Part 19

And so it goes. No! The duties of an old-maid aunt cannot be entered upon lightly. It would really be a charitable act for some one to study the subject and offer a course for those of us the numbers of whose nephews and nieces continue to increase. And we in the meantime can only hope that the pendulum of change will not delay too long in swinging back to the old-fashioned child, about whom, inside and out, we have a little knowledge if it is only empirical!

_An Obscure Source of Education_

Obviously a great deal of education, moral as well as intellectual, and even physical, is coming from the war, and it obviously comes in part from an immensely increased amount of reading on informing subjects, even in the newspapers. But the call for this reading contains a farther, and relatively obscure, source of education worth thinking of. We can no longer risk wasting our time, as it is to be feared most of us have done, by picking up to read the first thing that strikes our fancy. The greatly increased mass of material has forced upon us the habit of selecting what we read. The usefulness and importance of that habit hardly need dwelling upon to the constituency of this REVIEW.

_Heart-to-Heart Advertising_

I am all things to all advertisers. I like to submit myself to the experiments of some alert young psychologist, in response to whose plan (scientifically conceived, artfully presented), I greatly desire to eat, to see, to hear, to know, to do, to possess, that which he brings to my attention. Being a person trained to jejune classification, I automatically pigeon-hole the "appeal," and my mind therefore offers to advertisements a hospitable retreat under Ambition, or Culture, or Physical development, or the Senses, or Vanity.

The last quality and the first are not always distinguishable, the one from the other. When a page of insinuating text and startling illustration assures me that the reading of a specified set of books will enable me,--a person temperamentally shy and physically inconspicuous--to convince judges and jurors, and to combine into a glorious whole the abilities of St. Chrysostom, Abelard, Shylock, Daniel Webster, and a Confederate veteran, I am disposed to feel that though hitherto I have been unappreciated, it now rests with me (and the set of books) to alter, even to change, the opinion of my personal public. I glow, too, under the conviction that correspondence courses can transform me into a trained nurse, an O. Henry, a Thomas Nast. My vanity makes the conventional years of hospital service, or a "born" ability to tell a story, or to caricature, seem superfluous in an equipment for success. And I am sure I could raise wheat and apples in the north and oranges and pecans in the south, even though I should bring to my enterprise no capital, no experience, no commonsense.

But while I yield readily and sympathetically to the magazine advertisement, my heartiest response is given to the letter that altruistically offers me counsels of perfection. There is a certain lack of privacy about the magazine advertisement; but the letter advertisement is confidential, even sometimes secretive. True, my name is frequently misspelled, my sex is changed, and the ink and type are glaringly different in the heading and in the letter proper. But these are trifling vagaries: it is my own letter, and the writer knows me intimately. He says this plainly. And he proves it by offering me the book, or the beautifier, or the investment which I had not even known I wanted, but which I do want instantly, and with an intensity that falls short only of cutting from the lower corner of the page the slanting coupon that will procure me farther information.

It is this intimacy of attitude on the part of the writers of form-letters that gives me keenest pleasure. I like the way in which a kindly, tolerant young person--youth will always out--assures me that my manner of life and my personal predilections are as an open book to him. I like the first-aid flavor of his opening paragraph. I like most of all the jaunty soul-brother way in which he dallies with his point.

"The writer of this letter has been pondering a good deal", begins one of these experts in the personal appeal, "on the sort of letter he would like to get from So-and-So." And at the conclusion of his clever page, he inquires ingenuously (or artistically): "Is this the sort of letter _you_ like to get from So-and-So?" Bless the boy! of course it is.

And I do enjoy the letter that is designed to make me leap from my seat with the first line: "Tomorrow may be too late!" or, "This idea was worth $100 to one person--it may prove even more valuable to you;" or, "Shakespeare died in 1616!"

Again, the subject may be approached obliquely: "You have read of course, the interesting story in the _Sunday Morning Sunshine_, entitled "Sparkles." You'll remember how Dorothy--" And about the middle of page two I find that the reason why the heroine was a heroine was because she had a piece of furniture, the duplicate of which I am granted an opportunity to purchase, if I act quickly, at greatly reduced rates.

But although the letter-writing section of psychological advertisers gives me keen pleasure, they also give me some anxiety. It seems to me that they waste a good deal of good effort. The reason for this failure to conserve, lies, I think, in the lack of an ingredient that would fuse all of this experimental psychology and engaging personality into a practical working whole. And by "working" I mean money getting: for of course advertisers have their reason for being, in the persuading of somebody to buy something, or to subscribe to something. The ingredient which I miss is businesslike accuracy. Of course I realize that these are merely form-letters, that the mailing list is compiled from any available source. But the advertisers wish each person who receives a letter to feel that it was written for him or her personally, and they take a great deal of trouble to perfect the atmosphere. It is not artistic, or professional, therefore, to destroy the illusion by the address or the opening sentence. It was a disgusted gentleman who received a letter which began thus:

"Dr. John Doe Professor of Latin University of Utopia

Dear Sir:

A friend of yours--she prefers that we should not use her name--tells us that you are the best dressed woman in your city. Our new line of evening frocks...."

And women often receive letters such as the following:

"Miss Margaret Roe, etc., etc.

Dear Madam:

As a man who knows a good pipe from a bad one, will you grant us an opportunity to show you...."

Undoubtedly these charming highly imaginative specialists in advertising give great pleasure. But when business houses month after month send advertising letters which set forth the glories of something glaringly impossible of enjoyment by the person to whom the letter is addressed, then that person is likely to reflect that squandered postage, and inefficient management, must be paid for in the price or quality of the thing advertised.

The literary value of a personal form-letter is not affected, however, by the question of practical usefulness. Nothing could lessen my pleasure in a recent letter that shows me how I may realize the "chummy comradeship of Emerson's nature poems," and the "dainty art of Shelley and Keats." The writer also tells me that he knows what my principal problem is. And the opening sentence of the same letter seems to explain why I enjoy all advertisements:

"To that 'marvellous interestingness of life' which Arnold Bennett says literature reflects, is due the fundamental liking for good reading of some kind...."

_The Curse of Fall Elections_

We have received the usual number of exhortations to do our duty in preparing for the fall elections. Thank you. We will do the best we can, but on account of the war we are already late in getting into the country for the summer, and our doctor orders us away as soon as we can go.

Many of the people who exercise any influence for good are gone already, while most of those whose influence is evil--who live by politics are here and will stay here or within easy reach, to attend to business.

Moreover all those whose laziness, incapacity and crankiness prevent their having money enough to get away--the whole Bolshevik crowd of socialists, synadicalists and anarchists, remain here under the influence of those who live by politics.

If there ever was an invention of the devil, it is fall elections.

Elections should be held early in April, before so many good people go away, and after they have had half the year at home to do their best in.

_Larrovitch_

Our habitual readers may be surprised at our serving them a book notice. But the circumstances leading to this one are peculiar.

In its thirty-six years, the Authors Club has published but two books: _The Liber Scriptorum_, and _Feodor Vladimir Larrovitch, An Appreciation of His Life and Works_, which has recently appeared. The name of Larrovitch was mentioned in the last Casserole; we are now able to describe the permanent tribute to his personality which the Authors has made.

The volume consists of papers read at the Larrovitch centenary celebration (April 26th, 1917--postponed from April 1st) together with others since contributed. The contents page notes a sonnet by Clinton Scollard, Prolegomenon by Prof. Franklin H. Giddings, a personality sketch by Wm. George Jordan, translations and an article on "The Truth and False About Larrovitch" by Richardson Wright, translations of three Larrovitch poems by George S. Hellman, translations of Larrovitch letters by Thomas Walsh, a paper on his recollection of the great Russian by Dr. Titus Munson Coan, who, it will be recalled was one of the original "Friends of Russian Freedom," bibliography and bibliographical notes by Arthur Colton, whose name is already well known to readers of the UNPOPULAR REVIEW; and a table of references in English, French, German, Spanish and Russian compiled by Dr. Gustave Simonson. There are twelve illustrations in the volume, showing Larrovitch manuscripts, portraits at various ages, portraits of Larrovitch's parents, the room at Yalta in which the author died, and his grave. The book was designed by William Aspenwall Bradley of the University Press, and executed by Munder of Baltimore, making it a unique piece of typographical excellence.

That the Authors should have picked out this Russian from all the writers whirling in the vortex of literature, is explained in the preface and the dedication. The book is dedicated to the lasting sympathy between the American people and the Russian. And the preface states that the path to peace along which nations can walk to mutual understanding, is the path of the arts--the path of music and painting and literature. This is indeed true.

_Our Index_

The example of our "Father Parmenides," is always good, and we shall imitate it in the particular set forth in this extract from _The Atlantic_ for last December:

Following a convention, unquestioned and well-nigh universal, the _Atlantic_ has for sixty years published semi-annually in December and June an index designed for the convenience of readers who bind their magazines. This index with title-page occupies six pages; and while of great service to a couple of thousand subscribers and to a few hundred libraries, it is to eighty-odd thousand readers [These figures make us feel very small.] merely a dead and cumbersome weight. This month, therefore, we are breaking sharply with tradition, ... we are printing the index in its usual form, but in a small edition, and as a separate pamphlet, and hold ourselves ready to send it to _any reader who applies for a copy within thirty days of the publication of this magazine_.

This change will involve the saving of a paper-wastage....

All paper saved tends to lower the price, which has already reached a height obstructive to the diffusion of knowledge.

_A New "OUIJA Board" Book_

By PATIENCE WORTH

HOPE TRUEBLOOD

_A Mid-Victorian Novel by a Pre-Victorian Writer_

By the author of "The Sorry Tale"

Edited by C. S. Yost

$1.50 net

In this new novel of mid-Victorian days with its pervading sense of dark mystery, "Patience Worth" abandons her archaic dialect, and writes in modern English.

"Whether in the body or in the spirit, the author of the present volume is singularly gifted with imagination, invention and power of expression. 'Hope Trueblood' is much superior to 'The Sorry Tale,' partly because it is written in good English and partly because it displays far greater ingenuity of imagination ... a work approximating absolute genius."--_N. Y. Tribune_.

"A novel that George Eliot might not have been ashamed to own up to."--_N. Y. Sun_.

"From the very first there is established an atmosphere true to type and convincing. 'Hope' is one of the most radiant children we've met in a book in many a day. 'Patience Worth' has arrived."--_Chicago Daily News_.

HENRY HOLT & COMPANY 19 WEST 44th STREET NEW YORK

End of Project Gutenberg's The Unpopular Review, Number 19, by Various