OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
(By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks.)
To those who would learn what soldiering is like in the armies of democratic France I would heartily commend two books recently published by Messrs. ALLEN AND UNWIN, Battles and Bivouacs, by JACQUES ROUJON, and The Diary of a French Private, by GASTON RIOU. M. ROUJON, infantryman of the line, was in private life a journalist on Le Figaro; M. RIOU, Red Cross orderly, a liberal lay-theologian and writer of European reputation. The former's transliterator ("Munitions are distributed around," writes he undismayed; and has also discovered a territory known as "Oriental Prussia") obtrudes a little between author and reader. M. RIOU fares better; but both contrive to give a really vivid impression of the horrors and anxieties of the early days of the War before the tide turned at the Marne, of the flying rumours so far from the actual truth, of the fine spirit of camaraderie in common danger, of the intimate relations between officers and men, details, terrible or trivial, of campaigning, and, because our spirited brothers-in-arms are not ashamed to express their innermost feelings, of the deeper emotions at work under the surface gaieties. M. RIOU'S narrative is mainly the record of his year's captivity in a Bavarian fort. On his way he faced the fanatical hatred and cruelty of the German civilians, of the women especially, with a cynical fortitude. The commandant of his prison, Baron von STENGEL, was, however, a gentleman and a brick, and did everything in his power to make the difficult life bearable. An episode pleasant to recall is the reception of the Russian prisoners (intended by their captors to cause dissensions) by their French comrades in misfortune. The whole record gives an impression of fine courage and resourcefulness.
Very probably you are already acquainted with that restful and admirable book, Father Payne (SMITH, ELDER), of which a new edition has just now been published. The point of this new edition is that, in its special Preface, the genesis and authorship of the book are assigned, for the first time on this side the Atlantic, to Mr. A.C. BENSON. And the point of the new preface is that it entirely gives away the original edition (also printed here), in which the secret was elaborately concealed. My wonder is, reading the book with this added knowledge, that anyone can have at any time failed to detect in it the gently persuasive hand of the Master of Magdalene, Cambridge. You remember, no doubt, how Father Payne (a courtesy title), having had a small estate left to him, proceeded to turn it into the home of a secular community for young men desirous of pursuing the literary gift, and how he financed, encouraged and generally supervised them. Leisure, an exquisite setting, and the society of enthusiastic and personally-selected youth—one might call the book perhaps a Tutor's Dream of the Millennium. Anyhow, Father Payne, as shown in this volume, which is practically a record of his table-talk upon a great variety of themes, is exactly the gentle, shrewd and idealistic philosopher whom (knowing his parentage) one would expect. Bensonians (of the A.C. pattern) will certainly be glad to have what must surely have been their suspicions confirmed, and to admit Father Payne to the shelves of authenticity.
Miss DOROTHEA CONYERS has long ere this established herself as a specialist of repute in Irish sporting tales. You will need but one look at the picture wrapper of The Financing of Fiona (ALLEN) to see that a repetition of the same agreeable mixture awaits you within. Fiona was a charming young woman (Irish, of course) with a rich uncle and a poor, very unattractive cousin, who loved her for her expectations. As Fiona had no conception about money beyond the spending of it, the uncle made a will, whose object was that she should have plenty. The suitor, however, knowing of this, and being a naughty, rather improbable person, destroyed part of it, with the result that Fiona was apparently left only the ancestral home and no cash to keep it up. So she was forced to take in gentleman boarders for the hunting, and (for propriety's sake) to invent a mythical chaperon, who lived above stairs. And, after all, she needn't have done any such thing, because the rich uncle, in leaving her all the contents of the mansion, had foolishly forgotten to mention a secret drawer full of Canadian securities. As for the villain, I really hardly dare tell you the impossibly silly way in which he allowed himself to be caught out. But of course all this melodrama is not what matters. The important thing about Miss CONYERS' people is that (whatever their private worries) a-hunting they will go; and Fiona, financed by her paying guests, shows in this respect as capital sport as any of her predecessors. For the rest, I can hardly say with honesty that the story is equal to its author's best form.
What I like particularly about Mr. FREDERICK NIVEN is the friendly way in which he contrives to make his readers and himself into a family party. "We must," he writes at the beginning of a chapter in Cinderella of Skookum Greek (NASH), "get a move on with the story, in case you become more tired of Archer's compound fracture than he was himself." This is by no means the only occasion on which he shows his thoughtfulness for us, and I think it very kind and nice of him. At the same time I will ungraciously admit that the weak point of his story is that it does not move quite fast enough. Admirable artist in psychology and atmosphere, his plot, if you can call it a plot, is very slight. Cyrus Archer, the young American of the compound fracture (who had my sympathy from the start because he could never remember dates), goes out into the back of beyond for a spell before settling down to married life and a place in his father's business, and at Skookum Creek, where he grows tomatoes and studies Indians, he meets his Cinderella, with the result that his life has to be completely rearranged. A commonplace tale, but there is a rare and distinct flavour about the telling of it. Mr. NIVEN'S manner has indeed a very particular charm, over which one would take an even keener pleasure in lingering if only he himself lingered a little less over his story.