ata ch es ep ick ed tbook, 'The Man Nobody Knows,' in which he demonl's strated successfully the truth of the abounding cheerfulness of Christ in contradistinction to the conventional Man of Sorrows, that Mr Bruce Barton should aspire to the more voluminous interest of the Scriptures themselves; and, therefore, he has written 'The Book Nobody Knows' (Constable). Strange to say that book is the Bible. Obviously the title exaggerates. There are excellent points in this little volume; but the author los has tried to sit at once upon two stools, with the expected result. He appears to be a Fundamentalist on the Pentateuch, at the same time as he regards Jesus as rather inspired man than God. He cannot have it both ways. Also, it seems as if he has his tongue in his cheek when he touches upon the Old Testament miracles and the portentous length of years lived by our Bible ancestors. f in Sm ter Adam, in spite of the necessity for hard work, hung on for a matter of nine hundred and thirty years; but the prize for longevity goes to Methuselah, who established the world's record of nine hundred and sixty-nine years. He passed away in the year of the Flood; there is no telling how long he might have lived under a dry régime.' Mr Barton refers to Micah as 6 a down-state man'; he suggests that the last chapter of Proverbs was written by Bathsheba, and lightly assumes that when Saul was struck down and converted in the blinding light, he was suffering a sun-stroke. Flippancy mars the book, but it is interesting, and the influence of Christ on the life of the world is in no way minimised. Of better value for making the Scriptures familiar to the multitude who do not read them is Dr. W. L. Courtney's 'The Bedside Bible' (Chapman & Hall), which consists of some of the more 'literary' passages of the Old and New Testaments and the Apocrypha, extracted and set out with a few sufficient notes. The value of this reading, apart from the religious purpose, requires no especial advocacy here, for have not the greatest prose writers in our language been supremely influenced and inspired, whether they knew it or not, by an early reading of that well of English undefiled, the Authorised Version ? In an equally helpful key is 'From a Pillow' (Murray). 'J. W.,' the writer, not only champions helpfully the Vol. 248.-No. 491. P established old against the restless new, showing that happiness is available without the violent excitements; but brings out the truth that physical weakness and subjection to an invalid's bed do not prevent greatness of heart and mind provided the will to it is there. This little volume, with its wit, insight, wisdom, and memories, is a valuable antidote to tendencies which this age would be better without. Mr Gerald Howe, the newest publisher and a promising, has set himself a high standard in this publication of 'Examples of San Bernardino of Siena,' which Miss Ada Harrison has brought together and Mr Robert Austin has illustrated with drawings a little rough. The Franciscan, Bernardino, is worth knowing; for although he had none of the mystical majesty and poetry of the Saint of Assisi, his shrewd and humorous thrusts and sayings in his almost endless preachings, as shown in this selection, are almost as effective now as they were to the multitudes who waited before dawn to hear him. He was a Spurgeon of his time, without the extravagances which sometimes marred the dignity of the preacher at the Tabernacle. We pass from the mystical West to the mystical East, and a modern master. It is impossible yet to estimate the place among the enduring poets which will be taken by 'Rabindranath Tagore' (Milford), but already he has established himself in a security of fame stronger and higher than that of any other modern favourites of the anthologists. It is, therefore, well to have a sane and stimulating guide through the mass and frequent wealth of his writings in prose and verse, dramatic and lyrical; and such a guide is available in Mr Edward Thompson, whose breadth of mind and soundness of tone and judgment are shown, not only in his appreciation but also in his recognition that often the work of Tagore fell sometimes far below his own excellent standard. Mr James Milne is the kindliest of distinguished literary journalists, a gentle chiel taking notes of the infinite world of books, and, as in these 'Pages in Waiting' (Lane), recording his view of life with geniality and an epigrammatic brightness. He has a catholic sympathy. He is able to see greatness in publishers, virtues in best-sellers, and the humanity of princes. His new book is rich with a quiet joy, and all who read it will have reason to say 'Thank you.' The particular great triumph of the Wireless is that it has taught the community the difference between good music and bad; and the many parlour-players of five years ago who regarded 'The Star of Bethlehem' as a fine song and 'The Maiden's Prayer' as music, having become familiar with Mozart, Beethoven, and Bach, can realise the stuff and nonsense that such things really were. For such a reason Mr R. W. S. Mendl's thoughts 'From a Music Lover's Armchair' (Philip Allan), should win a wide reading; for clearly, frankly, and with a saving grace of humour, the author puts a point of view worth considering. He is conservative and yet modern. He likes a bright tune and would rather have it from an established master than from a merchant of syncopation with his ukelele plunkings. Why not introduce the opening allegro of Bach's third Brandenburg Concerto to the modern ball-room, he asks, and bid the jazz-band be silent for a while? But Wagner to him is perdition. That sloppy air the Spring Song in 'Die Walküre,' the mawkish Siegfried Idyll, loathsome tunes like the Pilgrim's March and the quasireligious brawls of Parsifal'! Beethoven is, indeed, to Wagner as Hyperion to a satyr.' Such disagreements, however wrong they be, are good because they stimulate; and there is much to stimulate the new student of the better music in this book. Fantasy is not for every one, and those who could not appreciate the humour of 'The Crock of Gold' are unlikely to enjoy Mr Eimar O'Duffy's brilliant satire 'King Goshawk and the Birds' (Macmillan). To every one his taste; and the serious-minded Irishman will hate him. We found it laughable. The inevitable has happened. Only the plutocrats are kings. The dollar is indeed almighty, and there are 'corners' in everything. So that when King Goshawk, sitting up in his bed on Manhattan, decides to gratify his wife by buying up and keeping as his monopoly the world's supply of singing-birds and afterwards the wild flowers, those enormities are done. The purpose is realised, and nothing can deprive this Lord of Nearly Everything of the possession of those natural and lovely necessities; until Cuanduine, the son of Cuchulain, with all his powers, passion, and beauty, is born to redeem them; and fails. Extravagant, of course, and grotesque; yet it is a grotesque extravagance of the truth. Now and then the fancy nods and the wit goes for a little while to sleep; but yet generally it is richly there with insight and touches of bitterness, and more than an echo of Rabelaisian laughter. We look forward to the promised continuation of this ironic mockery of the ancient epic. After the comedy we come to the harlequinade. Poor Shakespeare!-how much longer is he to be the butt of elaborately ingenious crankiness? The long-eared discoverers will not let him alone. The literary descendants of Nick Bottom are innumerable, and seemingly have taken now to topsyturvy commentary. Here is another example of theoretical perversity; though this time its begetter has wisely hidden himself under a number. The First Folio, we are assured, in 'Shakespeare's "Tempest' Corrected' (Simpkin), is 'a fake from beginning to end, its air of antiquity is assumed, and its language is not the natural language of the author, who could have expressed himself immensely better.' 'No. 230' then proceeds to illustrate. Side by side, on separate pages, he prints Shakespeare's text and his own 'immensely better' version. This, for example, is the revised form of Ariel's lovely song. 'Come unto these yellow, yellow sands, And there all join your hands. Courtesied when you have all and kissed, The wild waves shall be smooth and whist. And spirits shall the burden bear. Buff-wuff, hark, hark, The sea-wolves bark, buff-wuff. Hark, hark, I hear The song of Sirens, loud and clear, Did you ever? That sort of absurdity is happening on every page. It is the most cruelly funny book written under the shadow of established genius. The endeavour throughout is to be literarily truthful; which accounts for the strain of strutting Chanticleer' becoming 'the song of Sirens,' for Cockadoodle, you realise, is not a seaside bird. Buff-wuff! 1. The Emperor Nicholas II as I knew him. By Major- 3. Red Archiv (Russian). Vols. 1-17. Moscow, 1923-26. 5. The Diary of Nicholas II (Russian). Berlin, 1923. On the return of the Bourbons to the throne of France official and unofficial historians set themselves the task of writing historical and psychological studies of the late King Louis XVI. The material at their disposal, however, was scanty and unreliable; it was limited to half a score of memoirs by survivors of the revolutionary days or by repatriated émigrés, and the document containing the king's pardon to his executioners known as Louis XVI's testament. Owing to the absence of documentary evidence, and owing to the enormous mass of defamatory literature which poured from the press during the revolutionary period, contemporary authors were naturally unable to put either actors or events in true perspective; they also failed entirely in their attempts at psychological or historical analysis. The future historian of the reign of Nicholas II of Russia will be in a more favourable position. The present Government of Russia has made archives accessible which the student as a rule is not allowed to consult for many years, but most of the publications issued at the Vol. 248.-No. 492. |