The Brooklyn Daily Eagle from Brooklyn, New York • Page 10

Ml Till: DAILY EAGLE. NEW YORK. WEDNESDAY. DECEMBER 2S. 1927.

THE TRUCE OF GOD, IN LITERARY ENDEAVOR -OTHER BOOK REVIEWS 16 "WHY MEN HATE WOMEN" A Chinese See White Passed in Review iB? LUCIE 'Galsworthy Is Stlil Technician I -Etcipc'' Hold, Reader at Well GEORGE CARRIE: This Sitwell Is So by Marriage But It Appears That the Famoas Tares of Ear Letters Art Gainers TWeby. A Mandarin of the Fourth Button Journeys to Australia to Save His Head and Finds Us Amusing, Bewildering and at Times Worthy. ONE ot the favorite diversions of standing. He reaSaed our cwmeroua the Occidental mind la to air edvan-agee over hia countrymen and commended them foe adoption In hie lu opinions on things Oner.L n4UJ o( On the other hand, tt conspicuously lmparuai outsider, ne also marked seioom tnai a man oi uie wnuu Empire, or of any other Far Eastern land, ventures forth with an expression of his thoughts on the "Westerner Who can tell bow different the relations ot the "twain" that "never shall meet" might have been had not this interchange of opinion been so Henry Collins Brou NX hose "In the Golden Nineties" Awa.ts Vou, Makes One a Chili Just for a Nirht, and VC'hy Not? tt TLLL," said the hard-boilrd book editor, turning bt jd A Chratmes tree and addressing himself 10 bacon ftffgl, -that trvw Ke looked very hrd-boid. As nutter of fact, he felt very Upstairs, the living room.

Mrue. Schuruann-Heink was weavjig motherly n.asw. ut of the mouth of the victrola. ith her bell-ltke "Sulle Nacht It made the bacon stick In jines throat In the cei'ai the t.ry rumble of an electric train winding In and out of a toy tomi droned through the enormous conversation of three small boys and ot.e small girl cousin Outside the neighbor's police clog chasing a literary tomcat. Breakfast Monday morning no time for echolaily -Ye ejrc are getlinj cold." reminded the hard-boiled literary editor's Uarder-bciled wife.

1 The electric ttar cn the top of Die tree blinked off and on, cfl and on. The floor underneath, and every here underfoot, ru littered. One walked not lest there follow destruction to tin motorcars. One ass Carguantua in a babe toyland. Mrr.e.

Schumann-Helnk finished and ran down with a las: sijtv.ng gulp. "And that," thought the literary editor. "Is that." one-sided? i wnm sucn acceptance involves uie "A Chinaman's Opinion of Us" i sacrifice of a deep-rooted idea. 'Frederick A. Stokes Company! nes of letter- written by Hwuy-Ung.

18 unfortunate that In tranalat-Mandann of the Fourth Button, from trig. Mr. Makepeace tried to pre Australia to a friend In China. They i mn vnat he choose to call "a quaint represent" says the t-ansiawr. J.

A. Tu Mylt no, at quaint Makepeace of the Methodist Mission i hen empU)yed Chinese expres-m Canton "the prevailing thought of I production in English the Uvea In the his ZACHAROFF; our suoncomings. His observation are permeated with delightful humor, and tneir range includes everything tiotn pontic, women, economics and history to dancing, baseball, religion and otrtn control He tolenmtly accepted those Western principle hich appear sound to him. even makes some of the author's more val uable deductions either obseure or ridiculous, and sometimes both. Vocabularies at the end of the book, one for each letter, make the matter worse, for It Is exceedingly cumber-tome to refer to the appendix continuously.

"A Chinaman's Opinion of Us" is, however, only one Chinaman's beliefs, but Is worth the time spent on It because of Its deep wisdom and keen humor. THOSE seeking, enlightenment on Uie enigma that la China will find the second volume of the "Mary-knoll Mission Letters" (The Mac-inlllan Company) useful These extracts from the letters and diaries of the pioneer Catholic missloners, although not intended originally for this purpose, depict many unknown customs, and contain much valuable information about the Middle Kingdom. boorishness. Lowering themselves la boriously onto the floor, they preserved for an Indefinite period an Inflexible silence. Did a hostess ask them timidly whether ahe might Introduce Miss So-an-So, or if they would care to look at the garden, they would answer with unflinching sincerity.

'No'." Those who have had a modest or no reputation as talkers are likely tc get more out of this book than confirmed babblers. OWEN CTJLBERTSON. Wages of Sin THAT a woman can never be abs lutely free from the obligations of the social and moral law but must seme time pay for her Indiscretions and bow before the majesty ot the law that she has flouted In her mistaken sense of free will, Is the essence of "Venture's End," by Karln Mlchaelis, author of The Dangerous Age" (Haroort, Brace Ss r.i A THIl. 1E WEIL. MTKRAKf AUVJXKR.

frltlcliwd il marketed prtt department for r-y nd motion picture. Th Wrtiere' Workhop. Ine. 1st But Flftr- Ithtb 8treet, Manhett. The 'Book Shelf i Rttmning to normalcy, wo diteooor Horb Roth itluttrating Ctlmtt Bur gee j' book, namod abov, mnd publUhod by Paynn 4k Clarito, but ho dottn't roally hato thorn.

BUT NOT quite. Henry Collins Brown's "In the Golden Ninetks." the current Valentine's Manual, Is a book I always reserve for that period when literature as such palls and the world Is addressed to the therapeutic endeavor of being as silly and fleshly sis possible. Nineteen hundred and twenty-seven years ago a child was born In Bethlehem. And his followers have ccme to count themselves by millions. With stubborn blindness men have used His teachings for the suppression of silliness and fleshly things.

Thank Cod that the birh of a child. even so long ao. should once a year turn men's thoughts from the shedding of blood in His name, waging extinction and disease and pestilence, and Into the more Christmas-like pleasures of giving, no matter how dreadful the cigars, no matter how giddy the neckties. The world needs Christmas as a tonic. The truce of God was not created for the trenches alone Well, Henry Collins Brown's book occupies a large place In my hcll-day reading.

He wears no mantle of an Oxford don. Upon his br-w rests no cap of the Sorbonne. He revels In the breezy nice-nelllness of old New York, he recalls with a laugh the deadly earnestness in which New Yorkers surreptitiously pursued life, liberty and happiness, as an Inalienable right, rather than a spontaneous outburst. He Is of the earth, earthy. Muttonleg sleeves he digs up out ot the trunk In the attic, to hold them up.

not to Inspire ridicul but to inspire reverie. The cocktail hour to him was a brie' Interlude of wassail for the purpose of rubbing elbows with one's fellows, rather than for the mor enlightened purpose of getting pie-eyed. One gathers that a little hypocrisy was good for the ul. In the bicycle "Nineties." longest nation tory of the world, a nation containing one-third of the earth's population, now awaking from Its many ages ot somnolence." ALTHOUGH It will be readily apparent to those familiar with the East that the missives give us a true picture of a cross-section of a typically Oriental mind. It Is difficult to conceive any one human being as representative of 400.000.000 people's convictions, especially in the case of China, with her number of practically Independent provinces, her diversity of dialects, and variety ot customs and philosophies within her wide border.

The author, a social reformer of the Sun Yat Sen group, escaped decapitation by migrating to Australia. The ways of the "pale-faces" were utterly bewildering to him at flrat A man of culture, he sought the wherefore of our mode ot life, and gradually he had attained a sympathetic under- Talk for Dullards GOODNESS knows, this world la not at a loss. In lta present state, for something to talk about. The newspapers see to that. But If anyone were to weary of "the topics ot the day," as a vehicle of his Instinct to an outlet for his mental and vocal energies, let him get Olive Haseltine's "Conversation." (E.

P. Dutton Co.) Here is a book about conversation that will provide more things to talk about than one could make use of in one season and It he had one season's experience in exercising and entertaining himself and others with this history of the art of conversation he would be so well under way to a career as raconteur that he would never turn back to mediocrity or silence. Miss Haseltine's book sharpens the wits. It whets the appetite. After reading a chapter or even a few pages one is tempted to rush out and engage someone In a talking match.

It's so good that It can inspire the dullest of us to rise to the supreme conversational heights of talking to a foreigner about something besides America. According to the author, this would be a lofty attainment for Americans. For she is an Englishwoman. But she Is no mqre charitable toward some of her fellow countrymen. Take the Cambridge man tor one: "Under the inspiration of nature and simplicity." she eharges, "Cambridge men adopted a conscientious Reviews of Thrillers, Stories Of Biographies, Other Current Literature WHAT a dead world lies III one of his books.

At last his series has caught up to your reviewer. Porlnj through Its pages, this book stirred up memories, nursed romantic nostalgia into a precious lump in the throat. The critical faculty was dulled rather lulled Into a sentimental state of suspended animation. In the "Nineties" toy electric liahts on a Christmas tree were unheard of. Little children were forbidden to touch even the bulb lest they get a shock.

Such was the respect In which the elders held the forces of electricity. Instead one stood, blinking and ecstatic, before a tall tree, beaming with flickering candles, while father stood close by with a pail of water on each side. One got real toys in his stockings and only big parcels under the tree. Trains were of iron, or, occasionally, with a brass boiler1 and an alcohol lamp to generate a terrific pressure of steam, that was later to blow out one end of the engine, to the fainting consternation ot one's married aunt and the half-tearful, half-terrified Joy of the young engineer. A little boy In Mr.

Collins' "Nineties" did not ask for a real motion picture machine, but was content with a magic lantern and glass slides, thrown through a lens Illuminated by an oil lamp. When the slides were all shown and the family had tired of them, the young Bai-num flimfiammed more pennies out of the elders by flashing the slides on the screen uptide down. ct but Anthor Clisp to Formula. By ISRirL BECKF1ARDT. A DRAMA is meant for the stage.

Jin as music is meant to nlaverf The IrTm "rlnjut drama" Is an anomaly ny play which is not at best when per-j formed is either a poor play or no play at all However, there are some dramatic works which not only act well but may read with both profit and enjoyment If to a strong plot is added fine characterization or sub-4 servience to some intellectual purpose. 1 problem, or of meaning" as Mr i Galsworthy puts it, we have such a piay. Mr. Galsworthy's own dramas are among the few that enjoy the dual distinction of gracing both the stale and the library. His latest and.

as he promises, his last, play. 'Charles Scnbners Rons, is no exception. In this play Mr. Gals-: worthy's object or "meanrnj" is to portray and analyze the reactions of various types that make un the bulk of our society when confronted with me problem of taking action upon meeting an escaped convirt whose only fault is beina on the wrone side of the law. Captain Matthew Denant is a young Englishman, Oxford bred and a veteran of the World War.

He Is walking through Hyde Park when he Innocently becomes encaged in a somewhat intellectual conversation with a prostitute. As he leaves, a policeman attempts to arrest her for being a public nuisance. Denant returns and in the ensuing fight he knocks the policeman down. The copper's head hits an iron ratling, killing him. Denant is sentenced to five years at hard labor for manslaughter.

His finely bred nature being unable to bear the and humiliation of Imprisonment for "three more years like a Denant makes a getaway. In his flight he encounters, successively, a wealthy lady, an old gentleman, ex-mastistrate; two of the lower a rnlcMleclass couple, a farmer and a farm-laborer, two spinster sisters, and a Hijh Church parson. He finally snrrenders to save the parson from lying for him. As he says, "It's one's decent self one can't escape." CAPTAIN DEN ANT'S character Is so symmtheticallv drawn that it Is merely the abstract idea of "convict" whbh handover him that enters into the problem. The range of characters whom he meets Is so great as to constitute a veritable cross-section of all society.

The whole is fashioned with the best of Mr. Galsworthy's accustomed skill and artistry, so that the result Is a smooth, sincere and stimulating drama, And yet, as is always the case on either reading or seeing Mr. Galsworthy's plays, we are dissatisfied. And this dissatisfaction lies not su much against the play as against Mr. Galsworthy himself The work is perfect every condition has been met, every possibility exhausted.

In fact, if the thin were less well done we would be more content. The fault we find is that such excellence in craftsmanship and in delicacy of feeling should not have produced a more epic, a more inspired, an exhilarating rather than a satisfying re sult. More partiwlarly this lack of Inspiration is manifested in the char acterization. The plot is full and dramatic, the "spire" intellectual and interesting, but the characters are types rather than Individuals. They are mere puppets whose only purpose is to illustrate the problem presented through the plot.

In truly great drama, on the other hand, the plo snrin's from the characters' in dividuality being attacked or acted upon by some force or net of forces. In the present play, Matt Denant is a typical, personable young Englishman; while the remainder of the dramatis ersonae do not even appear by name. This impersonality of the fteures in his drama Is true of all Galsworthy's plays. In "Strife," for instance, John Anthony's only function is to represent a typical capitalist employer, while that of Roberts is merely to illustrate leader of workingmen. Instead of Individuals caught by strong universal forces, he presents marionettes In volved in unique circumstances.

Education's Ills UtlJMANIZING EDUCATION' 1 (New Education Publishing Company), by Samuel D. Sellout hausen, Is an attack on our eiuca- tlonal system. Its verve and gusto and often profound passages are stimulating. Unfortunately Mr. Schmalhausen's criticisms are unsys tematic, chaotic and confused, with the result that their stimulation is In definite, vasue and hence of a fleeting nature.

This book is more like a collection of essays, each having a vague logical connection with its predecessor, and hence cannot have me enect ine autnor aims at me reason for their vagueness Is the author's histrionic manner and com bative disposition. Mr. Schmalhausen was a teacher in the New York high school system when he became acquainted with the system he is attacking. It is true that the Institution of education can always be criticized, since it never does reach perfection, and all criticism should be welcome If v.e are to Improve It. However, Mr.

Schmalhnusen has done himself an injustice by failing to limit himself to his problem ana nas covered many neids, related and unrelated to education. One may una me author opinions on psveno analysis, the political machinery ot America, religion, ethics, philosophy, etc. It Is possible that education will have an effect on these fields of endeavor, but we do not find Mr. Schmalhausen showing these rela tionships. Day will dissolve itself into a pleas urable gush of sentiment, a sense of well-being.

In touch with the world. I know of no book hich recommends Itself so highly for Christmas week as In the Golden Nineties. For. after all, Christmas is for the children. And it makes one feel like a child again.

Fathers will find some comlort, as their sons take away, jternly, the electric trains which Santa Clam brought for the youngsters. Henry Collins Brown, the son-of-a-gun. nip'tea any literary editor soft-boiled. With a truer insight into the human race than ths much-lo'd Thomas Beer, he has scorned the mauver.ps of the Of course, they And so is hi book, By WILLIAM ntAlTSGLASS. CONSTANCE SITWELL la the Artagnan come to swell the ranks of the three 81: wells tdith, Osbrrt and SaehavereU.

That she came through marriage la Indicated by E. M. Forster In bis condescending preface. But whether tt Is Osbert or Sachaverell it la hard to choose between such glittering names and one must wait for the tardy recognition, of who's who or the Improbable appearance ct some apposite literary note. She la easily the equal of any of the four.

I "Flower and Elephants" Har-! court. Brace Sc Co.) will probably not become famous In our day, but there will come a time when the "Jean Chris tophes" and the "Genius- I will make one wonder now tne I fishlike floundering of their hyt-. terlcal heroes could have been mis-I taken for the authentic throes of genius or even human beings while this slender, quiet, immeasurably pro found book was neglected. To predict that this book is the harbinger of a new literary era may seem dogmatic, but those who read it can hardly escape such a conviction. I know of only one volume that can be likened to It the diarr of a little girl of six.

"Opal Whitely." published some years ago. Not In the sentimental sense may It be said that Constance Sitwell has re tained a childlike simplicity. Rather it is that she sees the world as a strange, vivid, objective thing. Ob jects have not yet been incnistea with a discoloring utility. The world Is a series of bright figures on a bit of porcelain, but some dim connection lurks among them of the search lor that nexus this book is the rec ord.

The author will not pretend to have found it in a glibly avowed, conventionalized God. There is a mystic entelechy holding together the most diverse appearances, something far too refined to meddle in, but a lonely world-spirit waiting for some sensitive one to discern it beyond the flux of things, something once perceived forqver redeeming life from its tyrannical immediacy. Always she Is balancing her slender. fastidious self against the hard, ugly world about her. She sees an old beggar woman crouching by a mud wall.

"Like Lazarus, the was covered with sores. She was gray with dust and dirt and there were no dogs to lick her sores. I gave her a little money and stood there vaguely look ing at my crisp muslin dress against that heap of rags." On every pase there are Images as vivid as Conrad's, as definitive as Proust s. and less artificial, more spontaneous than cither's. Whether it bs the great, lumbering elephants that tear up trees in their pitiful attempts to escape from their corral, the priests mumbling their sacred cabalas and endlessly poring over text venerated for their even ancient unintellisibility, the naked ascetic on his bed of nails taking out his plnce-nea to dumbfound, the white spectators, the quiet, 'wounded black bear looking with Its "furry coat so like a child's big toy," or, as she descends the Himalayas, "the white paddy fields with white paddy birds flapping above them the pale tassels areca-nut palms hanging down In the motionless air and beyond them the blue of the distance, the soft, rich blue of the windless noonday," or that glorious summation when she comes upon the Gates of Victory "A gateway crowning a vast flight of steps that descends into the plain.

There is no road beyond, only a great spread of desolate land. I stood at the top of the step's; the glorious portal rising above me lifted its towers and cupolas high Into a gray sky of drifting tattered clouds. The plain, immense ana forlorn, streched away and away till the green crops faded into insubstantial blue. India itself seemed to be there before one. And those great steps, in how sublime a fashion did they rise out of the plain so enduring, and no one to use them so magnificent, and no one to wonder," one is pervaded with her sad, beautiful dryad-like spirit.

For the Platonic, ascending perception of the ideal through a tedious dialectic she has substituted a less reasoned sloughing off of the temporal, the Immediate, the unreal. Mrs. Sitwell achieves all this by indirection. She may even be astonished that she could have provoked such a melange of thought in one. But writers wot not all they do.

No more than an author can express all the shades of his thought can he realize all the shades of thought he has expressed. In every one of us this book, I think, will stir the deepest and most individual penumbra of memories. ern type of woman who gets married with one foot In the office and one In the home, but these women are that much less a wife, a "part-time" wife, so to speak. BUT the novel is good, and If the theme la a trifle hnrknovcH it i still as pertinent as it was when women first started in as wage-earn- ers. 6ilvia Hawthorne Is a bit preju- diced on the question of the dominat- Ing personality In the marriage union.

She sees her mother as a submergid soul, content with the commonplaces, I because Jim Hawthorne was too ulgj and driving to allow another career in the same house. Richard Branch is mentally constituted in the same i dominant mold, and Silvia is Insistent upon fearful of her career if she accepts him as a husband. do get married, finally, and go to a small college town. There Silvia has a position teaching architecture at the college, while Richard contents himself with a minor job in engineering. Then slowly and neatly Miss Widdemer brinirs out th sreri- ual adjustments that must take place v.v..

-1 must mraiiy niaira couple, and It Is never hinted that either Richard or Silvia have found In each other anything but the perfect complement. In Silvia's fear of being submerged, however, lies the germ of trouble. All the adjustments are consequently made by Richard, to his growing uneasiness and discontent. As might be expected, he bears everything with silent fortitude, so that, man-like, may have a larger Justification for breaking hia promises. B.oLtja fa: Tart.

Tii; rear to Nhe lOSth Inraatrr Armor? Kelt BMlvrtlne- at p.m. frlire. AUMIS- siox nra SERVING BROOKLYN SINCE" 1885 Abraham Straus- BROOKLYN- BOOKS YouVe Been Wanting Noti'Fiction THE FAMILY, on Christmas night, did not turn on radio and doze to the feckless music of jazz. The cocktail shaker was not clinking Ice against frosted sides before the children went to bed. Instead, one sat on a chair and piped to a father's high false tenor and a mother's soft soprano such lovely music as Little Town of Bethlehem "Noel," "Godres-gee, Mary Gennilmen" and "Harktha Heral' Angels Sing." And one whined.

If told to go to bed, until one fell asleep at last, wi'h his nead upon the table and his feet in a sister's doll's bassinet. It was then that Christmas dinner went to work. In the "Nineties" there were no such things as callories, proteins, starch-content One ate largely and evilly of delicious food, that one might dream later such hideosities as Frank Pape Invented for the Boni Liveright edition of "Rabelais." The little boy of the "Nineties" got castor oil the morning af'ei Christmas as Inevitably as little George is now sat in the corner. One spent the whole vacatipn getting underfoot, getting castor oil, stufftt.g some more against the next day. Life is less complex In the home today, but somehow It Is not quite the old holiday.

Toy electric lamps on the tree carry no such thrill of forbidden marvels as did lighted candles. Or Is it that one can never catch again a lest childhood? A Perfect Englishman I In "Up the Years From Blooms-1 bury" (Littls, Brown Mr. George Arliss, English actor oT char- acters for the American stage, has traced his life from Infancy with such oareful attention to detail and a meticulous precision as to fact that they almost belle the ease with which the work reads. Like the conventional and conservative biographer, Mr. Al-llss begins with his childhood days circa 1880 and brings us down the close of his triumph In "Old English," his most recent "hit" in the Usited States, without any undue heart throbs.

The commendable characteristic of this autobiography Is that it lacks any exciting narration or hectic episodes and yet, in a puzzling way. It holds the reader's interest. Can it be that In this day of high-pressure dramatized biography the autobiography of a quiet-living character actor who never figured in any startling scandals, strikes, interdicted plays or other pulse-quickening episodes is sufficient to make good reading? So it would seem In this Instance. For any actor who began in a London penny theater and who developed his art of mummery through a long sequence in the back stretches of the British Isles, who came to these United States In the entourage of the lurid Mrs. Pat Campbell, who survived that engagement and who by dint of his ability to portray odd characters has quite endeared himself to the American playgoer, Mr.

Arliss' book tells us of little of the passing scene in the playhouses. This sounds like a plea lor excitement, it is not. It is merely to emphasize that the author either Is a poor reporter or else has gone through a most ordered career. Toward the former view these who have seen Mr. Arliss, monocle in eye, surveying life as it passes, are In clined to lean.

The reviewer once noted Mr. Arliss as he was observing a score or more of ship news reporters aboard the S. S. Berengaria at Quarantine, New York Harbor, in the process of interviewing a lady channel swimmer who was returning after an unsuccessful effort and who was being goaded into that pastime called "hurling charges." The reporters barked, the camera men roared, the s'rong girl spluttered, but Mr. Arliss' features, which seemed almost as immovable then as they are mobile on the stage, never registered the least trace of undue interest or curiosity.

Through his single eyeglass he surveyed the episode and saw that it did not concern him or his affairs. Forthwith he resumed his reading of the morning paper, fresh from the mall boat In such a manner Mr. Arliss apparently has gone through his stage career. The drama behind the drama, the lurid touches behind the backdrop of which we hear so little and long to hear so much, he touches on but lightly, if at all. On his own development as an actor he Is quite specific and satisfactory and after all that Is the purpose of an autobiography.

PAUL E. LOCKWOOD. Jews in New Russia JAMES N. ROSENBERG, who Is vice chairman of the Jewish Jornt Distribution Committee, spent four weeks In Soviet Russia In the spring if 1928. "On the Steppes." which con- slsts of extracts from his diary, gives us an enlightened and intimate im pression of present-day conditions, and the author's simple, effective manner of presenting his work makes one feci the authenticity ot the contents.

The agricultural work of the Jews in Russia was the object of Mr. Rosenberg's study. During the Czarlstic rale the Jews were continuously persecuted and were denied every form of occupation except that of small trader or artisan The revolution brought a theoretically sudden end to anti-Semitism, but It had an appalling effect on the majority of the Jewish population. In that the Soviet scheme of things left no place for the petty trader or handworker. In place of the small store were government-supported co-operatives, and government-controlled industry displaced the hand worker.

In agriculture, the revolution made for the rise of the peaiant class and their rliht to till land for themselves. The Jews, through relief organisa tions, have become farmers and, ac we 8ee fn indomitable people lifted out of the depths ot despair by a gleam of hope and the healing breath of nature." Ten thousand families had accepted this tually be repaaid by them. To symno! ize the optimistic spirit of the settlers. kit. uosenoerg tells us that some of 'hln almost immediately set out maun uces.

Acaciasi taxes twenty years for them to crow Into real trees; does that mean anything?" auinor aescrmes workers on the Soil," a colony of tarmers, where oxen are pulling the plows, and he comments on the psychological effect of the ox on the Jew 'V the city Jew, nervous. Impatient, fidgery, resi- icoo ana eager. uie by little he learns to adjust himself to the even disposition of the animal, learns something of the value of slow, steady, deliberate, patient work. He can't hurry his croDS. the sunshine snrtn.

time. He becomes a part of the deep current of nature." "On the Steppes" will interest those who seek information and ail who And pleasure in a fine piece of work will appreciate Mr. Rosenberg's viy word-pictures of his travels. It ui ub vamaoie to men of all creeds HAZEL S. LOEWENWARTER.

The Glittering Fraud "CMPTY SHRINES" (The Bobb Merrill Company) are those Vacated by the once virtuous and wealthy, who are still wealthy. Elize beth Finley Thomas has written a novel about a little stage girl who earnestly desires to know and emulate the upper circles of society, and then when she does get to know them no longer seeks to emulate them. Alberta Varley, one mlsht say, had been born with a lipstick in her mouth, except that a lipstick 'j longer significant of the stage, and it would hardly sound right to say she had been born with footlights in her mouth. She didn't have that kind of a mouth I She was an attractive young jman, possessing none of the vices usually associated with -ty ladles, except that she fell in love with an Utter Scoundrel and surely that Is a vice not con-p- any profession or class. An -Tray, Alberta marries the man and on the eve of bearing his child discovers he is a bigamist The baby dies and Alberta Is broken-hearted.

In the meantime h-r husband has de: her, which is although she doesn't realize it at the time. After a little Alberta becomes to a wealthy and prominent young man and thus reaches those olittprinf xr circles, only to find the tr.ith of the old saying that all is not gold that glitters. For these gay and apparently charming people are nothing more than a lot of very ordinary, mercenary and vulgar human beings. So Alberta changes her mind and marries the man you wanted her to at the beginning of the book. This is no great story, by any means, but it is Interesting, and I am quite sure there are a number of people who will enjoy it.

CECILIA M. WOLFE. ft A Wife's Career ORE Than Wife." by Margaret 1 Widdemer (Harcourt. Brace Sc was first published serially under the title "The Thread of Gold." Both titles are pretty bad but the one used at present is inexcusable. Once the prejudice, against it Is overcome, however, the book is bound to be good, a smoothly told story with Miss Widdeman's curiously sympathetic slant toward all characters.

It Is doubtful If she could create a properly villainous villain at the end ot the story he would certainly be the hero! The superhuman being who is "more than wife" which means, of course, more than a mother, more than a mald-of-all-work, more than a manager, housekeeper, etc. Is Silvia Hawthome. before many chanters Silvia Branch. She Is the daughter ot Jim Hawthorne, a famous engineer, and she Is herself a talented and succeeding young architect. With a special talent for music, writing or cooking.

Miss Widdemer would probablv have called her "Just a Wife." or "Wife and Mother First," but since her heroine Is an architect, she in also that indefinable some thing "more." The author undoubted Hj'vV Mr. Brown leads one away from his book! "In the Golden Nineties" Is net a volume of research. With an artless art. if one mey use so weak a bull, he prattles along suggestively. One's lane is led astray.

But always one returns, to be led Into further pleasant digression. Whoever told Mr. Brown to fling away continuity gave him Wolseian counrM. Memory has never been orderly and there was no ne(d for him to be, In this memory-stirring book. The "Nineties" were bustling years, with trolley car bells clanging Imperiously; trucks feeling their way through traffic to the clopplty-cl'p ot fat, well-groomed horses and grand, profane shouts of blue-nosed, red-cheeked teamsters; little boys holding their breath as they were dragged over crossings, beset on all sides by the snorting faces of fiery steeds and the lron-mustached fronts of green and red street cars.

One rode in cable cars and listened to his elders speak ot the on whose cable snapped end rolled back down the hill Just the week before. One got a great thrill, riding In an elevated, In the later while soot soiled one's Eton collar and one's stomach tell Into his sh-lops as he looked out the window upon the cobblestones so far bctow WOODROW WILSON Life and Letters, Youth and Princeton. 2 vols. By Ray Stannard Baker 9.75 THE AMERICAN ADVENTURE A History of the United States. 2 vols.

The romantic story of the building of the United States from its early days to the tremendous and prosperous present. By David Saville MuzzeyPh.D. 9.75 BUILDERS OF AMERICA A vital and compelling; discussion of the social, political and economic problems which confront the America of today. Ellsworth Huntington. 3.45 BISMARCK The story of a 'fighter the story of the great Bismarck, who, as the Iron Chancellor, moulded the future of Germany to his own ideals.

By Emit Ludwig 4.95 THE GOLDEN NINETIES A delightful account, of New York in the leisurely days of the nineties by an authority on the history of the Metropolitan city. Henry Collins Brown 4.93 Fiction THE VANGUARD A of light realism cleverly interwoven with a strain of gay fantasy. By: Arnold Bennett 1.46 THE KINGDOM OF THEOPHILUS The account of a man who risked health and wealth in the pursuit of happiness and who nearly lost both. By William J. Locke 2.24 THE QUEST OF YOUTH Farnol at his best in a romance colorful with mystery, action and character.

By Jeff ru Famol 2.24 ALAS, POOR YORICK! Three imaginary episodes in the life of Laurence Sterne. By Alfred H. Bill 2.24 THE PAUL STREET BOYS Translated by Louis By Fcrenc Motnar 1.79 A. a W. Tlonk ahnp, MeraoMlae.

OF COURSE, the "Nineties" to the older people must nave had theli charm, too, but to little boys they were the grandest years of life. One had a bobsled instead of a flexible flier. The advantage cl bobsled was that the hills often had snow upon them for sledding ttid after one got started he never was sure that he would have all bis bones whole and hearty by the time he got to the bottom ot the hill One gladly let a big boy steer. But one made his mother's face go white as he told tall stories at dinner of how he skidded around Mister Hasbrouck's hornless carriage -which had stalled on the Picrmonswoad. It was then tin one learned that tall-talk had Its repercussions.

The bobsled was taken away and one never saw it again. Of all the books of tiie season, this Is the one for Christinas week. Those who couldn't leave the city to see the old folks will feel them in Its pages. Those who did leave the city will feel cozy and warm ard contented and Just a little bit homesick for what went so long before, as they look over Its pictures. Tla ga-ga felting which comes after Chrbtroas Eva and Chiistma Other Store News on Pages 5, 6 and 12 cording to Louts Marshall' foreword, ly meant Silvia to represent the mod-.