The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, February 4, 1906, Page 27

THE SAN P s FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 4 Am Be more their s s pai ep t a newspaper gton because he is a fine writ se W s, W words. He is se s n gnd meas- L ad clear @ when emergencies corr ent pon him right on impor- to know e Press n out interested they are 80 much tumult and show special tmportant t of the ex- the secrets the and reported s responsible for it leak apter gives us a glimpse of to the avera embe e new member plays effective part th e Press Galler: e greatest mistake they politics is solely considered BOC man in Congres: be induced to stay. of Congress within have been able to ‘do bheir constituents are those kept in Washington long w how the trick is dome.” has been very successful in making ence fel keeping her Con- ong in office. the ¥s there has been a re- mprovement in the sobriety ers. Twenty years g0 the fioor of the House Aas ommon and in these it is & rare sight, urious information he gives, o with what he says ue of long service, ssman passes the s 2 m is ca . Cong mark he leaves his birth e Congressional directory, to go back to an old diree- find it. Watterson, in his ction spoke of some of the why the* observations of -a spondent tended to make him a He saw the littlenesses of the Of course this age-hiding is one ese minor frailttes of humanity. & busy man having to do some ried obituary writing and wasting to hunt up enclent directories be- use of the petty vanity of some promi- t statesman who was afrajd of being Oh, the pity of § ong the good sketches smen is one by Walter Wellman of m Boyd Allison, who is the “Father enate,” and the “titular leader Jor party in that body.” This mentioning the fact that t ate is @ body without a leader, but leaders,” ends his sketch through gentleness, steadi- and conservatism, through | ishness, through the re- and affection of men abler and| saggressive than he bear for him, am Boyd Allison sits at the bead of table.” it “has And wisdom of r is the one who | be so sacredly | 1 of famous | illiam S. Holman is ably drawn les Carroll Carlton. Holman is t ntleman from Indiana who is perhaps by ] b remembered by his well- tit] the “Watchdog of the | ury” The Great Objector,” that people will know who i those apt phrases are men 4 name of Holman had taken d upon their memories. He > gressional service for | ars. His extraordi bent toward economy was very use- { to the nation, and also often very fellows. Many told of him to the sake of a smile is this ¥ he advocated an appropriation which he considered to a meritorfous measure, while, some fous, he had objected to a bill member as being extravagant essary. His friendly greeting | napolls measure contrasted y with his habitual profession of | led sarcastic Dockery of | hdog’s bark draw near to hear the honest w: mouthed weicome as We he roar of laughter that greeted this effectually kill@l the appropriation t Mr. Holman sought to pas: | Correspondent Cariton did a still bet- ter sketch than this in his striking a | count of the greatest of the Indianians, | | Daniel W. Voorhees, the “Tall Sycamore | of the V s The portrait makes ten | of the most interesting pages of the col- | It is of one of the most elo- | | quent as well as one of the most wnnhyJ of orators this country has ever pro-| duced, and he is herein eulogized by a writer accustomed to listening to the best oratory the nation's aff: calls forth | from the lips of its most elect servants. | A feature of this sketch is the compari- | son of the “Tall Sycamore’s’ powers | with those of some other speakers of | national fame. Few men have the oppor- | | tunity to make such comparisons from | the material of wide experience. Carlton contrasts this “natural orator’ with men who were merely ‘‘good talkers,” with speakers who are logical | and argumentative, fiery and impetuous, | | elegant like Lodge, “whose diction was almost perfect,” and with the rapid and | tmpulsive, as well as the smooth talking, and the ones who are specially deliberate. | Sharpest contrast of all, he compares him | with Ingalls, who was “an artificial or: tor.” So much is said of Ingalls by way of foll to set Voorhees off, that the paper | might be called a double sketch, and un- derwritten: “Look thou upon this picture | and on that.” We are told of Voorhees: “In the first blush of his popularity he could speak with all the ease and grace of a swallow on the wing, for hours to- gether, without tiring either himself or | his sudience.” The severest gketch in the book is perhaps the one of John Sherman, done | by Alfred Henry Lewls It is brief, graphic, wonderfully well written, and | in three pages stamps upon the brain ! of the reader a clear-cut image of a remarkable Statesman that will be more enduring than is made by some whole books of biography. We remem- ber that Sherman has been called the iceberg. Lewis says he was so, but that was on the surface. Within he was warm, sometimes tropical. He tells | how, with all his astuteness and Seem- ing successful statesmanship, he never achieved his aim. “His ambition was to be President; he made a bride of his White House hope.” Telling of how Sherman refused to keep his bargain with Foster to give { up the Senatorship to Foster when Fos- ter wanted 1o come into it, he shows | the iceberg thus: “The day to resign {arrived, but Sherman remained frozen to his Senate post. Nor could any ar- gume however heated, Foster might bring to bear thaw him free. 'Then Foster told the story of the scheme and the subsequent perfidy of Sherman |in refusing to resign. Sherman said , nothing, did nothing, save maintain grim possession of the place.” In bright, pleasing contrast to those words are the omes which close the! praising sketch of Voorhees. They tell of how he desired no magnificent mar- ble monument, but “he would be better contgpt to have recorded in the Senate archives a few eloquent words, such as {fall frequently from the lips of Vest, { Daniel or Blackburn—monuments com- posed of the flowers of Speech, with tributes of affection, wrought in for- get-me-nots.” (Published by the author, New York.) RECENT INCIDENT FIGURES IN NOUEL e the tradi- of England That Russia is sald to tional and Inevitable ene; | secret and unscrupulous agents of alien is a nucleus thought around which the English novelist, E. Phillips Oppen- heim, has constructed his very clever new story, “A Maker of History.” Con- celve that remarkable international in- cident of last year's history, the attack of the Russian Baltic fleet upon the British fishing smacks in the North Sea, to have been deliberately designed for the purpose of starting a quarrel between Russia and England, and imagine a young Englishman traveling near the German and Russian frontier to have accidentally witnessed a secret meeting between the Czar and Kaiser for the purpose of arranging an alli- ance against Britain, and you therein have the central plot of a most exciting story of adventure, intrigue, love and mystery. The author of that extensive- 1y read story, “Anna the Adventuress,” has made the most of extending such a conception into an extraordinary series of plots and thrilling happenings. It is a thoroughly good story. t The name of the young Englishman, who without any intention of espion- age, witnessed this imperial meeting and brought away a sheet of the con- ct betwixt Czar and Kalser, was | Poynton, and he and the in-| cident became of so great importance | to the French Government and its clever secret service that “L'Affaire Poynton,” as they called it, became a best brains and employed their most unscrupulous agents. The tale is so told as to make us feel that the alter- native of war or peace between four of | the foremost nations of the earth, namely, England, with France as her ally, against Russia and Germany, de- pended upon the preservation of the life and liberty of the witness from the Governments and the securing of the written evidence existent on the sheet of paper which he had carried away out of boyish curiosity. The English youth having escaped from Germany with the paper safe In. his pocket reaches Paris, and while amusing himself at the Cafe Montmartre relates the incident to one of the fair women at the resort. The Cafe Montmartre is represented as being the rendezvous of the most astute and practiced spies and plotters from all | the countries of Europe; and at the same | time kept under the close surveillance | of the French detectives. One of the sirens, an egent of the sples, entices Poynton to go away with her; and then there is “a mysterious disappearance” of the very valuable witness. Poynton's beautiful sister, Phyllis, comes to Paris | and takes up the difficult and dangerous task of hunting for her lost brother. After much amateur detective work she learns that he had been to the Place Montmartre and she daringly goes there | without an escopt and enters the cafe to search for a' clew. Then she also mysteriously disappears. Her dear friend, Andrew Pelham, who is at the time almost blind, sends his trusted friend Lord Duncombe to search for Phyllis. After some futile efforts he gets a con- fidential intimation that he is not wanted in Paris, and he hurriedly leaves. To add to our excitement about the loss of the girl and about her loving distress over the disappearance of her brother we are made to believe that not only are some of the greatest personages of the French Government concerned in the abduction, but that they employ abso- lutely unscrupulous agents who will not | stop at murder, and false accusation of murder, in order to accomplish the ends of statecraft. The added interest of a love story is brought in by the relation of how a sight of a photograph of Phyliis causes Lord Duncombe to become enamored of her. He had been living a bachelor with little admiration for women for a long tim but the emotion of his love for Phyilis so overwhelms him that he makes no secret of hig passion; and .so he hunts for the lost girl with all the ardent energy of a man frightened by the disappear- ance of the woman he hopes to make his wife. All the eagerpess of- sympathy with the fourfold strands of the affections of sister, brother, lover and friend, then ' lends its aid to make tense the reader’ excitement about the plots and counter- plots. Part of the tlme the scene shifts across the channel to England and there the mystery of Phyllis’ double, appear- ing in the role of a desperate adven- turess, makes complication gtill more in- | tricate. It's fictlon of the absorbing sort. } If you begin to read it you can't quit ' Shi till the writer has satisfled all the curi- osity he has eo skillfully aroused within you. ¥ The scene in the book which is best worth {llustrating is of an exciting inci- i D SOME | subject upon whish they expended theiy | Sifcumbtanses 18 whish % / e OTHER BOOK.,) N v & : B’ 2 . ARD TIIS TOIe. B, SHE WAZSFRIEED BT CFFENHEIIL S NEW NOVEZ . ~ - - - ~— —— NEW NOVEL OF OPPENHEIM, IN WHICH HE WEAVES A STORY ABOUT THE FAMOUS MEETING LLL!:SJP‘.RAHON FROM THE INTERES' the man who an hour before had begged that he might be one to her. She had all of the hurried excitement of one who had to make instant and risky decision upon very important matter to herself and her brother. As for her lover, the peculiar the girl was placed were suspicious enough to put to severe test his faith in her loveworthi- ness. “‘What can I do to help you?' he asked simply, She looked at him eagerly. There were mud spots all up her gown, even upon her face. Her bair was widly disordered. She carried ber hat in her hand. “You mean it?" she oried. “You know that I do.”" “Guard this for me,” she thrust it into hle tnoer pocket. safe,’” he eald stmply. Her eyes flashed her gratitude upon him. For the first time he saw something in her face—heard it in her tone, which made his heart beat. After all she was human. -“You are very good to me,” she murmured. “‘Believe me, I am not as as I seem. Good-by." A feature of paghetic interest which is well brought 6ut by the novelist's power is the intense friendly love which Andrew Pelham feels for Phyl- 1is. He has-been her friend and pro- tector so long that he instinctively claims her affection, and he can hardly bear the thought of Lord Duncombe suddenly winning her love and taking her away from him. It was to Pelham that Phyllis wrote for aid as soon as she became distressed about the loss of her drother. He being at the time threatened with blindness could only anwer her appeal by sending Dun- combe to Paris to.do all he could. for her. In one place the two men have beéen discussing whether the handsome young woman who i8 masquerading in England as Miss Flelding is not really Phyllis in disguise.. Then the man, bitter with the affliction of approach- ing blindness, says to the more fortu- nate lover: . With Mise Fielding I have nothing to do. Yet you had better understand this. If she is Phyllle Poynton she belongs to me and not 10 you. . She was mine beforé you heard her nam: I have wa her grow up from a child, I have taught her to ride, to shoot aad to swim. I have watched her listening to the wind, bending over her flowers in her garden. I have walked with her over the moor when the twilight fell and the mists rose. We have secn the kindling stare and wo have scen th moon grow pale and the eastern sky ablaze I have taught her where to look for the beau. tiful things of life. She has belonged to me in all ways save one, I 8m a poor, helpless creature now, but, by the gods, I will let, no one rob me of my one holy compensa- tion. She is the girl I love; the better part of myssif. 9 (Little, Brown & Co., Boston. §180.) AFFAIRS OF HEART OF SH.EKEJ‘PEJRE . Bhakespeare’s love affairs form the ground work for a new story very artistically printed with old-fashioned ictures and pages decorated in Besl T2t x.‘n‘fazod'fl;"smg:;m s reetheart, en Hawks Sterling. The colored lct#n are done by Clara Elsena Pec! The sweetheart meant is that Anne Hath- away who was Shakespeare's wife, u:g who I8 represented as telling the sto: e was urged to do so by ‘triend, Ben Jonson. She says: “For 1 was Shakespeare's sweetheart —verily and alone his sweetheart, even -after 1 became his wWedded wife.” It is written .in He uite whis “It 18 because &! S8 oalabe e bl DS SRR o B bl it e AN Al THE GARTm THE KAISER ON A YACHT IN,THE BALTIC, INTRODUCING A LOVE ELEMENT WHICH HOLDS the secret engagement and marriage of the poet to Anne and the deer-stealing episode which got the lover into trou- ble just at the time he hoped his joy- ous honeymoon was to begin. This is the beginning of unsmooth currents of their true love, and later there comes in the more alarming episode of an un- wise passion of Anne’s husband for a beautiful “dark woman,” who is not more definitely named than “the Count- ess.” Anne Hathaway, whom Shakes- peare calls “Nan,” is represented as cir- cumventing this passion by wearing the apparel of a youth, and while play- ing the role of messenger from the lover she accepts the proffered love of the Countess for her assumed mascu- linity and in propitious time revealing it to Bhakespeare thereby kills his de- sire for the dark beauty who had enamored him. It is all very fanciful, and Anne is pictured as one of the very sweetest and most long-suffering of sweethearts. Perhaps as pretty a sample passage as I can quote you is th 2 There followed then * * * a peaceful, monotonous year. Will's let- ters often brightened it. He came once or twice to eee me secretly, since Sir Thomas' wroth had not died away; and before its close there was set upon my brows the crown of a woman's life. My babe, Susannah, was born. She was a sturdy lass, with Will's chestnut hair and my dark eyes, and it seemed to me that a sweeter, prettier infant never lived. Will's delight, when he heard of her birth, overflowed into a letter so full of the perfect bliss and pride of fatherhood that I have long since de- stroyed it, deeming it too sacred to be read by other eves. He longed to see the christening, but could not.” (QGeorge W. Jacobs & Co., delphia.) BOOK FROM FRENCH ABOUT THE BIBLE A translation well worth the trouble of its performance is the little book from the French of Pastor X. Koenig, called “Bible History.” It is concern- ing the Old Testament after the results of historical criticism and Is arranged for students of different ages. The pur- pose of the work ig to try to restore the Bible to the “unique place it ought to hold in every Protestant family, and it is also its aim to testify to the fact that historical criticism, far from hav- ing demolished the Bible, has, by sub- jecting it to tests used in establishing the validity of other documents of an- tiquity, eliminated a great part of the difficulty it presents in the face of mod- ern thought and made it yield up more of its grandeur and significance as the priceless document of the progressive revelation of God for the salvation of suffering man.” That idea of “progressive’ has evidently taken strong hold upon the author. He speaks of the old prophets leading us from epoch to Phila- ‘epoch even as they drew theé Hebrew people “away from their gross primi- tive nationalism, purifying their reli- glous feeling and guiding them toward religlous. conceptions that are more spiritual, universal, holier.” * The pi m he sets himself is to “determine how these results of modern criticisms, which seem to us to have been permanently and seientifically imitation of the| established, should be presented to dent which occurred just after George i quaint, old-fashioned style, and many |young people.” Duncombe had declared his love for Phyl- | lis. She was playing her role of adven- | turess and had just alightéd from the au- tomobfle in which she, in company with ! woven into the text that tells of his|errors, the a male companion who had just commit- ted a daring robbery, was making reck- lessly swift escape. She was in desper- ate need of & friend as she approached W of the Shakespearean phrases ' and thoughts and occasional quotations from his plays and sonn are inter- love as this author has rounded it out to her sympathetic imagina- tion. The first ; he does things told in the book are ' himself to __The author does not believe in the Bible in the old way of its being the infallible word of God. The myths, the ¢ immoralities must be acknowledged and taught as they are shown to be by historical criticism; but “believe that God ' revealed his “peculiar people.” the H revelation Hebrews, and that they “were commis- sioned to teach the world that the sum- mum bonum lies in a conscience trans- formed by the most intense d vital religious sentiments. He is a liever, too, in Christ as the Savior, and says of the Creator: * * * “His, final reve- lation of himself in Jesus Christ, the normal man, who gives us In his life, death and resurrection, the measure of God's infinite compassion toward us—if these things are so—and for my part I am absolutely con¥inced that they are— why do we hesitate longer to instruct our children in the truth, and to restore to our people, who have so nearly aban- doned it, the Bible rejuvenated.” (McClure, Phillips & Co., New York.) BRIEF LOOK INTO LITERARY WORLD Among the creditably enterprising publicatifons of this city is “Camera Craft,” the photographie monthly. To begin with, the name is good. An apt- ly chosen caption is a favorable in- troduction, wifich gives at once that invaluable advantage. a pleasing first | impression. Hearing the title of the magazine, we are predisposed to ,be- lieve that the kind of photography with which it deals is of the artistic brand, and all the suggestion of the genuine ‘worker that lies in the word “crafts- man” comes to us as we See the letters of the name or hear the sound of its | legitimate alliteration. ' The January number is lately out. It begins the year in @ way that well sustains its reputa- tion. That reputation is of a book not only valuable to the professional pho- tographer, but because of its reproduc- tions of photographs which are truly pictures it is of worth to all lovers of the beautiful in art. On the ornamental back of this num- ber is a bird upon the wing. The crafts- man has caught full spread “the scythe- like sweep of wings that dare the head- long plunge through gulfs of air.” It is so well done as to make you ex- pectant of good things under the cover. You open the magazine and you are not decelved. The frontispiece has music for its subject; next is a beautiful pre- sentment of the flower called “eyes of the earth,” and then we come to a child caressing a cat—so lifelike we can feel some of the laughing delight of the i it shuts its eyes to concentrate its at- tention on the bliss of the touch of her little dimpled band. The credit for this goes to Arnold Genthe, who has another excellent thing, a picture of “Fighting Joe Wheeler,” recently dead, which shows the old cavalry hero in a guise much more remindful of his ro- mantic character than those usually published of him. © Next are two excellent’ companion pieces, done by Annie W. Brigman, which show photography going clear away into the art realm of imaginative picture mak- ing. We speak of ‘‘art-photography this is poet-photography. The poeti mystery -of Greek and Indian myths is | in fhem. The first of these is “The Call of the Rocks,” in which some fair spirit of the mountains, represented as half- humanized rock, is calling to mortal souls to come aloft to the High Places of the earth where the mood of awe and wor- ‘will naturally fall upon the climber. jat mood may be day-dreamt of as the gift of the spirit of the cloud-piercing peaks, whose attitude is ever one of in- | vocation for blessings upon the people of the plains and valleys which the am- bitious climber, coming to her call, o'er- with her. 1t a good subject—*“the call of the Foeks'—for a picture to be kept per- petually before the eyes, for it is seidom we go the great heights which from some power of their ovhysical al- child as she makes the pussy so pleased ; titude lift us to spiritual exaltation. As is said in the indenture of Wilhelm Mels- ter’s apprenticgship, “the summit charms us—not ‘the ascent.” So the invi.ation is perpetually needed, the invocation al- ways required. “The Call of the Rocks” summons the soul to higher emprise than any stirring adventure promised by the “Call of the Red Gods.” The companion picture to this, by the same artist, is “The Dryad.” half veiled- Iy revealing a lovely woodland ereature who is just emerging from her drapery— the bark of a tree trunk. She is framed to delightedly awake the poetic imagina- tion which ereatively peoples the for- ests, rocks and eams with fairy folk and mytholggic life. Such pictures sug- gest the not” improbable theory that all around us are invisible forms of beauty, agencies of bliss, well-wishers of half- blind humanity, imagmative glimpses of which are boonfully vouchsafed to only the truly worshipful lovers of nature as they wander thoughtfully in wood- land paths or watch thankfully the spray of the waterfalls. That pair of plctures, fitly framed, would ‘make an appropriate present for some. dear friena about to start away on a holiday outing. They would help his will power to summon into his breast the poetry of the woods and hills, and make his holiday more of a holy day and a lasting delight to look back upon, inspiring all the remainder work days of the year till hollday comes again—to again regenerate him with the dream that seemingly sordid life is really a seml-veiled but rich ro- mance. There are more pictures, but I have no space to describe them here. Look for them in the book. Be sure you no- tice the one called “Woodland Path,” déne by Henry Berger Jr., which is the first prize landscape of the eleventh an- nual exhibition of the Oregon Camera l ! i Club. It goes well with the two I have just mentioned, and you can easlly fancy that following that beautiful woodland path you might come upon the dryads and the spirits of the wa- ters and the rocks. (Camera Craft, 819 Market San Francisco.) . . A Prinecely Gift. BY HARRIET PRESCOTT SPOFFORD. The King of Persia used to say ‘Twas mo less royal to accept Small boons than ‘twas to give away Whole provinces his sword had swept. Once, journeying through his realm'he went, Splendid with scimitars and glaives, With flowing banner. scarlet tent, And goiden vases borme by slaves. And Princes with their tribute came, With turquoise, webs of purple cloth, And horses all but breathing flame, Tossing bright manes, and flecked with froth. street, Then a poor tribesman of the sands, Longing to give, and having naught, Scooped up the ter in his hands, Cuplike, and running swift as thought. The spearmen started from their place, But the King, lingering on the bank, Looked in the dark, imploring face- And the King smiled and stooped and drank. —Harper’s Monthly Magasine (February). % . o Apropos of the pretty psychical hervine of Hamlin Garland's last novel, “The Tyranny of the Dark.,” Andrew Lang writes in the Ilustrated London News as follows: “There was a very quaint case of this sort, about seventy years ago, in a semi- detached house at Trinity, near Edin- burgh. It was occupied by a Captain Molesworth; next door lived his friend and landlord. The captain had two daughters, both very young. Onme of them died, and then the other was at- tended by .the same phenomena as the heroine of Mr. Hamlin Garland. Neither the chureh nor sciemce interfered; there was no preacher, no bacteriologist. The angry captain tied the girl up in a ham- meock, I think, which did not put an end to the noises. He pulled the house al- most to pleces in his zeal for the dis- covery of normal causes, and even broke the partitioor wall into the house of his landlord. This led to a suit in the court of the Sheriff of Edinburgh, which lasted long. 1 have seen some of the legal documents in this extraerdinary case, but they threw no ligt on the real cause of the troubles. The lawsuit appears to have died of the Inability of law to tackle circumstances which perplex science and religion.” e . The Rey. Washington Gladden, whose book “The New Idolatry,” recently pub- M¥shed, contains his famous utterance on tainted money, has been an appreciative reader of Peter Rosegger's “I. N. R. L,” a book which purports to be an account of the New Testament written from memory, by a peasant prisoner awaiting the carying out of the sentence of death. Dr. Gladden writes of the book: “I have found in it mot a little deep insight and clear interpretation, The author's im- agination has had free range, and he has presented to us many pictures of great vividness, and has thrown light on many of fhe acts and words of Jesus. It is utterly reverént and devout, and ‘while it helps us to realize the humaa Christ it takes nothing from his essen- tial divineness. Site 4 Free water drinking is another essen- tial to vitality and to the development of staying power. All the operations of the body, digestion, assimilation, absorptiom, elimination of polsonous waste and so om, are carried on by means of water; and an insufficien? amount of water In the System means embarrassment of every function. The body of & man of average weight contains more than half a barrel of water; and such a body needs for its proper op- eration at least two quarts daily of pure water. In this connection it may not be irrelevant to mention that the Japanese soldiers, whose surprising powers are now eugaging the admiration of the world, consume each between two and four gal- lons of water dally—W. R. C. Latsonm, M. D., In “The Secret of Endurance,” in The Outing Magazine for February. r SR Candle Flame. BY HELEN A. SAXON. Hast singed thy pretty wings, poor meth? Fret some moths there bde That wander all the weary night Longing in vain to see The Mght. Hast touched the scorching flame, poor heart? Grieve not; some hearts exist That know not, grow not to be stroms. And weep not, having missed ~—The Reader (February). NEW BOOKS FROM THE PUBLISHERS A MAKER OF HISTORY-By E. Phil- lips Oppenheim. Little, Brown & Co., Boston: $1 50. 1A HISTORY OF ALL NATIONS—Vols. 4 XIIT and XIV: edited by Johm Henry ‘Wright (Harvard University). Lea Bros. & Co., Pniladeiphia. TWENTY YEARS IN THE PRESS GALLERY—By O. O. Stealey. Published by the author. New York. A DICTIONARY OF THOUGHTS—Be- ing an encyclopedia of laconie quotations. Compiled by Tryom Edwards. F. B. Dick- erson & Co., Detreit, Mich, For sale by Charles Cooper, Golden West Hotel, San Francisco