“Special emphasis is laid upon the work that has been done by Jewish scholars from the days of Saadya, Rashi and David Kimhi down to the present time.”
Marion, by the author of “Me.” il*$1.35 Watt
“Marion, one of the eleven children of an English artist settled in Hochelaga, the French quarter of Montreal, tells her own story. Endowed with beauty and brains, and not endowed with a single shred of discretion, nor with the apparently almost extinct quality that used to be known as womanly reserve, she fares forth into the world of Bohemia, to earn her bread as actress, artist’s assistant, model—any unconventional and hazardous thing that comes to hand. ... Marion passes through many compromising situations, thrilling adventures, hairbreadth escapes from both want and infamy.”—N Y Times
“That it is written with vivacity and skill needs not to be said to those who have enjoyed its predecessor. The dominant feeling, however, with which one closes the book is ‘the pity of it.’ ... The interest of the story is greatly enhanced by its profuse and unusually beautiful illustrations, every one of which has the rare merit of really illustrating the text.”
“The most interesting portions of her revelations tell of her sensations as a model and of her rather lurid experiences in studios. ... There is no pretense at style in the book and little humor, as the author has been chiefly occupied in presenting a human document.” F. M. Holly
MARKS, JEANNETTE AUGUSTUS.Three Welsh plays.*$1 Little 812 17-7561
The first of these plays, “The merry, merry cuckoo,” gives a tender and touching little picture of the sympathetic devotion between a married pair who have lived long years together. The remaining two, “The deacon’s hat” and “Welsh honeymoon,” are comedies. The first was published in the Dramatist, and in the Metropolitan, and the third in Smart Set. All have been played in various places thruout the country, in little theatres, by drama societies, etc. The author was awarded one of the first prizes of the Welsh national theatre in 1911.Application for permission to produce the plays should be made to the author, in care of the publishers.
“She will do surer work than this, but her dialogue has emotional shading and her effects are subtle.” Algernon Tassin
“They have been acted a number of times and proved their validity on the stage.”
“Such folk plays as these of Jeannette Marks give the touch of life the play world needs.” Frank Macdonald
“Only a very blind critic could fail to see the excellent human quality of the plays contained in this volume, and only a very cold one could withhold admiration. Charm these plays have in abundance. It is a simple charm compounded of genuine feeling, childlike thinking, and quaint unaffected expression. The localism of the plays is novel and taking; the dialect is used with discretion, and is manifestly the speech of the heart. ... They are delightful to read and perhaps dramatic enough to hold an audience.”
“For sheer loveliness, humor, and the revealing of eternal wisdom through human nature, these plays easily surpass most of the one-act plays offered to the public.”
MARRIOTT, JOHN ARTHUR RANSOME.Eastern question; an historical study in European diplomacy.*$5.50 (3c) Oxford 949.6 17-15969
The author, who is a fellow of Worcester college, Oxford, states that he knows of no other book “identical in scope and purpose” with his own. He aims to give a “systematic and continuous account of the origin and development of the Eastern question.” “There is an introductory outline, then after a chapter on the geography of the Balkans and its influence on the politics of the Near East, the history of the Ottoman empire is narrated, giving much space to Napoleon and Greek independence, until the Crimean war. A very full chapter is devoted to this war. ... The last six chapters deal with contemporary history.” (Boston Transcript) The last chapter covers the years 1914-16. There are three appendices and nine maps, one of these being an ethnological map of the Balkan peninsula. A list of authorities is appended to each chapter. Some of the material has been utilized for articles recently contributed to various English magazines.
“The few blemishes detract little from the great positive value of the book, which like much of the work of Englishmen succeeds remarkably well in preserving the true historical spirit in a time of warlike passions.” A. H. Lybyer
“The author has supplied a real need in English historical literature. It comes at a very opportune time. It is the work of a genuine scholar, learned and free from conscious bias.” F. W. C.
“One of the most illuminating chapters in this invaluable book is that entitled ‘Physics and politics,’ and future negotiators may take to heart the suggestions made at p. 33 that any settlement of Balkan affairs must originate from within.” Ernest Satow
“A clear, scholarly, and accurate account of Balkan problems.”
“It is an able and scholarly book, such as we should expect from so well known a member of the Oxford school of modern history as Mr Marriott, and it brings together in an orderly narrative many episodes that lose their significance in the ordinary European histories.”
“It is a very small book for so large a subject; and, though it probably contains as much as the ordinary reader is likely to digest, and that in a digestible form, it still leaves room for a work based on exhaustive research. Mr Marriott has earned our thanks by giving us, at the cost of no slight labour, a study which has long been needed and should certainly be widely read.”
MARSH, RICHARD.The beetle.*$1.50 (1c) Putnam 17-3888
The story is told in the first person by four of the characters, a London clerk, a scientist, a young society woman, and a detective, each of whom in turn gives his own version. The mystery is well sustained thruout the four narratives. There is an element of hypnosis in it, and one of oriental magic, in addition to the element of sheer physical horror, the horror one instinctively feels of creeping things.
“This is an absorbing narrative of fantastic horrors that should be read only by those of unimpaired nervous system and then preferably in broad daylight.”
“Is it a purely critical affectation to feel that these books are not good because they lack reality, because they do not try to convey the impression of life, but are content to give an idea or to tell a story?... Is it a dry-as-dust pedantry that says the idea is good or the story is good, but that the book is not good from the critical standpoint? I think not,—naturally.” E: E. Hale
“Mr Marsh does not know how to create character; his young chemist is especially unconvincing. The attempts at humor are clumsy indeed; Mr Marsh ought not to bother his head about providing comic relief. He has a powerful imagination and he knows how to tell a story, and these powers have enabled him to write a book guaranteed to give an hour’s excitement to every one healthy enough occasionally to enjoy horror.”
MARSHALL, ARCHIBALD.Abington abbey.*$1.50 (1½c) Dodd 17-25863
“‘Abington abbey’ details in 388 leisurely pages, how the family of George Grafton, banker, moves from his London home and settles in the newly purchased Abington abbey, a delightful old country place. ... Mr Grafton is a rich widower, with three beautiful daughters, and a son at school. These, with the ‘Dragon,’ the girls’ governess, constitute the family.” (N Y Times) “The story as a whole cannot be satisfactorily summarized, for, although its sequence is uninterrupted and its events hang together closely, its effects are almost wholly atmospheric.” (Boston Transcript)
Reviewed by H. W. Boynton
“It is an intimate revelation of the English temperament, the English tricks of thought, and the English way of living. ... Interwoven into the story is the personality of one of those clerical characters without whom no story of English life seems complete. ... And it is solely through the novelist’s account of this clergyman’s persistent interest in the affairs of his parishioners, of his determined intrusion into their home life, and of the quiet rebuffs that he met from the Graftons and others, that a humorous aspect is given to the novel.” E. F. E.
“It is almost startling to come across a book, published in 1917, which, for all reflection itgives of the time in which it was written, might have come from the pen of Jane Austen or Anthony Trollope.”
MARSHALL, ARCHIBALD.Upsidonia.*$1.50 (3c) Dodd 17-26182
Upsidonia is not pictured as a utopia; it is merely a country where everything usual to us is turned upside down. The poor are more highly respected than the rich, servants give orders to masters, prisons are places of comfort and luxurious ease. The story is told by a young Englishman who inadvertently wanders into this strange country. His first act is to toss sixpence to a beggar, who turns out to be a person of power and influence. Amazing complications follow.
“The ingenuity of all this is unquestionable, its satiric import is at times easily discernible, but it is very obviously not the sort of fiction with which Mr Marshall is most thoroughly at home.” E. F. E.
“No one who read that superb story ‘Watermeads,’ would suspect Mr Marshall of so commonplace a mind as is revealed in this thoroughly uninteresting story of a fictitious country. ... It is a barren tale of unpleasant people, without humor or originality or reason.”
“A breezy, amusing story, cleverly told, although not always quite up to the possibilities of its theme.”
“Mr Marshall’s latest book would make a delightful short story; or it might well serve as the foundation for a more complicated fantasy. But in forcing it to the fashion of a six-shilling novel Mr Marshall has doomed it to failure. ... There are, here and there in the book, touches of humour of a far finer kind especially in the solemn footnotes regarding the politics, customs, and literature of Upsidonia.”
MARSHALL, HENRIETTA ELIZABETH.[2]This country of ours.il*$2.50 (1c) Doran 973 17-31892
This is an English writer’s story of the United States, told for young people. It follows “Our island story,” “A history of France” and other similar works by the author. The contents are arranged as follows: Stories of explorers and pioneers; Stories of Virginia; Stories of New England; Stories of the middle and southern colonies; Stories of the French in America; Stories of the struggle for liberty; Stories of the United States under the Constitution. This final section brings the story down to the present time. There are ten illustrations in color by A. C. Michael.
“The book appears to be in the main historically accurate. It is noticeable that while the days of discovery and colonization receive very thorough treatment, the period following the Civil war is put into about forty pages—a condensation which gives the reader the impression of being out of proportion in a work of 612 pages.”
MARTIN, EDWARD SANDFORD.Diary of a nation; the war and how we got into it.*$1.50 (1½c) Doubleday 940.91 17-28643
A brief record of the formation of American opinion for the student of the war who wishes to go back to the beginning of it and chronologically run thru the comment, from this side of the water, from August, 1914, to the time when the United States entered the conflict. The observations are selected from articles that appeared in Life and “are concerned with the war in Europe and with American politics as affected by it. By what processes of sympathy and indignation, thru what vicissitudes of diplomacy, delay and almost despair, we came after two years and a half to the breaking point with Germany, may be traced in a measure in the chapters.”
“Full of shrewd common sense.” C. H. P. Thurston
“In calling attention to this inspiriting and aptly named volume we may recall what we said of the previous reprint of articles from New York Life. They stand for a type of editorial comment for which there is no parallel in British journalism—unconventional, colloquial, but trenchant and often intensely serious though appearing in what is nominally a comic paper.”
MARTIN, HELEN REIMENSNYDER (MRS FREDERIC C. MARTIN).Those Fitzenbergers. il*$1.35 (1½c) Doubleday 17-7923
Little Liddy Fitzenberger had led a strangely isolated life. For some reason, unknown to her, no one in Virginsburg would associate with “those Fitzenbergers.” Her father, glum and morose, never speaks to her, and between her stepmother and herself there is open dislike. Her only friend is Elmer Wagenhorst, and Elmer insists that their meetings must be kept secret. The coming of the new minister and his wife to Virginsburg makes a big difference in the life of Liddy, and the time comes when she and Elmer find their positions reversed.
“We hardly blame the Pennsylvania Dutch for their dislike of Mrs Martin, for she pictures them as stupid, mean, unforgiving and immoral. ... The humor of the story is irresistible.”
“All these are very real people. There is, however, a trace of bitterness in the author’s characterization that the book would be better without. There must be more than a little humor in such a settlement as Virginsburg There always is. Mrs Martin too rarely shows her ability to catch its gleam.”
“The dialect is true to type, and the story holds the reader’s interest to the end.”
“Each new novel by Mrs Martin shows distinct progress in fictional art, and this one excels most of her other books in the vitality of its plot, the variety of its characterization, and the briskness and humor with which its action moves. Mrs Martin is developing especially in her handling of conversation.”
“The quaint talk is capitally rendered and the characterization is good; but the author in the latter part of the story yields to the temptation to make her now educated girl and boy talk too elegantly, while the plot becomes ridiculous.”
MARVIN, FRANCIS SYDNEY, ed.Progress and history.*$3.75 Oxford 901 17-19164
“‘Progress and history’ is a series of essays arranged and edited by F. S. Marvin and published in 1916 and is a sequel to ‘The unity of western civilization,’ published the year before. It was originally a set of lectures given in Birmingham. Where the former collection aimed at a statical view of the permanent unifying factors that have held western civilization together, the present one exhibits a dynamical view of these forces in growth. The idea of progress covers the conception of increase of knowledge, increase of power, and ‘increase in our appreciation of the humanity of others. The first two thoughts, harmonized and directed by the third, may be taken to cover the whole field, and this volume to be merely a commentary upon them.’” (Nation) “The contributorsare Mr L. P. Jacks. Mr Clutton Brock, Mr R. R. Marett, F. Melian Stawell, the Rev. H. J. Carlyle, Baron F. von Hügel, Mr A. E. Zimmern, Professor J. A. Smith, and the editor.” (The Times [London] Lit Sup)
“It must attract the attention of the educated public not only by the present actuality of its appeal, but by the good and often brilliant style of the writers, and generally by their known competence to deal with the several subjects that fall to the share of each. Unfortunately, as in most works written in indefinite combination, the unity of purpose becomes less clear in some parts of the book (generally speaking, perhaps, in this case after the fifth essay), and the result is a certain nebulosity, which is not inconsistent with suggestiveness.” Alice Gardner
“In ‘Moral progress,’ Dr L. P. Jacks abandons the historical mode of treatment. He gives a keen analysis of the notion of progress and of the flattering assumption that we are progressing morally. His essay is pure gold throughout, and no analysis can do it justice. But anyone who believes the things he sees daily in his newspapers should read it about once a week for his sanity’s sake.” F. C. S. Schiller
“Throughout the book there is a kindred aim, with excusable differences as to detail in certain problems. And this aim is idealistic, spiritual, with all possible stress laid upon the factor of betterment.”
MASEFIELD, JOHN.Locked chest; and The sweeps of ninety-eight.*$1.25 Macmillan 822 16-21746
Two of John Masefield’s early plays, written in 1905 and 1906. They were brought out in a limited edition in 1916 and are now issued as one of the volumes of the regular edition of Mr Masefield’s works. “The locked chest” is based on one of the Norse tales in the Laxdaelasaga. “The sweeps of ninety-eight” is a play of the Irish rebellion of 1798.
“Written with a considerable amount of humor, and though little likely to add to Mr Masefield’s fame, the plays are thoroughly readable and capable of presentation.”
“Both are one-act plays, vivid, dramatic, and with sharply drawn characters. ... ‘The sweeps of ninety-eight’ is of another Irish insurrection, and has Irish humor in its grim comedy. But ‘The locked chest’ is tense with emotion and tragedy, its simple action revealing long years of life, and supprest, unrecognized passions. Such a play stands forth like a Rodin figure, stripped of all unessentials.”
“Mr Masefield’s reputation as dramatist will not be enhanced by these two one-act plays.”
“If ‘The sweeps of ninety-eight’ was signed Douglas Hyde it would be thought that this distinguished poet and Gaelic scholar had gained a new intensity of feeling and sense of dramatic construction. Surely Dr Hyde never wrote anything more Irish than this play of Mr Masefield’s.”
“The little plays are pleasant reading. Incidentally they should appeal to amateurs in search of short, lively, actable pieces.”
MASEFIELD, JOHN.Lollingdon Downs, and other poems.*$1.25 Macmillan 821 17-10980
“Mr Masefield’s new volume contains more than fifty sonnets, forming a long cycle, but broken by a few interludes, descriptive, allegorical, dramatic, narrative, or lyrical.” (Spec) “The volume also contains a long narrative poem, ‘The blacksmith,’ a strange piece of fantastic imagining, a brief little war play, ‘The frontier,’ and several other immaterial verses not without pictorial appeal.” (N Y Times)
“This volume has a singular and intriguing unity, a unity broken up by interludes and by a succession of changes in the angle of approach, and in time and place. ... It is panoramic, rich in perspective—passing all the way from lyric and reflective sonnets to terse poetic dialogues and narrative lyric almost ugly in its bareness. It would be idle to pretend that Mr Masefield is a philosopher. He is not intellectual except in the sense that he is tortured by an intellectual issue; he is neither subtle nor profound. But he feels this issue intensely, and even more than usual he strikes music and beauty from it.” Conrad Aiken
“In ‘Lollingdon downs’ we ask for food, and he shares with us—his hunger. A powerful dramatic sketch of a tremulous and tingling imperial ‘Frontier’ is the best performance in this brief and rather baffling work.” O. W. Firkins
“By this very reason of the depth of the author’s thinking, there is a possibility that the verses in ‘Lollingdon Downs’ may not have the wide reach of his other volumes. Mr Masefield’s work now is all intellect purged of the more human and earthly appeal; it addresses itself primarily to those who appreciate the metaphysical in its superabundant and alluring aspects.”
“His present volume is at once a withdrawal and an advance. ... There is no single piece here so good as his lines on his mother printed in the ‘Oxford book of English mystical verse.’ But he has largely laid aside those scenes of violence couched in defiantly bad language which seemed to be his favourite matter a while since.”
“The subject-matter of the sonnets reminds us alternately of Lucretius and FitzGerald’s paraphrase of Omar Khayyám—though the treatment lacks the composure of the one or the serenity of the other—and we cannot resist the conclusion that the difficulties of the task have been increased by the form adopted.”
MASEFIELD, JOHN.Lost endeavour.*$1.50 (2c) Macmillan A17-398
An adventure story of the seventeenth century. Charles Harding, a school boy walking home from Deptford with one of the masters, a Spaniard known as “Little Theo,” is waylaid and kidnapped and put aboard a vessel bound for Virginia where he is to be sold into slavery. His companion meets a like fate but for a time their ways are separate. One goes to a life of hardship in Virginia, one to romantic and desperate adventure in the West Indies. When the two meet again they unite in an effort to establish a kingdom on one of the islands. This is the “lost endeavour” of the title, but it is no less a thrilling adventure for all that. The English edition of this book was published by Nelson in 1910.
“The reader who could not warm to ‘Captain Margaret’ or to Masefield’s other experiments (too clearly experiments) in prose romance may find something more spontaneous and genuine here.” H. W. Boynton
“John Masefield’s ‘Lost endeavour’ as a swashbuckling yarn is too poetic, too literary, for adolescents, and too lacking in all considerationthat such a fact as woman’s existence might sometime conceivably enter into even the minds of pirates, for adults. Also, its Indians are too grotesque and its plot too plotless. But certain remarkable bits of characterization and certain flashes of pure poetry make it all as surely Masefield as any page of Kipling is surely Kipling.”
“Whatever advantage it may seek from costume and atmosphere is a minor affair; the narrative is well capable of standing on its own feet. ... The tale lacks the sort of ending to satisfy a boy’s heart—the Treasure Island ending; but whatever it loses thereby as a boy’s book it gains as a man’s book. It is very much that.”
“To have endued, as Mr Masefield has done, the threadbare romance of Aztec ruins and Indian magic with true romantic bigness and persuasiveness is a considerable triumph of the imagination. The chief quality of the thing—apart from its poetic realism as a sea story—is its extraordinary blending of the dreamlike with the actual. ... If this tale fails wholly to satisfy, its failure will not be due to any lack of power or artistry on Mr Masefield’s part, but to the reader’s feeling that a fictional power that is perhaps capable of producing results like those which Joseph Conrad achieves has been spent upon a rather flimsy theme.”
“Masefield’s description of the old ship navigated by the pirates has the same vivid lyrical quality as his amazing description of a vessel in ‘Captain Margaret.’”
MASEFIELD, JOHN.[2]Old front line.il*$1 (4c) Macmillan 940.91 17-27866
A description of “the old front line as it was when the battle of the Somme began.” It is written for days when the marks of the battlefield are gone, when “Centre Way, Peel Trench, Munster Alley, and these other paths to glory will be deep under the corn, and gleaners will sing at Dead Mule Corner.” The town of Albert is taken as the central point of reckoning distances. From Albert four roads lead to the battlefield of the Somme—one to Auchonvillers and Hébuterne, one to Authuille and Hamel, another to Pozières and a fourth to Fricourt and Maricourt. Mr Masefield locates the defenses of both the enemy and the Allies, going into details of boundaries, topography, places of greatest weakness and strength. To relieve the account of possible monotony there are poetic allusions to natural loveliness and dramatic references to the terror of the happenings along the Somme.
“A vivid piece of descriptive writing. It has the charm of a veteran’s reminiscence wherein the setting is hallowed by the action.”
“We could wish that Mr Masefield would visit the other scenes of momentous conflicts, and furnish the topographical data indispensable to a proper understanding of the military events.”
“Nothing less than the endowment of poetic sensibility and the gift of a flexible style would have sufficed to make his narrative other than monotonous. But its interest is keen and continuous.”
“More than any other writer, Mr Masefield has given us the feeling of the curious blind world of the trench fighter.”
“With its well-chosen photographs and trench map, this admirable little book will be of permanent value.”
“His book, it need hardly be said, is not an ordinary guide. Its design is to be useful, and there are, indeed, signs of the task: a certain forced quietness and contraction of the style, broken by outbreaks and pulsations of language as a duty is passed: business first, and then Dalilah. We could not miss these excursions, for Dalilah is beautiful though a temptress; but sometimes we remember that she was not true.”
MASEFIELD, JOHN.Poems.*$1.60 Macmillan 821 A17-1381
The eighteen poems in this collection, which is published with the consent of Mr Masefield, were selected by Henry Seidel Canby, Frederick Erastus Pierce, and Willard Higley Durham, of the English department of the Sheffield scientific school, Yale university. The copyrights run from 1911 to 1916. Contents: A consecration; The everlasting mercy; Dauber; Biography; Cargoes; Sea fever; Spanish waters; An old song re-sung; The west wind; On Malvern hill; Fragments; Tewkesbury road; Sonnets; August, 1914.
“‘Dauber,’ ‘Biography,’ ‘Cargoes,’ ‘Fragments,’ ‘Tewkesbury road,’ ‘Spanish waters,’ ‘Sea fever,’ ‘The west wind’ and ‘An old song re-sung’ appeared in ‘Story of a round house’ (Booklist 9:330 Ap ‘13), ‘Consecration’ and ‘On Malvern hill’ appeared in ‘Salt water ballads’ (Booklist 10:314 Ap ‘14), ‘The everlasting mercy’ was published separately in 1912 by Macmillan at $1.25. All but one of the sonnets appeared in ‘Good Friday’ (Booklist 12:373 My ‘16).”
“From the wild, lawless, vulgar, often carelessly written narrative telling of the fight between Billy Myers and Saul Kane, to the last poem in the book, the elegiac stanzas of which, hinting at the changes brought about by the great war, are cast in the quiet dignity and mellifluous flow of Gray’s ‘Elegy,’ there is an immense advance in technique.”
“The ease of the procreation of books in our shifty era is illustrated in the selection from Mr Masefield’s poems. Apart from this useful glossary [a glossary of sea-terms], a clever student in an industrious afternoon, if he knew Masefield, could virtually have compiled this volume which has absorbed the convergent energies of three Ph.D.’s.” O. W. Firkins
MASON, ALFRED EDWARD WOODLEY.Four corners of the world.*$1.50 (2c) Scribner 17-25588
This is a collection of twelve stories and one play, which have been copyrighted from 1909 to 1917. The play, “Under Bignor hill,” deals with the Roman occupation of England. Two stories, “One of them” and “Peiffer,” deal with the European war. Most of the others deal with murder, ghosts or suicide. “The crystal trench” tells how Mark Frobisher’s body was lost in a crevasse and how his wife saw the glacier yield it up after twenty-four years.
“They are very enjoyable, these stories; and if writers like Conrad, Thomas Burke, and H. G. Dwight had not projected into the short story a quality that gives it vitality and endurance, we should perhaps be fully content with the temporary satisfaction to be got from ‘The four corners.’ According to the standard created by these writers, Mr Mason’s work is flat. According to the standard of the average, it is most excellently good.”
“England has no more ingenious or versatile tale-maker than the author of ‘The four corners of the world.’ We do not imply that Mr Mason’s work is feebly imitative, but it is derivative and representative and, rarely, individual, rather than ever really original. There are no dull or ill-written stories in this volume, and they should satisfy that very large constituency which responds to the short story as a clever contrivance.”
“All the stories are interesting and well written, even though no one of them is particularly remarkable.”
“Among the grim stories ‘North of the tropic of Capricorn’ is very successful; the tragedy is vivid because not too much is said. ... Among the longer stories ‘Green paint’ is a successful venture into the realms of an undefined South American republic, governed by the unscrupulous and plausible strong man.”
MASON, CHARLES FIELD.Complete handbook for the sanitary troops of the U.S. army and navy, and national guard and naval militia. 4th ed rev il*$4 Wood 355 17-5986
“The fourth edition is stated to have been carefully revised and brought up-to-date, with considerable new material relating to nursing and pharmacy. Describes the organization of the sanitary troops in post and field, briefly outlines human anatomy and physiology, gives instruction in first aid and nursing, mess management and cooking,materia medica, pharmacy, post and camp sanitation, riding, packing and driving, minor surgery, and clerical work. Part 9, dealing with the army regulations and the Manual of the medical department, has been completely rewritten to agree with the latest editions of these documents.” (N Y P L New Tech Bks) The work was first published in 1906 under the title “A complete handbook for the hospital corps.”
MASON, WILLIAM PITT.Water supply (considered principally from a sanitary standpoint). 4th ed rewritten il*$3.75 Wiley 628.1 16-24713
“For the present edition a large amount of the text has been entirely rewritten and suitable amount of new material added. The tables have been brought up to date and new photographs introduced. ... The chapter on Drinking water and disease has been strengthened by the addition of many pages devoted to typhoid fever. ... Newly developed methods of water purification, particularly processes aiming at disinfection, come in for consideration, as do certain newly found factors influencing natural purification in streams and stored waters. The use of chlorine ozone, ultra-violet light and copper sulphate receive attention. There is considerable discussion of various phases of the pollution of drinking water supplies and the care of watersheds.”—Science
“Although this can not be called an exhaustive treatment of the subject it is one of the most interesting and suggestive treatises on water supplies published since the old book of the same title by Professor William Ripley Nichols, of the Massachusetts Institute of technology.” G: C. Whipple
MASSEY, EDWARD.Plots and playwrights.*$1 Little 812 17-23583
This comedy was originally produced at the “47 workshop,” Harvard university, under the direction of Prof. George P. Baker. It was afterwards produced by the Washington Square players, at the Comedy theatre, New York city, in 1917. In the prologue, Caspar Gay, the “dollar dramatist,” looking for an inspiration for his new play, meets Joseph Hastings, writer of short stories, who undertakes to show him drama on every floor of an Eleventh street lodging house. The three scenes in part 1 give these three dramatic episodes. In part 2, Gay and Hastings meet again. Gay tells Hastings that he has only found material for drama, but that it is material which can be turned into “a big Broadway success.” Then follows a “burlesque of a crook play, in which the characters of the three episodes take the parts.”
MATHEWS, BASIL JOSEPH.Paul the dauntless, the course of a great adventure. il*$2 Revell 220.9 17-58
“This admirable story of the life of St Paul has for its basis an accurate presentation of all it is possible to know about the life of the great apostle. ... Taking as the skeleton of his story the scanty facts known of Paul’s life and journeyings, Mr Mathews himself followed in the footsteps of all his wanderings, studying the scenes, the people, the life, not only as they are at present but as history describes them to have been in the early years of the Christian era.”—N Y Times
“Written in a spirited style and abounds in picturesque descriptions of scenery and thrilling adventure. A large number of illustrations in color as well as in black and white from drawings and photographs add interest to a very delightful and stimulating book.”
“At once historically accurate and absorbingly interesting.”
“Well worth reading. The author has covered much of the ground traversed by St Paul in his wonderful journeys, and has profited by the researches of Sir W. Ramsay and Principal George Adam Smith and other scholars, so that though his narrative is cast in a popular form with a good many imaginary conversations, it is solidly based on facts.”
MATHEWS, MRS GERTRUDE (SINGLETON).Treasure. il*$2 (4c) Holt 918 17-9241
A story of gold hunting in Dutch Guiana. The author has set it down as nearly as possible in the words of the man whose adventures she relates. He is a mining engineer who confesses that his first interest is not in metals. It is his love for the primitive and the wild life of the bush that takes him into out-of-the-way places. In the adventures recorded in this book he left Paramaribo to go into the interior in search of a mythical lost mine. His pictures of the tropical forest and stories of his native companions, together with the revelation of the attractive personality of the narrator, make it an unusual book.
“The life of the ‘bush’ is well portrayed by a nature lover and it is a pity that a somewhat unique coinage of words mars the style.”
“It is exceedingly interesting on several counts. It is an out-and-out story of a search for gold. It is full of curious happenings, strange places. Its few characters are delightfully alive. And the personality of the man himself, his love for beautiful things, and his power to make the bush live in his picture of it, are all unusual and vastly worth reading about.”
MATHEWS, JOHN MABRY.Principles of American state administration.*$2.50 (1½c) Appleton 353.9 17-1515
A book based in part on college courses in state administration given at Princeton university and the University of Illinois and in part on researches carried on for the Efficiency and economy commission of Illinois. The author says, “No attempt has been made to describe exhaustively all of the multifarious activities and functions of the American states. ... The aim has been rather to select for description those services and functions which appear most to deserve attention, either because of their intrinsic importance or because of theirsuitability for illustrating the general principles of state administration.” Part 1, the introduction, discusses general principles; part 2 is devoted to The organization of the administration, with discussions of the duties and powers of the governor and other state officers; part 3 takes up The functions of the administration, including taxation, public health administration, etc. A conclusion considers the reorganization of state administration.
“There is no single volume which brings together so much first-hand material concerning the structure and functions of the state executive departments. The facts are well-chosen and effectively presented. The treatment of the office of governor is especially detailed and judicious. The author necessarily treads frequently on controversial ground. His discussion of open questions is always suggestive, though it is not to be expected that the reader will accept all his conclusions.” A. N. Holcombe
“This admirable description of the machinery and activity of state administration is the first separate treatment of the subject which has appeared. It sets a high standard for later works in this field. ... The author’s conclusions as to the modern tendencies in administration are sound and well reasoned. He offers also a goodly number of references for collateral reading and chooses these from works representing different standpoints. The reader is in this way given a broad view of state problems. There is a good concluding chapter on reorganization. ... The book deserves and should find a wide field of usefulness among the colleges and universities.” J. T. Young
“The book is written in clear, non-technical language and should be of use, not only to students of state government, but also to delegates who this year and next will be engaged in drawing up new constitutions.”
“A noteworthy production.”
“The entire work will be found helpful to legislative committees and other bodies interested in making the executive arms of our states more efficient.”
“One of the commendable features of the work is the simple and understandable style which the author uses in setting forth the organization of the executive branches.”
MATHEWS, SHAILER.Spiritual interpretation of history.*$1.50 Harvard univ. press 904 16-25174
“The William Belden Noble lectures in Harvard university for 1916 were delivered by Dean Shailer Mathews of the divinity school of the University of Chicago. His subject was ‘The spiritual interpretation of history.’ ... In the first lecture he considers views which more or less explicitly belittle or deny spiritual forces in history, and endeavors to show that they overlook or underestimate data for which a spiritual interpretation is demanded as a working hypothesis. In the remaining lectures up to the concluding one he attempts to show that a study not only of these data but of the historical process itself discovers a tendency which compels the recognition of spiritual forces, if not a spirit, in social development.”—Springf’d Republican
“The final lecture on the Spiritual opportunity in a period of reconstruction, though practically helpful, is less compelling than could be wished, and betrays the benumbing effect of trying to combine science and religion in one discussion.”
“While the author surveys a large field in a small volume, the treatment is far from truncated. On the contrary, the style is lucid and attractive throughout; and the conclusions are based on an unusually rich and varied mastery of the field of human experience. The author shows fine justice and sanity in dealing with conflicting theories, each of which is given its due place in the synthesis of the whole.” J: E. Boodin
“Professor Mathews’s rational tendency is a hybrid between Tennyson’s purpose which runs through the ages, and Spencer’s impersonal Unknown, Bergsons’s ‘élan vital,’ Hegel’s ‘weltgeist,’ and Lotze’s ‘purpose.’ The layman is merely confused by this metaphysical fog, while the theologian finds it too illusive to damn as heresy. But the man who is seeking an escape from the mechanistic conception of life and wishes to remain loyal to the scientific spirit of the time receives no genuine help from this doctrine.” V. T. Thayer