OUR CURIO CRANKS.
The man who collects mud-splashes from the wheels of the exalted great.
A period so bygone as that of His late Majesty King Henry II. (of whose exact date you will scarcely need to be reminded) has not an immediate and irresistible attraction for every novel reader, and it may take much to persuade some that they will ever become really concerned with the deeds and destinies of such people as Jehane the woodward's daughter, Edwy the tanner of Clee, and Lord Lambert do Fort-Castel, be their deeds and destinies never so adventurous or romantic. Further, the juvenile manner of the pictorial cover attached to Jehane of the Forest (Melrose) is not calculated to whet the appetite of the adult public, and the eulogy of a well-known author, appended on a printed slip, lacks the essential glow of the effective advertisement. It misses the point; it is pedantic, and pedantry is the one thing for which wary readers are on the look out in stories of antiquity. It is first important, then, to acquit Mr. L. A. Talbot of every offence of which, in the blackness of the outward circumstances, he might be suspected—affectations, anachronisms, excess of local and contemporary colour, absence of humour or human touches, any tendency to bore. The book presents a charming picture of the counties on the Welsh Border and unravels a delightful tale in which the characters talk the language peculiar to their time, but are controlled by the everlasting motives of human nature. Though the times were harder than ours the people seem to have been neither better nor worse than we are; and, when approached from such a point of view as Mr. Talbot has taken, there is nothing to be said against, but very much to be said for, the period of 1154-1189, which, as every schoolboy is punished for not knowing, covers the reign of Henry II.
Miss Mills Young does not, I think, improve as an artist. The Purple Mists (Lane) is her latest book, and it is not so real and satisfactory a piece of work as Grit Lawless or Atonement. The theme of her new novel is the coming of love to two people who married without any other emotion than restrained but unmistakable antipathy. Why people should do these things so often in novels I do not know, but on the present occasion Euretta (Euretta is not an attractive name) and John Shaw (you can tell by his name that he is a strong silent man who is deep in his work and has no time to bother about women) are driven into matrimony by Miss Mills Young. After a while it appears that Mr. Shaw is beginning to care for Euretta very much, but he shows his affection for her by avoiding her as much as possible and snarling when she speaks to him. It is obvious that a more kindly figure must be somewhere close at hand eager to console Euretta. Miss Young discovers him, finds that he is precisely the deep-drinking, warm-hearted rascal necessary for this kind of occasion, and provides him with the inevitable situations proper to the tertium quid. The defects of The Purple Mists all arise from the fact that Miss Mills Young has been told by her friends that she tells a good story. If, next time, she thinks first of her characters and then chronicles their logical development, instead of forcing them into a threadbare plot, she will give us the fine book of which I am sure she is capable.
"According to the Jewish Chronicle, the number of Jews in the world now exceeds 13,000: to be exact, 13,052,840."
Family Herald (B.C.)
Our contemporary should cultivate the large tracts of truth which lie between the extreme vagueness of the first estimate and the pedantic accuracy of the second.
"Rokeby Venus in Ribbons."—Globe.
Are we becoming prudish?
"Breezes between North and South."—Cork Examiner.
This is the weather forecast for Ireland, and at first sight seems obvious; but "in view," as our penny contemporary says, "of the grave importance of the present political situation," we suspect a deeper meaning.