Lord Daventry, with his sayings cynical and epigrammatic upon the world and woman, makes the book an entertaining as well as an instructive afternoon's companion: this, despite the fact that many of us, and in particular those of us who are idealists, may not wholly concur with his lordship's opinions. John Ward, M.D., is the first novel of a new author, Charles Vale. He has succeeded in holding our rapt attention from start to finish. May his next work be equally good. F. H. B. Initiation Into Literature, by Emile Faguet of the French Academy. (G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York and London.) M. Faguet has produced a very condensed, thorough and valuable little hand-book to literature. The reviewer must confess that he read it in much the same way as he might have perused his Baedeker. The reader is carried rapidly down the stream. of literature from the well-springs of Indo-Sanskrit to the seas of modern literary productions. A brief outline of the quality, tone, and general works of the authors of each age is given. There seems to be no reason whatever for M. Faguet's having scorned to touch upon our own American authors, except that he does not consider their work literature. Possibly they were too intelligible, for M. Faguet says of Lope de Vega: “He was one of the greatest of the world's poets, although he was intelligible." But, be that as it may, to the person craving literary knowledge, or to the poseur who seeks names, the reviewer highly recommends this concise little literary encyclopædia. E. F. S. The Wine Press, by Alfred Noyes. (Frederick A. Stokes.) The Wine Press is a tale of war, a story not of the clash of steel on steel nor of the heroic achievements of Arthurian chivalry, but one whose purpose is to portray the horrors of presentday warfare and to demonstrate its barbarity to "those who believe that 'Peace is the corrupter of nations." To accomplish this purpose Mr. Noyes makes it his task first to demonstrate what there is in war that appeals to a people and then to bring to view the true horror of war itself when all the glamor of loyalty and patriotism has been removed. Utilizing the accounts of the Balkan wars, he describes the experiences of a peasant who first fought for the flag of his country and for the freedom of his religion, but was at length forced to battle with the very men "who marched beside him yesterday," not for the sake of Fatherland or liberty, but because the allies could not agree over "a port to export prunes." Mr. Noyes demonstrates remarkably the contrast of view-points of those "to whom the blood of peasants is not red a hundred miles away," and of one of those same peasants who must fight with "flesh against things fleshless," and at the same time brings out what there is in war that drowns the cry of the soul in pain and makes all-powerful the animal lust to kill. What alone can exert power over the individual to make him face things that ordinarily would weaken and sicken him, the purpose of selfoblivion in the cause of country is at last taken away and the peasant is no longer inspired, but a slave subservient to military organization. He is once more mortal. He survives not to enjoy the victory he lately won, but to see the slaughter of his wife and babe. It is a tremendous subject, and Mr. Noyes uses strong pictures, but at the same time manages to preserve the poetry of his verse, which in such lines as: "The blood bubbled over his boots And greased his hands again," is by no means easy to do, and is accomplished by careful discrimination of words. In this the poet's ability enables him to portray such scenes as the above without giving offense to his reader. The poem makes a remarkable impression; one so great that the reader becomes reconciled to the slaughter and the bloodshed, only to realize in the end that nothing is left but hopelessness and desolation when the onslaught has passed. The probabilities of war assume a new shape, and Sandalphon's complaint delivering to God the cries from East and West— "O God, deliver thy people. Let thy sword Destroy our enemies, Lord," is swept away before the Dawn of Peace: "Yes-on our brows we feel the breath A god is at the doors of Fate! The Spirit that moved upon the Deep Is moving through the minds of men. The nations feel it in their sleep, A change has touched their dreams again." H. J. W. Peach Bloom; an Original Play in Four Acts, by Northrop Morse. (Medical Review of Reviews, New York.) Doubtless there have been many such persons in the past as Hildegarde, Mr. 'Morse's heroine, and her prudish parents. In part, the virulence of the social evil of our great cities has been due to them. But we are inclined to doubt their widespread existence at the present time, basing this opinion on glancing over the newsstands and the theatrical comments. Mr. Morse, however, in presenting Peach Bloom has given us the plot of the innocent girl, entrapped in a house of ill fame and rescued by a trick of chance, drawn so unequivocally and frankly that it is in a class quite distinct from the salacious products turned out for box-office receipts. We can fairly recommend it as fulfilling its purpose, though dubious of its necessity. J. C. P. The Yale LITERARY MAGAZINE acknowledges the receipt of the following, of which notice will be given later: Commercial Education in Germany, by Frederic Ernest EDITOR'S TABLE. Lysander, Mr. Thoreau, Ossawatomie and Cato were making up this number. It was quite an ordinary make-up. All four of them were cross and opinionated. Lysander and Mr. Thoreau were discussing, respectively, the pros and cons of one of Mr. Matteawan's poems. Neither of them were particularly interested, and the argument came to an abrupt close. Both Mr. Thoreau and Cato had contributions to offer which the other refused to accept. There were a few moments of mutual vituperation, and then even the personal equation proved insufficient to keep the tired brains working. A gloomy silence fell. Then someone noticed that one of the chairs was empty. I think it was Ossawatomie. "Where is Harlequin?" he asked. The others looked at each other questioningly. The fact that the fifth editor was missing did not surprise them nearly so much as did the careless ease with which they had all overlooked his absence. Once more there was silence-then from the room adjoining the sanctum came a strange babel of sounds-a wild, confused jabbering of human voices pitched in every conceivable key. The damning light of understanding broke over three and a fraction of the faces in the room. "Of course," said Lysander snappishly, "Harlequin is in there trying to find a Columbine and some Pantaloons for the spring caper. He told me he wasn't going to show up." "But how in the world," suggested Cato, who rather thought he had had the better of the argument with Mr. Thoreau, and wanted a public record of it made somewhere, "is he going to tell about this make-up?" "Very true," said the rest. "How is he?" And now I, too, would like to know. "How is he?" HARLEQUIN. "The Iconoclast removes the idols as though it were an act of worship." Y My thesis is the abolition of the Senior Council. I hereby MY call upon this august body, founded in 1909, formally to dissolve itself. Then we can murmur gratefully: "The Lord hath given, the Lord hath taken away." Of course you are properly astounded, and want to know why I make this extraordinary hubbub. You will believe me when I say that it is through no personal feeling in the matter. Like all agitators, I am working pro bono Yalensi. The Senior Council has ceased to function. That is the keynote of my attack. The Council was founded at a time. when Yale needed some leading and restraining force. I know the story of the events of 1909, and I suppose that the septemvirate really accomplished something at its inceptive period. Since that time, however, Yale has been rather quiet! In our academic intercourse we have very little that needs regulating, and what does require firm handling can be excellently managed by the properly constituted authorities. Every one of you will realize that in the last two years an occasional request |