Fine? Ay, and more than fine. But we young men of the nineteen-noughts made one big mistake. We thought Guy Beverley had scaled the summit of art; but art has no summit. We thought he had plumbed the depths of psychology; but psychology defies the plumber. I date a new epoch in my life from that day in 19— when I picked up my Daily Reflector and read the opening chapter of a new serial, Her Soldier Sweetheart, by Ruby L. Binns. That was on a Monday. By Wednesday of that week this unknown writer had revealed to me a New Idea and a New Style. The idea is familiar to most of you now, but in those days the daring conception that a common soldier might turn out to be the missing heir of a baronet rang like a challenge in the ears of the older romanticism. It is her style, however, that is Ruby Binns's most enduring gift to English prose literature. Lean, restrained, economical, it holds (for me) the very spirit of the English race and tongue. Listen:—
She went to the door, thinking she heard something. There was nobody there, so she went back to her work, thinking sadly of her soldier boy. "Cheer up," said Clarice; "perhaps he'll come back soon." "Perhaps," answered Yvonne wanly, "but it does not seem very likely, does it, dear?" The next moment the door opened and a tall soldierly figure entered the room.
English? It is like a May morning on Tooting Common. Beverley would have handled that situation well, no doubt. But could he—could anyone—have achieved the poignancy of that unaffected phrase, "It does not seem very likely"? I said that the depths of Art were unplumbable. True, but Ruby Binns has at least got lower than most.
Next week I want to speak of a new man and a new book, Stott Mackenzie and his Only a Trailer-Car Conductress.
THE BEAUTIFUL THING.
You see ugly things in London now-a-days. Oh, yes, but you see beautiful things as well. I saw one yesterday—one of the beautiful things.
It was a cold wet evening, not actually raining but very, very nearly. I stood at the place in Piccadilly where the 'buses stop. There was quite a little crowd waiting, as there always is at this time of day—women with parcels, work-girls going home, a few men. All of them looked tired, and many of them looked cross.
When a 'bus drew up at the curb all those people made a simultaneous plunge for it. Before it had finally stopped they were clinging like a swarm of bees to the steps and rails. It is an arduous game this 'bus-catching, though for those who are young and strong it should perhaps have a certain attraction, combining as it does the allurement of a lottery gamble with the charm of a football scrimmage.
There were only three vacant places, and these, after a desperate struggle, were secured by two athletic-looking girls and a red-haired schoolboy. The conductor waved back the disappointed boarders and they dropped off sulkily. I watched them a moment and then my eyes toward two soldiers, who were crossing the street. Fine, well-set-up men they were, and they carried themselves with the indescribable air of those who have crossed swords with Death and left their opponent, for the time at least, defeated. One of them had a green shade over his left eye. The other carried a stick and walked with a slight limp.