Review of Reviews, 1/11/06. 



Notable Books of the Month, 



5^3 



have been erected on the physical plane for the pro- 

 tection of the sanctity of the home. 



II.— THE DISENCHANTED.* 



It is perhaps unjust to include Pierre Loti's latest 

 charming work as one in a trilogy of novels assert- 

 ing the Dethronement of Love. But in a sense it is 

 true. The disenchanted Turkish ladies of whom he 

 writes are in revolt against the conventioaally ac- 

 cepted conception of what Love is, and should be, 

 for a Moslem woman. They would dethrone the 

 established throne of Love, based upon social con- 

 venience or the will of man, in order to erect upon 

 its ruins the throne of true Love, of which the es- 

 sence is the free consent of both parties to a perfect 

 union. In this the fair daughters of the Infidel who 

 have apostatised from the faith of their fathers are 

 more faithful subjects of the great King Eros than 

 either the scientists of the " Guarded Flame " or the 

 Saints of Fogazzaro's romance. But nevertheless to 

 the male Mohammedan, Pierre Loti's Disenchanted 

 are all rebels against Love as he understands it. 



Andre Lhery, a well-known novelist, was languidly ex- 

 amining his letters one pale spring morning, on the shores 

 of the Bay of Biscay, in the cottage where his latest fancy 

 had kept him almost a fixture since the preceding winter. 

 A great ma.ny letters this morning." he sighed. " too 

 many." 



Women's letters, for the most part, signed and 

 unsigned, each correspondent as a rule thinking 

 herself the onlv woman in the world daring enough 

 to write to a strange man, whom, moreover, she 

 alone could understand as he had never been under- 

 stood before. This morning's post had brought a 

 letter bearing the Turkish postmark, clearly stamped 

 with a name which never failed to stir the novelist's 

 soul — Stamboul ! 



And. as already so often in dreams, the profile of a town 

 rose before his eyes — eyes which had seen the whole world. 

 in all its infinite diversity — a town of minarets and domes, 

 majestic and unique, matchless still in its irretrievable 

 ruinousness. outlined sharnlv against the sky. with the 

 blue circle of the Sea of Marmora beyond, stretching to 

 the horizon. 



Stamboul, age-old Stamboul, such as the old 

 Khalifs saw it. such still as Soliman the Magnificent 

 conceived it — Stamboul at midday, at midnight, at 

 eventide, and at break of day; in winter and in 

 summer, in sunshine and in storm — every aspect of 

 the town will be indelibly impressed on the mind of 

 whoever reads this book. Andre Lherv had had 

 correspondents before in Turkish harems — what had 

 he not had ? But this one's language was too 

 modern, her French too pure. It was useless for 

 her to quote the Koran, and ask for a reply posie- 

 restante. with infinite precautions. She was a bird 

 of passage at Constantinople, or perhaps the wife of 

 an attache — but no Turkish woman. Yet it was as 

 if Turkey called to the man who had once loved it 

 so deeply. 



•"I/efl D^senchant^es. Eoman des Harems Turcs Oon- 

 temporains." par Pierre Loti. Paris: Oalmann-L^yy. Lon- 

 don: \ Sipgle. 3f. 50c. 



Let the reader substitute for Andre Lhery the 

 name of the author of this enchanting story of the 

 Disenchanted ; he is not forbidden to do so. But 

 he is forbidden — at least he is told that it is waste 

 of his time — to try- to give real names to the Disen- 

 chanted, the three little black-robed phantoms of 

 the harem round whose tragic lives this story of 

 Turkish womanhood of to-day is woven. They are 

 ■ entirely imaginary " ; one could wish Pierre Loti 

 had not told us. 



A TURKISH GIRL OF TO-DAY. 



The April sunshine — the April of 1901 — shone 

 into the room of a young girl asleep. The room 

 was very modern, with all the latest refinements of 

 a decadent age ; on the sheets and pillows perhaps 

 too much lace, on the girl's fingers perhaps too 

 many costly rings ; the girl herself, with her exqui- 

 site oval face and almost too finely cut features, 

 hardly real, scarcely life-Hke in her waxen beauty. 

 Her room might have been that of any pampered 

 little Parisienne, except for an inscription in Turkish 

 o\'er her bed. Baudelaire, Verlaine, Kant, Nietzsche 

 and Gyp's latest novel lay about. And in an open 

 case a brilliant marriage diadem, and trailing on 

 the chairs a bridal dress of white silk and orange 

 blossom. 



To Djenane, this young girl, is brought, by the 

 connivance of her French governess, a letter from 

 ^\ndre Lhery. This letter she goes (veiled and 

 accompanied, of course) to show to her two cousins. 

 Another pacha's house, guarded by a tall eunuch ; 

 another modern room, with fresh Parisian toilettes 

 hing about, for the morrow is Djenane's wedding- 

 dav, and her cousins are to be her bridesmaids. She 

 is twenty-two, almost an old maid. It is French that 

 is spoken here, or German, or Italian, or English, 

 for these little modem Turkish girls read Dante, or 

 Bvron, or Shakespeare in the original. A letter 

 from Andre Lherv, one whose novels thev had often 

 read, is an event in their eventless lives. They loved 

 him because he spoke with affection of Turkey, with 

 respect of Islam. 



OLD AND NEW TUBKET. 



The contrast between the young Turkey of to-day 



and the old Turkey of vesterdav is soon sharply 



felt: — 



A mamma appeared, the two sisters' mother, and quickly 

 the conversation was changed, the letter spirited away. 

 Not that she was very strict, this ^aim-faced mamma, bat 

 still she would have scolded them, and above all she 

 could not have understood. She belonged to another 

 generation, speaking little French, and liaving read only 

 Alexandre Dumas the Elder. Between her and her daugh- 

 ters there was an abyss of two centuries at least, so 

 quickly do things move in Turkey to-day. She was not 

 even outwardly like them, for her fine eyes had an almost 

 childlike expression of peace quite absent from those of Andr6 

 Lhery's admirers. In this world she liad never been, never 

 even wished to be. more than a tender mother and a 

 blameless wife. 



She still could not wear European dress grace- 

 fully ; and the old grandmother still clung to her 

 silver embroideries and Circassian veils. And what 

 did either of them care for Andre Lherv? 



