“A good book is the precious life blood of a master spirit.”

John Milton.

I.Assignments

1. Write a review of a book of travels.
2. Write a review of a biography.
3. Write a review of a novel.

II.Models

I

Fraser, John Foster. The Amazing Argentine. Pp.291, illustrated. New York: Funk & Wagnalls Company. $1.50 net.

This volume should go far to dissipate any idea that there is not much of any consequence south of the Rio Grande besides the Panama Canal. In the story of his journeyings over the length and breadth of this enormous country—twice the size of Mexico—Mr. Fraser paints us a picture of a progressive people, and a country that is rapidly assuming a position as the foremost producer of the world’s meat-supply. Stretching from the Atlantic to the Andes Mountains and from north of the Tropic of Capricorn to the Straits of Magellan, it supports 30,000,000 cattle, over 80,000,000 sheep, and 8,000,000 horses. The railroads, in which the British have invested £300,000,000, are among the best equipped in the world, and carry annually 40,000,000 tons of freight, with approximate receipts of £25,000,000. The export trade is advancing by leaps and bounds, and in 1912 the value of wool exports was £50,000,000, live-stock products £35,000,000, and agricultural produce £53,000,000; while the extent of the frozen-meat business may be gaged from the fact that £11,000,000 is invested in freezing-houses. The book is a distinct help to Americans in showing them a little more of the great country that is opening up to their enterprise.—The Literary Digest, October17, 1914.2

II

Le Sueur Gordon. Cecil Rhodes. 8vo, pp.345. New York: McBride, Nast & Co. $3.50.

Cecil Rhodes must be looked upon as the Clive of South Africa. He found that country a land of wilderness and savagery. He transformed it into a fair and industrious province. He possessed the unscrupulous and relentless spirit of such conquerors as Julius CÆsar, and he was at the same time a financier of the widest resource. But some nefarious or alleged nefarious transactions which stained his name as a business man and a politician deprived him of royal recognition. He was not only denied a title, but even failed to obtain a decoration, and it was not until his death that a magnificent monument was unveiled to his memory in the heart of Rhodesia, a province which he had created and which was named after him.

Cecil John Rhodes (1853–1902) was born, like so many eminent Englishmen, in the house of a clergyman. Into the forty-nine years of his life he compressed a very stirring chapter of British victory. There was something of the buccaneer in his character when he prompted the notorious Jameson Raid and eventually brought the British Government into conflict with the cunning and ambition of Kruger—Oom Paul, as he was styled. For the bitter and bloody Boer War the blame has always been laid upon the shoulders of Rhodes.

Rhodes was an Oxford man and an omnivorous reader. He began by working in the diamond-mines at Kimberley as a common laborer; he ended by becoming manager of the Chartered Company, and amassing a vast fortune.—The Literary Digest, April, 1914.3

III

Sense and Sensibility. A Novel. By Jane Austen. London: Egerton. 1811.

Though inferior to Pride and Prejudice, this work is about as well worth reading as any novel which, previous to its publication, had been written in the English language. Its interest depends, not on its descriptive and narrative power, but on character portrayal and humor.

Though both lovable girls, the two heroines, Elinor and Marianne, are as imperfect and as different as sisters are apt to be in real life. Vulgar match-making Mrs. Jennings, as Austin Dobson calls her, like many a flesh-and-blood dowager, at first repels us by her foolish prattle and finally wins our respect by her kindness. Sir John Middleton, with his horror of being alone; Lady Middleton, with her horror of impropriety; Miss Steele, who can always be made happy by being teased about the Doctor; Lucy Steele, pretty, clever, not over-fastidious in her principles, and abominably weak in her grammar; Robert Ferrars, whose airs are justly punished by his marriage to Lucy; Mrs. Ferrars, who contrives to be uniformly unamiable; Mrs. John Dashwood, fit daughter to such a mother; and Mr. John Dashwood, fit husband to such a wife—together form a gallery of portraits of which any author might be proud.

The book, too, is rich in humor. Among other delightful things we read of a will which, like almost every other will, gave as much disappointment as pleasure; of a child of three who possesses the usual charms of that age, an imperfect articulation, an earnest desire of having his own way, many cunning tricks, and a great deal of noise; of apricot marmalade applied successfully as a remedy for a bruised temple; of a company who met to eat, drink, and laugh together, to play at cards or consequences, or any other game that was sufficiently noisy; of a husband who is always making remarks which his wife considers so droll but cannot remember; of Constantia wine, which is equally good for colicky gout and broken hearts; of a face of strong natural sterling insignificance; of a girl who was pleased that a man had called and still more pleased that she had missed him; of a woman of few words, for, unlike people in general, she proportioned them to the number of her ideas; of a newspaper item that interested nobody except those who knew its contents before; and of a man who was perfectly the gentleman in his behavior to guests and only occasionally rude to his wife and mother-in-law.

It is true that the two heroes are not very heroic, Edward Ferrars being only a curate and Col. Brandon a poor old man of 36 with a flannel waistcoat; but the latter is pretty thoroughly the gentleman and the former gives up a fortune of 30,000pounds in order to marry a girl whom he does not love, thereby furnishing, if not an example of good sense, at least an agreeable contrast to Marianne’s lover, Willoughby, who marries a girl whom he does not love in order to get the money which he is too genteel to earn.

On the whole, it is a wonderful book to have been written by a girl of twenty-one.4

III.Notes, Queries, and Exercises

1. Among the important functions of a newspaper is the task of announcing the appearance of new books, describing their contents, and commenting on their merits. The style of such notices should, above everything else, be clear. Most of them are unfortunately disfigured by a jargon which repels readers instead of inducing them to peruse the books reviewed.
2. What information should the heading of a book notice furnish?
3. ModelI is an excellent example of what a review in a single paragraph should be. The first sentence bridges the intellectual and geographical space between the United States and Argentina, between the reader and the subject, which is just what an introduction should do. The second sentence describes the country in general terms, ending in a clause that leads directly to the most striking single fact about Argentina, its importance as an agricultural country. The three sentences that follow give concrete facts in support of this clause. The final sentence drives home the point stated in the first.
4. Discuss the meaning and etymology of “dissipate,” “Rio Grande,” “annually,” “approximate,” “exports,” “enterprise.”
5. Point out one restrictive and one non-restrictive clause.
6. Describe orally the location and character of the Rio Grande, Mexico, the Panama Canal, the Atlantic, the Andes, the Tropic of Capricorn, the British, and the Straits of Magellan.
7. What figure of speech have we in the phrase, “the Amazing Argentine?”
8. In ModelII we have an illustration of a biographical review in three paragraphs. It presents a vivid picture of Cecil Rhodes in spite of the fact that it is not well organized. Try the experiment of rewriting it according to this plan: Par.I—Introduction, or Bridge; Par.II—Rhodes’s Services to Mankind; Par.III—Rhodes’s Faults; Par.IV—Rhodes’s Private Life.
9. Find in the model an example of alliteration and an example of antithesis.
10. Explain the allusions in “Clive,” “Julius CÆsar,” “buccaneer,” “Jameson Raid,” “Kruger,” “Boer War,” and “Oxford.”
11. Define “financier,” “nefarious,” “politician,” “notorious,” “ambition,” and “omnivorous.” From what language do these words come?
12. Analyze ModelIII as I and II have already been analyzed for you.
13. Find in III an antithesis and an alliteration.
14. Which of the books do you wish most to read? Why?
15. Do these models observe the law of presenting concrete rather than abstract statements?
16. Make a list of the books you have read, putting in one column the books of travel, into another the biographies, and into a third the novels.
17. Choose one of these as the subject of a review which you are to write.

IV.Oral Composition

In preparing for this observe the following points:

1. Remember that your main purpose is to persuade others to read the book.
2. In your first paragraph make a bridge from the minds of your audience to the book.
3. In the body of your review describe concretely the one most interesting feature of the work.
4. In your last paragraph restate the idea of the first but do it in some other form.

V.Written Composition

Concentrate your attention on perfection of sentence structure.

VI.Suggested Time Schedule

VII.Suggested Reading

1. Macaulay’s Frederic the Great, Clive, and Hastings.
2. Mark Twain’s Roughing It.
3. Scott’s Ivanhoe.

VIII.Memorize

GUILIELMUS REX

The folk who lived in Shakespeare’s day
And saw that gentle figure pass
By London Bridge, his frequent way—
They little knew what man he was.

The pointed beard, the courteous mien,
The equal port to high and low,
All this they saw or might have seen—
But not the light behind the brow!

The doublet’s modest gray or brown,
The slender sword-hilt’s plain device,
What sign had these for prince or clown?
Few turned, or none, to scan him twice.

Yet ’twas the king of England’s kings!
The rest with all their pomps and trains
Are mouldered, half-remembered things—
’Tis he alone that lives and reigns!

Thomas Bailey Aldrich.
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