(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._)
From what is known of the tastes of Sir IAN HAMILTON it might have
been supposed that he wrote his _Gallipoli Diary_ (ARNOLD) lest his
pen-hand should lose its cunning while wielding the sword. Indeed
he tells us of a rumour among his officers "that I spend my time
composing poetry, especially during our battles." But that he did not
write for the sake of writing must be clear to anyone who reads the
book, even if the author had not declared his motive in the preface.
Here he admits that, though "soldiers think of nothing so little
as failure," it was in fact the thought of possible failure that
determined him, at the very start, to prepare from day to day his
defence. Perhaps this is not quite the attitude of one who stakes
all upon the great chance. In another significant passage of
self-revelation he tells us how, on a tour of inspection in Egypt,
he met RUPERT BROOKE, "the most distinguished of the Georgians." "He
looked extraordinarily handsome ... stretched out there on the sand,
with the only world that counts at his feet." Whether in ordinary
times the world of art is or is not the "only world that counts,"
I cannot say, but I am certain that to a soldier entrusted with
an enterprise of so great moment the only world that should have
"counted" at that hour was the world of war. If the chapter which
describes the failure that followed the landing in Suvla Bay exposes
the incapacity of some of his officers to inspire their men with that
little more energy which would have ensured a great victory, it seems
also to expose a certain want of compelling personality in the High
Command. But of the military questions here raised I make no pretence
to judge, and in any case judgment has been passed on them already.
The interest of the diary lies in its appeal as a human document.
It is the _apologia_ of a man who, for all his criticism, often
apparently justified, of the authorities at home (there are passages
which he must surely have suppressed if Lord KITCHNER had still been
living), sets down scarce a word in malice and but few in bitterness
of spirit; who appreciates at its high worth the devotion and
gallantry of his officers and men; who, whatever qualities he may have
lacked for his difficult task, reveals himself as loyal at heart and
generous by nature.
* * * * *
Miss RUTH HOLT BOUCICAULT (a name with a double theatrical
association) has written, in _The Rose of Jericho_ (PUTNAM), a novel
of American stage life which I should suppose comes as near to being
a true picture as such stories can. She derives her title from
the convenient habit of the desert rose of detaching itself from
uncongenial or exhausted soil, subsiding into a compact mass and
travelling before the wind to more profitable surroundings. It will be
admitted that the author has at least hit upon a picturesque metaphor
for a touring company, which on this analogy becomes a very garden of
(Jericho) roses. Actually, however, she no doubt intended it to apply
more to the disposition of her heroine, and in particular to her power
of transferring her young affections, flower, leaf and root, from one
object to another, with undiminished enthusiasm. _Sheelah's_
capacity for being off with the old and on with the new is almost
preternatural; her progress from stage-child to leading lady is
accompanied by such various essays in unconventional domesticity that
the reader may well experience a sense of confusion, or at least feel
some difficulty in sustaining the first freshness of his sympathy. The
story is at times almost startlingly American, as when the original
betrayer of the heroine is excused on the ground that, being English,
his morality would naturally not rise to native level (I swear I'm not
laughing--see page 168); and so full of the idiom of the Transatlantic
stage as to be a perfect _vade mecum_ for visiting mimes from this
side. For the rest, vivacious, wildly sentimental and obviously
written from first-hand experience.
* * * * *
By calling her _Potterism_ (COLLINS) "a tragi-farcical tract" Miss
ROSE MACAULAY disarms our criticism that she conducts too heavy a
discussion from too light a platform. I don't think the author of
_What Not_ is likely to write anything dull, anything I shan't be
pleased to read. She has a keen eye, a candid soul, a sharp-pointed
pen. She is deliciously modern. And she dislikes _Potterism_, which
is sentimental lack of precision in thought. It is much more (or much
less) than this, but I get the definition by inverting a phrase of her
dedication. _Potter_, by the way, or _Lord Pinkerton_, as he is now,
owns a series of newspapers "not so good as _The Times_ nor so bad
as _The Weekly Dispatch_" (guileless piece of camouflage this!), and
_Mrs. Potter_ ("_Leila Yorke_") is a novelist who might have written
_The Rosary_. Two of the young _Potters, Jane_ and _Johnny_, though
they both when up at Oxford joined the _Anti-Potter League_, do not
thereby escape being Potterites. They cling to materialistic _Potter_
values. Whereas an aristocratic clergyman, a woman scientist, a
Jew journalist (this last an admirable study) do in varying degrees
contrive to avoid the deadly infection. This tract needed writing. I
have a feeling that it could be better done and by ROSE MACAULAY.
But it makes excellent reading as it is.... The pachyderm will wince,
shake himself and be left grinning.
* * * * *
Mr. ARNOLD PALMER derives the title of _My Profitable Friends_ (SELWYN
AND BLOUNT) from a verse, new to me, in which the poet, apparently
when launching her wares, concludes,
"But who has pain has songs to sell;
My Profitable Friends, farewell!"
which I take to be the pleasantest way in the world of calling them
pot-boilers. But whether they were so intended or not, there can be no
question of the very agreeable dexterity that Mr. PALMER brings to the
composition of his tales. Save for a few experiments (which I should
call the least successful in the collection) his formula is not the
episodical "slice of life," with crumbly edges. His choice is for the
well-made, with usually some ingenious little twist at the finish,
and (so to speak) a neatly tied bow to end all. As an instance of this
kind I commend to your notice the admirably shaped little yarn called
"Two-penn'orth." Mr. PALMER has a pretty wit (perhaps here and there
a trifle thin), shown nowhere to better advantage than in "A Picked
Eleven," one of the most entertaining, and at the same time
human, short stories that I have ever read. Further, his tales are
essentially of the friendly order, and the public will be in fault if
they do not also prove profitable, since we have none too many writers
capable of getting such deft results with the same economy of means.
* * * * *
In most stories constructed on the _Enoch Arden_ principle one of the
husbands or wives (whichever it may be of whom there are too many) is
usually a very nasty person. Miss SOPHIE COLE, in _The Cypress Tree_
(MILLS AND BOON), makes all three of her entangled characters quite
attractive; in fact, though I fear she would not wish me to say so, I
really liked the unsuccessful competitor better than the winner. Books
made up of the little homely things which might happen to anybody
and distinguished by their pleasant atmosphere have been Miss COLE's
speciality in the past; this time she has, without abating a jot of
her pleasantness, added a touch of the occult in the shape of an old
black-letter volume which infects everyone who gets possession of
it with a mildly insane determination to keep it. An honourable man
steals it and a nice woman smacks her baby for holding it, so you can
see how really baleful its influence must have been when you consider
that they were both Miss COLE'S characters. A very little of the
occult will excuse a good deal of improbability, and the small amount
that has crept into _The Cypress Tree_ does not spoil the effect of a
truly "nice" tale.
* * * * *
As an admirer of the _Spud Tamson_ books it irks me to have to say
that _Winnie McLeod_ (HUTCHINSON) contains too much solid sermon to
appeal to me. I gather that R. W. CAMPBELL wants to show how dangerous
life may be for a poor and beautiful girl, and as a warning _Winnie_
can be confidently recommended. But sound and wholesome as the
preaching is it seems to me more suitable for a tract than for a
novel. Moreover it is not easy to feel full sympathy with a hero who
is frankly called an Adonis, who "played a good bat at cricket,"
and also in a strenuous rugger match "dropped a beauty through the
Edinburgh sticks." Altogether the picture suffers from the prodigious
amount of paint that has been spent on it; yet I am confident it will
afford edification to many people whose tastes I respect but cannot
share.
* * * * *
"Ninety-six per cent. of men employed in the gas undertakings
voted in favour of a strike. Four per cent. were against
such action and the neutrals formed an infinitesimal
number,"--_Daily Paper._
A mere cipher, in fact.
* * * * *
"Required, immediately, man with intimate knowledge of colours
to call on consumers with ochres from the French Alps."
_Daily Paper._
Personally, we always prefer to consume raw umbers from the Apennines.
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Customer._ "BUT IF THESE WATCHES COST TEN BOB TO MAKE,
AND YOU ARE SELLING THEM AT THE SAME PRICE, WHERE DOES YOUR PROFIT
COME IN?"
_Watchmaker._ "WE GET IT REPAIRING THEM."]
* * * * *
Transcriber's Note:
p. 1.: 'say' corrected to 'says' ... 'says a Government official.'