The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, September 25, 1904, Page 6

cconcenti s wceptions a Theorist NEY C. TAPP, an politie ting if not co latter quali in his utter dness of as twisted history overlooked the es with a fine rn ox ences. His be- a ctrange and upon accepted s and to deduce 1s from facts here- to admit of but one Mr. Tapp’s book is to it is that at last the idea, which he attrib- us of the primitive s triumphed over the and aristocratic propaganda of By the latter term the s all of the govern- iples of feudalism—the di- the existence of a inheritance and the ) non people. As- his baneful influence of ked the path of up- ing liberty in Anglo-Sax- nd when it was saddled upon the conguered peeples by William the Congqueror, the author proceeds upon the theory that “Normanism” as & race characteristic and “Anglo-Sax- onism” as an afitagonistic race char- acteristic continued to wage continual warfare for governmental control through all England's history and continu s0 to do even to-day. The American republic alone represents the full 1d complete triumph of the one policy over the other; the seed sown in the heart of the savage Angle or Jute on the banks of the Eibe, shadowy in history, has borne ma- ture fruit in the constitutional repub- fc of the United States of America. As preliminary to the elucidation of his theory Mr. Tapp reveals himself as a strict constructionist of constitu- tions, both written and institutional, by his definition of what constitutes sov- ereignty and what the powers of state, Supreme sovereignty, resident in the hands of the people, should delegate to & government only such authority as s necessary to protect all to the disadvantage or the advantage of none. The constitution is the paramount la: delegated by the sovereign power, 1. e. the people, to its agent the govern- ment. In the United States the consti- tution (and this is a strange ‘hought) is a pact between States only and not of the people, and the Federal Govern- ment thereby created is in no sense a national government, but a government of States as corporate bodles. The author reviews ground made fa- miliar by all studies in government in his resume of the ancient systems of Greece and Rome. He denles, however, that from the republics of Greece or the early republic of the Romans came any modicum of what is now the true re- publican order. The rudiments of rep- resentative government “by the consent of the governed” he finds, as do others, in the primitive tribal scheme of those Teutonic clans that later moved to the shores of Celtic England. It is agreed by the authorities that the rudiments of English local government trace their origin from the ancient Anglo-Saxon scheme of Witanagemot and Reeve Council and that these institutions sur- vived in modified form the incursion of the Normans with thelr nascent feudalism. But does not the author take & far-fetched view of things when he declares that had Anglo-Saxon Eng- land remained isolated from Continent- al influences, represented in the Nor- mans, republicanism would have flour- ished unhindered? Here is his asser- tion: “No class of nobility could have its origin from them (the Anglo-Saxons). No upper house of Lords could have be#h concelved by their minds. Ac- cording to their thinking and criterion of government the representatives in the legislative branch of the govern- ment should be elected by the people. The idea of appointing = House of Lords by the crown for life was of Norman conception and alien brains. It had its origin with the ‘foreigners,’ who had defeated the native Saxons and established their permanent mis- rule over a defeated and suppressed people.” It does not seem that Mr. Tapp con- riders the fact that feudalism—i. e. “Normenism,” wes as much a pre- dominant element in the phllosophy of government of the Middle Ages as ab- solutism was the tenet of seventeenth and eighteenth century politics; that not only Norman France, but Gothic Holy Homan empire and Teutonic THE SAN FRANCISCO SUNDAY CALL. (3 Grwnrs sarn 765 CrrnD ’— « & FOND IPIOTHER'S CONCEPIION OF IHE LNFANT WONDER. 3 1 spiration. Child’s Derse Brings Surprise to Critics. N England, and more recently in our own couniry, curiosity has been rife over little Enid W elsford, whose work of verse, all written before the age of 12 years, has attracted the won- | derment of all and the praise of some critics. young Miss has named her first flight on Pegasus. that some of the poems incorporated had to be dictated to the little girl's mother “The Seagulls and lips before the hand of genius had vyet learned facility with the pen. v : That a doting mother takes Enid very scriously may be gathered frout the painting “Genius and the Child,” which she has conceived in affectionate tribute to the early budding lyric stirrings of her daughter. Sphinx, dight with peacock feathers, who evidently is warning Enid thot she will get the crop if she stands in the water bare-footed. | Not since the day of that “Infant Phenomenon” of “Nicholas Nickleby,” Miss Ninetta Crummles, has an eager world hung so wonderingly upon the scintillations of fledgling in- “Genius” in this instance is Her eulogists point with awe to the fact Other Poems” this precocious from lisping a species of blandly-beaming L nent misrule” of the feudal system. Indced, did Anglo-Saxon King Arthur and his knights of the table -round represent anything but the feudal theor: After allowing us to believe that the invasion of the Normans was nothing but a continuation of the earlier in- cursions of pure Danish stock, the author continues to trace the warring influences of Anglo-Saxon and Nor- man ideas through all England's sub- sequent existence. Even after the testimony of English history, ¢f Eng- lish litevature and of English tradition fail to show aught but an homogeneous Englich people, the writer persists in seeing everywhere in government a rampant “Normanism” and a pug- nacious “Anglo-Saxonism.” The wars of Simon de Montfort but clinched the fetters of the commons or Anglo- Saxons, the Hundred Years’ War was fought entirely in the interests of the Normans, the great Civil War was avowedly a struggle between Anglo- Saxon and Norman, even the American Revolution expressed but the final tri- umph of the ancient governmental echeme of skin-clad Angle and SBaxon over the oppressive tyranny of the armor-girt follower of Willlam L This stretching of fact to meet theory is fantastic, If naught else. In tracing the transplanting of the Anglo-Saxon idea to America, Mr. Tapp has to make the most Interesting hurdling over historical fact in the whole volume. His statement that the Puritan bellef in “the right to worship God without any sanction from any priesthood or ecclesiastical court” was but & perfect demonstration of the An- glo-Saxon spirit of liberty, does not take into mccount the tale of Roger ‘Willlams and Anne Hutchinson, who ‘were denied sanction to preich by this very magnanimous genius of freedom. Again, in an attempt to reconcile the presence in the colonies of the Vir- ginlan cavaliers and the aristocracy of the Southern plantations—Normans certainly—with his dogma of an Anglo- Saxon outpouring from England to America, our author gathers these worthy Revolutionary fathers under the generic title of “a few of the privi- leged classes of England who had been sent over to rule and collect taxes.” This surely will not be altogether ac- ceptable to the pride of some F. F. V's. (G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York.) A Small Novel of Davis Order ERE the redoubtable Sherlock Holmes to turn the light of his analytic power upon some of the prodigies of literature we would . probably witness results as startling as any arising from “The Sign of the Four,” or “A Study in Scarlet.” If, for example, this astute sentiemad sbould yead “The Pursuit of Phyllis” between applications of the needie his deduction would probably sound something like this: John Harwood Bacon is & man not yet 30 vears of age and this is mani- festly his first book. Having been raised in a country town and later coming to the city—New York, doubt- less—Mr. Bacon became at once an eager seeker for the pleasures of so- ciety, which were awarded him in mod- erate proportion. As the most polished and easy exponent of the life of the haut ton Richard Hardigg Davis be- came for him the model par excellence for the soclety novel. He studied Mr. Davis' style carefully. When he de- termined to write “The Pursuit of Phyllis” he re-read “The Princess Aline” and kept that book handy on his library table. Mr. Bacon is not necessarily a globe-trotter, To this hypothetical réfitme of the case by Sherlock H. little need be added. The story is a light, sketchy fancy,ynot altogether original in the matter of plot, as our friend the detec- tive asserts, and containing little more than the alry persifiage supposed to be essential to the typical soclety novel. Your typical young society man, with money to play with, starts out on & mad impulse and follows your charac- teristic sweet young girl of the “smart set” three-quarters of the way around the globe, falling more hopelessly in love with her with every league left behind. A very hackneyed plece of novel machinery serves to separate the twain until in the author’s good time they are allowed to fall inte one an- other’s arms on a hilltop at Hongkong. Tableau. Curtain (Henry Holt & Co, New York; {llus- trated.) Titian, His Art and Life Story HE concluding paragraph of Georg Groneau's sympathetic study of the life and talents of the great Titlan explains why & careful reading of his book is not without reward to lovers of the best in art. “Titlan’s fame,” writes Gro- neau, “has lasted more evenly and been subjected to fewer fluctuations than even that of Raphael and Michel Angelo, who at times have been judged somewhat coldly. It was left for men of our century, when they were be- sinning to regard the colerists as ar- tists of the secend rank, to imagine for one brief moment that th cast doubts on the greatness Jesty of Titlan's’ art.” It is the seif-selected task, then, this eminent European art show by his detalled analysis great Venetlan's work why it the masterpleces that have down to us from the riotous the teacher of Rembrandt Dyck havae lost nothing of Egg' E: EEEE?& (3} EE’E it B - nificance in the flight of years. Not the cold perfection of technique that was Michel Angelo’s, nor the delicacy of line that was Raphael's is the charm which makes Titian's canvases living elements of to-day's esthetic appreclation; in his art it is color— color expressing all the passionate feeling and animated action of a mas- ter genius. “He who would be a painter,” said Titian, “needs to know but three colors—white, black and red—and to have them well in hand.” No one since his time has had the colors so “well in hand.” Groneau seeks to show in the early chapters of his work how it was that the conditions of life and art in Venice brought to the young Vecellio, just taking up his abode in the Adriatic city, a consuming passion for high colors. Venice, then in the height of its glory, was the constant theater for gorgeous pageants and glittering spec- tacles. House fronts and cathedrals’ exteriors were crusted with frescoes and mosalcs of rich and harmonious colors. The people reveled in color for coler’s sake. So it was that when the young painter, fresh from the pastoral beauties of the lower Tyrol, came into the zone of this riotous chromatic extravagance his soul caught the tune of things and. his palette glowed as none has since done. It was with Giorglone, then dean of Venetian painters, that Titian worked, first as pupil and then as intimate fel- low craftsman. While absorbing from his master a profoundly spiritual con- ception of portraiture and exemplify- ing it in his early paintings to such degree that the works of the respeo- tive artists have been confused, Titlan gradually began to forsake the lyrical mood and to give vein to his penchant for the dramatic. By so doing he put life into the conventional set figures of religious paintings. Says Groneau: “Titlan passed with rapid strides through the whole range of problems possible in altar picture; in the As- sunta he introduced into Venice en- tirely new subject matter; he trans- ported ‘The Madonna With Saints’ out of a world of quiet existence into the restless and changeful conditions of real life; he set aside the old ideas of ° composition end removed the principal group from the central line of the plo- ture, and by means of his structure of lines and his ordered harmony of color pervading the whole, created a new and dramatically life-like present- ment of the old theme.” Unlike Raphael, Titian did not come to the highest fruition of his powers til he had reached middle life, but ‘was painting some of his best pic- at an age when most men would in their graves. Thus it is that until after his thirtieth year did tlan begin to produce these master- pleces of sacred art and, the series of allegorical studies in the nude, which number gome of his most famous paintings, Titian's love for the beauti. CEE ful human form found its earliest and to some its best expression in the “Sacred and Profane Love”—called by Ridolfl in 1648 by the homely tffle, “Two women near a fountain in which a child is looking at hjs reflection.” In fact the original title composed by the creator is lost and the one commonly accepted now found origin with the Germans. According to Groneau it is as a por- trait painter that Titian appeals the most strongly to modern wielders of the brush. Of his portraits there are a score, become familiar to every artist who essays this difficult art. It was as the painter of such canvases that Titian became the courted of kings and the honored guest of princes. While at the court of the Hapsburgs Titian produced two portraits of Charles the Fifth and later the famous portrait of the tyrant Philip of Spain—the latter “a miracle of art,” according to Morelli. Thus does Groneau char- acterize Titian’s genius in this chan- nel of effort: “He reveals the inmost soul of his model with a clearness and keenness which testify to his extraordinarily riage, the gestures, sees the soul re- approaching more nearly to the great- manifold aspect of Titian’s work. These, value not solely for art experts. Any New York; illustrated; price $2.) to the opportunity of gracing Library Series, published in this coun- series is devoted to selections from' the father, St. Augustine, down to Emer- addition of a vignette Introduction, bi- poems of Shelley, the prefatorial du- of the poet is encompassed in a few Shelley is not a great poet, according ery and touches realities with miracu- mate on the character of his poetry: it 1s nothing if not responsible and sad, a word to represent it and call it mag- with the text in clear type printed with the artistic handicraft expended on the —_—— Brief Reviews X3 Follo” edition of Shake- cool observation. Not only the artist in Titian appears to be interested, but Titian the man. He observes the car- flected in the eye, and his hand records these observations with triumphant certainty. At the same time he is ever est simplicity and breadth of view.” Very studied and very well put are all of Groneau's cr isms upon the with the running biography which serves to link together the various ap- preciations, make the book one of a one of culture may learn much by an appreciative reading. (Imported by Charles Scribner’s Sons, Minor Classics in Rich Dress ONFIRMED bibliolaters will jump E their library table with such del- icate little cameos of literature as those comprised in the Red Letter try by Messrs. H. M. Caldwell & Co. of Boston In connection with Blackie & Co. of Glasgow. Each volume of this minor classics of English lterature, ranging from the works of Thomas a Kempis and the still earlier church son and the genial Autocrat of the Ereakfast Table. Each number of the library is given increased merit by the ographical and critical, from the pen of some modern authority. In the fifth of the series, the selected ties are undertaken by Mrs. Alice Mey- rell, the well known English woman of letters. Though her critical estimate hundred words, Mrs. Meynell has hit off the peculiar quality of the roman- ticist's verse with clear cut emphasis. to her view, since he Is not possessed of the divine fire of poesy which car- ries beyond the mere flights of imag- lous touch. But even as a poet of the second rank Shelley has power which moves his commentator to this esti- “That character is exceedingly seri- ous as well as wild; it has the motion of an Ariel without Arfel's light heart; and yet what a flight i{s his—what a flitting! No one can define the Shelley quality by any word; but we may take fcal.” The volumes of this series are uni- form in dainty size—3 7-8 by 6 inches— red and black Ink; a frontisplece por- trait, reproduced In half tone, and framed in decorative design, completes book’s making. (Pricefl full red lmp leathe §1, silk cloth 50 cents.) of Other Books ACBETH” is the fifth play to be issued In the “First speare’s works, now being edited with glossary, notes and erit- clsm by Charlotte Portar and Helen A. Clarke. This volume, like all the others, presents pecuiar attractions to Shakespeare students in that it gives in the first popular edition the original text of the great dramatist’s works, without amendation or modernizing of any part. As Shakespeare specialists know, the First Folio is the sole authority for twenty of the plays and furnishes the first complete text of two besides. The appearance before the death of the poet of the earlier quarto issues was both unauthorized and productive of inevitable diScrepancles in the text. But to the lack of scholarly care in Shakespeare’s first publishers must it be attributed that in many instances the early unauthorized quarto editions were made the foundation for the folio printing after Shakespeare's death. As the joint editors of thits new “First Folio” edition show, however, thess sixteen plays pirated in the quarto form show signs of revision-at the hands of the author in The Folio and are therefore more nearly authentic in that form. After all the floundering about on the part of Shakespeare editors, the medern tendency, given strong impulse by the work of Dr. Furness, is to & reversal to the original text with no- tations of variations from that in chronological order. This Charlotte Porter and Helen Clarke have done In their popular edition In a manner scholarly and complete. Footnotes serve to point out variations in the Globe or Cambridge texts and completa variorum readings, extensive literary illustrations and glossary give this series of handy little Shakespeares ex- ceptional value. (Thomas Y. York.) Crowell & Co., New William J. Shearer, A.M., Ph.D., Su- perintendent of Schools of Elizabeth, N. J., and a familiar writer on sub- Jects of home influence and home train- ing, has produced a book on “The Man- agement and Training of Children,” which may be found useful to some mothers, There are chapters upon the responsibility of parents, upon sym- pathy between parent and child and the development of good and bad in- stincts in the youngster. All this is perfect theoretically without doubt, but it is not the consensus of opinion that children can be raised on theory. Usually the eldest grows up under the straight rule of principle and all suc- cessive progeny are raised “by experi- ence.” A book on the theory of child training must be used by the young mother much as a cook book—sparing- ly; this last statement, however, the writer disclaims as original, mor will he stand the responsibility for its ut- terance, since he but quotes one who knows. (Richardson, Bmith & Co., New York; price $§1 50.) “The American Boy’s Life of Theo- dore Roosevelt,” by Edward Strate- meyer, is an excellent book for the American boy to read once and then again. The narrative covers the whole life of the President from schoolboy to his present exalted position in a style well fitted to juvenile comprehension and appreciation. The author has been quick to catch the fascinating phases of Rooseveit's life as hunter, plains- man and rough rider and deals with the profundities of politics only in such measure as is necessary. The descrip- tions of battle scenes in Cuba are well calculated to hold the boyish fancy. (Lee & Shepard, Boston; {llustrated; price 31 25.) Some Small Talk About Bookmen FRIEND wrote from his heated office in New York to Stewart Ed- ‘ward White, author of “The Silent Places,” saying: “It must be a satisfaction to know that while you are playing ‘The Silent Places’ has be- come the best selling book In the Unit- ed States.” From the depths of the Si- erras Mr. White returned: “As for play—well, if you'd been tralling us for the last week, you'd take that back. Up under the Great Western Divide is Roaring River, from which you enter Cloudy Canyon and Deadmans Gulch. At the head of the latter is a notch or saddle in the range same 11,000 feet up. There are no tralls. We have been try- ing to get through. Our most desper- ate assault actually took us to the other side, but we met a gentlemanly precipice and had to return. The last two days I've been taking afoot twelve coders = DI == hours a day away above the snow line trying to pick a route. I think I have found one. We're going to try it, any- way. I've built about two miles of trail and monumented the rest. If we get through, Mrs. W. will be the first woman to accompiish such a feat, and we shall name the pass ‘Elizabeth Pass’ after her.” The startling incidents wnich Robert W. Chambers has used to such good and effective purpose in his book “In Search of the Unknown” are rivaled by actual occurrences in the author’s own correspondence. Once a woman bombarded him with letters for an en- ng that she was spend- tire year, s ing her fortune to buy up and destroy all of his book: se “The King in Yellow™ had made her crazy, ominous- ly adding that as socn as her money e out she was coming to his home Mr. Chambers, in tell- remarked that he was > murder hi g this stor pleased to that her money still holds out.” Another time a man sent him a model of a machine, declaring, with oaths, that the author must pay $10,000 for t privilege of inspecting it, uld have him poisoned. Mr. has a ton of crank letters that are curious enough to be be- queathed to a museum for use in study- ing the human mind in all its vagaries. Admiral Winfield Scott Schley’'s own st “Forty-five Years Under the which is to be brought out shortly by the Appletons, will be of especial interest in view of the fact that the admiral has recently stirred up the controve about the naval battle of Santiago by an article in the Saturday Evening Post. Whatever articles he may write or speeches he may make, the final appeal as to his position will be in his book. The admiral has spent much of his time since the Spanish war in writing the details of his expe- rience, and his recollections are con- stantly reinforced by references to dis- patches and other documents. About one-third of the volume is devoted to the Spanish war, and in it we have i definite, concrete form just what the admiral did and thought in his own words. It is said that the Schley-Samp- son controversy is to be made a politi- cal issue. If this be true the book will be greeted with still greater interest as a campaign document. The book will be carefully read to see if everything that the admiral has said and written #0 far agrees with this final statement. The admiral shows the courage of his convictions in submitting to the test. ‘What promises to be one of the hand- somest little volumes of the fall is now in press for the American Unitarian Assoclation. It is an allegory called “The Wandering Host,” and the author is President David Starr Jordan of Le- land Stanford University. The story, Illustrating the diversity of paths inte which differences of opinfon in mat- ters of religious doctrine lead searchers after truth, is told in singularly beau- tiful English, and the typographical setting is in keeping with the beautiful narrative. The special face of type, the Illustrative border In green through- out, the all-rag deckle-edge paper, the all-paper cover with decorative design unite to make this one of the most at- tractive of the season’s publications. Daily, and weekly, and even monthly papers persist in their error as to the existence once upon a time of Nanay Stair, the heroine of the new novel of that name published by D. Appleten & Company. “Nancy Stair,” by Elinor Macartney Lane, says a prominent weekly, “is & novel well worth reading, not only fer its entertalning qualities, but for its rescue and sympathetic portrayal of & beautiful character in history, whe came within the orbit of Robert Buraa, the poet.” And a big dally protests that “there seems to be a perfect craze among novelists to rake in the ashes of the past for dead and gone personages with which to decorate the pages of fiction.” A third reviewer speaks of “hureye ing to Carlyle,” where he ocertainly found no mention of Nancy Stalr. The publishers have given their assurance that the fascinating heroine was a fig- ment of Mrs. Lane's imagination, “Reminiscences of Peace and War* 18 to be the title of the volume contain- ing Mrs. Roger A. Pryor's story of her life In Washington during the fiftiss and her extraordinary experiences dur- ing the Civil War. Mrs. Pryor was & part of the brilliant social life of Wash- ington in its palmliest days, and she had the unique experience of ltving practically in the Confederate army during almost the whole of the Civil War. New BooksReceived THE PURSUIT OF PHYLLIS—John Harwood Bacon; Henry Holt & Ce., New York; {llustrated; price $1 25 THE MASTER'S .VIOLIN — Myrtle Reed; G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York; price $1 50. PROSIT: A BOOK OF TOASTS— “Clotho”; Paul Elder & Co., San Frane eisco; price $1 50. LONG BRIDGE BOYS—W. O. Stod- dard: Lothrop Publishing Company, Boston; illustrated; price $1 25. ANGLO-SAXON INSTITUTIONS — Sidney C. Tapp; G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York; price $1 50. DEFENSE OF BRIDGE — “Bads- worth”; G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York; paper; price 10 cents. EVERYDAY ESSAYS—farfon Fos- ter Washb.rne; Rand, McNall, Come pany, Chicage; illustrated. THE TROTTING AND P HORSES OF AMERICA — H:nil-;l'og Busbey; The Macmillan Company, New York; illustrated: price $2. AIR, FOOD AND EXERCIS] Rabagliati; William Wood & Co."!‘;'t York. 2 PHARMACAL JURISPRUDENCE— Harley R. Wiley; published by the au- thor, fan Francisco; price $3 50, PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED STATES—Compiled and published by the W. B. Conkey Company, Chicago; Nustrated. HAPPY THO' BROKE—Clifton Arey Fox; The Colburn Publishing Com-= pany, Chicago; illustrated.