The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 20, 1903, Page 14

THE SAN FRANCISCO SUNDAY CALL—CHRISTMAS NUMBE 14 SENRYENS IR O BOOKS- IR THF. ~ CHRI : m'['s(;flm' - FOR SMALL SOCKS OOKS will not go into Christmas stockings, as & rule, but if you B will remember it was always to- ward the mysterious piles heap- ed up under the stockings that you made your first frantic dive on those early Christmas mornings of the far away past. Books will go into those piles. Books should go into those plles, and lots of them. In summer the small boy is certain thet Fourth of July is the holiday par excellence, but as the sun begins to hang lower and the crisp mornings commence to come visions of Christ- meas begin to loom larger and more large in his head until on that fateful eve, when there are =0 many bulky day in the whole year like Christmas. Really he is right, for there is no time for the children like good old Decem- then the wild hallos and horn blowings in the streets and finally after the din- ner there is the comfortable curling up in the big chair over near the window with the new book propped on knee. vs get the first notice, but the as book is the last love and the strongest. Yearly the great harvest of Christ- mes books for the young folks is be- coming more and more rich and of widely varying kind. For the toddlers of 3 and 4 there are colored pictures worthy of a frame of old oak and a place in the library; your boy and girl receive gilt and leather bound volumes which their elders hardly dare touch without a caution. Ver- fly this is the day of the youngster. Perhaps the most beautiful speci- men of a child’s book which has come out this Christmas season is “The Book of the Child,” by Jessie Wilcox Smith and Elizabeth Shippen Green, the two standard fllustrators of chil- dren. Beautiful color plates of unus- ual size depict in the remarkably life- Jike style of the two artists the many little tragedies and comedies of a day in e little one's life. A quaint illu- minated text accompanies the illustra- tions. Under other covers Miss Jessie Wil- cox Smith gives us “Rhymes of Real verses are not too old to interest a six-year-old and vet every ome of them causes a smile to come to the lips of the “grown-up” who reads them. Stif, for the very young folks there ularity with the infants. There is “The Life of a Wooden Doll,” by Lewis Sax- by, wherein that spirited individual ap- pears in the varipus scenes devised for her by her €mall mistress. She is evi- dently & good housekeeper, with a task for every day; she amuses herself fash- fonably, receives her stiff-legged guests with & pleasing boxwood smile and is the possessor of a stuffed cat, remark- able for her geniality. Then there are the ever fresh Denslow’s picture books, with their uproarious picture mirth. ““The Golllwogs Circus” presents those interesting citizens in new pranks for the delight of their young admirers. “Li"l Verses for Li'l Fellers,” by George Vere Hobart, will make good rocking- chair songs when the sandman comes around. In the realms of fairy there are plen- ty of tempting volumes for little girls, and boys, too, who have yet to see their rison has written a particularly dainty book called “The Star Fairies,” in which there are to be found a haif- dozen tales of all sorts of elves and fays. “Six Glants and a Griffin,” by Birdsall Otis Edey, is not half so ter- rifying a story as would be imagined from the title. The giants all belong to the union, hence are good giants. For the growings boy who would scorn a falry book as being “sissy,” the Christmas output of the publish- ers offers a wide choice. Perhaps:the best books one can put into a grow- one of the four-footed would seem a sacrilege. “Four-Footed Tralls,” by Meabel Osgood Wright, is equally as good a book of the same type. Edwyn Sandy's “Trapper Jim” may safely be termed the new book for boys of greatest practical value and useful- ness. “The best book for boys on the grand outdoors™ is a phrase frequently employed by the book’s reviewers. Mr." BY ROBERT: 0caoogocOooand 0000 0, Begin But w [uw]e]u] Y when chilly on winter Lw@ufii Sandys has spent much of his life in the woods, hunting, fishing, shooting, painting, trapping, or simply camping out for his own quiet pleasure and re- sports and interests that center around woods and lakes and streams and fields, even including sparring, and stuffing wild creatures that have been killed. Cyrus Townsend Brady has written a good book for boys in “In the War With Mexico.” This stirring story of war and adventure, the secord to ap- pear in the “Boys of the Service,” has a vivid historical setting of uncommon interest. The amusing and exciting ex- periences of Midshipman Ned Denton of the Wasp's Nest and his two sallor comrades, ashore as well as afloat, af- ford, also, a striking panorama of our war with Mexico; and it is a question whether his experiences abcard the U. 8. 8. Somers, with the story of the mutiny and the account of her wreck, or his march with Scott upon the City of Mexico, are the most absorbing. The reader meets, in the beginnings of youngster will welcome “Johnnie,” the story of a boy, by E. O. Laughlin. Johnnie is not a good little boy, nor a very bad little boy—just a boy who would scare his sister with a live garter snake or make a botch of his “exercise” on the last day of school like any other boy. Any boy can find his own picture in “Johnny.” ‘Without doubt the sweetest story for girls, and girls’ mothers as well, which has come out this year is “The Awaken- ing of the Duchess.” In this little story Francis Charles points only. too strong adventures of a brave, true-hearted lit- tle girl, named Bird O'Mara. At the opening of the story Bird is left an orphan by the death of her father, a painter of much cultivation gnd refine- ment, who has spent the last years of his life in the country. A half-brother of ‘her father comes for her and takes her, sorely against her will, down to New York, where Bird has to live with \ O W2 AL I .people who do not understand how to get happiness out of life, or how to get happiness into it for others. > These, then, O distracted Christmas books for your own reading and start the young ones right by buying good books for their edification. IN LARGER ONES OT all for the éhildren are the books offered to the Christmas buyer. ¥or the gentle lover of good books, whose purse strings will not nearly encompass his o’erweening affection, the holi- day bookstalls offer a refined and ex- quisite torture. One is really resolved with Franklin to wear the old coat and buy the new book. ings by popular artists which still catch the fancy, the tendency this year has been in the direction of quality at the expense of quantity. A few poems of Browning, the choicest bits of Ten- nyson, are gathered into a small and dainty book of handmade paper, with a rich leather binding, and sold as a much, more acceptable gift than the overgrown “gift book” of past sea- sons. * The question of what books are hav- ing the largest holiday sales admits of varying answers; some say that the solid reading has the most demand, nently the best of the year are John Morley’s “Life of William Ewart Glad- stone” and Senator Hoar’s ‘‘Autoblog- raphy of Seventy Years.” John Mor- ley’s biography of the great commoner is as faithful a record of a life as ever the assiduous Boswell was capable of, but it is also written with such a knowledge of the political atmosphere in which Gladstone moved and with ‘3~\\,/'>"‘| g N\ N ’ |\ m & & i :"y 47 D u,""f.;n\\ n\/ln 0o0ogh The dentist, dancing sc we%flfheh rse than all, I c unde such accuracy in all the enormous de- tail of his public life that it may well stand as a history of the last quarter century of the Victorian age. Besides intimate a light as if his conception was born of personal acquaintance with the great Englishman. Senator Hoar’s story of his own life is the dual record of his private life and long public career. In this Hoar does not hesitate to express his candid opinion about some of the men and events connected with Congress in bygone ;renrs. His opinions are always force- ul. Of books of travel and exploration, Sven Hedin’s new book, ‘‘Central Asia and Thibet,” is easily the leader this vear. This book is the first adequate description of his remarkable expedl- tion and its accomplishments, an expe- dition so rich in adventure as well as solid achlevement that he has been called by the London press “the mod- ern knight-errant of science.” All these experiences he describes graphically, including, among others, his several traversed that country, his extraordi- nary journey in disgulse toward Lhasa, his discovery by Thibetan spies warned of his intention to enter Lhasa, his cap- tivity and escort by 500 Thibetans, his conflicts with them and his voyage in an English folding boat over twelve Thibetan lakes. Sir Glibert Parker has coptribu “Old Quebec: the Fortress of N?: France” to the season's list of standard books on travel. Americans who make even a brief sojourn {n that most indl- vidual of Canadian cities feel the effec- movement, yet a fascinating book with- al, s the posthumous publication of the letters written from’ China by Wilbur J. Chamberlin to his family. Under the title “Ordered to China” there are gathered together the epistles which this brilllant correspondent of the New York Sun penned during the heat of the troublesome times following the re- lief of the legations by troops of the N — > whciclelclednlalciefelclelclulsln]«) packages in the hall window box and - he is sent upstairs to bed earlier than ,& lishing Company, New York; price usual, he is positive that there is no %S $125. ber 25. In the early morning there are ing Hancock; G. P. Putnam’s Sons, the toys, the games and the candy, New York; {llustrated. ‘Wonderfolk in Wonderland, Bdith Children” in equally charming style. Here Miss Smith interprets in cisco; price 25 cents. color the amusing little children’s Mosaic Essays—Friendship, Happi- verses supplied by Betty Sage. The ness” Nature, Success; decorated; com- powers. The stamp of the good news- paper man is upon each one of these crisp, vivid recountals of what was dally passing before his eyes. He 4 freshment. “Trapper Jim” is a.story: shopper, are a few of the best that V! ecord, are a half-dozen more of these s - pper, of the bes can . writes to his wife and sister with as ’ Wallace Irwin; comic picture books, which seem sud- Dut the author has devoted himself be had for the young ones at home or Gladstone the statesman, Morley pic- fiye s anerence to the stirring de- yoon Colingy % ‘Ross; Paul El- denly to have sprung into pop- VhOle-heartedly to letting his boy in others’ homes. Remember that every ‘“;f’h"‘““m"e the man in a manner ... ;¢ the Boxer outbreaks as he 2’“‘:‘2“‘:’ fi::fi;';c S n“lu 4 < readers fnto the secrets of all the other day in the year you are buying VhiCh makes the reader see him in as , 7ot iy R s > Lz 284 would show in the reports tahis Paper gy College Record, Virginia Wood- Unfortunate it was that death came to this faithful worker in the pursuit of his duty. There is one recent book which has not attracted the attention due toit and that is “The Thoughtless Thoughts of Carisabel.” This is a collection of thirty little satires upon modern foibles which may well stand comparison with Charles Lamb's delightful gibes at pop- ular misconceptions. They were first published in the Baltimore Sun, but now are given the covers they so well merit. Isa Carrington Cabell, for that is the solution of the rebus which fathers the book, is evidently the cherriest of op- timists,, but is endowed with that rare trait of seeing the humor in every-day commonplaces. The author has the trick’ of drawing the reader on to con- cur with each of her arguments until the final point is ready for clinching first suspenders. “Wally Walderoon,” thejr careers, Grant, Lee, McClellan, Th 5 » by Joel Chandler Harris, tells of a little Beauregard, Kearny and other famous lenuel:::ak ;;nmdeaflh;'eu(z:rr::mgnzr:f :::;-:‘:v 0; amcapet:“r::x;; :e:::l:y-hl::n:l;{l; and then turning the laugh on him by § SR ©f R [en: %] old man who possesses the wonderful generals of a later period. these 1s the absence of the cumber- discovery of the remains of cities dat- BIVing the Qyietion & BECUCRISIIN 50> FRw Siodey story-telling machine. “Sweetest Su- ~ Eyery boy likes to read about him- gome volumes, elaborately illustrated, iN& from the'third century A. D., with lution. Such delicate wit as Is ex- Calitornians; price. uni, ” ;;Bu:;::fl f'fgd‘;n" ‘nci :d“re:‘ '::; self or to regggnlze in the tale of some which used to pass undez the ger:g:xe: translations of Chinese man“'.'cflpt. hibited lnd"’rhoulhllm Thoughts” is ”’u‘y';m.zmu.“:‘m rest - other small boy just what he would do gt ” . rare nowadays. . . Wally a visit and hear the magic of his himself were he to be similarly situ- :fi; Sl g :,b(', ::v:'"ll:fi{::eotfhg ot e o aroitet R s e For those whose old mortar board P2 g rdntg T e magical contraption. Mrs. Carter Har- ated. Therefore, the freckle-faced Taw. and strongest caravan which has ever Stlll hangs in a corner of the library il T .., i there are two little booklets of verse which should carry their! appeal to the heart of every college man. These are “Songs of Contentment,” by the late Ralph Gibbs, a fellow in English at the University of California at the time of his tragic death, and “Conso- latlo,” by Raymond Macdonald Alden, Stanford, '03. Recent graduates of California need read no panegyric upon Ralph Gibbs’ poems—they know well the merit that is in those beautiful lit- tle bits of soul whisperings that came from the pen of the scholarly young ing boy's hands are “Following the a moral, and yet nothing of the didac- stud he lived he would doubt- Deer” andy“A Little Brother to the tic intrudes upon the thread of the nar- Others swear by fiction. There are ‘.’{{';i‘f fii’.‘fin’-‘.’fi"-\'&‘f: ::.w: g less e:t.'en:&n his place along with Bear,” by Willlam J. Long. In these rative. It is the story of the awaken- S0Me voracious fiction readers who Jmits. Many of the eprsodes .c; ,,::}' Edward Rowland Siil, the greatest of books, as in his other nature studies, ing of & mother's love for her only Sreedily consums every new novel as dents in its history are dramatically of. our California songsters. The “Con- = 1 Long puts before the eyes of his read- daughter after for many years locking it 8ppears and for whom a little salt fective, and through good use of ézm solatlo,” by Raymond Alden, has a ers the plain, unvarnished life of the her out of her heart with the gilded ©f sincerity in the form of good his- episodes In its founding, in its struggles tender interest attached to ftself in Dr. David Starr Jordan Woods in such & manner as to cause a key of society. The book s a strong tory or blography would add a much and in its intimate connection with the thatitis a memorial to those students strong feeling of kinship with these call to some sorts of mothers. needed condiment to their literary most stirring period in the history of Who were carried off by the fever at $1.50 net. wildlings to spring up in the heart of = “Aunt Jimmy's Will” is another ex- Pabulum. the continent, the author has ba.nr:u Stanford on the eve of their graduation. any healthy minded boy or man. After cellent story for both girls and thelr Of. thig class of substantial books to write a charming book. e It is & touching tribute to their mem- Is the most Important book of the reading these books, to shoot down elders. This attractive story details the the two Which can be called pre-emi- A somewhat tardy echo of the Boxer OFY- : yeur smansting from the Pacific Finally there must be nonsense even Coast. This and other interest- for grown children. To supply enough fun for every day in the year, even leapyear, several of our local jesters have ' published through Paul Elder & Co. nonsense books guaranteed to drive dull care away. The three al- leged cynics, Oliver Herford, Ethel ‘Watts Mumford and Addison Mizner, have revised their calendar of wisdom P [zaassn for 1904 with precious results. Miss Mumtford and Mr. Mizner have so suc- cessfully put their heads together as to evolve “The Limerick Up-to-Date Book”; the limericks therein contained are as good as any other limericks— that for what it is worth. “Bachelor Bigotries,” by a very young married man, and “Widows Grave and Other- wise,” by an equally bashful genius, furnish food for thought upon the di- vine problem for every day in the year. New Books Received The K. K. K, C. W. Tyler; North River Publishing House; {ldstrated. Following the Deer, Willlam J. Long; Ginn & Co., Boston; illustrated; price $1 25. A Bunch of Roses, M. B. M. Davis; Small, Maynard & Co., Boston. The New American Navy, Joha D. Long; 2 vols.; The Outlook Publishing finmpnny. New York, {llustrated; price 00. The Story of a Labor Agitator, Jo- seph R. Buchanan; The Outlook Pub- Builders of the Beautiful H L. Piner; Funk & Wagnalls Company, New York; price $1 50. Japanese Physical Training, H. Irv- Guerrier and Edith Brown; Small, Maynard & Co., Boston; illustrated. The Doll That Was Lost and Found, Josephine Scribner Gates; Franklin Company, Toledo, Ohlo; {illustrated; price, $1 00. More About Live Dolis, Josephine Scribner Gates; Franklin Company, Toledo, Ohlo; fllustrated; price $1 00. Bobtail Dixie, Annie N. Smith; Edu- cational Publishing Company, New York; llustrated; price 60 cents. Drawing Room Plays, Grace Luce Irvin; decorated by A. F. Willmarth; Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price $1 25, ‘The Limerick Up-to-Date Book, Ethel Watts Mumford and Addison Mizner; decorated in color; Paul Elder & Co, Ban Francisco; price $1 00. Bachelor Bigotries, anonymous; dec- orated by A. F. Willmarth; Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price $1 00. ‘Widows, Gay and Otherwise, anony- mous; decorated by A. F. Willmarth; Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price $1 00. Cynic’s Calendar of Revised Wisdom, Oliver Herford, Ethel Watts Mumford and Addison Mizner; Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price $1 00. Book of Nature, Johnny Jones; {llus- trated; Paul Elder & Co., San Fran- piled and published by Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price 50 cents each. Consolatio, R. M. Alden; Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price 50 cents. Roems of Ralph E. Gibbs; Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price $1 00. son Frame: Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price $1 50. Impressions Calendar, decoratsd, compiled and edited by Paul Elder & Co., San Francisco; price $1 00. E— ADVERTISEMENTS. Buy Holiday Books From == THE WHITAKER & RAY COMPANY 728 MARKET STREET Our Book Catalogue is the most cemplets _olr in the West. Sent gratis. ‘We Publish Books by David Starr Jordan O ——The Very Latest— Omar and Fitsgerald and other Poems, by John G. Jury—a remarkably clever book. and_Gold 125 Edition, ing; price. Send for List of Western Publications, The Voice of the Scholar