W I L M E T T E. L I F E June 7, 1929 haps and meals-a tenth of the bulk seems to be ·3heer food . . He becomes l walker; the observation compassed by those thirty-two eyes astounds. He he comes an historian, seeing a new England, and mining amazing data from local conversations. He h entertained by Sir Robert himself, ' and is later put up at the international focus of the Scouts in Epping Forest. The Canterbury pages are very fine, the French contacts very funny. The battlefields around Verdun, as exhibited hy one who fought there, drive still cieeper a realization of the Great Futility. One close'5 the book glad to have been along. Four times lucky \'v ere the fellows who actually went: once to go, again to be so competently ,taken, again to have a journal o{ it all so handsomely turned out. but chieAy to have inaugurated this juyous manner of spreading camaraderie he tween the nations. '· Comment on Current Books I A SAGA OF THE SWORP. By F. From that moment politics held him captivated. Honest, likable, ·strong, the people paid him the tribute of electing him to office after office. When Lincoln was assassinated, Andrew Johnson, then Vice President, steppe.d into his place,, fought his enemies, and carI ried on his plan'5 for a just reconstruction in ::,pite of fierce and cruel opposition. In "Andrew Johnson: A Study in Courage," Lloyd Paul Stryker tells the story of this man '"·ho "hewed his fortune from the rough rock of adversity." · It is an epic of valor imA~HISTORY OF GARDEN ART. pressively recorded - colorful and By Marie Louise Gothein. E. P. Dut- stirring. ton and company. Marie Louise Gothein".., great work SUFFRAGETTE DIES on Garden Art, published in Germany Flora Annie Steel, one of the early in 1913, is now available in English. In champions of the wom~.:n's movement a general appreciation of the book it in Etigland, and a widely rrad novelist is difficult to decide which of two out- died recently. Her most famous novel, standing qualities should de sene l1rst "On the Face of the Wat rs," has been mention; the breadth of its scholarship, said by people who know the subj~ct or the Spartan restraint which has to contain the mO'st illuminating study elimit.lated all tempting bit13 of extran- of the Indian Mutiny that any writer ~ ous information. Sir Reginald Bloom- has achieved. field has described a garden as "a place of retirement and seclusion, a place for quiet thought and leisurely "THE VIRGINIAN" IN TALKIES Owen Wister's "The Virginian" will enjoyment." It is a bit of territory cut off from "wild nature," attached to a be brought to the talking screen by habitation, planned for. and constructed Paramount as one of next season·s special productions. The title part will as carefully as house or temple-and so be played by Gary Cooper, and Mary it ha-5 been from earliest kncnvn times. Brian will have the part of the schot)l From one point of view, Frau Gothein's teacher whom the "Virginian" courts hook is a history of mankind seen from with such patience. If you have ne\'e: tlte narrow enclo. ure of a garden. read it before going to the movie. If The book is a hi story of garden deyou already know its charm, the ac'\ign with . full reference to its associated tion. suspense, and real wit to he found arts of architecture, sculpture, the dec- Gn each page-you \\'ill want to reoratiYe treatment of water, and other read it. accessories. The details of horticulture, · i.e., the varieties of trees, shrubs, and BALLOON. Bv Padraic Colum. The plants that may he gro\\'n in a garden, are sparingly noted- too sparingly in Macmillan Comp~ny. In Padraic Colum's new plav, "Balmanv cases. General botanical consideratfons are almost "·holly omitted. But loon" Casper, who operated a telescope there is a wealth of reference to the in the street, is fascinated hv the Hotel literature of the '5 uhject, and the six Daedalus, in which resides ill the peohundred and more illustration ~ . many ple who count for something in the reproduced from the glorious copper- \\'Orld. Chance help~ him to enter the plate engravi11gs of the seventeenth hotel and to pa'3S himself off as one of century, are in their way as instructive the "Daedalians." but whether he has as the text. These . even chapters reallv been ahle to enter their world is constitute the most valuable and inter- left ~loubtful. Can am· of us ever enter C'.lting part of the book, and give a de- a world that is not o~r own? Can the tailed history of the de,·elopment of a man of reverie ever enter the world of great art. from it. beginning in the the man of action, or the man of ~ction Renaissance gardens of Italy, to its cul- ever enter the world of the man of mination in the French gardet1s of the reverie? That is the pro blem that un Roi Solei!. \ V c ha Ye in compact form derlies the comedy "Ralloon"- the first and with a \H'alth of illustration, the play. ~Jr. Cqlum says. to he based on growth of the axial plan, the solution modern philosophical ideas. "Ra,lloon" Jf the prohlrm of diversity in unity, and was just off of the press last \Hek. the final uniting of architecture and HOBNAILS AND HEATHER. B~· garden design in an organic '"hole. Major Clifton Lisle. Harcourt. Brace. PLAYS PRESENTED Perhaps Sir Robert Raden- Powell In Tnhn Masefield's little theater on laid the securest foundations for the Rnar'~.; Hill. ncar Oxford, several of true League of Nations when, twentyCor<l lHl Bottomley's plays for verse- one years ago. he brought the Boy speakers ha,·e been producl under Scouts into being. Today forty-two ideal conditions and these drama are cnunt rirs enjoy the benefits of this included in ~f r. Bottom lev's new vol- hrotherlwod. Rut the supplementar.v mnc of "Scrne:'l and Play-s" just pub- iclea of tying the world together hy inlished hy ~fac?\fillan. They \Yere all trrnatil)llal Yisit.; is a recent one, and \\'rittcn for the u. c of the ·speaken; \\'ho tn the Gitccn ]·.agle Scouts of Troop I, ha\'C just come to the front at the Paoli. Pcnns\·h·ania. led hv Scoutmaster famous Oxford Recitations, .inaugurated \f ajor Cliit~n Lisle.' helo.1gs the honor hy J\fr. Masdielcl, and yet they are fully of the first gr ,lup hikt: in the Old capable of being performed for their Countrv bY American Scouts. · dramatic interest. "Hnl)na(Is and Heather" is the most fitting possible account of this event. ANDREW JOHNSON. A Study In From chapter \'lnc. telling of the rai·.,ingCourage. of ftt11cls. the training. the Yoyagc, the \\.hen the nineteen year old Andrrw heart-warming reception hy the PlyJohnson married Eli;a McCardle, he mouth Scouts. the Yisit to the Comcould read. hut he knew nothing of mander of the l·lert. to the escape from \\Titing or arithmetic. Eliza's oppor- the sea at ~font St. Michel. seven tv-one tunitie.;; fnr education had heen g-reater days and seven hundred miles ·later. this hook makes happy reading. To than those of her y::ntng 1ltlshand and write so busy and compact a log reshe took him in hand. teaching him as quire~J great skill; humor '5aved it, },e at workinQ" in the littlr tailor shop . humor and a sincerity which gives A little o,·cr a vcar l:~ter Tohnson was \·ividness. The reader becomes a boy. <'lertrd alderman of Gree~v.l'e. Tenn enjoying these laughs and tiffs and misMacMillan. YOUNG WOODLEY. By John Van Druten. Day. SHORT STORIES. By Kay Boyle. Paris: Black Sun Press. · THE JADE NECKLACE.. By Pemberton Gunther. Macrae-Smtth. CHILDREN OF DARKNESS. By Edwin Justus Mayer. Horace Live right. DARK WEATHER. By Marguerite. E. Baldwin. Dutton. Britten Austin. 1 ,Ttltphont for Your Boob Wilmette J700 New Dollar Eooks· Seveul Doll.u Books that have come recently; and several that we have not evtn advertised before: The Mistress o.f Husaby Sigrid Undset Parnassus on Wheels Christopher Morley Victory Joseph Conrad .Preface to a Life Zona Gale HOME FLOWER GROWING. Bt· E. C. Volz. The Macmillan Compan~--. Thi s book goes thoro ~hly into the propagation and culture of plants in the open garden, in window boxc'5, and in the house; it gives practical. sugge stions on vratering, fertilizing, a.nd-in the rase of house plants-the ventilation. temperature, and light control. all of which arc very important considerations if one is to grow flowers succes .; fullv. This hook will undouhtedh· he of assista nee to all would- he gardei1er s. WIN PRIZES The James Tait Black Memorial Prize for the best biographical work of 1928 has been awarded to Mr. John Buchan for hi·s hook "Montrose." Mr. Siegfried Sassoon has won the prize for the best novel with his "Memoirs of · a Fox-hunting Man." The Strong Hours Maud Diver The Four Million ( 2 5 Tales of Bagdad-on-theSubway) 0. Henry The Red Knight of Germany The Story Richthofen of Baron von .Floyd Gibbons The following Dollar Books we cite as being most in demand here: Jurgen: A Comedy of Justice James Branch Cabell Wanderers Knut Hamsun Caesar or Nothing Pio Baroja Three Tales Gustave Flaubut The Sailor's Return David Garnett , The Return of the .Soldier Rebecca West Youth Josrph Conrad Litrle Pitchers /sa Glenn The Pines of Lory I J. A. Mitchell Lord'·~Fint Floor 'I berton Becker. Dodd, Mead, a~d Company. "Stories of our background and tradition." is Mrs. Becker's subtitle for this felicitous collection; and it might well he "storie.,; of a vanished America." She begins with New England, and follows the transit of the frontier to the Pacific. The backwoods hunter, the pioneer farmer and planter, the rural politician, the prospector · and the lumberman fill the :' e pages, each t~le, skf't ch, or short story being characteristic of a peculiar section and time. 1n making her choice, Mrs. Becker has looked not only to literary merit hut to historical values. Her se lections are intended to illustrate the mind. cu~ toms. and life of the American folk in various environments and e · as; and ::o we11 has she succeeded that the volume. if attentivelv read. will teach as · much about our social history as many a formal treatise. To go into the cohwehhed storeroom of American fiction. to rescue forgotten heirlooms like many of these, and to nth them bright for a new generation of readers. is to perform a double service. Most young Americans kno·,\· little about coon-dogs or steeple-traps. and never har out a schooltencher to wii1 a holiday: we have no frontier where. as Carolina Kirkland wrote of early 'Mic.h igan, settlers would borrow even the hahy if they were allowed, no Aathoat cmigra.n ts like those descr'ibed hy James Hall in his "Legends of the \Ve·:.;t," and no spelling-bees like that in "The Hoosier Schoolmaster"; the last covote, as in ~fiss Austin's story. is fast folbwing the last ante lope into the realm where Havden Carruth's homesteader ha·3 disappeared. A good deal of our literary production of the past whirh. by strictly belletristic or artistic standards, is defective, is rich in human interest and the color of the past. It is to he hop~d that Mrs. Becker follows up thi· 3 initial collection with other volumes. G 0 L D E N TALE S OF OUR AMERJ.CA. Selected bv Mav Lam-