utterances of the "Others" are occasionally quoted by way of contrast.

Had the author confined his discussion to abstract questions and political issues, and adopted a more conservative method of criticizing individuals, his book would have been equally as instructive and perhaps more dignified.

E. J. H.

FARNHAM'S "LIFE OF FRANCIS

66

PARKMAN"

MR. R. CHARLES HAIGHT FARNHAM is to be congratulated on his Life of Francis Parkman. Those who recall the very brief obituary notices. of the author of "The Oregon Trail" and of France and England in the New World" that appeared seven years ago, will remember that Mr. Parkman was a confirmed invalid and almost a recluse, concerning whom the dates of his birth, his books and his death were almost the only information obtainable. These persons may be inclined to regard Mr. Farnham's sturdy volume as a monument of padding. They will be mistaken, however; the book is no longer than it deserves to be, and is an interesting memorial to one of the great historians of the time.

Mr. Farnham departs widely from the usual form of biographies. Let him explain his plan: "As in the case of many other scholars, Parkman's external life. was unimportant compared with the more interior interests of his education, his method of work, his historical productions and the growth of his character. It seemed advisable, therefore, to depart from the tradition that accepts chronological narrative as the backbone of biography. I have tried to simplify the reader's labor

A LIFE OF FRANCIS PARKMAN. By Charles Haight Farnham. Little, Brown & Co., 8vo, $2.50.

and gain vividness of portraiture by confining chronology chiefly to one chapter, thenceforth viewing facts and experiences as bearing mainly on achievement and development. . . . The book thus divides itself into three parts: (1) Parkman's preparation; (2) the reflection of his personality in his works, and (3) the story of his moral growth." An introductory chapter deals with the Parkman ancestry, "the raw materials of the human entity, Francis Parkman-the marble that his gifts, ambition and experience were to carve into the historian, the citizen, the friend, the father."

The chronological chapter recounts briefly Mr. Parkman's life, the dates of his books, his honors, his death. In the chapters devoted to the preparation of the historian's works, Mr. Farnham has had the use of the brief biographies prepared by Parkman's friends for publication in the" proceedings" of various societies, and in some magazines; of Parkman's diaries, of his few letters, and especially of two long autobiographical letters to friends, one of which, though Mr. Farnham does not say so, seemingly covered nearly four hundred pages. In Chapter VI, in this part, Mr. Farnham touches on Parkman's mysterious illness, which disabled him from work for more than ten years at one period, and made him an invalid for more than forty years of his life. It seems to have dated from his trip west, the account of which is to be found in "The Oregon Trail;" and to have been due to his getting tired of nursing himself when slightly unwell, pushing on his way without regard to his physical disabilities. Thereafter he suffered from inflammation and weakness of the eyes, rheumatic gout, insomnia, and paralysis of certain arteries of the brain. Despite these afflictions, he produced his histories, although he never saw a perfectly well day during his entire literary career. He himself wrote: "For two

periods, each of several years, any attempt at bookish occupation would have been merely suicidal. A condition of sight arising from kindred sources has also retarded the work, since it has never permitted reading or writing continuously for much more than five minutes, and often has not permitted them at all."

In his second part, Mr. Farnham describes how Parkman made his histories, and endeavors, successfully, to show the man back of the books. Parkman's limitations, which seem almost to have been his strong points, are revealed-his indifference to many studies which seem almost necessary qualifications for an historianhis interest in life, manners and actions, rather than in the philosophy of history. How well Mr. Farnham appreciates his subject is shown by this extract:

"Parkman's highest wisdom lay in his perception of the dangers lurking in the pursuit of technique. He knew how readily the mind becomes enamored of the hand; how rarely the artist possesses breadth and strength enough to resist the fascination, so that only the very greatest escape blindness to the fundamental human interests of art; he saw that the most painful aberrations of judgment, the worst of mistakes in subject and treatment as related to vital interests, are to be found in works of great technical excellence. Thus he feared the atmosphere of the study. warned students against emasculate scholarship,' and desired to keep himself broad and sane by all possible contact with the world."

6

To the study of Parkman's spiritual growth, Mr. Farnham devotes the final part of his biography. The tendency of the whole part is indicated by the opening sentence: "Parkman's greatest triumph was not the writing of books, but the selfcommand acquired in remoulding his nature to his conditions." It is Parkman, the conqueror, the man who did, in little as well as in great things, that appears in this final part, and in the last paragraph is summed up the whole book:

"In looking back over his life, one is struck by

his prodigious strength of character. He was ready to face the universe if nature would play him fair. She had played him foul, yet she could not prevent his victory. In his patient fortitude under suffering, in his persistent industry despite the greatest obstacles, and in his fidelity to his ideals, Parkman was certainly one of the most heroic figures in the history of letters." The book amply sustains this judgment. R. G. Butler.

A

THE MAGERFUL LIFE

FTER hearing Jean Myles's story of her wedding, Sentimental Tommy used to pray: "O God, keep me from being a magerful man!"-though he had a secret idea that he should like to be one. Now, Governor Roosevelt is essentially a 'magerful" man, though of course in a good sense. Life to him means fighting, and fighting means fun, and when face to face with an angry mob, and when epithets and brickbats fill the air, he will write pleasantly and declare that he's having "the time of his life." To such a man what he calls the doctrine of ignoble ease is relatively unimportant; the life of toil and effort, of labor and strife-that is the only life that counts. "I wish," he says, "to preach that highest form of success which comes, not to the man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does from bitter toil, and who out of these wins not shrink from danger, from hardship, or the splendid ultimate triumph."

And when all is over, does the ultimate Is that the highest form of success? triumph rest with the man of action or the man of thought? Or with both? Or neither? And is it altogether fair to say, as Governor Roosevelt says, that the men who fear the strenuous life, who fear the only national life which, he thinks, is really worth leading are "the timid man,

THE STRENUOUS LIFE. Essays and Addresses by Theodore Roosevelt. The Century Co., 12mo, $1.50.

the lazy man, the man who distrusts his country, the over-civilized man who has lost the great fighting, masterful virtues, the ignorant man, and the man of dull mind, whose soul is incapable of feeling the mighty lift that thrills 'stern men with empires in their brains'?" It may be that there are some of us who think that all this strenuousness, like Mr. Wordsworth's world, is too much with us: that after much beating of the tom-tom and tooting on the horn a little restfulness is infinitely soothing—and that the quiet, thoughtful lookers-on have their place in the great scheme of things equally with the men who act and talk and strenuously beat upon the loud, reverberating drum. Surely none will disagree with the essayist

from this essay which may be commended to the notice, not of boys only, but of men, strenuous and non-strenuous alike. It is this: "There is no need to be a prig. There is no need for a boy to preach about his own good conduct and virtue. If he does he will make himself offensive and ridiculous."

"Expansion and Peace," "Civic Helpfulness," "Character and Success," "Military Preparedness and Unpreparedness," and a number of other subjects are treated of in these essays.

J. H. W.

HOW TO READ WISELY

only when the men and women who make it up lead clean, vigorous, healthy livesand that we must be resolute to do our duty well and manfully; resolute to uphold righteousness by deed and by word; resolute to be both honest and brave, to serve high ideals, yet to use practical methods. Yet one may wonder whether it be worth while so strenuously to insist upon the acceptance of propositions so self-evident.

In an essay on "The American Boy' Governor Roosevelt tells him that if he would turn out to be a good American man he must not be a coward or a weakling, a bully, a shirk or a prig. That he must work hard and play hard, and must be clean-minded and clean-lived, and able to hold his own under all circumstances, and against all comers, which is all admirably true; as also is the statement that the boy can best become a good man by being a good boy, and that he should be clean and straight, honest, truthful, gentle and tender, as well as brave. Indeed it seems, at times, as though we were in danger, like the virtuous lady, of protesting too much. And there is an extract

called difficult is the giving of advice in reading books-giving it wisely and feeling sure that the advice will be used. This world of books has vast am

plitude and the needs and tastes of readers are widely varied. So many things must be known before definite advice can be undertaken; and these things are always difficult, and are sometimes impossible, to know. One may deal in general propositions, it is true, and then feel entirely safe; but general propositions will not satisfy most readers. They are apt to leave them as much in the dark as they were before. Indeed, what one says may contain nothing that the reader does not feel he already knew. He will then go away a sadder but not a wiser man.

Carlyle and Frederic Harrison are notable writers who have undertaken among something in these directions. Probably their influence has been potent in directing the minds of readers away from ephemeral books and centering them for

COUNSEL UPON THE READING OF BOOKS. By H. Morse Stephens, Agnes Repplier, Arthur T. Hadley, Brander Matthews, Bliss Perry and Hamilton Wright Mabie. With an introduction by Henry van Dyke. Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 12mo, $1.50.

a time on the books that last through generations of men. But few who have descended from general truths to particular instances can be said to have been well rewarded. Readers who have been directed, we will say, to Milton, Scott, Gibbon, Wordsworth and Byron, would perhaps report that two or three of these writers charmed their emotional natures and inspired their understanding, but the others brought to them no message of consolation, no argosy of knowledge. It is even worse where the advice pertains to books of lesser rank, and worst of all when it pertains to current literature. It is a wise man indeed who can be certain of his ground when he steps into those boggy meadows, or tries to find a way about in those tangled thickets.

The writers in the present volume make no attempt to furnish lists. They deal with books in their larger aspects, and mainly with great books. Scarcely any others are mentioned. What they undertake to do is to define and elucidate greatness, or to distinguish between kinds of greatness. Professor Stephens, who brings to the theme of history learning and convictions, born of a lifetime spent in the study and treatment of history-not to say, the writing of it also-shows us whence came the inspiration out of which has been developed the modern school of scientific historians. It was Niebuhr and Ranke who gave definite direction to scientific history, although it was a man born long before their time, who was first to practice it on the amplest field and in the most notable manner-Gibbon. Professor Stephens makes a plea for truth in the historical narrative, as opposed to mere style and charm of expression. He says of writers like Froude and Carlyle that they "rank among the glories of English literature, but their genius for literary expression has done great harm to the study of history." In this view he

finds it is not Bancroft, not Prescott, not Parkman, who was the greatest American historical scholar, but Henry Charles Lea.

Taking ground somewhat contrary to Professor Stephens, Miss Repplier, who never writes anything that is not of first rate quality, pleads for putting deep human interests into the writing of history. She would have the life, not only of the period, but of the author as he saw it, placed before us-colored, it may be, but strong, personal and definite. It is a very charming paper that Miss Repplier contributes, full of sound sense, fine and elevated sentiments, and firmly right. Indeed, most readers will find that among the five men who bear her company, she shines with a light all her own. The "five" men, I have said, and yet there are six. But the sixth is the author of "Little Rivers." Dr. Van Dyke writes the introduction. Very charming fun he has with those whose colleague he is. Well he may, for to him was given the last

Mr. Mabie, who writes of essays and criticism, enters a field very much his

own.

This is also true of Brander Matthews, whose topic is fiction. Bliss Perry's theme is poetry, and he writes with a scholar's understanding. In Mr. Mabie's paper we find an amplitude of knowledge. and that felicity of expression which never fail him in whatever he undertakes to say. Perhaps felicity of expression should be called Mr. Mabie's greatest gift. Indeed, the variety of sentiment and view with which he may approach subjects closely allied, and the charming newness with which he may present some familiar aspect of it, the whole theme being wrought out each time in happy phrases and nicely turned sentences, are something which I think might without exaggeration be called one of the marvels in contemporary literature. Mr. Mabie here explores the great field of the past. It is