Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

from Paardeburg and the Tugela to Johannesburg and Pretoria? Was it a brigade of women which fought its way from the coast to Pekin to show the ignorant Chinee that a foreigndevil must not be slaughtered without reason? No! Such work requires men-men of brawn and pluck, men of muscle and valour, men who shudder not at the sight of slaughter and carnage. It was the blood of men that was shed in these enterprises, just as it was the blood of men that flowed

On Hastings' unforgotten field eight hundred years ago.

And yet the women of the AngloSaxon race have played their part. Indirectly they, too, have shed their blood, but it is only indirectly. They may rule and guide the world, but only indirectly. Nor is our reverence for them the less because they may fight only by proxy.

The day of peace will return, and when it comes again let the women remember the day of war. The one

who holds the gun is the one who should hold the ballot. The soldier is the voter, the general the statesman. The one who in time of war binds up the wounds or keeps the hearthstone swept until the warrior returns must be content in time of peace to perform the same duties. Tame, self-denying duties they are, demanding a high degree of patience; but self-denial and patience are womanly virtues. She alone may worthily rock the cradle and guide the shaky steps of the future man. In this holy but narrow sphere she must be content to play her part. Here, and here only, may she stand guard against infidelity, licentiousness, and the vices which beset mankind. Here, and here only, can she bring forth the fruit of the Spirit-love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness and temperance and encourage others to produce like fruit.

[blocks in formation]

the State or the Church, perhaps more. The woman who guards, preserves and illuminates the home is performing an equal duty with the soldier whose vigilance as a sentinel guards the regiment's camp from surprise. To perform home duties intelligently and faithfully requires like qualities to those demanded of men who perform political duties. The importance of this sphere is amply proven by the character of the young men and young women who grow up without having felt the guiding and restraining influence of a refined and well-regulated home life. This is the body from which the criminal class draws most of its recruits.

And yet the guardian and sweetener of the home may with benefit to herself and the community enlarge her activities as her circumstances warrant. Her services in schools, hospitals, asylums and church will be beneficent to herself and others if these services are whole-hearted and earnest, and not undertaken for self-glorification. The grace of womanhood may be preserved even by the woman who goes forth to advocate temperance in public, as Frances Willard did, for the saloon is the enemy of the home. A woman may be a humble imitator of Grace Darling, Rosa Bonheur, or any one of the score of women who have achieved fame and remained gracious women. She may not be a Madame Blavatsky, an Annie Eva Fay, or a loud-mouthed advocate of woman suffrage, and retain the respect and admiration of men and women. She may not be a female "bounder."

While everbody is willing to recog nize that the boy is father to the man, it must not be forgotten that the daughter is mother to both the man and the woman. The physical development, the home-training and the school education of girls is a great factor in the development of the race. This fact is too often overlooked. A refined and educated mother usually means refined and cultured sons; an

ignorant and boorish mother will generally have ignorant sons. A refined and educated mother means refined and educated daughters, who in their turn become mothers of the proper stamp.

Let females, therefore, be educated. It will enable them to perform their duties with greater pleasure and higher success, and it will have an enormous influence on the progress of the race. The girl should have the same opportunity as the boy in public school; when she leaves that she should attend the girls' college or the university, and be encouraged to develop her mental qualities as far as she may. The education of a girl should be different from that of a boy, but it should be just as thorough. Those who plough must inevitably be masters of those who can only ask for food, but that is no reason why these weaker persons should lack in education, physical culture and mental development.

The legal profession is at the head of the political game in the United States. President McKinley is a lawyer, and so are Bryan, Roosevelt and Stevenson, the other presidential and vicepresidential candidates. Lawyers seem to make excellent political leaders, though the reason for this and the justice of it are not as clear as a philosopher might wish to have them.

In Canada the same rule obtains. Sir John Macdonald was a lawyer, the Hon. Edward Blake and Sir Wilfrid Laurier are lawyers. Sir Oliver Mowat and many other provincial leaders are lawyers. The legal profession surpasses all others in the number of its representatives who have seats in our Parliament. Filling the minor offices in the Governmental service and in the political machine are many more lawyers. Politics and law seem to be harnessed together in this country.

Whether there is any fault to be found with our democracy because it forces lawyers to the head of our political systems is an open question. It certainly is just as well for the political

[merged small][ocr errors]

Many times during the past few years we have seen Canadian lawyer M.P.'s doing all sorts of hack work for the political party to which they gave allegiance, and we have later seen the reward appear in the nature of a judgeship.

Now if the lawyer could become a judge without the intervention of the politician stage it would be much better. Why should a lawyer M. P. be compelled to stifle his judgment, be compelled to abase himself before the god of politics as a preparation for the filling of the highest office which a man may fill the office of judging between man and man and between the State and the citizen? Is it not, to say the least, a peculiar system? And is a man not justified in declaring that such a system is degrading to both the legal and the judicial professions?

Just when Parliamentary candidates are being chosen in all the Canadian constituences, it may be opportune to recall Sir William Meredith's recent statement to the graduates of the University of Toronto, who if Canadian politics was a dirty stream it was because the men that ought to keep it pure permit it to be so. The choosing of candidates should not be left in the hands of wire-pullers and party hacks. Every university graduate and every man of means and education should make himself felt in this work, so that honest and honourable men may be chosen to compete for our highest Parliamentary honours.

John A. Cooper.

[graphic][ocr errors][ocr errors][subsumed][subsumed]

CONC

CURRENT FICTION.

ONCERNING the mysteries of society" in the United States it behoves one to speak with reserve. We foreigners are bound to believe that the Republic is what it claims to be, a democracy, free from the baleful influences of an aristocracy of birth and a hereditary monarchy. If we are to judge from the reflections of Judge Grant's heroine *, society in New York is afflicted by some of the evils which belong to older civilizations. Selma White is persuaded that she is soulful and patriotic, that she possesses the requisite qualities to shine in any circle, and that, in consequence, it should not be possible, in a democratic community, for any doors to be closed against her. But through certain doors she finds herself unable to pass, and (one regrets to find) to the very last page of the book they remain apparently as firmly shut as ever.

We may

suppose that Selma is a type: handsome, well-mannered, ambitious and hard. That she is also inordinately conceited and unprincipled may be merely the prejudice of a foreigner. She divorces her first husband (for good cause) and in a month marries a New York architect, a man of some refinement and distinction, but without social ambitions. In declining to be a toady and to grow rich by gambling he loses his wife's affection and dies broken-hearted. Selma now concludes that social success can best be secured by political advancement. She marries a member of Congress who becomes the Governor of his State. By breaking (at her urgent request) his word of honour he is chosen Senator. The curtain now drops. We must assume

*Unleavened Bread. By Robert Grant. Toronto: The Copp, Clark Co.

that the book betrays insight into both social and political conditions in the States. There is a suggestion of satire in the constant repetition of sounding phrases about liberty, and the public good, and the equality of men which may perhaps be the proper equipment of a democrat, but which sound marvellously like the declamations of the demagogue. The satire-if a United States writer can be satirical about his own country and retain a whole skinimparts a relish to the dialogue at once amusing and instructive. The novel well deserves its success.

"Hilda Wade"

is the last novel Grant Allen wrote. It belongs to a class of fiction which has become very popular of late pure romance with an intensely modern environment. Hilda is a sheer impossibility. So is Sebastian, the famous physiologist, in whose hospital, Hilda becomes a nurse in order to clear her father's memory from the accusation of murder. There is something pathetic in a man like Grant Allen toiling at fiction (which he wrote indifferently well) in order to make a living, while the pursuit of science was his soul's delight. In these pages he propounds some fine scientific problems for purposes of fiction. He creates materials which are used with masterly skill. even the average ignorant reader is not deceived. We feel that Sebastian's wonderful anæsthetics, and his ability to murder under the guise of medical treatment is not science, but only a cheap hocus-pocus worthy of the trashiest shilling shocker." Hilda finally gains her end, and Sebastian confesses

[ocr errors]

But

* Hilda Wade. By Grant Allen. Toronto: The Copp, Clark Co.

on his deathbed that her father was an innocent man, ruined by his friend who, for the sake of scientific research, administered too powerful a drug to a dying patient. Her ambition accomplished, Hilda subsides, with meek submission, into the arms of a commonplace young sawbones. Those who read for the " story," will be perfectly satisfied; those who dimly feel that fiction, like the drama, can be made to serve a powerful purpose in revelation of character, in delineation of the strongest passions of the human heart, will conclude that the modern novel is, after all, often a very slight performance.

A large fortune places mighty forces in a man's hand. Christopher Lambert,* suddenly finding himself rich beyond the dreams of avarice, conceives the idea of dabbling in statecraft, the scene of operations being three small European states on the border between Austria and Prussia. His aim is to unite them into a compact territory under one rule. To do this he arranges for the marriage of the Princess Xenia and Prince Karl, rulers of two of the petty kingdoms. The third is to be conquered, and Lambert finances the whole scheme. The chief danger is the power of Prussia, which wants to absorb the states. One of Lambert's pawns in the game is a German governess, for whom he secures a post about the Princess. This woman, through jealousy, betrays the plot to the Prussian agent. Lambert's house of cards tumbles to the ground and he narrowly escapes death at the hands of a revolutionary society, which, pledged to a republic, he had attempted to use as an instrument for the creation of a monarchy. The Princess Xenia's throne disappears in the storm, and we may, without severe labour of mind, imagine her fate. The reader is amused and interested throughout. Mr. Watson is no tyro as a maker of modern romances, and in "The Princess Xenia" his talents are displayed to the best advantage.

*The Princess Xenia. By H. B. Marriott Watson. Toronto: The Copp, Clark Co.

THE COPYRIGHT LAW.

A new condition of things, as far as Canadian books are concerned, is set up by the new Copyright Act which was passed at. the late session of the Canadian Parliament. That Act, having been assented to by the GovernorGeneral, is now in force and not, as some persons seem to suppose, in a state of suspended animation, awaiting the pleasure of the Imperial authorities. Under our constitution it is subject to Imperial disallowance during two years, but meanwhile it is part of the law of the land. This Act is a simple affair, and deals with a single aspect of the whole question. Mr. George Morang and the publishers and literary men associated in the movement are to be congratulated upon the result of their labours, for they have taken the first practical step toward making Canadian authorship a remunerative occupation by making the business of publishing itself more remunerative. The Act provides that when a Canadian publisher purchases from the owner of an English book the right to issue a Canadian edition, other editions are excluded from this country. Hitherto the Canadian publisher was unable to secure his own market (even when he had paid for it), and thus was deprived of the profits on the most popular, and consequently the bestselling, English books. Even when the English publisher endeavoured in good faith to prevent the sale of cheap colonial editions here, the transaction could be effected through a middleman, and the Canadian publisher forced to meet a competition from which, by the terms of his bargain, he was to be protected. Prosperous publishing houses have done, and can do, much for literature. The new Act affects in no way the publishing of Canadian books issued first in this country. It does not directly, protect, encourage or bonus the Canadian author. But it provides for the Canadian publisher a surer means of profit, and puts him in a stronger position as an encourager of native writers who cannot (usually) bear the expense of publishing, and

[blocks in formation]

But

Surely there is a limit to the benefits derivable from cheap books. Free libraries now dot the land. No poor boy can truthfully say that the best literature is beyond his reach. The classics are to be had in popular editions at moderate prices. Both these devices for bringing good books to the masses of the people are praiseworthy, and to be encouraged. a book may be cheap without being too cheap as a specimen of bookmaking. There is a tendency to issue editions which, from every point of view, are to be deplored. A Toronto newspaper lately contained an enticing advertisement of "two cloth bound books for 25c.," and such offers tempt persons to buy without consideration a class of books-as books-which noselfrespecting shelf should be asked to hold up. There is, one fears, a steady deterioration of taste in this matter. No student, however humble his accomplishments, no true lover of learning, however lean his purse may be, wishes to accumulate a load of trashily and often flashily-bound books. They have no durable qualities in the binding. The paper is thick, heavy and easily destroyed. The type is broken and defaced. Usually they are monstrosities, and are sold on the counters from which you may also purchase sugar and flannel and tacks. They are a delusion, and a library containing them is no credit to its owner. Like a hideous daub, passing itself off as a picture, their influence is to vitiate, not elevate, the taste. Against such, the young should be warned. They often appear, when not carefully examined, to be bound with some regard to the rules of art. A discriminating eye soon distinguishes

their tawdry finery. To bind the works of a great author in seemingly attractive covers while the paper and the type are worthless, is an insult to his genius, for they are not "books" at all, they are cheap imitations of the real thing and should be shunned as refinement shuns vulgarity, as scholarship avoids the sciolist and the fraud.

THE CANADIAN CONTINGENT. It is announced that Mr. Sanford Evans is at work upon a book embodying the whole story of the Canadian contingent of troops sent to South Africa on Imperial service. The sending of troops to join in the war marked a new and bold policy on the part of Canada, and we may be sure that, as the years go on, it will stand out in the history of the Dominion as an event of far-reaching importance. It is fitting that the episode should be dealt with in all its phases, political as well as military, and in the hands of Mr. Sanford Evans it is sure to receive the careful thought and to display the excellence of workmanship which the subject demands. The book will review the events leading up to the decision to send a contingent, and will record, in narrative form, the achievements of the three corps in the field. Needless to say, its appearance will be awaited with interest, and it should form an acceptable record of a highly significant national event.

The latest books of the month include: "Robert Orange," by John Oliver Hobbes, Toronto: The W. J. Gage Co.; "The Girl at the Half-Way House," by E. Hough, Toronto: The W. J. Gage Co.; "As Seen By Me," by Lilian Bell, Toronto: G. N. Morrang & Co.; "Soldiering in Canada," by Lt.-Col. George T. Denison, Toronto G. N. Morang & Co.; "Sport In War," by Lt.-Gen. R. S. S. BadenPowell, Toronto: G. N. Morang & Co. Of course, Col. Denison's book will appeal especially to Canadians. It will be reviewed at some length next

« ÎnapoiContinuă »