Evening Star Newspaper, June 18, 1933, Page 78

COUNTER-ATTACK. A Battle Plan to Defeat the Depression. By Millard E. Tydings, United States Semator from Maryland. In- dianapelis: The Bobbs-Merrill Co. N 1918 a war-weary world was almost unanimous in longing for peace and thou- :ands who did not understand the diffi- culties in the way of stopping such a gigantic struggle involving so many natiors. with such cpposing interests, wondered why seme l>aders, political and military. did not find a way. Today world feeling is almost the same about the economic and financial depression. Is there a way out? The way cannot be a single track. So many elemenis are part of the complicated situation and, again as im the World War, so many coaflic.ing in- terests biock the path. Senator Tydings is not a blind optimist. He understands all the causes which have brought the world. to what seems the brink of destruction. He also real- jzes the many and serious obstacies to a re- covery program, but he believes that courage and reasomableness together will furnish “a battle plan” which will “defeat the depres- sion.” 1In his preface he states his funda- mental hypothesis. “While it must be con- ceded that much can and should be done for the alieviation of the eccnemic chaos and the sufferirg and plight of our people through a purely national program, it has appearedi to me that the real causes of the depression were international rather than local, and, hence. where the causes are the cures must be also.” In his first chapter, “War-Armisiice-War,” whose title speaks for itself, Semator Tydings places biame on the “Four Horemen of the De- pression”—“Captain Tarif and Embargo’ “Captain Depreciated Curreney.” “Captain War Debt” and “Captain Armament.” “These riders of devastation wear the camouflaged trappings of friendship.” Their tunics vary in different countries, as do their helmet inscriptions. Sometimes the materials aré “Buy American,” sometimes “Py British”; sometimes the slogans are “Protect American Labor,” somsetimes “Pro- tect British Laber.” “The Depression’s Com- munigues” are all dated, in business-like or military fashion, and include pronouncements on technocracy, wheat, railroads, the Sovict government, farm relief, cotton surplus labor, interest rates, dictatorship, taxes, currency, foreign policy, bank failures and numerous other subjects having a bearing on the depres- sion problem. A chapter is given to each of the “Pour Horcemen” and in these chapters Senator Tydings performs a double task: he traces the history of the dark rider and he shows how he may be conquered. In the fight which is on, we and tke rest of the world have four objectives: Revival of world trade. final settl-ment of war debts, stabilization ¢f natirnal currencies, disarmament to a peace-iime basis Definite propcsals for accomplishing these ob- jectives are made, proposals so sensible that one hopes they will be among those adopted by the Lcndon Economic Conference. Every pro- pos®l involves international co-operation, and perhaps the nations of the world are so well alarmed that they will be ready for co-operation in salvation. Perhaps they will realize that the war of the depression demands a united batile plan such as was adopted by the United States and the Eurcpean allies during the Woild War. The last sentence in Senator Tydings’ preface is “Of course, we shall win out—eventually.” The dramatic method of pres- entation, in which the military simile is sus- tained throughout makes the beok especially readable, and the Mcidity and vigor of the style add literary quality to what is an un- usually practical economic discussion THE LONDON CONFERENCE. (Pamphlet). 7 By Donald B. Woodward. Garden City, N. Y.: Dcubleday, Doran & Co. R. WOODWARD, author of a recent book on “Inflation,” calls this present pamph- let “A Newspaper Reader’s Guide to the News and an Explanation of the Technical Discus- sions.” He first asks “Why a Conference?” and answers “The cause for the World Economic Conference is dire necessity.” A resume is then given of provisions in the treaty of Versailles, events in the League of Nations and at tho Washington Naval Conference, the London Naval Ccnference, the World Disarmamer.t Conference, the Lausanna Conference and the Ottawa Conference, and provisions in the treaty of Locarne and the Kellogg pact which have important bearing on the problems before the present Economic Conference. There are brief discussions of the internationa2l currency question, price troubles, the present shacklirg of capital, restrictions on international trade, tariffs and controlled production. In his sum- mary Mr. Woodward says: “The emplovment of workers is the chief problem for the World Economic Conference” Many economists have declared the stabilization of currencies (he ch'ef problem. but Mr. Woodward has prob- ably selected the broadest aim toward which 1 others must contribute THE CHAMBER MUSIC OF BRAHMS. Deaniel Gregory Mseson. New York: Macmillan Co. HROUGH a grant from the Oberlaender Trust, Dr. Mason was able to spend some months in Germany and Austria studying ma- terials for this book. which is illustrated with facsimiles of some MSS. of Brahms secured in Vienna and never betore reproduced. There are also over a hundred excerpts from the works of Brahms conculted, most of them ar- rarged for piano. Daniel Gregory Mason, Mac- Dowell professor of music in Columbia Uni- wersity, is himself a compeser, a well known music critic and author of a number of books on music, among them “Prom Grieg to Brahms.” He says that so far as he knows his is the first book “to be devoted entirely to the analytical study of all Brahm<' chamber music works.” His object in writing the book, aside from h.s own pleasure, which we are sure he felt Leenly, was to present something weful “not only to music-lovers wishing to understand the chamber music of Brahms, By The THE SUNDAY °"STAR, WASHINGTON, D. €, JUNE I3 193 DWW A Senator’s Plan to Defeat the Depresston. A Handbook on the London Conference. Chamber Music and Some Fiction. but to students of music in general, and par- ticularly to composers. Brahms’ technical skill and imaginative logic are so extraordinary, his grasp is so firm on all the elements of style. and especially on rhythm—se fundamental to musical plastic, and so ccmparatively neglected in our day—that the study of his works can hardly fail to prove highly liberating ana stimulating to all open minds.” The treatment of the chamber music of Brahms is under four periods: Youth, Young Manhoed, Mastership and The Last years. To the first period be- longs the “Trio in B Major, Opus 8,” the first work in the great series of 24 masterpieces, which was first performed in America. In the “Sextet in B Flat, Opus 18,” of the same pe- riod, Dr. Mason sees Brahms “definitely taking the step m childhood to manhood.” The second » ,.od saw the production of the “Celio Sonata in E Minor, Opus 38,” “the first of the seven sonatas for pi:no with :solo instrumen:: . . . that Brahms considered worthy of pres- ervation,” the “Tris for Vielin, Horn and Piano. Opus 40” and the “Quartet in A Minor, Opus 51, No. 2.” In the two later periods, to which belong respectively the “C Major Trio, Opus 87" and the “Violin Sonata in D Minor, Opus 108,” youthful fancy is exchange for maturc imagination and then for increasing depth of intellectual content and emotional concentra- tion. In the works of his last year “supreme mastery attains its moment of equilibrium with temperamental vitality, before that is touched by the inevitable waning of energy of old age.” “The Chamber Music of Brahms,” with its analytical study of 24 chamber musie works, is a distinguished contribution to the scholar- ly literature of musie, and an appropriate trib- ute to the hundredth anniversary of the birth of Brahms. A CALENDAR OF SAINTS FOR UNBE- LIEVERS. By Glenway Wescott. New York: Harper & Brothers. SAINT for every day in the year, many of them obscure saints to the laity, with a tabloid biography of each, is the plan of this unique calendar, which makes a small volume. Glenway Weszott warns that it is not a learned wcrk, but no one would have mistaken it for such. Neither is it a pious work; nor vet an altogether frivclous, flippant work. like Voltaire’s “Philosophical Dictionary.” It is partly serious, following traditions, with more than an oceasional touch of iromy. “Onmly a half dozen ordinary books,” with especial ap- preciative mention of Lucy Menzies’ “The Saints in Italy,” are claimed as bibliography. The mcod is changeable, sometimes admiring, sometimes one of “distaste for self-revelation and for self-sacrifice. They both do seem to defeat their causes.” On the whole the atti- tude is that of a more or less sympathetic un- believer. “The joy of a bock like the present asne is that the really important affirmations are those of a large part of the human race dur- ing two-thirds of its history; what matter who believes and who does not2” Some of the miniature biographies are very brief; some, like that of St. Francis of Assisi, are several pages long. Ome or two examples of the short ones may be given. St. Rose of Viterbo (died 1252): “A child prodigy who engaged in polities on the side of the Guerlphs. In-the ecity where she lived her body still lies, magnificently dressed, the hands covered with rings, and one can see that she was beautiful.” St. Pancras (fourth century): “This Phrygian boy would not deny his faith, and for centuries after his death came and tormented those who swore falsely.” St. Lioba (eighth century): “An Anglo-Saxon pcet- ess patronized by Charlemagne and his wife. They invited her to live with them; life in a convent suited her better.” St. Anicetus (sec- ond century): “This pope is greatly admired for having remained friends with St. Polycarp in spite of tbeir disagreement about the date of Easter, It was the great Marcus Aurelius who had him put to death.” Mr. Wescott's “Calendar” is clever, but not as clever as Ed- gar Lee Masters’ “Spoon River Anthology,” to whose type it belongs. GHOSTS OF LONDON. By Elliott O’Donnell. New York: E. P. Dutten & Co. ENRY JAMES' “Turn of the Screw,” a masterpiece ghost story surpassing all others in concealed horror, is not a stery to read late at night, especially if you have windows opposite ycur bed through which you are likely to see evil faces peeping at you when- ever you open your eyes. “Ghosts of London” is not such a subtle elusive, imaginative taie as “The Turn of the Screw,” nor is it writen by a Henry James. It is a volume of stories and historical information about the authentic ghosts of London, if ghosts may be authentic None-the-less it is not a book for a nervous person to read at night unless he wishes the thril! of hearing the padding footsteps of the tortured bear-ghost of the Tower following him up the stairs as he goes to bed. These London ghosts carry greater conviction beeause Mr. O’Donnell himself believes in them, or at least in many of them. What he relates is based on well-founded aecounts of witnesses and, in a few cases, on his personal experiences. He thinks that the jeers of sceptics cannot explain away the many super-scientific and ultra- rational happenings which are termed oeccult. The ghosts of London inclue kings, queens, courtesans, murderers, suicides, lunatics, tramps, highwaymen, parsons, actors and many un- identified as to profe:sion or circumstances. The Tower of London is a place especially rich in ghosts, as might be expected from its un- savory past. Anne Boleyn's ghost has been seen in the Tower chapel, which appeared bril- liantly lighted at the time. Animal ghosts haunt the Tower, where in life they were baited for the amusement of spectators, “for tragedy in the lives of animals has the same result physically as it has in the lives of humans.” St. James’ Palace and Park and the Green Park, Berkeley Square and Red Lion Square, Bloomsbury, Lincoln’s Inn, the Temple, Grey- friars, Charterhouse, Newgate, Hyde Park, the London Bridges, Blackheath, the Haymarket Theater, the Thames and St. Paul's, as well as many other famous places in London, have all had their ghosts. The Cock Lane ghost is cspecially noted as one of the most sensational which has ever haunted London. In 1760 a certain woman named Fanny died at a house in Cock Lane, supposedly of smallpox (which would not have justified a ghostly return), but the return of her ghost arcused suspicion that she had been murdered by her brother-in- law, in whose favor she had made a will. The various ghostly appearances and rappings of Fanny were probably due to trickery on the part of a family who thought they had cause for enmity toward Mr. Kent, the brother-in- law. The weird tales of ghastly manifestations which fill this volume are told by Mr. O’Don- nell in a historical narrative fashion, without effort to enhance the horror by a melodramatic style. VOODOOS AND OBEAHS. By Joseph J. Wil- liums, S. J. New York: The Dial Press. HIS scientific study of phases of West In- dian witchcraft has just gone into its third edition in this country and is being published in England. In the popular mind, Dr. Williams tells us, Voodoo and Obeah are interchangeable and both signify weird and superstitious prac- tices among descendants of West African tribes in the West Indies and Southern United States. They should be, however, distinguished from cach other and other forms of black and white magic. Voodoo as it first appeared in Hait1 was essentially serpent warship, varying lttle from its form in West Africa during slavery days. Many grewsome rites were gradually accumulated, culminating in ecannibalistic orgies, the Don Pedro rite, or dance, and the “Goat without horns,” or human saecrifice. In its inception religious, Voodoo has come in its deeadent form to be classed as witchcraft or sorcery. Obeah and Myzlism were two antag- onistic superstitions among the Ashanti of the hinterland of the Gold Coast; the first was from the beginning formal witchcraft and the second had a religious origin. Myalism became white magic, having the general good as an objective and holding its ceremonies openly; Oheah became a blacker and blacker form of magic, seeking the harm of individuals and practicing its rites in darkness, preferably at midnight. In its later religious aspect, Obeah has become a form of devil-worship. Dr. Williams has spent about six years in Jamaica has penetrated to the recesses of mountain and bush, where secret arts are carried on, and has been able at tim°s to watch some of them flfireptmbusly, His book is not based entirely on his own investigations, for his extensive bibliography includes a long list of authorities to be found in the Boston College Library of Newton, Mass., and he has given many years of study to the subject, applying to it the scholarship which was demonstrated in his previous works, “Whence the ‘Black Irish’ of Jamaica?” “Hebrewicms of West Africa” and “Whisperings of the Caribbean.” THE MARTYR. By Liam O’Flaherty. New York: The Macmillan Co. " T 4 o'clock of an afternoon in September, 1922, a battered motor car drove at a furious pace down the street to the Republican headquarters at Sallytown, County Kerry.” The Civil War had arrived. “The Martyr,” a blend- ing of mysticism and cruelties, is a story of the Civil War and its two leaders, Crosbie and Tracy. Crosbie, in command at Sallytown, is an ardent revolutionary, but detests bloodshed and violence and shrinks from saerificing his men. Tracy, second in command, is a dare- devil, a gunman who enjoys the use of his gun and scents canger for himself and his men with keen pleasure. The clash between the two men is immediate and bitter, and is intensified by the interference of Angela Pitz- gibbon, “the famous Angela * * * the daughter of a wealthy landowner called Col. Pitzgibbon, she had created a scandal by taking part in the rebellion of 1916, being captured in a volunteer's uniform with a smoking revolver in her hand, her tunic bleedy from a wound in her side.” It is not perplexing to decide which of the two revolutionary leaders this dark Angela, whom victory has never followed, will choose for her partisanship. She is an interesting enough personality to have been chosen as the center of the narrative, “a legend- ary figure in Irish political life. An outcast from her own class, she was regarded by the revolutionary mass of the people as & lving symbol of their insurrection. * * * She seemed to be the harbinger of death. * * * And death came to whomsoever she influenced.” That Crosbie should be attracted to her is one of the ironies of fate. The action is rapid, irn- T Guild for older boys and girls. tense, confined to four main characters, and progresses to inevitable disaster, ending in a ghastly climax. Mr. O’Flaherty writes with directness and power, a fitting method for the brutality and mercilessness of the warfare which he cescribes. VENETIAN BLINDS. By Ethel Mannin. New York: Alired A. Knopf. HE Venectian blinds are drawn up by Miss Mannin to disclose the interiors of the houses on scme of the mean streets of Outer London and the ordinary people who live 1n them—people like thousands of others all over the world. The Pendricks live on Ledstock street, v a house-in-a-row, but with a privet hedge, «.:d a wash basin in the bathroom, with “good class” neighbors, at least at their end of the street. They have risen to this degree ot respectability through stages of three rooms in Clapham and, when the second child, Elsie, was born, a small house without a bathroom, in Tooting. Mrs. Pendrick never forgives Led- stock street its “common end” and its proximity to a sewage farm, but to her husband it seems luxury in comparison with the home of his childhood, where he used to eat off newspapers spread on sugar boxes and sleep on a shakedown of coal sacks. The near neighbors are quite satisfactory to Mrs. Pendrick and she soon be- comes interested in their affairs. The Mord family lives next door; Mr. and Mrs. Mord, their child, and Mrs. Mord’s lodger, with whom she is in love because she must be in love with someone and her husband no longer interests her. There are also the Wrays, a policeman and his wife who ‘“stints” the table in order to “swank” in flashy clothes, and -old Mrs. Crabbe, who lives alone with her dog. At the “eommon end” of the street live the Leiders; the father, Carl, and son, Fritz, are Socialists, but Stephen Pendrick cannot see that it makes any difference and becomes a friend of Pritz. From Ledstock street the Pendricks move to Rinscombe road and a new set of neighbors. Stephen and Elsie grow up. Stephen deter= mines to “get on” and some time to have a villa in the country, away from suburban pave- ments and smells. He becomes engaged to Mabel, who hates the country and secretly despises Stephen because his people are “‘com- mon,” but “once they were married they didn't see much of them.” Elsie becomes infected by the ““‘good time” disease and her idea of a good time is rather dangerous. So the years pass. Stephen moves to Acacia avenue when he is married, and the “arty little curtains” of the avenue repiace the Venetian blinds of his parents’ homes. But the same sort of people live behind the curtains and the blinds and the same sort of life goes on in Ledstock street, Rinscombe road, and Acacia avenue. *“Vene- tian Blinds” is a piece of real literature, a nar- rative leisurely and detailed about some of the undistinguished people who lead unsen- sational lives, yet find them as interesting ana important to themselves as those favored ones to whom fate brings adventures find their lives. SILVER CHIE#¥. Dog of the North. By Jack O’Brien. Philadelphia: The John C. Win- ston Co. JACK O’BRIEN was chief surveyor with ihe Byrd Antarctic Expedition and the dogs were under his especial care. He knows and loves dogs and has already written about them in “By Dog Sledge for Byrd.” “Silver Chief” is the May selection of the Junior Literary It is a dog story, an adventure story, and a mystery story all in one. Sergt. Jim Thorne of the Canadian Northwes. Mounted Police is trailing a half- breed who is wanted for murder. Sergt. Jim is a character worth knowing, even before he forms a partnership with Silver Chief. He settles for Winter quarters in Silver Chief’s hunting greunds, a rather dangerous choice, for Silver Chief has a heredity which makes him dangerous and his reputation is none of the best. He is the son of a “husky” mother, who has run wild, and a wolf father. He staiks for food and is suspicious and resentful toward man, for he has seen an Indian kill Dee, his mother. Sergt. Jim determines to entice or capture Silver Chief, make him his friend and the leader of his huskies. The story “Silver Chief” tells how he does this and how Sergt. Jim and Silver Chief together trace the mur- derer to his ambush and finally capture him. The climax is the long sledge journey of the three back to the post, through deep snow, in zero weather, during which Silver Chief proveos his complete friendship for Sergt. Jim and his qualities as a police guard. The book closes as, with Silver Chief in the lead, Sergt. Jim’s big huskies, drawing his sledge, plunge into the dark timber, on their way home. It is a well-told dramatic story, and the illus- trations, some in color, by Kurt Wiese, add greatly to the interest, for of course a thrill- ing moment is chosen for each illustration. Books Recerved NON-FICTION. GAMES FPOR SMALL LAWNS. By Sid G. Hedges. Philadelphia: J. P. Lippincott Co. CULBERTSON'S OWN CONTRACT BRIDGE A NOVELETTE AND OTHER PROSE 1931). By William Carlos Williams. THE ABBOTT SCHOOL OF FINE & COMMERCIAL ART Summer Classes Landscape and Commercial Art 1624 H St. N.W. Nat. 8054 “