealand,” and the recently published anthropological researches on the Native race by Professor Maemillian Brown, “Maori and Polynesian.” Though New Zealand journalists have a high reputation, magazines do not flourish owing to the competition of English and American magazines and reviews. But this, we are convinced, is largely due to the insufficient inducement that is offered this class of writer to contribute his or her best, and also in a measure to the limited outlook afforded by an enforced insular residence, and not to lack of ability on the part of this class. For the names of successful contributors to “Home” and American magazines and reviews we turn to Mrs. Grossmann’s list, and discover the familiar names of Jessie Weston (C. de Thierry), Miss Constance Barnicoat, Hilda Keane Rollett, and G. B. Dancaster, who has lately essayed the short story and article. “It it interesting to note that in New Zealand, where the sexes are almost equally free, women come first in poetry and fiction, and apparently in review journalism, while in history, practical journalism and in all scientific work, natural or sociological, men have almost a monopoly, and this without any artificial restrictions. This may be partly an accident, but it certainly suggests a natural difference.” To continue Mrs. Grossmann’s felicitous figurative simile we are convinced that the infant born in New Zealand to the arts of poetry and prose literature, though not full fledged, is within appreciable distance of flight. Though to some extent hampered by the traditions and the Mede and Persian-like laws that have governed the flight of its parents, it aspires to control its own methods of flight because the currents are different. And though it may eventually incorporate the best traditions of the English school with its own, it must ever stand out distinct in the qualities of sociology, economy, spontaneity and natural description. The best thanks of New Zealand writers are due to Mrs. Grossmann for her very pertinent and justly eulogistic championship. REVIEWS. Tire Goose Girl : Harold McGrath. With illustrations by Andre Castaigne. Indianapolis: The BobbsMerril Co. The type of story exploited with such distinction and success by Mr. Anthony Hope has been essayed by Mr. Harold McGrath no less successfully. The scenes

of the book are laid in one of the outlying principalities of the German Empire, and the plot revolves round the fortunes of a goose girl, who is obviously of aristocratic extraction if looks and bearing count for anything. The plot, though far from original, has some novel features, and the pictures shown of German peasant life eharm both by their undoubted faithfulness to detail and quaint homely setting. Unmistakably German is the pen portrait drawn of the buxom landlady of the Black Eagle, who declined re-marriage on the ground that she has once crossed the frontier of marriage and “never again!” yet who thinks no day wholly successful that does not at least yield her one proposal of marriage. The story opens where the goose girl is driving her geest-, whose livers are so soon to be converted into Strasbourg pates, into the town of Dreiberg. Like so many old towns, the streets were narrow, and seeing a party of horsemen approaching, the goose girl (Gretehen) tries to drive her geese to the shelter of walls of the houses. But the geese, terrified at the clatter, flew everywhere, one bolder than the rest alighting on the shoulder of the Grand Duke, who headed the cavalcade. Sorry for the havoc wrought amongst the flock, the Grand Duke offers compensation, which is gratefully, if timidly, accepted. Mr. Carmichael, the American Consul at Dreiberg, who is riding with the Grand Duke, is struck both by the beauty and the mien of the goose girl, and soon after rescues her from some insulting gallantry of one of the Duke’s aides. Carmichael is very deeply, very honestly, and very hopelessly in love with the Grand Duke's only daughter and heiress, Princess Hildegarde, who is shortly to be betrothed to the neighbouring King of Jugendheit for State reasons. The Princess, however, reciprocates Carmichael’s love, and envies the goose girl, who is free to marry whom she will. As a baby, the Princess had been abducted, and tho Grand Duke had laid the blame on several of his suite, and had banished them across the frontier. Nor did he find the child until she had grown to be a woman. Tn the meantime, the King of Jugendheit has been masquerading as a vintner in Dreiberg, and has fallen in love with the goose girl, and, like the Princess, is torn between love and duty. How this tangle is straightened out that the two pairs of lovers may marry and live happily ever after must be discovered by readers themselves. But we must confess that, though we knew that Mr. McGrath would find a way out, we were not prepared for the villainy of the chancellor, whom we thought a model of fidelity, though we guessed the identity of the vintner, the mountaineer, the watchmaker, the butcher, etc. But this is more than a love romance: it contains shrewd, clever characterisations, a wealth of description, and an unerring instinct for local colour. The illustrations, which are both profuse and superexcellent, add not a little to the charm of a book whose only fault, if fault it be, lies in the fact that it is a little long drawn out. We are indebted to George Robertson and Co., booksellers and stationers, 107113 Elizabeth-street, Melbourne, for our copy of this book.