_If We Are Late_
There is every prospect that this number will be out unusually late, on
account of the choke-up in transportation. At this writing the printer
ought to be at work on the paper, which has already been on the way to
him--from Philadelphia to Massachusetts--twenty-six days.
We hope our readers will not blame the delay to us, and that their
patriotism will cheerfully endure it.
_The Kindly and Modest German_
Here are some commonplaces that should be iterated in some shape every
time an American organ of opinion goes to press.
There once was such a man as the kindly and modest German, and through
his virtues he had nearly obtained the industrial and commercial
leadership of the world, when sudden wealth and power aroused in him the
brute instincts that are latent in the best of us, and started him after
more than can be had from industry, and can be had only by force. The
brute instincts were nearer the surface in him than in those who have a
recorded civilization of some seven or eight thousand years: for the
poor Germans, at least the ruling branch of them, have barely as many
hundred. Even Russia was Christianized four centuries before Prussia.
Now it is a rare parvenu who is not conceited. Germany has camouflaged
the old idea of conquest by that of spreading her Kultur to the inferior
portion of mankind--to the peoples that produced Homer, Dante,
Shakespear, Newton, Darwin and Spencer--as if those peoples were savages
whose territory could be brought under civilization only by conquest,
and as if Germany alone had civilization. And this absurd idea she backs
up by a crude conception of the Law of Evolution--a conception that
stops with the competition of brute forces. Cooeperation, mutual help,
emulation in well doing do not enter into her idea of evolution. She has
thrown away her splendid success in the higher competition, and reverted
to the competition of brute force,--camouflaged again by science and
cunning.
When a conceited parvenu goes mad, his conceit is as mad as the rest of
him. When he is at the same time bellicose and bloodthirsty, he will not
stop fighting as long as the conceit is in his system, and the only way
to get it out is to whip it out.
It looks as if in Germany's case we had seriously underestimated one
important feature of that job. For a long time we thought that we had
got to beat only the military class--that they had merely fooled the
kindly and modest Germans we used to know. As lately as this Spring, a
British general told the present writer that his people did not expect
the war to be ended by a military victory--that without an overwhelming
superiority on either side, modern warfare has at last reached the
degree of perfection long ago attained by the Kilkenny cats (only the
general did not put it in that way), and that before, so to speak, the
tails get through fighting, the kindly and modest German people would
take matters into their own hands and stop the war, give up the plunder
they have got from their weaker neighbors (for after all, barring their
sudden occupation of a little of France, they have with all their
boasting whipped only little or undeveloped peoples), and pay
damages--as far as they can be paid. But it has come to look mightily as
if the general and his people were mistaken--as if the kindly and modest
German no longer exists, as if the madness has seized the whole nation,
and as if there will be no way out before we give one side the
overwhelming superiority which was the general's alternative. Plainly we
can't be too quick about it.
Before the conceit is whipped out of the Germans, they are not going to
submit to any peace short of holding on to their plunder, and as long as
they have enough of that to be visible, they are victors, and with all
their conceit in them. It would drive them into another war as soon as
they could get ready, and even meanwhile the conditions would be
intolerable--intolerable not only for the small peoples they have
conquered, but for the rest of us.
But things are very respectably intolerable as they are. We have barely
entered the war, and yet you are exceptionally fortunate if your income
has not been pinched, your affairs generally disturbed, heavy anxieties
thrown upon you, and perhaps, even thus early, mourning. Possibly you
have found a grim consolation in realizing that most of the time since
the beginning of human records, our present lot has been the lot of the
greater portion of mankind. Perhaps you have found a consolation less
grim in realizing that this state of affairs has been diminishing--very
notably diminishing during the century preceding this war; and it is to
be hoped that you have found a consolation almost triumphant in the
realization that a large portion of the world at last realizes that such
conditions can be put an end to, and are grimly determined to do it. But
unless it is done thoroughly, unless the Kaiser and his gang are as
safely disposed of as Napoleon and his gang were after Waterloo, these
conditions are going to recur indefinitely.
Waterloo put an end to _gloire_, but it did not quite end the idea of
the legitimacy of conquering civilized people and good neighbors--it did
not make impossible the attitude of the German statesman who, when asked
by our ambassador Hill why Germany did not conciliate Alsace-Lorraine,
answered without the slightest suspicion that he was showing himself a
barbarian: "But we have conquered them." It was this attitude which
gradually changed Germany's preparations against France's possible
_revanche_ after 1870, into a scheme to conquer the world. This
antiquated idea of right by conquest, and this barbarous passion for it,
have done more than anything else, except perhaps dogmatic religions,
for the misery of mankind. This attitude survives, among lettered
nations, only in Germany and her allies. We have got to fight until we
kill it, no matter how many treaties of peace intervene: and it will not
be killed as long as Germany is left in possession of a foot of the
territory she has seized during the present war.
All these considerations render the idea of a "Peace without victory"
worse than a mere disgusting piece of sentimentalism. They render it a
danger, and one that unless obliterated, sooner or later must explode.
But behind all that, it is absurd in its very conception. What could be
more ridiculous than a treaty with Germany? It would of course be
ridiculous on the part of a nation that did not intend to keep it, but
on the part of a nation that did intend to keep it, it would be doubly
ridiculous. Nothing can be plainer than that real peace cannot be
reached, no matter what treaties and intervals of nominal peaces
intervene, before Germany has her conceit whipped out of her, and
whipped out so thoroughly that, as in Napoleon's case, there will be no
need for discussion or pretended agreements, but that she will simply be
told what she must do, and made to do it.
At one time there was hope that the kindly and modest German the elders
among us knew, would take hold and attend to the matter himself. But he
is not here to do it: we have got to do it ourselves, and we cannot
afford to flinch, or dally, or stop half way.
_What the Cat Thinks of the Dog_
I am not altogether sure whether I like the Dog or merely tolerate him.
It puzzles me to say just what I do, in a manner, like about my
house-companion. For a certainty, his manners are very distressing, and
they evoke my most hearty disapproval. I cannot abide those rude
volcanic barking fits of his. Often, when lying snugly tail-enfolded by
the gently warming kitchen stove, lost in a comfortable dreamless
doze--how delicious this semi-Nirvana of the senses!--I would suddenly
be startled into undesired wakefulness by my friend's frenzied howls.
You'd think he had wanted to call my attention to a mouse recently
entrapped or, at least, to the arrival of the butcher with a fat quarter
of lamb wherefrom one might expect the carving of good cheer for him and
me. But no! nine times out of ten it would but be some uninteresting
urchin whom he had caught sight of through the window, and who was
sauntering a block away with an insolent swagger that could not but
arouse my profound contempt. I sometimes find it far from easy to keep
my temper in such circumstances and to refrain from wishing him and his
urchin a watery grave the next time they betake themselves to the river
for swimming and diving sports. Yet I must not judge him harshly. An
unkind nature has granted him a most unmusical, a most nerve-shattering
voice, incapable of the least culture.
I take much exception also to the ungentle and ungraceful manner in
which he swings his tail, or rather flips it back and forth and jerks it
up and down, for one can hardly talk of swinging where no smooth
delicately rounded curves are perceptible. How inferior, both by
heredity and by training, is the Dog's handling of his tail to that of
the Cat! How little he understands the art of curving and waving and
uncurving the tail in the nicely nuanced rhythms and exquisitely
designed patterns that are so familiar to ourselves! If the aerial
artistry of the Cat's tail may be fitly compared to the beautifully
rounded brushwork of our Chinese laundrymen when, as I have incidentally
observed him more than once, he prepares his stock of wash tickets, the
tail movements of the Dog remind me of nothing so much as the ugly
zigzagging and unsymmetrical lines that my master's little boy produces,
squeakingly, on his slate in his vain attempts to draw a locomotive (at
least I gather, from various remarks that I have overheard, that this is
what he has in mind). No, there is not the slightest reason to allow for
an aesthetic strain in my friend's psychology. Frankly, I do not believe
he knows the difference between an Impressionist masterpiece and a
bill-board daub. Nothing, further, can be more absurd than the frequency
with which the Dog's rapid and angular tail movements are executed. No
sooner does the master, or his little boy, or the mistress, or even the
garbage man appear, than this tail that I speak of is set furiously
wagging and swishing, often at the cost of a cup or plate which may
happen to be within reach of its tufted point. I wonder that they
tolerate him in the kitchen at all. I shall never forget the time that,
excited beyond control at the unexpected return of the master from a
fishing excursion, he scampered about madly and lashed his tail from
side to side with the utmost fury. Well accustomed by this time to his
vulgar ways, I paid little attention to the hubbub but continued quietly
lapping up my saucer of milk, when I was suddenly stunned by a powerful
swish of the Dog's milk-spattered tail against my face. Angered beyond
expression, both by the Dog's extreme rudeness and by the almost total
loss of a savory meal, I was about to scratch out his eyes, but the
evident unwillingness of the maid to suffer retaliatory measures, and
the reflection on my part that the Dog's conduct, reprehensible as it
was, had not been dictated by any unfriendly feeling for myself,
prevented a scrimmage. It was as well, for nothing pains me more than to
part company with my dignity, even if only for a moment.
In view of so many just grounds for complaint,--and there are many that
I might add,--it puzzles me, I repeat, to say just what I like about the
Dog. Can it be that, living, as we do, under the same roof, and thus
forced by circumstance to put up with each other for better or for
worse, we have become habituated to a common lot, and learned to ignore
the numerous divergencies of taste and philosophy? From a strictly
scientific standpoint, this is an excellent explanation of our mutual
forbearance, but I am afraid that sincerity prevents me from accepting
it as a completely satisfying solution of the problem. How comes it
that, when the Dog, in company with his master, has absented himself
from the house for a period of more than usual length, as once for a
week's hunting jaunt, I find myself getting fidgety and morose, as
though there were something missing to complete my usual feeling of
contentment? And how comes it that last year, when the Dog's right
forefoot was caught in the door, and he set up a caterwauling (excuse
the Hibernicism) that made him a frightful nuisance for the rest of the
day, I, who would ordinarily have been the first to resent such a noise,
as evidencing a deplorable lack of vocal self-control and taste, did on
the contrary feel no small amount of sympathy for the suffering wretch?
I imagine that there was something about the tilt of my tail and the
glance in my eye that communicated my compassion to the Dog, for the
next day he seemed a trifle more considerate of my preferences than had
been his wont. I construed this as a species of thankfulness on his
part. (Yet I would not lay too great stress on this; he may merely have
had an attack of the blues, as a result of his recent misadventure.) And
how comes it, farther, that I felt considerably nettled the other day
when the neighbor's boy kicked the Dog three times in succession?
Prudence, to be sure, prevented my taking up an active defence of my
friend, but I certainly felt at least an indefinite impulse in that
direction.
Such incidents seem to argue a genuine vein of fellow feeling, of
sympathy, for the Dog, though, I must insist, this sympathy never
degenerates into a maudlin sentimentality. After all is said and done,
there is never entirely absent a grain of contempt from my estimate of a
mere dog, even of the Dog of the House. It is enough to admit that there
is commingled with this contempt a certain something of more benevolent
hue, a something which I must leave it to others to explain.
_A Hunting-ground of Ignorance_
Espapia Palladino is dead, and of course the usual amount of nonsense is
being written about her. The woman certainly had some telekinetic power,
and she certainly pieced it out with humbug, as is generally done when
the power happens to exist in a low order of person. And as most persons
are of a low order, the power is so pieced out in most cases. The same
is of course true regarding telepsychic power.
But that behind the frauds and mistakes there is something genuine yet
to be accounted for, is doubted by hardly anybody who knows anything
about the subject. If writing about it, and all other subjects, could
only be restricted to those who know something about them, how much
better off we should all be!
And if dishonesty were only restricted to the inferior type of person!
One of the committee who made out Palladino an unmitigated fraud, told
us that he signed the report with mental reservations, and that he
passed his hands under the table which she held suspended by her
finger-tips on top of it, and found it absolutely disconnected with the
floor!
_Maximum Price-fixing in Ancient Rome_
"Is there anything whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath
been already of old time, which was before us." The prototype of the
aeroplane is found in the myth of Daedalus' wings; the possibilities of
the submarine--some of them--are illustrated in Lucian's story of the
sea monster; and maximum prices, in sober Roman history.
The Emperor Diocletian, at the beginning of the fourth century, made a
serious effort to lower the high cost of living, by law. He was
apparently one of that school of amateur economists which holds that the
business man's greed is the root of the evil. In his opinion there were
any number of people who were expert in the art of running up the rates
and charging the poor ultimate consumer, whether civilian or soldier,
all that the traffic would bear. And his eye was on them. A part of the
preface to the edict which was to abolish all the difficulties at one
stroke, reads thus:
Who is so dull of heart that he does not know that on
merchandise prices have become more than exorbitant, and that
unbridled greed can not be mitigated by abundance of supplies
or rich harvests? And so to the greed of those who, though men
of the greatest wealth so that they could abundantly supply
even nations, still seek private gain. To their greed, O
people of our provinces, our care for common humanity urges us
to put an end. Who does not know that, wherever the common
safety of all demands that our armies be led, there the prices
of merchandise are forced up, not four times or eight times,
but without limit?
A system of maximum retail prices was to be the cure-all:
We have decided not to determine exact prices for commodities:
for it does not seem just to do this when at times many
provinces glory in the good fortune of low prices; but we have
decided to establish a maximum of prices, so that when there
is any scarcity greed may be checked.
If the emperor could have looked down the ages to the year 1918, he
would have found that a maximum price of ten cents for sugar is very
likely to become the regular price everywhere. He did not know this; but
that his law would only be effective if supported by a penalty for
disobedience, he knew right well. He decided on a penalty--a penalty
which would appear adequate, probably even to the thorough-going
Germans:
It is our pleasure that, if anyone in his audacity opposes
this statute, he be subjected to capital punishment.
Not only price-raising, but hoarding and speculating were also held to
be opposition to the law. The final statement of the edict makes this
clear:
And from the penalties of this statute, that man is not free
who, possessing the necessities of life, should think that he
ought to withdraw them from trade for a time after this
statute is in force.
But the emperor did not confine himself to fixing maximum prices for
food. His was a more ambitious attempt than any of its modern
counterparts. He fixed prices for liquors, and cloth goods and shoes. He
fixed maximum wages for workmen in all sorts of trades, and even for men
in the professions. In some cases pay was by the day, and in some, by
the job. The record does not show that union men were paid more than
non-union men.
But this economic Utopia, though supported by all the power of an
autocratic government, was not for long. One slight miscalculation
ruined the whole scheme. The maximum price, or maximum wage, was put
quite low in the first place, and yet in any given case was precisely
the same in every province of the empire. In London the barber would
shave you for two denarii (less than one cent), and in Alexandria you
need pay no more. Prunes from Damascus must be sold there and in Cologne
for the same price. Under such artificial conditions legitimate business
could not succeed. The result is briefly told by a church father:
Then was there much blood shed for trifles; and nothing was
put up for sale, because of fear, and much worse was the
scarcity, until the law was repealed of necessity, after the
death of many.
_Darwin on His Own Discoveries_
In connection with the article in this number on John Fiske, we are
fortunate in being able to give a letter from Darwin to Dana which is
just appearing in the current _American Journal of Science_. To our
readers, comment would be superfluous.
Charles Darwin to J. D. Dana
DOWN, BROMLY, KENT, NOV. 11, 1859.
_My dear Sir_: I have sent you a copy of my Book (as yet only
an abstract) on the Origin of species. I know too well that
the conclusion, at which I have arrived, will horrify you, but
you will, I believe & hope, give me credit for at least an
honest search after the truth. I hope that you will read my
Book, straight through; otherwise from the great condensation
it will be unintelligible. Do not, I pray, think me so
presumptuous as to hope to convert you; but if you can spare
time to read it with care, & will then do what is far more
important, keep the subject under my point of view for some
little time occasionally before your mind, I have hopes that
you will agree that more can be said in favour of the
mutability of species, than is at first apparent. It took me
many long years before I wholly gave up the common view of the
separate creation of each species. Believe me, with sincere
respect & with cordial thanks for the many acts of scientific
kindness which I have received from you,
My dear Sir
Yours very sincerely
(Signed) CHARLES DARWIN
_Reflections of an Old-Maid Aunt._
In the elaborately efficient curricula of our modern colleges, although
there are courses of instruction in almost every branch from
Book-agenting to Motherhood, and from Sewing to Integral Calculus, there
is one of endeavor which is, as yet, hopelessly uncharted. I speak of
the art, or, of course, it should be science, of being an old-maid aunt!
It seems a simple matter to the casual observer and, perhaps, that is
why no one has thought necessary to study the subject and offer a
course. We remember how successfully it was done in our youth by those
delightful old ladies who came for visits and taught us to knit and were
almost sure to have some sort of confection concealed somewhere about
their person or room. We remember how they implanted the idea that
certain words were beyond the vocabulary of any lady, and that a child's
whole duty in life was to be polite in such matters as "Sir" and
"Ma'am", to be obedient to any of the species, Grown-People, and to be
ready at all times to help in the search for spectacles. Their lot was
easy enough and the very suggestion that they needed to be instructed in
their capacity of aunt, would be ridiculous!
It is no wonder then, with that picture in view, that I launched forth
upon a visit to my small nephew and nieces with no premonitions of the
shoals which lay ahead. After five days in the presence of the strenuous
regime which surrounds and enfolds the modern child, I have returned
once more to the quiet back waters of old-maidenhood and to
contemplation. And now a sadder and a wiser aunt, I offer some
suggestions which might help another unwary one before she breaks into
the complicated existence of the newly developed genus, Child.
In the first place, don't use that obnoxious word "DON'T". Its use you
will find, or more likely be told, curbs the child's free spirit and
destroys his personality. If, thereof you find him with a redpepper as a
toy, don't try to take it from him, for being stronger than he you may
succeed and thereby put a dent in his tender young willpower! Just trust
that if he should get it into his eyes or mouth the result will not be
fatal, and feel confident that thereafter he will seek some other form
of toy! Or should you find him standing on a chair, before a blazing
fire, reaching for something on the mantel piece, don't remove him
forcibly at once and try to convince him that he should never get there
again. No! Rather divert his mind to something else in the room so that
he will get down of his own accord, and leave the desired object until
there is nobody present to divert him! For do you not see that if you
tell him that there are things in the world which he cannot do, you will
bind his free and birdlike soul and sadden his little life? Be
comforted, though, for, perhaps, when he does fall the fire will be out,
or the chair will tip the other way!
In the second place don't be surprised to hear him cry, nay rather howl
lustily, all the while he is being fed. Of course you think at once that
he must surely be ill; in your memories of childhood such an occurrence
meant only some dread disease. But before you send a hurried call for
the doctor, take a look at the food. You will find that a sad and
terrible change has come over the stomachs of children! No longer can
they digest oatmeal when accompanied by its time-honored companions,
sugar and cream, but must eat it plain in a luke warm state. Other
cereals have also lost these erstwhile friends, in spite of the alluring
but deceptive impression which you may have gotten from advertisements,
and are eaten, or rather absorbed, for the doing has lost its gusto,
plain. So don't pity the child when you see him eating a teaspoonful of
sugar just before he goes to bed, for that is his theoretical dole of
sweetness for the day. Just hope that somewhere in the background is a
friendly cook who is not yet aware of the fact that children have lost
their powers of digestion!
And most important of all, don't offer him any sort of refreshment, most
particularly not the innocent-looking but deadly animal cracker! When
Mrs. Noah, for it must have been she who invented that confection for
the small voyage-wearied Ham, Shem, and Japheth, made the first animal
crackers, she probably thought that she was doing a great thing and that
children throughout the age would call her blessed. And so they have
until now a fearful discovery has been made: animal crackers are
absolutely indigestible! We shudder as we think of the menageries we
ourselves have consumed! To what heights of perfection might our
excellent health have risen, were it not for those wolves lurking in the
form of sheep or elephants or overgrown curly-tailed dogs! To what size
might our present too rotund forms have grown, were it not for those
deadly processions marched hither and yon and then eaten in never
varying order, head; tail, when present; feet; and then two bites on the
body. Farewell, Animal Cracker, you are discovered at last! No more
shall you with your treachery delight and entertain innocent little
children, unless some fathers, defiant of the new laws of nature and the
edicts of scientific mothers, procure you on the sly!
And so it goes. No! The duties of an old-maid aunt cannot be entered
upon lightly. It would really be a charitable act for some one to study
the subject and offer a course for those of us the numbers of whose
nephews and nieces continue to increase. And we in the meantime can only
hope that the pendulum of change will not delay too long in swinging
back to the old-fashioned child, about whom, inside and out, we have a
little knowledge if it is only empirical!
_An Obscure Source of Education_
Obviously a great deal of education, moral as well as intellectual, and
even physical, is coming from the war, and it obviously comes in part
from an immensely increased amount of reading on informing subjects,
even in the newspapers. But the call for this reading contains a
farther, and relatively obscure, source of education worth thinking of.
We can no longer risk wasting our time, as it is to be feared most of us
have done, by picking up to read the first thing that strikes our fancy.
The greatly increased mass of material has forced upon us the habit of
selecting what we read. The usefulness and importance of that habit
hardly need dwelling upon to the constituency of this REVIEW.
_Heart-to-Heart Advertising_
I am all things to all advertisers. I like to submit myself to the
experiments of some alert young psychologist, in response to whose plan
(scientifically conceived, artfully presented), I greatly desire to eat,
to see, to hear, to know, to do, to possess, that which he brings to my
attention. Being a person trained to jejune classification, I
automatically pigeon-hole the "appeal," and my mind therefore offers to
advertisements a hospitable retreat under Ambition, or Culture, or
Physical development, or the Senses, or Vanity.
The last quality and the first are not always distinguishable, the one
from the other. When a page of insinuating text and startling
illustration assures me that the reading of a specified set of books
will enable me,--a person temperamentally shy and physically
inconspicuous--to convince judges and jurors, and to combine into a
glorious whole the abilities of St. Chrysostom, Abelard, Shylock, Daniel
Webster, and a Confederate veteran, I am disposed to feel that though
hitherto I have been unappreciated, it now rests with me (and the set of
books) to alter, even to change, the opinion of my personal public. I
glow, too, under the conviction that correspondence courses can
transform me into a trained nurse, an O. Henry, a Thomas Nast. My vanity
makes the conventional years of hospital service, or a "born" ability to
tell a story, or to caricature, seem superfluous in an equipment for
success. And I am sure I could raise wheat and apples in the north and
oranges and pecans in the south, even though I should bring to my
enterprise no capital, no experience, no commonsense.
But while I yield readily and sympathetically to the magazine
advertisement, my heartiest response is given to the letter that
altruistically offers me counsels of perfection. There is a certain lack
of privacy about the magazine advertisement; but the letter
advertisement is confidential, even sometimes secretive. True, my name
is frequently misspelled, my sex is changed, and the ink and type are
glaringly different in the heading and in the letter proper. But these
are trifling vagaries: it is my own letter, and the writer knows me
intimately. He says this plainly. And he proves it by offering me the
book, or the beautifier, or the investment which I had not even known I
wanted, but which I do want instantly, and with an intensity that falls
short only of cutting from the lower corner of the page the slanting
coupon that will procure me farther information.
It is this intimacy of attitude on the part of the writers of
form-letters that gives me keenest pleasure. I like the way in which a
kindly, tolerant young person--youth will always out--assures me that my
manner of life and my personal predilections are as an open book to him.
I like the first-aid flavor of his opening paragraph. I like most of all
the jaunty soul-brother way in which he dallies with his point.
"The writer of this letter has been pondering a good deal", begins one
of these experts in the personal appeal, "on the sort of letter he would
like to get from So-and-So." And at the conclusion of his clever page,
he inquires ingenuously (or artistically): "Is this the sort of letter
_you_ like to get from So-and-So?" Bless the boy! of course it is.
And I do enjoy the letter that is designed to make me leap from my seat
with the first line: "Tomorrow may be too late!" or, "This idea was
worth $100 to one person--it may prove even more valuable to you;" or,
"Shakespeare died in 1616!"
Again, the subject may be approached obliquely: "You have read of
course, the interesting story in the _Sunday Morning Sunshine_, entitled
"Sparkles." You'll remember how Dorothy--" And about the middle of page
two I find that the reason why the heroine was a heroine was because she
had a piece of furniture, the duplicate of which I am granted an
opportunity to purchase, if I act quickly, at greatly reduced rates.
But although the letter-writing section of psychological advertisers
gives me keen pleasure, they also give me some anxiety. It seems to me
that they waste a good deal of good effort. The reason for this failure
to conserve, lies, I think, in the lack of an ingredient that would fuse
all of this experimental psychology and engaging personality into a
practical working whole. And by "working" I mean money getting: for of
course advertisers have their reason for being, in the persuading of
somebody to buy something, or to subscribe to something. The ingredient
which I miss is businesslike accuracy. Of course I realize that these
are merely form-letters, that the mailing list is compiled from any
available source. But the advertisers wish each person who receives a
letter to feel that it was written for him or her personally, and they
take a great deal of trouble to perfect the atmosphere. It is not
artistic, or professional, therefore, to destroy the illusion by the
address or the opening sentence. It was a disgusted gentleman who
received a letter which began thus:
"Dr. John Doe
Professor of Latin
University of Utopia
Dear Sir:
A friend of yours--she prefers that we should not use her
name--tells us that you are the best dressed woman in your
city. Our new line of evening frocks...."
And women often receive letters such as the following:
"Miss Margaret Roe, etc., etc.
Dear Madam:
As a man who knows a good pipe from a bad one, will you grant
us an opportunity to show you...."
Undoubtedly these charming highly imaginative specialists in advertising
give great pleasure. But when business houses month after month send
advertising letters which set forth the glories of something glaringly
impossible of enjoyment by the person to whom the letter is addressed,
then that person is likely to reflect that squandered postage, and
inefficient management, must be paid for in the price or quality of the
thing advertised.
The literary value of a personal form-letter is not affected, however,
by the question of practical usefulness. Nothing could lessen my
pleasure in a recent letter that shows me how I may realize the "chummy
comradeship of Emerson's nature poems," and the "dainty art of Shelley
and Keats." The writer also tells me that he knows what my principal
problem is. And the opening sentence of the same letter seems to explain
why I enjoy all advertisements:
"To that 'marvellous interestingness of life' which Arnold
Bennett says literature reflects, is due the fundamental
liking for good reading of some kind...."
_The Curse of Fall Elections_
We have received the usual number of exhortations to do our duty in
preparing for the fall elections. Thank you. We will do the best we can,
but on account of the war we are already late in getting into the
country for the summer, and our doctor orders us away as soon as we can
go.
Many of the people who exercise any influence for good are gone already,
while most of those whose influence is evil--who live by politics are
here and will stay here or within easy reach, to attend to business.
Moreover all those whose laziness, incapacity and crankiness prevent
their having money enough to get away--the whole Bolshevik crowd of
socialists, synadicalists and anarchists, remain here under the
influence of those who live by politics.
If there ever was an invention of the devil, it is fall elections.
Elections should be held early in April, before so many good people go
away, and after they have had half the year at home to do their best in.
_Larrovitch_
Our habitual readers may be surprised at our serving them a book notice.
But the circumstances leading to this one are peculiar.
In its thirty-six years, the Authors Club has published but two books:
_The Liber Scriptorum_, and _Feodor Vladimir Larrovitch, An Appreciation
of His Life and Works_, which has recently appeared. The name of
Larrovitch was mentioned in the last Casserole; we are now able to
describe the permanent tribute to his personality which the Authors has
made.
The volume consists of papers read at the Larrovitch centenary
celebration (April 26th, 1917--postponed from April 1st) together with
others since contributed. The contents page notes a sonnet by Clinton
Scollard, Prolegomenon by Prof. Franklin H. Giddings, a personality
sketch by Wm. George Jordan, translations and an article on "The Truth
and False About Larrovitch" by Richardson Wright, translations of three
Larrovitch poems by George S. Hellman, translations of Larrovitch
letters by Thomas Walsh, a paper on his recollection of the great
Russian by Dr. Titus Munson Coan, who, it will be recalled was one of
the original "Friends of Russian Freedom," bibliography and
bibliographical notes by Arthur Colton, whose name is already well known
to readers of the UNPOPULAR REVIEW; and a table of references in
English, French, German, Spanish and Russian compiled by Dr. Gustave
Simonson. There are twelve illustrations in the volume, showing
Larrovitch manuscripts, portraits at various ages, portraits of
Larrovitch's parents, the room at Yalta in which the author died, and
his grave. The book was designed by William Aspenwall Bradley of the
University Press, and executed by Munder of Baltimore, making it a
unique piece of typographical excellence.
That the Authors should have picked out this Russian from all the
writers whirling in the vortex of literature, is explained in the
preface and the dedication. The book is dedicated to the lasting
sympathy between the American people and the Russian. And the preface
states that the path to peace along which nations can walk to mutual
understanding, is the path of the arts--the path of music and painting
and literature. This is indeed true.
_Our Index_
The example of our "Father Parmenides," is always good, and we shall
imitate it in the particular set forth in this extract from _The
Atlantic_ for last December:
Following a convention, unquestioned and well-nigh universal,
the _Atlantic_ has for sixty years published semi-annually in
December and June an index designed for the convenience of
readers who bind their magazines. This index with title-page
occupies six pages; and while of great service to a couple of
thousand subscribers and to a few hundred libraries, it is to
eighty-odd thousand readers [These figures make us feel very
small.] merely a dead and cumbersome weight. This month,
therefore, we are breaking sharply with tradition, ... we are
printing the index in its usual form, but in a small edition,
and as a separate pamphlet, and hold ourselves ready to send
it to _any reader who applies for a copy within thirty days of
the publication of this magazine_.
This change will involve the saving of a paper-wastage....
All paper saved tends to lower the price, which has already reached a
height obstructive to the diffusion of knowledge.
_A New "OUIJA Board" Book_