(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks_).
I think I should have detected what was the primary Trouble with _A Lad
of Kent_ (MACMILLAN) if Mr. HERBERT HARRISON had given me any
opportunity of studying _Lord Haresfield_ at closer quarters. Upon the
material vouchsafed it was impossible to spot in him the villain of the
piece; I was only allowed to meet him at two brief interviews,
throughout which he was consistently courteous and kind, with nothing of
the murderer about him. There was, in this connection, not only
_suppressio veri_, but even some _suggestio falsi_; at any rate I still
have great difficulty in believing that a man so obviously intelligent
and diplomatic could have initiated schemes so unnecessarily elaborate
and entirely incompetent for the mere removal of an unknown and
fatherless village youth. I make these observations only as in duty
bound; for myself, I didn't care twopence who was trying to get rid of
_Phillip_, or why. Provided they didn't succeed, I was content to leave
them at it and enjoy the fascinating picture of life in a sea-coast
village in the good old days when everybody was busy either in
preventing or assisting the "free trade" when a press-gang might come
along at any moment and steal a man or two without so much as by your
leave, and, generally speaking, things moved. Mr. HARRISON has a
delightful style, a perfect sympathy with the times of which he writes,
and no small gift of characterization. Frankly, I don't believe he
attaches any more importance to his plot than I do, for he is quite
content to leave it to itself for several chapters on end.
* * *
_The Double House_ (STANLEY PAUL) began attractively with a retired
Indian colonel who had a mysterious sorrow and wished to betake himself
to some quiet English hamlet "where echoes from his past might never
penetrate." Of course this could hardly be called wise of the Colonel;
the slightest knowledge of quiet English neighbourhoods in fiction or
the drama might have assured him that towards the end of Act I somebody
was simply bound to turn up who knew all. However, he rented one half of
a divided old manor house, and, even when informed that the other half
was inhabited by a widow of quiet habits, he apparently did not share my
own instant certainty that there were coincidences ahead. As a matter of
fact E. EVERETT-GREEN, the author, had so arranged matters that this
lady was the sister-in-law of a wicked murderer, for whose crime the
gallant _Colonel_ had himself been tried. So much for his past; but as a
matter of fact that of the lady was ever so much more sinister. She had,
it appeared, married a gentleman called _Paul Enderby_, only to learn
after the ceremony that her husband had a twin-brother _Saul_, who must
have been the twinniest twin that ever breathed, since at no moment
could any living soul tell the two apart. I won't harrow you with
details, but the confusion was such that, even after the unlamented
decease of _Paul_, poor bewildered _Mrs. Enderby_ was by no means sure
that she wasn't only a bereaved sister-in-law. Her sad plight reminded
me of nothing so much as that of the lady in _Engaged_ who entreated to
have three questions answered: "Am I a widow, and if so how came I to be
a widow, and whose widow came I to be?" The great difference between the
two cases is that this of _Mrs. Enderby_ is meant to be taken with
solemnity--a task that I regret to add was too heavy for me. I am only
sorry that so charming a title as _The Double House_ has been so sadly
wasted.
* * *
If a wicked male novelist had dared to write _Jacynth_ (CONSTABLE) I
tremble to imagine the things that certain fair critics would have said
about him. But since a woman is the creator, and one, moreover, with the
well-won reputation of Miss STELLA CALLAGHAN, what is there to say?
After all she must know. As a portrait of futility, _Jacynth_ is the
most mercilessly realistic thing that I have met for some time. Pretty,
brainless, egotistical, utterly unable ever to understand even the least
of the men who loved her--this was _Jacynth_. The picture is so
unsparing that (though I am not calling the book a masterpiece or free
from dull moments) the very completeness of the dreadful thing
fascinates you unwillingly. _Jacynth_ was the typical product of a
seaside town, where she was adored by two men--a young squire and a
famous novelist. I was just a little bored by her beginnings, especially
when she sprained her ankle--a gambit I had imagined _demode_ even with
the most provincial of heroines. However, _Jacynth_ married the
novelist, and after the honeymoon settled down to a steady course of
fatuousness and general interference with his work which presently
reduced the poor man to exasperation, and finally constrained him to
pack her off on a prolonged visit to the seaside home of her maidenhood.
After that _Jacynth_ went from worse to worst; too preposterous a fool
even to be greatly moved when she brought tragedy into the lives of
those who came under her malign influence. I will not follow her
vicissitudes in detail. Throughout the book the most sinister thing in
her story was to me the fact that a woman had written it. Moreover I
have a lurking suspicion that the portrait is no imaginary one. Perhaps
this is a high tribute to Miss CALLAGHAN'S skill; it certainly is meant
to be a compliment to her courage.
* * *
I've often longed to come upon
Some giant spoor and dog the track till
I ran to earth a mastodon,
A dinosaur, a pterodactyl;
But I supposed my natal date--
However distantly I view it--
Was several thousand years too late
To give me any chance to do it.
And yet Sir ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE
Has found a man who's penetrated
Through bush and swamp on virgin soil
And seen the things I've indicated,
Creatures with names that clog your pen--
Dimorphodon and plesiosaurus--
And carried home a specimen
To silence any doubting chorus.
In _The Lost World_[A] the tale is told
(SMITH, ELDER do it cheap) in diction
So circumstantial that its hold
Is more than that of common fiction;
If you can run the story through,
By aid of portraits when you need it,
And not be half convinced it's true,
You simply don't deserve to read it.
[Footnote A: New Edition, with illustrations.]
* * *
There is nothing wrong with Mr. EDEN PHILLPOTTS' latest collection of
short stories, _The Judge's Chair_ (MURRAY), but there is something
vigorously to protest against upon the wrapper that covers them. For
there I found an uncompromising statement to the effect that these
stories "bring to a conclusion the author's Dartmoor work," and no
sooner had I read it than my heart sank into my heels. Solemnly I plead
with him to reconsider this decision, for if he does not his innumerable
admirers will be deprived of something almost as annual and quite as
enjoyable as Christmas. If he wants a holiday let him have one by all
means, though personally I was not pleased when he left Dartmoor for
Italy. But let it be only a holiday, a break in his real business. As
for the book, I advise everyone who can appreciate dry humour and quaint
philosophy to sit behind _The Judge's Chair_. "The Two Farmers" is in
its way a masterpiece, grim and very real, and there is not the ghost of
a sign in the whole collection that Mr. PHILLPOTTS has written of
Dartmoor until he is tired of it or it of him. He has made a niche for
himself in that old temple of Nature, and we must all try to persuade
him to stay there.
* * *
I have been reading a book, written by the Rev. H. S. PELHAM, and
published by MACMILLAN, which is at least twenty times as absorbing and
moving as any novel. It is called _The Training of a Working Boy_. I
daresay you may have met with other volumes on something like the same
theme before, and may suppose you know all about camps and evening
schools and blind-alley employment and the rest of it. But I am pretty
well sure that you have read nothing more practical and human on the
questions of boydom. It is, indeed, the humanity, sympathetic and more
than half humorous, of Mr. PELHAM'S attitude that gives his book its
appeal and incidentally, I fancy, explains his success with the object
of it. His little volume is a plea for personal rather than pecuniary
help, and is directed more especially to Midlanders, since its chief
concern is with the boy population of Birmingham. I can only wish for it
the largest possible number of readers in the shires and elsewhere,
since to read it is inevitably to be moved to active sympathy.
* * * * *
Illustration: THIS PICTURE ILLUSTRATES THE DEADLY STRUGGLE WHICH GOES
ON DAILY BETWEEN RIVAL SEASIDE RESORTS. IT REPRESENTS A PARTY OF
HIRELINGS IN THE PAY OF WOBBLETHORPE-ON-SEA ENGAGED IN RUNNING UP THE
RAINFALL OF LITTLE BLINKINGTON.
* * * * *
"The selection of a player for the leading _role_, that of Pallas
Athene, the beautiful goddess of Greek mythology, was successfully
accomplished when Miss Genevieve Clark, the pretty and vivacious
daughter of Speaker Clark, consented to take the part. Those who
know Miss Clark and Greek mythology will realise at once that there
will be a natural affinity between the player and the character."
_Washington (D. C.) Post._
We never actually met Pallas Athene, but have always heard of her as
being neither very pretty nor vivacious.
* * * * *