Miss Johnston, who began by writing romances pure and simple, has dramatized the story of the Civil War in two able novels, “The Long Roll” and “Cease Firing.” It is not easy to characterize these stories in a phrase, nor is it necessary. They are written with a kind of quiet passion which gives the current sufficient volume to carry an enormous amount of history without sacrificing dramatic interest.
Dr. Mitchell, like Dr. Holmes, revealed himself in several different capacities, as physician, as poet, as essayist, and as story writer. His novels are characterized by inventiveness, by dexterity, by freshness of feeling. “The Adventures of François” is a capital piece of story-telling; while many people regard “Hugh Wynne” as the best semi-historical story which has appeared in this country. In other novels Dr. Mitchell showed his skill as a psychologist.
SUPPLEMENTARY READING
| A Study of Prose Fiction | Bliss Perry |
| Criticism and Fiction | W. D. Howells |
| Essays on Modern Novelists | William L. Phelps |
| American Prose Masters (Cooper, Hawthorne, Emerson, Poe, Lowell and Henry James) | W. C. Brownell |
| American Poetry and Fiction | C. F. Richardson |
| Great American Writers | Trent and Erskine |
| Some American Storytellers | Frederick Taber Cooper |
| American Short Stories | Charles Baldwin, Editor |
| The American Short Story | Elias Lieberman |
QUESTIONS ANSWERED