In a moonlit garden Clement Carmichael was waiting impatiently.
Presently Madge came to him with a radiant face and placed the lost
despatches in his hands. His reputation was saved!
Seizing the girl in his arms he pressed his lips to hers in a long
passionate kiss.
THE END.
* * * * *
CASUS BELLI.
(_For a sensitive Scot._)
Tea-shop, how I loathe thee!
Our connection's o'er;
Henceforth I don't know thee
Any more.
'Tisn't that I did not
On thy pastry dote;
'Tisn't that it slid not
Down my throat;
'Tisn't that thy crumpets
Fell a trifle flat--
If I've got the hump it's
Not from that.
'Tisn't that the waitress
Tried to wink at me,
Or let fall a stray tress
In my tea;
'Tisn't that I tossed thee
Tenpence in the till
For a snack that cost thee
Almost _nil_....
Nay, 'twas _this_ unnerved me--
Just a sc[)o]ne alone,
Which the lass who served me
Called a sc[=o]ne.
* * * * *
IN A GOOD CAUSE.
In connection with his chief Cartoon of this week, _Mr. Punch_ begs to
invite his readers to help the kind people of Holland on whom the care
of so many Belgian refugees has fallen. Contributions will be gladly
received by the International Women's Relief Committee (Miss Chrystal
Macmillan, Treasurer), 7, Adam Street, Adelphi, W.C.
* * * * *
Illustration: _Scene: A Recruiting Station in Ireland._ IN ORDER NOT TO
LOSE A STALWART RECRUIT WHO HAPPENS TO BE UNDER THE STANDARD HEIGHT
MEASUREMENT THE EXAMINING OFFICER MAKES A BRILLIANT SUGGESTION TO
SERGEANT O'FLANAGAN--
Illustration: --WHICH SUGGESTION SERGEANT O'FLANAGAN CARRIES OUT WITH A
HIGHLY SATISFACTORY RESULT.
* * * * *
OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._)
_Coasting Bohemia_ is the attractive title of a series of essays upon
men and matters by Mr. COMYNS CARR, issued in a portly volume published
by MACMILLAN. During the last forty years Mr. CARR, eminently a clubable
man, has made the acquaintance and enjoyed the friendship of a galaxy of
painters, authors and actors. He was equally at home with MILLAIS,
ALMA-TADEMA, ROSSETTI, BURNE-JONES, WHISTLER, GEORGE MEREDITH, HENRY
IRVING and ARTHUR SULLIVAN. A shrewd observer, quick in sympathy, apt in
characterisation, he has much that is interesting and informing to say
of each. Perhaps the chapter on WHISTLER is the most attractive, since
in some respects his individuality was the most pronounced. In a couple
of brief sentences, pleasing in the slyness of their gentle malice, Mr.
CARR hits off a striking quality in the character of the WHISTLER we
most of us knew. "At times," he writes, "Whistler was even greedy of
applause, and, provided it was full and emphatic enough, showed no
inclination to question its source or authority. There were moments
indeed when, if it appeared to lack volume or vehemence, he was ready
himself to supply what was deficient." Mr. CARR has in his time played
many parts. He made a start at the Bar, but did not get further than the
position of a Junior, which suited him admirably. As a critic, he cannot
plead in extenuation the dictum of DISRAELI that critics are those who
have failed in Literature and Art. He has written several successful
plays, was English editor of _L'Art_, was among the founders of the New
Gallery, and remains established as one of our best after-dinner
speakers. Of such is the kingdom of Bohemia. From these various sources
he draws a stream of reminiscence that runs pleasantly through many
pages. The only drawback to the delight with which I read them arose
from the circumstance that the volume was uncut. Why should a harmless
reviewer be compelled to "coast Bohemia" armed with a paper-knife,
interrupted, when he comes to an exceptionally interesting point, by
necessity for cutting a chunk of pages? _R.S.V.P._, Messrs. MACMILLAN.
* * *
The ease with which the nuptial knot
In Yankee-land is severed--such is
The underlying theme of what
_The Letter of the Contract_ touches;
So, but that BASIL KING has brain
And uses it when he is writing,
The book (from METHUEN) might contain
Little that's novel or inviting.
Yet it's so good it's doomed to miss,
I rather fear, the approbation
Of folk who hope such books as this
May help the cause of reformation;
For, if divorce in U.S.A.
Inspires such work, it stands to reason
To change the law in any way
Amounts to literary treason.
* * *
In contemplating the present season's output of fiction I have been
impressed by the number of novels that might apparently have been
written with an eye to the conditions that attended their publication.
Which, unless one credits our romancers with much further sight than is
commonly supposed to be their portion, is absurd. The thing is a
coincidence; and of this there is no more striking example than the
story that ANNE DOUGLAS SEDGWICK has prepared for the world this autumn.
She calls it _The Encounter_ (ARNOLD), and it is all about the struggle
between "the Nietzschean attitude of mind in Germany," as exemplified in
an egotistical, crack-brained genius named _Ludwig Wehlitz_, and the
ideals of civilized Christianity exemplified in several other more
agreeable persons. You will own that this is at least _á propos_. The
whole thing is, of course, quite charmingly told. All the characters are
thoroughly alive; most of all perhaps the placid, tolerant and entirely
practical mother of the heroine. _Persis Fennamy_ had been introduced to
the genius as a suitable disciple and possible helpmate by the
_Signorina Zardo_, who worshipped him from afar. _Persis_ met _Ludwig_,
was interested, impressed and even willing to admire. There were two
other men also, attendant upon the great one: _Conrad Sachs_, who was
gentle and deformed, and _Graf von Ludenstein_, who represented another
type of German manhood. He represented it so well, indeed, that, when
_Mrs. Fennamy_ discovered that he had taken _Persis_ off for an intimate
conversation in a wood, even her tolerant placidity was deranged. But it
was all right, and _Persis_ escapes heart-whole from the lot of them,
clay superman and all. She is to be congratulated. So is the author, for
her book is both apt to the moment and interesting in itself.
* * *
There is, for all its gaiety, a certain external quality of pathos (now
that the German is to us so sinister a figure) in much of _The Pastor's
Wife_ (SMITH, ELDER) with its types of an East Prussian village drawn in
with those deft, half kindly, half malicious touches to which the
creatrix of _Elizabeth_ of the Garden has accustomed us. _Ingeborg_ is
the daughter of an English bishop--a bishop, by the way, so needlessly
odious that even those who would cheerfully believe the worst of the
order must protest against this hitting below the gaiters--and she meets
her pastor in a railway carriage on a cheap trip to Lucerne. This
so-utterly-by-the-pursuit-of-knowledge-dominated _Herr Dremmel_ (his
subject is scientific manure) has a lapse from the even paths of
research into the disturbing realms of love, and with an egotistic
single-mindedness which is beyond all praise overwhelms her into
marriage by the heroic process of ignoring all objections, refusals and
obstacles. And lo! in this manse of lonely Kökensee we have a problem!
_Elizabeth_, tongue in cheek, in the mask of IBSEN!... I couldn't get
myself to believe in the ineffable preoccupations of _Herr Dremmel_ that
made so desolate a pastor's wife; nor could I see the later enchanting
_Ingeborg_ in the little negligible mouse of the episcopal study (though
I liked them both); and, as I said, I entirely refused to accept the
bishop. But I heartily and thoroughly enjoyed the story, the happy
little strokes of humour and irony, the apt, pert thumbnail-sketches of
the subsidiary characters, the tender love of country things and moods;
and saw that I'd been an ass to take it all too seriously. It was
written to charm--and it's charming.
* * *
Laughter in these dark days is so wholesome a corrective that we mustn't
be too exacting with Mr. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM, that fertile spinner of
yarns, when in _The Double Life of Mr. Alfred Burton_ (METHUEN) he
presents us with the diverting idea of a mean, little, loud, untruthful
auctioneer's clerk converted by the eating of a mysterious brown bean
into a paragon of candid truth, refined taste and romantic desire.
There's an amusing scene when _Burton's_ chief, a thoroughly resourceful
specimen of his tribe, cries down, under the same mysterious influence,
the pseudo-antiques he is selling, and so intrigues his old friends the
dealers that, with a curious _naïveté_, they make absurdly high bids in
the belief that the auctioneer is up to some profitable little game.
_Mr. Alfred Burton_ himself becomes at a stroke a famous author just by
merely writing what he sees and seeing true. (But wouldn't his readers
also need a nibble at the bean?) Finally falling from grace as the
effect of this food of the gods wears off, he accepts a directorship of
the new mind-food company, "Menatogen," which brings him untold wealth.
Quite innocent fooling which yet leaves one with the impression that our
popular authors let themselves off rather lightly from the labour of
working out their themes.
* * * * *
Illustration: A GARGOYLE OF NÔTRE DAME DE PARIS.
(_With acknowledgments to the etching by M. Méryon._)
SPIRITS OF EVIL, WHEN THEY'RE THROWN
OUT OF A CHURCH, ARE TURNED TO STONE;
BUT THE ABOVE WAS PETRIFIED
EVEN BEFORE HE GOT INSIDE.
* * * * *