Chapter IV: Part 4

But it is too late for that now. All the same, I will, to the best of my poor abilities, give you advice and the benefit of my experience, gathered from contemplation of many wretched and foolish cases in which people tread happiness under foot, and then instantly lament what they have lost.

First and foremost, Agnete, you must look into yourself, and get rid of the lie which like an octopus has caught you in its embrace and smothers the best within you.

The lie about your husband’s deficiency. Your expressions of longing for a harmony of souls is a lie, just as your pretension to love with the soul and not with the senses is a lie.

You are one of the many women who, for reasons which I fail to understand, find no salvation in your relations to a man. What for him was the highest enjoyment, for you was only a torturing excitement. A physical shortcoming in yourself would in him appear a crime in your eyes. Instead of honestly and frankly explaining to him the state of things and the cause of your unhappy condition, you try to seek satisfaction by making scenes.

Don’t you see, dear child, a clever woman never makes scenes. It isn’t politic. A scene that lasts an hour does fourteen days’ detriment to her appearance.

Your question, “What ought I to do now?” really means, “How can I punish him further?”

Rather you should ask, “What can I do to heal his wounded soul?” And this is my answer, Agnete, “You can do it by confessing your own mistakes, and forgetting his.”

You must not ape humility, and let something cry within you, “See what a sacrifice I am making!”

No, you must acknowledge your wrongdoing and not let it out of sight. Take it in both hands, hold it tightly like a costly goblet, and keep your eyes fixed on it. You should remember that it is no credit to you that you have not betrayed him because there has been no necessity; for you know nothing of the mad impulse that can arise between two human creatures, suddenly, like a storm in the thickest part of the wood.

Above all things, recognise that at the time your husband summoned his mistress to his side when he thought he was going to die, he acted from the greatest and most primitive of instincts—the instinct of love.

Tell him that you have been wrong. Show him your love. Give him your best. Not for an hour or a day, but every hour and every day. That is the only way to his heart, and to your own peace of mind. And then the time will come when mutual forgiveness has performed its miracle.

Try to understand what I mean.

Hearty good wishes from your mother’s old friend. If you like you may show your husband this letter.

ELSIE LINDTNER.

* * * * *

It is certainly a very fine trait in Magna’s character, that she who used to be—well, never mind, I won’t say what—has never breathed the name of her child’s father to any living soul.

The man must have been good and strong, and I am fortunate indeed that my Kelly has found a protector in the little fellow. Oluf doesn’t like Kelly drinking schnaps. So Kelly doesn’t drink schnaps. Oluf wants Kelly’s moustache to grow, so Kelly lets it grow.

“So long as I have Oluf, who takes care of me, you need not be afraid of me.” Those words are close to my heart.

And yet I have still some anxiety. The world is so big, and here things are reduced to such a groove. I notice the effect on Oluf when Kelly tells him about America. Who knows if the day will not come when the pair come to bid me and Magna farewell to go off on adventures?

Oluf was making plans the other day for travelling to Canada, and camping in the great forests far away from civilisation. The boy had fixed it all up. They were to live in the trees, and live by hunting and fishing. Perched up on the highest branches they would spread out their nets, and catch fish out of the great river that rolls through the forest. They would only enter a town twice a year to sell the skins of the beasts they had caught.

Oluf is not too small for such dreams, but Kelly—

I am so unwilling to budge from here till Kelly has taken root in the soil so that he can’t tear himself away. He promises to stay here always, but what is a promise?

* * * * *

DEAR MAGNA,

I must really tell you without delay. Richard has been to see me. When Lucie brought in his card I was dumbfounded. But the moment he entered the room, thank God I got over my feeling of embarrassment. We stood and looked at each other, and were at a loss how to begin the conversation, till it occurred to Richard to say something about Kelly. He knew, of course, the whole story.

It did one good to see the dear fellow, to speak to him again. He said he could only stay a few minutes, and he stayed two hours. In reality, it was his little wife who sent him to see me. She thought it so extraordinary that she should not know me, who had played such an important part for so many years in Richard’s life.

We spoke a great deal of our respective children, and were both equally proud.

Now Richard has promised to visit me next Sunday with his family. You and our boys come, too. In the course of the week I shall return Richard’s call.

Do you know, Magna, I intend to make it quite a festive occasion, and there shall be no feeling in the matter that I am a divorced wife. You will have to lend me a few things as most of my china is over in the villa, and I shall order the food to be sent in from Palace Street. One can be certain of getting it good there, or would you advise going to an hotel? I have got so out of the habit of entertaining that I feel nervous at the thought of it.

Anyhow, you must come, Magna, and take care that Kelly is properly attired. Also see to his hands.

When Richard was gone, I sat a long time and meditated in retrospect on how very nicely he and I had once got on together. The one drawback was that we had no children. On that account I made the sacrifice and left him. I have been royally rewarded for it, through my Kelly.

Richard’s wife plays a good game of bridge, and we have already started a society for the winter. The report of your enormous pluck has reached the old Market Place, for Richard spoke of you in terms of the warmest admiration and esteem. At parting we both positively had tears in our eyes.

May I, without hurting you, give a hint? Please put on your silk dress, Magna. I shall have a new one made, I think, as quickly as possible. You see, this is to be a very important event in my life.

Embrace my boy for me, and remember what I said about his hands.

ELSIE.

DEAR JEANNE,

It is wrong of me to have been so lazy lately about writing. But I have had so much to do. I have, as a matter of fact, moved house. It happened in a twinkling. This habitation became to let through a death, and mine was taken by a young married couple.

Now I am living on the beach road so far out that I am hardly to be reckoned as belonging to Copenhagen. Can you guess why I have moved? Simply to be nearer the farm, so childish does one become with advancing age. Magna advised me strongly to come out altogether, but I am not inclined to do that. I am always and shall be a child of towns, though in the year that Kelly has been learning to be a farmer I have taken an almost incredible interest in cows, pigs, winter crops, and all the rest of it. My life is so full of richness and light, I have nearly more joy than I can bear, and no troubles at all.

Magna manages our “estate,” as she always calls it to please me, most admirably. And how well she understands the art of setting others to work!

My Kelly and her little Oluf are now, as they always have been, inseparable, and I believe that the blue-eyed little comrade exercises a most beneficent influence on Kelly. Magna told me one day that she had heard Oluf saying—the boy lay in a hay-cock and didn’t know that Magna was on the other side of it taking her after-dinner nap—“I have no father, for my father died ten years before I was born. But if you like to be my father, I shall be quite content to have no other.”

Magna visits me every time that she has anything to do in the town. When the window is open I can hear the crack of her whip above all the rest. And will you believe it, Jeanne, my heart begins to beat at the sound, for it means that the boys are with her, or that Magna is coming to tell me about them. You should just see her sitting rosy and upright in the dog-cart, her head hidden in a hood, with an old sealskin on, all rubbed the wrong way, the same that twenty years ago formed a topic of conversation the whole winter through, because it had cost her poor, struggling husband goodness knows how many thousands.

Magna is now getting on for sixty. But no one would think it. She beams as if the whole world were at her feet. I look at least ten years older, although, God knows, I take a lot of trouble over my hair, and touch up my cheeks a little, as I always did. She makes a fuss about getting out of the cart as if the coachman could not look after the butter and eggs.

Just think, she gets up at four in summer and at six in winter, and works for two. There is no work that she considers is too menial.

Lately she and Kelly painted all the four buildings for Whitsun. And they did it like the wind, so that one could hardly believe one’s own eyes. I sat out on the verandah and watched, and was nearly sick with delight.

Then we had roast ribs and oxeyes for dinner. How Kelly eats! You can have no conception of his appetite. It’s not elegant, but oh, so splendid! And after they have been slaughtering Kelly brings me lambs’ fry, black puddings, and liver sausages. What I once couldn’t tolerate now tastes to me better than the finest Astrakhan caviare.

How I chat on all about my own affairs. But I don’t forget my little fellow-traveller on that account, and her troubles are mine. Still, I am not going to make them such a serious matter as you do, for they are not worth it. You have arrived at a stage when everything looks to you black, and must look so. I should be deeply pained if I had not long ago seen what the cause of it is. You are now just about the age I was when we first met each other; that age which for women is so difficult and dangerous. And the inexplicable happiness is not granted to every woman to come through the time unscathed and triumphant as I did.

I have thought about it, and wondered what the reason could be why I, contrary to every one else, should remain during those years much the same as always; and I have come to the conclusion that it was because I lived so superficially at that time, and without any deep feeling for other people.

But you, little Jeanne, since you linked your fate so fortunately with Malthe’s, have been a sheer compost of love-worship and self-sacrifice. I could have foretold long ago that your transition age would be a hard time. But now try yourself to make it easier. Review the circumstances, sift, and explain them to yourself.

You have something to be thankful for that does not fall to the lot of one woman in ten thousand. Your husband continues to love you as much to-day as when you first became his. Does that not counter-balance everything? Are the little cosmopolitan godless angels of children really so hard to bring up as you think? They have, of course, the artistic temperament, and you attempt to model them into normal human beings. You will never succeed.

And is Malthe’s depression of spirits of any great significance? There is cause for it. He has of late, with justice or injustice, been overlooked, and younger powers have been preferred before him; his name has no longer the _cachet_ it once had, and even his talent seems to have taken a back seat. But, dear Jeanne, you are greatly to blame for this. You have loved your husband so blindly and fondly that you have not set him on a pedestal, but you have built a castle of air far up in the highest clouds, and there you have placed him like a golden ball on the most inaccessible pinnacle, with no one above him and no one near him.... You have fed his ambition and stifled your own natural, critical faculty, instead of standing at his side and being helpful to him in deciding between good and mediocre, and now you complain that you cannot console, and that he spurns you. You are ashamed to say so, but I read between the lines that you are very, very unhappy.... And it is all because you are not well, dear Jeanne, and your despondency is likely to last some years.

But I could hit, I think, on ways and means of putting your cares to flight; if only you will at once make up your mind to bring your little flock northwards, so that I may take them with me to the Villa this summer, and teach the little goose-herds, the Parisian, the Sicilian, and the Smyrna child, indifferent Danish, while you and your Malthe close the house, store your furniture, and trot round the globe.

Don’t let the thought of money stand in your way. Tell Joergen from me that he may with an easy hand use the money which he would set aside as a dowry for his daughters.

He must be ashamed of himself if he has not that opinion about his own flesh and blood, that it will be a pure joy to any one to take over the girls, even if they come without a rag to their backs or clothed in flour sacks.

Besides, I have made my will, and, dear Jeanne, if I once played _la banque_ at Monte Carlo, I am not likely to do it again.

What a glorious summer it will be over there in the White Villa with your chicks. And we’ll borrow Magna’s Oluf and my Kelly for a week, too. What does my old travelling companion say to this?

Much love to you and to your husband, and the whole small flock, from

Yours always,

ELSIE LINDTNER.

* * * * *

Poor Jeanne and poor Joergen.... So it fares worse with you than I thought.

I have the greatest desire to travel over to them and mediate, but in these days my heart is too touchy and my neuralgia a consideration. I ought not by rights to sit out on the balcony in the cool evening air, but I never could be careful.

But it shall not happen; it would be too foolish and irresponsible a step—people don’t separate in a hurry like that without a ghost of a real reason. All very well if Malthe had another string to his bow, or if Jeanne was in love with another man, but, good Lord! one of them couldn’t live without the other, and yet she talks of having “weighed” the matter, and thoroughly thought it out. I am so angry my hands tremble.

Jeanne must really collect herself, and understand that all this is nothing but a transition. When I think of it, I can recall no case among the many I have known—except, of course, my own—of a single woman who has managed to get through these years without a slight rumpus of some kind. Afterwards they have taken endless trouble to patch up the wounds they have inflicted. Now, Jeanne has been more than unreasonable in this respect. There isn’t a man in the world who can stand such an everlasting adoration.

It was certainly brutal of him to say, “Mind yourself, your house, and your children, but don’t meddle with my work.”

But he meant nothing more by it than a child in a temper does when it vents its anger in trampling on a favourite toy. Yet the words rankled in Jeanne as a reproach—a reproach for what?

He has lost faith in his talent. Therefore he is irritable and dejected, and Jeanne, who all these years has had enough to do in bringing children into the world, and caring for them and him, now stands suddenly still, looks round and behind her, and feels disillusioned. Now is the time when she wants the tenderest words he has ever lavished on her, but he, with his head full of building plans, sees no sense or object in two people talking of love—two people who have proved their love with their whole life.

One of them ought to fall sick unto death ... so that the other should forget his small grievances.

Well, we shall see. If Jeanne listens to my advice, and lets the children come up here, all will be well.... A little air and freedom is what they need; otherwise I shall have to sacrifice myself and for the second time knock about the world with my little travelling companion.

* * * * *

So I have been in my old home once more! Weeks will have to go by before I get over the re-visiting of it. Every trace of me had been removed—with a scrupulous care and thoroughness as if every piece of furniture, every hanging and picture had been dangerously infected. Doors had been obliterated, and new ones cut in walls which used to be doorless. Not even the peaceful white fireplaces were there any longer, but instead gilded radiators. Had I never inhabited the rooms they could not have seemed more strange. I looked in vain for Richard’s oak bookcase, and the panels from his grandmother’s country place.

I had to see everything. My namesake—she who bears the name by right, not courtesy—led me from one room to another. It was as if she asked me incessantly, “Isn’t there anything that reminds you of your reign?” No, nothing, not the very least thing.

And then when we sat round the table at which Richard and I used to sit alone with the servants waiting behind our chairs, all the vacant places were filled with children whose appearance in the world was one of the conditions of my departure. Wonderful, wonderful! and a little sad.

I noticed how Richard exerted himself that I should feel at ease. But he, too, I think, was moved by the oddness of the situation.

She calls me Madame Elsie, and I call her Madame Beathe.

Involuntarily I glanced round for the big portrait Kröyer in his day painted of me, the portrait which Richard simply idolised. He saw what I was looking for, and cast down his eyes. I felt inclined to say, “Dearest friend, don’t let us be sentimental. What was once is no longer. But the picture was a true work of art, and for that reason you should have let it hang where it was.”

One thinks such things, but doesn’t say them.

I was shown, too, the daughters’ bedroom upstairs, and there—there hung my picture among photographs of actresses and school friends. Finally it will land in the attic unless it occurs to some one to make money out of it.

Why is it I cannot get rid of a feeling of bitterness and humiliation? They were all very kind and considerate. But when Madame Beathe joking suggested a match between her Annelisa and my Kelly, I felt near to crying. Annelisa is a thoroughly nice girl, it is true. But I cannot endure the thought of Kelly being looked down on, because of his country manners. And she does look down on him.

The little mistress has one fault. She is too immaculately tidy. I noticed that all the carpets had dusting sheets over them, and naturally supposed their removal had been forgotten, till I saw that every single article on her dressing-table was covered in the middle of the day with gauze, and I heard her scolding one of the maids for not washing her hands before beginning to lay the cloth after touching some books. Richard, I am sure, finds it trying.

When he smokes a cigar she sits on pins and needles for fear he shall scatter the ash about. And God knows that for a man Richard is tidy enough. She discovered a mark on the white window-ledge, only a raindrop, I believe, but got up twenty times at least to scrub, brush, and breathe on the spot.

It gives me food for thought. It is not for me to judge what she does and how she acts. But I can’t get over it. I feel bound to criticise her. And somehow the idea will bother me that this is my home she is fussing about in, and not the other way about.

Annelisa kissed me at parting, and asked if she might soon come to see me. But she shall not come when Kelly is at home. That is certain.

And now they have invited me to a grand dinner-party.

* * * * *

Kelly must have a tail-coat, there is no question of that.

* * * * *

No, Kelly shall not have a dress suit. Kelly won’t come with me to the dinner-party at Richard’s. I am going alone.

* * * * *

Pah! I am positively excited! It was a grand occasion. And it did me good to hear pretty speeches made about my appearance. The orchids certainly did go well with my mauve silk. They couldn’t have come from anywhere but Paris, of course.

Annelisa and I became great friends. She took me up to her room and confided in me that she and her mother don’t get on.

You were afraid to move almost for fear of being told you were making things in a mess. And the child betrayed, by the way, the little domestic secret that her mother now had a bedroom to herself, because her father was so untidy in shaving. When no one was looking her mother went about with a duster and wiped away the marks left by the soles of your boots. Wasn’t it too awful? But it didn’t seem so dreadful to me, for all at once I saw plainly what it meant, and I consoled the child by telling her that in a year or two the scouring demon would be cleaned away.

Richard seems quite unconcerned. He doesn’t dream of complaining. But if he has any memory, it must occur to him in looking back, how in the years that I was passing through the phase, everything inwardly and outwardly went on the same as usual.

Richard plays a brilliant game of bridge. But I must say I was utterly unprepared for Professor Rothe making the third. He behaved as if nothing whatever had passed between us. And Lili’s name was not mentioned.

Richard said when I rose to go, “You have been the Queen of the Feast!” God knows I blushed.

Maybe that in his secret heart he recognises the great sacrifice I made for him. It was, undoubtedly, no easy matter to leave him and the beautiful house. But my exemplary conscience was sufficient reward, even if I had not afterwards received the guerdon of Kelly.

* * * * *

I believe I shall succeed in having a chat with Madame Beathe about her _tic doloreux_. If one broaches the subject tactfully, it’s possible to achieve a great deal; and it is only a matter of getting her to see herself that her malady is an appendage of her years.

* * * * *

What holes Kelly wears his stockings into, and how black he makes his pocket-handkerchiefs! I do believe the boy uses them to wash the cart-wheels.

* * * * *

Kelly said yesterday, “And if you hadn’t adopted me, I should have been in the gutter all my life.” How he looks at me!

* * * * *

I suppose I had better have left it alone. I was told that for others such a period of incapability might exist, but not for her. She knew the duties of a proper housewife, and did not attend to a fifth part of things and leave the rest in dirt and disorder.

It was a little too much that I should not only come and interfere in her housekeeping, but ascribe to her a fictitious illness that only existed in my imagination.... And then followed a long story which to listen to was enough to make one laugh and weep together. Goodness! she had actually been jealous of my former régime, and had no peace till she had turned the whole house topsy-turvy. She didn’t intend that I should know this. But the storm burst when she thought to-day I had been taking my revenge. Her one object in life was to live for her husband, her home, and her children, and she had no notions about posing as a beauty, and be painted by famous artists. And so on....

She was so beside herself finally, that I was obliged to cave in, and say that I had made a mistake, she was not at the dangerous age, and her scouring mania was a perfectly natural instinct, and it was a pity that all housewives did not follow her example.

And then we were good friends again, and she told me that she was very glad I was really quite old.

Any woman so old and harmless, of course didn’t count.

No, I shall not burn my fingers again. It is most curious how forgetful one becomes with the flight of years.

But forgetful is not exactly the right word. It is much more a sort of half-unconscious perversion of actual facts. The same kind of thing as parents making out to their children and almost believing it themselves, that when they were children they were absolute angels.

Magna, for instance, is capable of self-delusion and lying with regard to the miseries of her dangerous age. Magna, usually the soul of truthfulness, who never tries to make herself out better than she is, apparently believes that she got over those difficult years easily and calmly. Good God!

For once we nearly grew angry with one another. I maintained that it was nothing to be ashamed of, but rather an honour, that she had afterwards matured into the magnificent, vigorous creature she now is.

But she wouldn’t hear of it. The only thing she would admit was Oluf, and she only did that because he is flesh and blood.

We both became vehement, and in the end Magna went the length of asserting in her excitement that I had been far more affected by the critical years than she and Lili Rothe put together!

It was useless to protest against such a ludicrous mis-statement of facts. But we very soon made it up again, and played our game of Friday bridge. Unfortunately Kelly had not come in with Magna.

He and Oluf had to sit up all night with a sick cow. It would have sufficed if one of them had done it, but where Kelly is there Oluf will be also.

God bless Magna for her way of chatting about the two boys. I devour the words as they fall from her lips. It is so splendid to hear her. Magna thinks it will be a good thing for Kelly if he marries in a year or two ... it seems almost as if she had fixed on some one already. What if it should be to the new dairy-maid? Well, I should not mind, so long as it was for my boy’s happiness. In that event we must think of taking a farm for Kelly, for Kelly and Oluf.

* * * * *

It would interest me to prove to Magna who was right. If I could bring myself to reading through once more what I wrote down in those days ... yes, I will to-morrow.

* * * * *

I am ashamed, oh, how ashamed I am! It is not fancy or forgery. I wrote every word of it in circumstances which bear witness to the honesty of the writer. I can never look either Magna or Jeanne in the face again ... or in my boy’s.

Not I who have a thousand times dreamed and wished with all my heart that I had brought him into the world! I can only hang my head now and be thankful that he never had such a person for his mother.

I, I, who strutted about like a peacock, proud of my own perfections; I, who pointed the finger of scorn at others; I, who presumed with the rights of a judge to condemn or pardon others, inwardly jubilating triumphantly, “Thank God I am not as other men are.”

_That_ can never be erased, never made good.

Now that I have reached the evening of my days, and my one occupation is to sit and look out of the window at the people who pass, and dream happy dreams for my boy, I commit no thought or deed that needs the veil of oblivion.

But then, when I was in my prime ... when I might have applied my gifts for usefulness and pleasure—I was such a....

The memory of it can never be wiped out. It can never be made good.

And I had thought that Kelly was to read it all after my death, so that he might learn to know what I really was; learn to despise me as I lay in my grave.... I have had the fire lit though it is summer. I intend to destroy every line. Every line!

But will that prevent Kelly beholding me in all my pitiableness? Am I such a coward? Such a coward?... No, Kelly _shall_ read it, every scrap when I am dead.

Then he shall see what a deplorable, wretched creature I was till love entered my life, when he did. Then he shall know the great miracle which love wrought.

Kelly has a claim to me in bad as well as good....

I feel to-day so ineffably tired. It seems as if this day were to be my last. The day of judgment, when I am to stand face to face with myself.

But the day of judgment is to be followed by regeneration. Kelly is to be my regeneration. Not for myself do I pray to be granted a year, an hour; I pray for Kelly’s sake alone, that our meeting that night may not have been in vain. This prayer throbs from my lips into Eternity.

Will it be heard?

* * * * *

There are bells chiming for vespers. Now Kelly is coming home from work, so tall, strong, and healthy. They are busy with the spring ploughing, and to-morrow will be Sunday. Then I shall see him, have him to myself....

Kelly, Kelly ... why aren’t you here at this hour? Kelly, I want to see you, and to thank you.

Be good ... be happy....

THE DANGEROUS AGE

BY

Karin Michaëlis

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AN UNOFFICIAL HONEYMAN

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Dolf Wyllarde

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THE UNKNOWN WOMAN

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Anne Warwick

Author of “Compensation”

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WINGS OF DESIRE

BY

M. P. Willcocks

Author of “A Man of Genius,” “The Way Up,” etc.

_Cloth_ _12mo_ _$1.30 net_ _Postage 12 cents_

“So far as it deals with the problems of the modern woman, or rather, with the modern woman’s new way of facing a problem that is as old as life—that of love—the book is curiously revelatory.”—_New York Tribune_

“The story of the woman who forces herself on the weakling to save him from himself is good work.”—_New York Sun_

“The story is so remarkable for its analytical power, its minute observation, its sense of background, its delicate style as literature, that it arrests and holds, and calls the reader back again and again.”—_Boston Evening Transcript_

“The right of woman to her own individuality is the book’s chief inspiration. It is for serious minds, and to such provides much food for thought.”—_Springfield Republican_

“The author handles her characters as might a true mother her children—knowing, yet not specially noting, the faults and virtues of all. The style is clear and terse to incisiveness, and almost every page has its sage or witty saying. It isn’t an easy story to lay aside unfinished.”—_Chicago Record Herald_

“Much of beauty and truth, with occasional instances of vivid strength.”—_Chicago Evening Post_

“There is in all Miss Willcocks’ stories a certain quality that makes for the heights. She has a precious vocabulary. The realism that distinguishes her never for a moment extinguishes her grace of style or charm. She is essentially an artist who offends neither by useless detail nor disappoints by leaving too much to the reader’s imagination. Always she handles her wisdom and wit perfectly, while she presents her stories powerfully. This is a book to read and keep.”—_Philadelphia Record_

“Her technique is good, her details are exceedingly well handled, and her study of types is most delightful.”—_Louisville Post_

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HECTOR GRAEME

BY

Evelyn Brentwood

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“A tale which carries conviction with it. The story is well told and the conception of the central character is extremely interesting.”—_New York Times_

“A remarkable book. The study of that virile character, Hector Graeme, is exceedingly powerful. The gripping power of the novel is undeniable and its psychology sure-based.”—_Boston Evening Transcript_

“One of the most convincing novels of military life ever written.”—_Rochester Post Express_

“One of the strongest pieces of fiction to reach this desk for many a month. It is a character study of the sort that may be honestly described as unusual.”—_Cleveland Plain Dealer_

SEKHET

BY

Irene Miller

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“A novel of genuine dramatic power. Its pages are marked by a strong, cumulative interest. It is a long while since a novel of greater dramatic force has claimed our attention.”—_New York Herald_

“To those aweary of novels that are not novel, and stories that lack blood and bone and sinew, ‘Sekhet’ will seem as manna to hungry palates. It is as human a document as one might find. Its characters live today, and love and sin and die, just as surely as the author relates. A better sermon than is often preached, a better novel than is often written, describes the book exactly.”—_Philadelphia Record_

“A powerfully written tale with marvellous descriptive bits and very strong character drawing—a story which grips the emotions from the start.”—_Nashville American_

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EARTH

BY

Muriel Hine

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“A readable story.”—_Boston Evening Transcript_

“The story is well told and is without an uninteresting paragraph in all its pages.”—_Boston Globe_

“The story is pleasantly told.”—_Washington Evening Star_

“The tale is well written and has a good plot and the character delineation is well done.”—_San Francisco Call_

HALF IN EARNEST

BY

Muriel Hine

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“The story compels interest from first to last.”—_New York Times_

“The real interest of the book—and it is a very real interest—lies in the conflict of character and will between the two protagonists.”—_New York Evening Post_

“A well built, well written tale.”—_Washington Evening Star_

“Holds the interest, being well constructed and smoothly told.”—_Washington Herald_

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THE STORY OF A PLOUGHBOY

BY

James Bryce

With an Introduction by Edwin Markham

_Cloth_ _12mo_ _$1.25 net_ _Postage 12 cents_

“A big story, bearing the blood prints of reality.”—_Edwin Markham_

“Whoever reads this story will get so keen a sense of actuality, will feel so strongly the grip of a living, human hand through all its pages that he can hardly help rejoicing, as for a friend, that the lad lives true to his vision and the man to his final glimpse of the solidarity of mankind.”—_New York Times_

“This ‘Story of a Ploughboy’ ought to rouse people to the degrading effects on men of unremitting, unregulated, unsweetened, unenlightened toil, and also to the fact that it is the ploughboys of the world who make the fortunes of the rich. It is a most unusual story and makes a good impression.”—_New York Evening Globe_

“Three of the greatest merits that any book can have cannot be denied to this story: it is a book of good faith; it is a book of vital actuality, and it is a book for men.”—_New York Herald_

“The pictures of life and labor are admirably well done, and if the book does preach socialism, it preaches it logically and convincingly.”—_James L. Ford in New York Herald_

“To read this story that quivers with the pathos and passion of life is to get a keener and kindlier vision of our mortal existence.”—_Buffalo Commercial_

“Those who are interested in stories with a sociological trend will be charmed with this history, minute and graphic, of a ploughboy.”—_Buffalo Express_

“A record of a young man’s life—one of the most popular themes of today. The story has pathos, sincerity of intention, and all the multiplied details of realism that make happy the heart of the reader on Socialistic problems.”—_Baltimore Evening News_

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AWAKENING

BY

Maud Diver

Author of “Candles in the Wind,” “Captain Desmond, V.C.” and “The Great Amulet”

_Cloth_ _12mo_ _$1.30 net_ _Postage 12 cents_

“A story of very human interest, a careful study well thought out in all its possibilities.”—_Boston Evening Transcript_

“A most delightful and enjoyable story.”—_Boston Times_

“This is a story told with a good deal of poesy and power, a story disclosing and suggesting much of the inner life of two great civilizations.”—_New York American_

“Apart from its romantic interest the book has good literary style.”—_New York Herald_

“Mrs. Diver’s sympathetic appreciation of the Indian point of view is remarkable and could only come from long experience.”—_Providence Journal_

“Even the most enthusiastic admirer of Maud Diver’s previous works will not hesitate to say that ‘Awakening’ is the greatest book she has yet given us.”—_Cleveland Town Topics_

“The author is a word painter and her story gives her plenty of opportunity to show her talent. Many of the situations are exquisitely tendered and are brought out with a delicacy of touch that is worthy of a poet.”—_Albany Argus_

“Like the other works by the same author, ‘Awakening’ is marked by excellent diction and delicate touch of descriptive powers.”—_Chicago Journal_

“The story is engrossing.”—_Detroit Free Press_

JOHN LANE CO., NEW YORK

THE BEACON

BY

Eden Phillpotts

Author of “The Thief of Virtue,” “Demeter’s Daughter,” etc.

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“One is lost in the beauty of imagination of the word paintings of Dartmoor, and absorbed by the thoughtful study of human nature.”—_The Outlook_

“The book has the usual excellences of clearness and picturesqueness.”—_The Nation_

“We seldom see such strong buffets of wit in present day stories. The book has greatly pleased us.”—_New York Sun_

“The dramatic power of plot and characters of the tale are undeniable. Mr. Phillpotts remains an admirable artist in the maturity of his powers.”—_New York Tribune_

“The tale in its mingled tragedy and comedy is admirable and holds the attention. The people are alive and interesting. This book ranks high.”—_New York Herald_

“No one who has once begun to read ‘The Beacon’ will fail to read eagerly to the end.”—_New York Evening Mail_

“As a prose poem of great beauty, those parts that sing the beauty of Cosdon will delight the reader.”—_Chicago Evening Post_

“A problem worked out in a way that must fascinate any thoughtful reader.”—_Chicago Record Herald_

“There is a flavor of a whole portion of humanity in Mr. Phillpotts’ men of the soil that makes his novels much more than passing fiction. There is also the aroma, the color, the austerity of the moors that creates an atmosphere long remembered. Both will be found at their best in ‘The Beacon.’”—_Boston Herald_

JOHN LANE CO., NEW YORK

MANALIVE

BY

Gilbert K. Chesterton

Author of “The Innocence of Father Brown,” “Heretics,” “Orthodoxy,” etc.

_Cloth_ _12mo_ _$1.30 net_ _Postage 12 cents_

Frontispiece and Jacket Illustration by Will Foster

“Mr. Chesterton has undertaken in this quaint narrative to make burlesque the vehicle of a sermon and a philosophy. It is all a part of the author’s war upon artificial attitudes which enclose the living men like a shell and make for human purposes a dead man of him. He speaks here in a parable—a parable of his own kind, having about it a broad waggishness like that of Mr. Punch and a distinct flavor of that sort of low comedy which one finds in Dickens and Shakespeare. You are likely to find, before you are done with the parable, that there has been forced upon your attention a possible view of the life worth living. ‘Manalive’ is a ‘Peterpantheistic’ novel full of Chestertonisms.”—_New York Times_

“One of the oddest books Mr. Chesterton has yet given us.”—_New York Evening Globe_

“The fun of the book (and there is plenty of it) comes quite as much from the extraordinary and improbable characters as from the situations. Epigrams, witticisms, odd fancies, queer conceits, singular whimsies, follow after one another in quick succession.”—_Brooklyn Eagle_

“One of the most humorous tales of modern fiction, combined with a very tender and appealing love story.”—_Cleveland Plain Dealer_

“The book is certain to have a wide circulation, not only because of the name of the author attached to it, but because of its own intrinsic worth.”—_Buffalo Commercial_

“There can be no doubt as to the iridescent brilliance of the book. Page after page—full of caustic satire, humorous sally and profound epigram—fairly bristles with merriment. The book is a compact mass of scintillating wit.”—_Philadelphia Public Ledger_

JOHN LANE CO., NEW YORK

THE INNOCENCE OF FATHER BROWN

BY

Gilbert K. Chesterton

Author of “Manalive,” “Orthodoxy,” “Heretics,” etc.

_Cloth_ _12mo_ _$1.30 net_ _Postage 12 cents_

Illustrations by Will Foster

“Mr. Chesterton writes extremely good detective stories—detective stories the more fascinating because if there is about them a hint of irony, there is also more than a hint of poetry and a shadow—or, if you will, a glow—of the mystic and the supernatural.”—_New York Times_

“The stories are entertaining; the mysteries and their solutions are ingenius and interesting.”—_New York Sun_

“The stories are vastly entertaining, and excellent specimens of literary craftsmanship at the same time.”—_The Outlook_

“Never were philosophy, ethics and religion preached in a more unusual manner.”—_Chicago Tribune_

“In their own Chestertonic realm, the stories are personal and convincing; full, too, of the charm of landscape. The author arranges his scenes and marshals his characters with an artistic eye worthy of a Poe.”—_Chicago Evening Post_

“The stories have a charming variety, and interest in them is awakened more insidiously than in the average story dealing with the detection of crime.”—_Chicago Record Herald_

“Throughout these meteoric adventures there is, of course, besides Father Brown a lot of Mr. Chesterton himself, scintillating along the way, to the fascination and bedazzlement of the reader.”—_Washington Evening Star_

“The stories are of the dashing and brilliant kind that Stevenson invented—exciting tales told in an artistic manner.”—_Albany Argus_

JOHN LANE CO., NEW YORK

THE GLORY OF CLEMENTINA

BY

William J. Locke

Author of “The Belovèd Vagabond,” “Simon the Jester,” etc.

_Cloth_ _12mo_ _$1.30 net_ _Postage 12 cents_

Illustrations by Arthur I. Keller

“Mr. Locke has succeeded in uniting with the firm carefulness of his early work the rapid, fluent, vibrating style that makes his later books so delightful; therefore it is easy to make the deduction that ‘Clementina’ is the best piece of work he has done.”—_New York Evening Sun_

“Among the novels of the past five years no books have more consistently produced an effect at once certain, satisfactory and delightful than those of William J. Locke. This latest addition to his shelf is full of life and laughter and the love not only of man for woman but of man for man and for humanity. Mr. Locke is a born story-teller and a master of the art of expression.”—_The Outlook_

“The book contains a mass of good material, with original characterization, and is written in a style piquant and clever.”—_The Literary Digest_

“A story containing the essence of humanity, with an abundance of sensible and sensitive, casual and unobtrusive commentary upon life and man, and especially upon woman.”—_Boston Evening Transcript_

“It contains even more of the popular qualities than are usually associated with the writings of this noted author.”—_Boston Times_

“Mr. Locke’s flights into the realms of fancy have been a delight to many readers. He has a lightness of touch that is entirely captivating, and his remarkable characterization of inconsequent people gives them a reality that is very insistent.”—_Baltimore Evening Sun_

“Never has he drawn so deeply from that well that is the human heart; never so near those invisible heights which are the soul; and, if we are not altogether mistaken, ‘The Glory of Clementina’ will also prove to be that of its author.”—_Baltimore News_

“A fascinating story with delicate, whimsical touches.”—_Albany Times-Union_

“The book seems destined to live longer than any written by the author to date, because it is so sane and so fundamentally true.”—_Philadelphia Enquirer_

JOHN LANE CO., NEW YORK