i8 
LAND & WATER 
Books to Read 
By Lucian Oldershaw 
July 19, 191J 
FROM the somewhat mixed bag of an off season of 
pubhshing. I will pick first of all a noteworthy con- 
tribution from the Na%7. Mjny people have heard 
rumours and a few lucky people have seen copies of 
The Tenedos Times, a periodical by means of which the 
Mediterranean Destroyer Flotilla kept up its spirits and 
incidentally raised funds for certain charities during the 
early days of the war. Here it is reproduced in permanent 
form for all the world to appreciate (G. Allen and Unwin, 
2is.), and is again pubhslied to benefit a charity, this time the 
Officers' Branch of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Associa- 
tion. The extraordinarily good work both in colour and in 
pen and ink, especially tlie latter, by the late Commander J. 
Ji. Waterlow, should alone make the book a treasured pos- 
session. For the rest tlie letterpress contains much good 
topical jesting, and an abundance of verse serious and other- 
wise, including many excellent examples of the limerick, 
that popular stand-by of the ephemeral journal. Here is an 
example which for better appreciation should be accompanied 
by its spirited picture : 
A wonderful bird is the pelican ; 
His mouth mil hold more than his belican ; 
He can stow in his beak 
Enough for a week — 
I can't understand how the helican ! 
Such is the spirited frivolity of the fighting man. Let us 
turn next to the sulemnity of the man who stays at home. 
* * * * 
There is an undoubted nobility of utterance in the poem, 
directly or indirectly inspired by the war, which Mr. Eden 
Phillpotts has brought together in a volume appropriately 
entitled Plain Song_ (W. Heinemann, 3s. 6d. net). With a 
classic simplicity and sureness of style, only halting now and 
then from a certain pedantry in the choice of words, Mr. 
Phillpotts sings of high endeavour and the cause of freedom. 
He deals only. with the big and permanent things, and his 
deep reverberating tones may well be lost for a time among 
the higher pitched notes of the great mass of modern poetry. 
Yet I hope this message will be heard and listened to, for 
it helps to sustain an exalted mood in which nothing base 
and petty enters, and in which alone the lasting triumphs of 
the spirit are won. Here is a characteristic thought expressed 
with characteristic directness of rhetoric : ■ 
And know the work that you are called to do 
Rests in your reach alone, beyond the ken 
Of any othef. Who takes place of you ? 
Not in the compass of a million men 
Your duty lies : it shall be wrought by none 
If at your sovereign will it is not done. 
- • ♦ * * ♦ 
The classical spirit in another mood is also evident in Mr. 
Oswald H. Hardy's volume of verse In Greek Seas (John 
Lane, 3s. 6d. net). Here are the poems of a cultured traveller 
who muses in verse that often rises to considerable heights of 
executive skill. It is pleasant in the stress of the times to 
.follow Mr. Hardy into his quiet bye-ways of thought, and allow 
oneself to be soothed by liis true gift of harmony. I quote 
two verses from " On Shillingford Bridge," with its inevitable 
suggestion of " The Scholar Gipsy " ; 
. . . — too fast the cords that bind the sonl, 
Too dim the path before our downward feet. 
Soon must wc sec the swift approaching goal 
With all our fond endeavours incomplete— 
Too late to learn, when we are past reprieve, 
A world we have not duly ser\-ed, and all untimely leave. 
Yet not in sorrow would we leave the day. 
Not in despair shrink from the allotted bourne, 
There follow who will tread a surer way. 
Noting these little tracks that we have worn. 
So occanward flows on thy constant tide 
And still the quenchless springs of God burst from the 
mountain side. 
***** 
The war from the point of view of the stay-at-home is 
with us again in Your Unprofilahk Servant (W. Westall and 
Co., 3s. 6d. net). This is a picture of the war mood in England 
from the woman's point of view. The author may not have 
the X-ray power of Mr. H. G. Wells when he is seeing it 
through and through, but she has the power of clothing what 
she does see, which is considerable, with its proper com- 
plement of flesh and blood. Her book has a message of solace 
for women who have lost tliose they love in the war — a message 
the value of which a man cannot appraise, but which carries 
the countersigns of sincerity and simplicity. 
How many people, like myself, after reading an excep- 
tionally good article in the Morning Post, over the initials 
" E.B.b.," have formed the intention of cutting it out for 
their scrap-books, and forgotten to do it till tlie paper had 
been used to light a fire ? They can now rejoice with me 
that they did not waste their time fiddling with scissors and 
paste, for in The Maid With Wings (John Lane, 5s. net), they 
will probably find many of the things that they had intended 
to rescue from oblivion. At any rate, in these " fantasies 
grave and gay," they will be able to rejoice in a good selection 
of characteristic, and therefore delightful, work from the 
fertile pen of Mr. E. B. Osborn. They will also have an 
opportunity of appreciating the wide range of his knowledge 
and interests, the clearness and saneness of his style and the 
racy vigour of his prejudices. Let me express the variety of 
the book by describing three of the nineteen sketches that 
make it up. The fantasy which gives its title to the volume 
describes, with a fine sense of the romance of history, the 
apparition of Joan of Arc to a dying soldier. " The King 
of Hoboes," describing an interview with an American tramp, 
is both wonderfully dramatic and psychologically acute. 
It is worthy of a place beside some of the dialogues in 
Lavengro, among the classes of tramp literature. " Simplified 
Spelling " is a little " Battle of the Books," an account of a 
meeting of words presided over by " Damn " to protest against 
■ the proposed reforms of the Simplified Spelling Society. It 
is an earnest of much other good literary fooling in the book. 
***** 
In The Transactions of Lord Louis Lewis (John Murray, 
5s. net), Mr. Roland Pertwee tells with great verve and in- 
genuity a series of tales of the adventures of a wealthy col- 
lector of objects of vertu and art. The villains of the tale 
are two dealers, Cal(bb and Paliser, who three times enter into 
unholy partnership to oust Lord Louis, and three times get 
ousted themselves. It is a thoroughly entertaining book. 
"Britain's Effort" Exhibition 
THE photograph on the opposite page is of a litho- 
graph by Mr. C. R. W. Nevinson, now to be seen at 
the galleries of the Fine Art Society, 148, New 
Bond Street. It is part of an Exhibition entitled 
" Britain's Efforts and Ideals in the Great War, illustrated 
in si.\ty-six Lithographs by eighteen artists." Each artist 
takes a separate activity ; Mr. Nevinson, for instance, 
illustrates " Making Aircraft " in six lithographs. Mr. 
Charles Pears deals with Transport by Sea, Mr. George 
Clausen, with Making Guns, while Mr. Eric Kennington 
and Mr. Frank Brangwin illustrate how soldiers and sailors 
are made. Women have their artists. " Work on the 
Land " is delightfully depicted by Mr. William Rothenstein, 
and " Women's Work," by Mr. A. S. Hartrick. It is an 
extraordinarily interesting exhibition, and does undoubtedly 
bring , home to the observer the wonderful energies and 
activ.'^ies that have been stimulated and released by the war. 
Naturally, the subject is by no means exhausted, but it would 
require, not sixty-six lithographs, but as many as the number 
of the Beast, which is 666, to deal adequately with all the 
work of war. Britain's ideals are explained in a dozen alle- 
gorical pictures by a haU-a-dozen different artists 
THE POSTHUMOUS POEMS OF 
ALGERNON SWINBURNE. 
tdiled by LDMUND GOS5E and T. J. WISE. 
Demy 8vo., 6/- net. Ldition de Luxe, 30, - net (only » (ew'copies now remaining). 
NK>V ^V.VU JIOOKS. 
MY -75. 
By PAUL LlNTItR. 
3 6 net. 
The Diary of a French Artjlieryman. 
THE WAY dF 
THE AIR. 
By EDGAR MIDDLETON. 2/6 net 
A bool: for all who are interested 
in flyinS. 
rqj!5V NOVKt^S. 
THE NURSERY. 
»v EDLX IMIUXPOTTS. 6/- net. 
"An eventful and moviniz story. . . 
It holds the ftileniion anJ enlists the 
sympathy." — Times. 
SECRET BREAD. 
By F. TKXXYSOX JESSE. 6/- net 
MARMADUKE. 
By FI.OnA ANNIK STKKU 5 - net. 
UEINEMANX 
POTTERAT AND 
THE WAR. 
By BENJ.\MtN VALLOTTON. S/.ne 
ZELLA SEES 
HERSELF. 
By E. M. nELAFIELD. 6/-1..I 
(2iid Xnipres.sion.) 
