of Reading in an editorial on April 19, said: She sets forth her arguments so lucidly and so persuasively that we can see a perfect host of young writers profiting from her pages. And, say we, "we can see a perfect host of young readers doing likewise." For there is an art in reading as well as in writing. The fact that Clarke Knowlton is descended from Colonel Thomas Knowlton of Revolutionary fame has not deterred him from writing a thoroughly modern story in "The Bridegroom." We employ the index finger and say with assurance: "Here is a young man to watch." There is always an interesting psychological element in the work of Edward C. Venable. "Lines on the Portrait of a Lady" has a Jamesian quality. Mr. Venable still tarries in Brittany, and, since he doesn't herald his movements widely, the date of his expected return to Baltimore is unknown. South. The euphonious Tuscaloosa, Alabama, is his birthplace. He was once assistant city attorney of Birmingham, but then he migrated to New Jersey and became a schoolmaster. Since 1923 he has been devoting himself exclusively to writing and lecturing. NEXT BILL Heredity-The Master Riddle of Science by EDWARD M. EAST by GEORGE A. COE Youth and Peace by OLIVER LA FARGE, Harvard '24 The Dead Vote of the South by GERALD W. JOHNSON Through the Mill of by STANISLAW A. GUTOWSKI Chasing Antelope on the Great Mongolian Plateau by WILLIAM DOUGLAS BURDEN Treed! by EDWIN DIAL TORGERSON The Professor and the Pink Lady by FREDERICK WHITE Cap'n Quiller Listens In by TORREY FORD The Perfect Servant College reunions are looming large just now. Arthur Hobson Quinn's "The Last Appeal" presents in the form of fiction an idea suggested by his own thirtieth reunion, last year. Dean Quinn is University of Pennsylvania, '94. We are pleased to be able to present a rediscovered poem of Paul Hamilton Hayne. The note by his son relates the circumstances surrounding the publication of one of the last works of a favorite poet of the South. cation (glorious thought!) have SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE go with you. Your address may be changed as often as you desire. The index finger points to a few of the features listed on this page, which go to make up the July SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE. Some of the best numbers we have ever had are now in preparation. We don't believe you will want to miss a single one. Be sure to send us your present address together with your new address. All Readers, Attention! Here's a Chance to Go Down in History When and where did "Uncle Tom's Cabin" last appear, or where is it now appearing? Mark Sullivan, who is preparing a history of the United States from 1900 to 1925, is interested in the fate of Uncle Tom. Mr. Sullivan's history will deal not only with the conventional themes of "wars, of Presidents, of Congresses, of embassies, of treaties, of political leaders, and of parties" but with many other things that interested the American people during these years, the stage, baseball, popular songs, moving-pictures, the radio, popular fiction, and the like. Having read J. Frank Davis's "Tom Shows" in the April SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE, Mr. Sullivan is moved to inquire of our readers whether there are still troupes of "Tommers," and when and where they last appeared. Any information sent to this department will be forwarded to Mr. Sullivan and will be appreciated by him. As a matter of fact, Mr. Davis seems not to have laid the ghost. Reports of extant "Tom Shows" have come to our eyes. The following letter appeared in the Cincinnati Times-Star shortly after the publication of the April number: UNCLE TOM STILL LIVES TO THE EDITOR OF THE "TIMES-STAR": When a writer for high-brow publications gets out of his own territory he surely has some strange brain squalls. Take the statement of J. Frank Davis in the April SCRIBNER'S, which you reprint. "The play (Uncle Tom's Cabin) lasted more than five decades for no reason save that to the simple folk of its day it was just a familiar, shrieking melodrama, slipshod, raw and often most terribly manhandled." What rot! If those qualifications made for long life to plays, there are plenty of others that would still be in operation. However what I started to say was that J. Frank Davis is ignorant of his subject when he says "the last Tom show died." I can tell him of a dozen now in operation. Just recently one company played Louisville for a week. Columbus, Ohio. B. H. NYE. And from the managing-editor of the Buffalo Evening News came this: We thought that perhaps you, (and surely, Mr. Davis,) would be interested in the enclosed clipping from our paper. After you look it over will you please send it to Mr. Davis? I enjoyed his article greatly. I was, however, skeptical about the death of Uncle Tom. Skepticism sometimes pays; at any rate we got what I think is a most readable story. MARC A. ROSE. Here are a few excerpts from the story which is indeed " most readable": TOMMY AITON IS "STANDIN' 'EM UP " Thomas Aiton, Manager of Mason Brothers' Uncle Tom's Cabin company, paused during Holy Week in Lockport. He had just finished a week's engagement there, and has been brushing up his company preparatory to starting out for the summer season. 'Tis Spring, and those birds of passage, the troupers must soon be on the wing. Tommy Aiton sits in his room in the Raleigh Hotel in Lockport, gazing abstractedly out of the window, his long legs stretched under a table on which is a portable typewriter. To his left is the trunk piled with copies of The Billboard and other theatrical papers, railroad guidebooks, scrapbooks, and papers advertising the show. He passes a lean hand over the lower part of his face, reflectively. "Yes, sir, yes, sir," he drawls, "the old show's going good. We been standin' 'em up wherever we go. Open up galleries that ain't been opened for years. Big cities and medium towns, we make 'em all-” An interesting article by J. Frank Davis on Tom Shows appears in the current number of SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE, closing with the statement that "a unique American institution passed out when the last Tom Show died." Buffalonians, who had read the article, wondered if it really could be so, if the last Tom Show had been tenderly laid away. A copy of The Billboard in the Evening News office disclosed several advertisements for troupers including this one inserted by Mr. Aiton for: "A PIANO PLAYER, double band; violin, double band; two strong cornets, saxophones, real stage manager who can put on Tom and Ten Nights. Marks, Harris, Legree, Topsy, who can sing and dance. All men double band. People all lines write. State lowest salary. Year-round season here." The only other Tom show which Mr. Aiton knows of that is playing theaters is the Stetson show which is in the west. There are half a dozen or more tent shows. One of these is owned by a man named Tom Finn. It wintered in Hoosick Falls, N. Y. ., and will begin the season May 1. "Made a lotta money out of it, Tom Finn has," Aiton observed. "He hits the one-store towns, but he packs 'em in." Mr. Aiton is one of the oldest in the game. He's been with Tom Shows for 29 years, starting as a boy posting bills. A few times he has left it for a season to go out with a circus or a tent show, but always has returned to his first love. Movies haven't hurt the business, he avers. They've practically killed off the spoken drama in the smaller towns, but the longing to see real play acting is still so strong within the people that they flock to see "Uncle Tom's Cabin" in spite of its quaint melodrama. "Yes, sir, they're crazy about it," said Mr. Aiton. "You can make dollars with Tom, where you cannot make pennies with Ten Nights." So we have a start on compiling the present status of the "Tom Show." Mr. Aiton's disparaging statement of the financial possibilities of Ten Nights in a Bar Room, may arouse some of our temperance friends. We will keep tally as to which has been seen most, and most recently. We remember witnessing a tent performance of Ten Nights about twelve years ago, and a parade for a Tom Show about two years later. When did you see or hear of them last? LANSON ON FRENCH EDUCATION The writer of the following letter apropos of Paul van Dyke's recent article "The Provincial Universities of France," is a celebrated professor of the Sorbonne who has extended his fame outside academic circles by a "History of French Literature" marked by a "singular power of synthesis and a force of thought in describing the historical rôle of writers which no one has equalled." He is now director of the Ecôle Normale Superieure an office in which Pasteur was one of his predecessors. MY DEAR FRIEND: I thank you for sending me your article. I have read it with lively pleasure. It would not be possible to speak of our universities in a way more exact or more friendly, nor to mark more judiciously the differences which distinguish them from American universities. You are quite right in calling attention to the social benefits which your country gains from the fact that young men who intend to enter business are in the habit of attending your universities and colleges. We have something, if not equivalent, at least analogous in our Faculties of Law, where it has been, since the time of Napoleon I, the habit of our high and middle bourgeoisie to send their children on leaving the Lycée and where generally they carry on their studies until they take the Licence (First University Degree). It must not be forgotten that our universities were for a time in a condition of lethargy and that they were not reconstituted until between 1885 and 1897. When the reestablishment of the universities restored life to our Faculties of Letters little by little some young men who did not intend to devote themselves either to teaching or to original research began to form the habit of entering the universities to seek additional general culture. They go as far as the Licence. They are chiefly students of the Law School of whom the larger part intend to enter legal professions; but there are among them also those who intend to follow industrial or commercial pursuits. There must also be counted as an element in our national life the fairly large number of those whom you would call university men who, for one reason or another, enter active careers and bring to them the mentality of scholars, of learned men or of professors. A certain number of our agregés (men who have passed the stiff competitive examinations opening the door to higher teaching positions) and of our licentiates are in business, industry, banking or state administration, and occupy there important positions. That has been so for a long time, and since the war it is more frequent. Simply by counting up those whom I personally know I arrive at a number which is not negligible. A point to which I wish to call your attention and one essential to making a full comparison between our universities and yours is this: for historical reasons the content of our universities is much more restricted than that of your universities. Many special subjects of study and many students are not included in them. Except at Strassbourg all the Faculties of theology, both Protestant and Catholic, are outside of the universities of the State. At Paris many institutions of higher learning are not included in the University. Many of these attract young men who are the future heads and directors of all sorts of economic enterprises. In the provinces also there are a certain number of institutions which in America would be included in a university, like the School of Mines of St. Etienne or the School of Fine Arts of Toulouse. All this does not detract anything from the justice of your description. I only want to say that in order to form a complete idea of the training received by the elite of our youth, destined to direct national activity in all its multiple fields of effort, it is useful to take into consideration a whole crowd of institutions which are neither state universities nor parts of state universities. GUSTAVE LANSON. SOUTH AMERICA HEARD FROM DEAR MR. EDITOR: Why is it that an uneducated, not "as holy as thou" out-of-the-pale latin-american should find what we call "gazapos" in Edward Bok's writings, and not the same thing be done by any of your learned readers? Here are the point and its sequels: to dear Mr. Emerson, Mr. Bok ascribed the opening citation to his article "The President" in the SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE of January last, and it happens that the lines appear to be of Lowell's "The Present Crisis."-I come to you seeking assistance to help me understand the irony underlaying Mr. Bok's transposition of the poet by the philosopher. I hope you will find enclosed $5 in U.S. currency to pay for a year's subscription to your really delightful periodical, and do me the favor of sending same and my address printed below thru the proper channels. ENRIQUE URIBE W. I am, sir, your obedient servant, The señor's question was answered almost as soon as he asked it. Trust our readers for that. Such interest from a Colombian reader helps us to forget spring colds and such. PROFANITY DEAR EDITOR: I feel moved to write to you, first to tell you how much I enjoy SCRIBNER'S. I have been a subscriber to, and a close reader of, the Magazine for several years, and I could scarcely think of getting along without it. Dr. Phelps's department "As I Like It" is, think, worth the price of the subscription, to say nothing of many other features that are most excellent. But I want to tell you wherein I differ from you in regard to profanity in books, magazine articles, etc. L. R. who writes you from Long Island in the January number disapproves of such profanity, and in your little reply to her, you say that you think it is not harming our young people. While it may not harm them, it certainly does them no good, and to my mind it is not a question of harm to anyone, but because we are forbidden by God to take his name in vain. I think that should be enough. To me there is nothing elevating in the reading of such language, rather, when I begin to read a book or an article and I find a number of "swear words" I lose all interest in the book or article, and I know many persons who feel that such language detracts from the interest of a story or article, to say nothing of the sin of profanity. DEAR EDITOR: May I suggest in these columns that our English friend, Mr. H. A. L. Fisher was a bit too kind to us in his "America After Fifteen Years"? While no one will deny the importance of the developments to which he referred, it seems that he overlooked certain latent possibilities in regard to their effect on our society. Yet it is refreshing to find a foreign writer who is not hypercritical in his treatment of us. Perhaps inherent British modesty stayed his pen. Most certainly the movies and automobiles are providing leisure for our people! But I think the writer was inclined to overvalue our need of such pastimes, and what are more vital questions: Is it the right kind of leisure? Is such leisure better for us than the variety in which our fathers indulged? It is known that the prosperity and well being of a people is a function of the stability of the family unit. All forces, then, which tend to disintegrate this unit are most fatal to the underlying fabric of a nation. Not that movies and autos have not their place in the general scheme of our lives, but the writer's emphasis on the strength of the motion picture and automobile industries testifies to our excesses. Moderate indulgence is harmless, but gross excess in anything is degrading. How many young men who call on their girl friends ever think of spending the evening by the fireside? How many are there who meet and chat with the girl's parents? When the caller arrives, the old folks move out (unless the young man happens to be a particular "friend of the family.") The very word "date" is nowadays synonymous with "step out." The auto is responsible here. Then if it's not the movies, there are always the roads and dancing at the country club. And that brings up golf. Certainly it is not lamentable that this ancient and honourable game had been made accessible to the man-in-the-street. Yet it is almost a disease when Mr. M. I. T. S. spends his every Saturday afternoon, Sunday morning and Sunday afternoon on the links, and often closes his office early during the week to go in pursuit of the little elusive white pellet. Darkness alone sends him home to his family. Perhaps I have been too severe. If so, it is only because I have been so impressed with these observations. Radio, it would seem, promises to offset these tendencies. With a proper control (a hopeless thing in light of Mr. Fisher's comments on our press) of what is broadcasted, what a positive element this might become in the edification of Mr. M. I. T. S.'s mind! University, Va. EGBERT B. FREYER. FOREIGN PHRASES A school superintendent protests against provoking his inferiority complex. DEAR EDITOR: The habit of using foreign phrases in sentences or of interposing paragraphs from a foreign language in magazine articles and books is becoming rather prevalent. The February number of your magazine has a paper by Cortissoz which is as spotted as a milkmaid's apron, and looks about the same. Gavarni's reputation has suffered thereby. The introduction to the "Journal des Gens du Monde" may be untranslatable but I know it would have been more intelligible to me if an attempt to translate it had been made. I wonder if I am unique in that respect? Even my good friend, William Lyon Phelps, has hurt my feelings by using several quotations in a foreign tongue, and thus, emphasizing my inferiority. To read a present day novel or magazine is like riding over a corduroy road in an oxcart. My antipathy to using foreign phrases dates from childhood, when, as a rather busy boy who desired to learn, I was chagrined by the number of foreign phrases which crept into the books of that time. Thirty years ago French was the favorite instrument with which writers displayed their erudition and impressed those who had limited linguistic aptitude, and few opportunities to cultivate the little bent which they possessed. After the Spanish American War we were bespattered by an outpouring of mock Castilian. This was followed by an influx of hybrid Dutch from South Africa. Kipling became the idol of the hour and homeopathic doses of Hindustani were administered. This was followed by the period of German propaganda when writers affected the phrases of Luther. Just before the Great War English seemed to be discovered and, for a short period, we were comparatively free from the discourtesy of foreign phrase. Now we are back to French and, I suppose, we shall complete the circle again; though possibly Don McMillan may popularize Eskimo. Why do writers use foreign phrases? Are they afraid their scholarship and cosmopolitanism may be questioned? The custom is probably a pure affectation which is screened by "Untranslatable" or "No Equivalent English Word." Yet each word looked up usually has an English meaning. Probably no translation can preserve the shades of meaning which the original possesses. However, it is equally true that a foreign phrase conveys no meaning whatever to a person unskilled in the language used. For many years your magazine has beguiled me from the day's work by its intriguing qualities. I have read its pages with both interest and gain. Usually, I have been pleased as well as instructed by your publication. But the growing tendency to accept contributions filled with foreign phrasescrazy quilts of affectations-tends to alienate my affections. Yet for the "old sake's sake," I shall probably continue a reader of SCRIBNER'S and await the day when writers will speak to Americans in English. Excuse this rather verbose letter. But for forty years you have kept me from my duties by the excellence of your periodical. As a reprisal, I am constrained to steal some of your time to administer a gentle, little chastisement. Washington, Pa. J. C. STIERS, Superintendent of Schools. WONDERS BY TELEGRAPH Many of our readers have descended upon us for allowing Mr. Dickenson to get away with a postscript to a telegram. Here is a sample: DEAR EDITOR: I read with much enjoyment Dickenson's story, "Jonesy Gets His Swim," in your April number, but would like to know how one adds a postscript in pencil to a telegram! I always want to say more in my telegrams than my purse allows but I am all "up in the air" as to methods. M. E. CLAY. Dallas, Texas To which Mr. Dickenson replies: DEAR EDITOR: I intended writing you before to say how sorry I was and how surprised to see the wonders I accomplished by telegraph in the "Jonesy Gets His Swim" story. The P. S. was an afterthought and, it seems, a mighty poor one. We throw ourselves upon the mercy of the court, but, after all, it was a good story, wasn't it? Among communications which we were unable to find space for are those from Miss Sarah Crannell, Albany, N. Y.; John E. Ayer, Seattle; Reverend Ernest A. Palm, 417 Alder St., Missoula, Montana; Ruby G. Smith, Ithaca, N. Y.; F. P. S., Carlyle, Ill.; Duane E. Fox, 902 F Street, N. W., Washington; B. M. R., 2109 Buena Vista Avenue, Alameda, Cal.; W. M. Lownery, St. Louis; L. H. MacMorran, New York City. THE CLUB CORNER Suggestions for Future Programmes from Recent and Coming Numbers An exceedingly valuable and interesting point of view on race, heredity, and sex is presented in SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE in articles beginning in May and running through the succeeding numbers. They come from such distinguished scholars, thinkers, and scientists as Albert Guérard, E. M. East, and Ellsworth Huntington. RACE, HEREDITY, SEX "Southern Memories"-Sidelights on the Race Problem, by Albert Guérard, May, 1925. "The Last Taboo," by Albert Guérard, June, 1925. "Heredity-the Master Riddle of Science," by E. M. East, July, 1925. "Heredity and Sex," by E. M. East, in an early num ber. "The Chinese Renaissance," by Ellsworth Huntington, in an early number." "Minimum Standards of Australia," by Ellsworth Huntington, in an early number. AMERICANISM As a companion piece to "An Immigrant at the Crossroads," February, 1925, Stanislaw Gutowski contributes "Through the Mill of Americanization," to the July, 1925, number. POLITICS "Some American Women and the Vote," by Katharine Fullerton Gerould, May, 1925. "Recent Strides of Federal Authority," by William Cabell Bruce, U. S. Senator from Maryland, June, 1925. "How Free Is Free Speech?" by Robert W. Winston, June, 1925. "The Dead Vote of the South," by Gerald W. Johnson, July, 1925. Mrs. Gerould states that many women do not concern themselves with the larger issues in politics. It is a stimulating paper which all club women ought to read. And one step toward taking issue with her is the reading of Senator Bruce's able presentation of a conflict which is at the very basis of our institutions. Another is the reading of Gerald Johnson's very frank statement of one of the reasons that the political parties in America lack issues for women or any one else to become interested in. Judge Winston asks a vital question and from his experience as a lawyer and judge he answers it. Here is another large issue in which women should concern themselves. CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE "Fix Bayonets!" by John W. Thomason, Jr., June, 1925. "The Bridegroom," by Clarke Knowlton, June, 1925. "The Perfect Servant," by Eleanor Stuart, July, 1925. The Fiction Number of SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE, August, 1925. This number marks the conclusion of Mrs. Whar ton's papers on "The Writing of Fiction," which we have mentioned in these columns before. We list above a few examples of outstanding work in current writing. Captain Thomason's description has received the enthusiastic praise of critics-among them, W. C. Brownell, Laurence Stallings, and Alexander Woollcott. This, his first published work, is in the nature of a literary discovery. It is without doubt one of the few distinctive pieces of writing that the year has produced. Excellent examples of the best in current fiction are these stories by Knowlton, Miss Stuart, and those appearing in the Fiction Number. EDUCATION, COLLEGES, "The Organization Complex in Our Colleges," by Ruth Steele Brooks, May, 1925. "College and the Artist," by Henry Rood, Febru ary, 1925. "Education-A Forgotten Art," by George Sprau. "The State and Religious Teaching," by Henry Noble Sherwood, State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Indiana. "President Vergilius Alden Cook of Harmonia College," by Carol Park. "Boys and Poetry," by Matthew Wilson Black. "Shall We Learn Foreign Languages?" by Mitchell Bronk. "The Morals of College Journalism," by E. C. Hopwood, editor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. "The Stuff that Dreams are Made On," by H. C. Sproul. "Youth and Peace," by George A. Coe, author of "What Ails our Youth?" July, 1925. "Colleges and War," by Oliver La Farge, Harvard, '24, July, 1925. These articles range from serious discussion by educational authorities to a satiric portrait of a college president and the dreams of a young instructor. They present many sides of the educational problem and the problems which are affecting the home. All of them are to appear in early numbers, except the articles by Mr. Rood and Mrs. Brooks, which have already been published. The numbers in which they appear, if scheduled, are listed with the article. The articles by Mr. Coe and Mr. La Farge in next month's magazine deserve the consideration of all people, especially mothers and those who are more than casually interested in the prevention of war. Carol Park's portrait of a college president, while amusing, has serious intent. It puts up to all those who are interested in educational institutions the question of whether the present trend in the selection of executives is to go on and what the result will be. Many other articles on educational topics will appear in future numbers. Queries and communications addressed to the Editor, Club Corner, SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE, 597 Fifth Avenue, New York, will receive prompt attention. |