LITERARY LETTER FROM LONDON.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14842, 6 December 1913, Page 9

LITERARY LETTER FROM LONDON.

(FBOII A COaHESPONDEHT.) LONDON, October 22. Mir Arnold Bennett must havo become terribly modest, all of a sudden, for it appears that he recently declined to havo his portrait published, in company with those of other male celebrities, in a book provisionally called, "Men of Genius," and only gave his consent when the name of the work was changed to "Men of Mark." Tho author of this work, who is my authority for the foregoing statement, is that internationally famous photographer, Alvin Langdon Coburn, to whose exhibition of camera pictures at the ultra-fashionable Goupil Gallery. aU the social and literary world of London is now flocking. Writing of Mr Arnold Bennett reminds mc that, accompanied by his pretty French wife, ho has just quitted this island for Belgium, where he intends to get busy with a now play. Unlike Sir James Barrio, Bennett has not quite forsaken romance in favour of playwriting, -but in" spite of Max Bcerbohm's clever cartoon in which Hilda Leeways besought Bennett (who was depicted sitting: on a "Milestone"), to get j

on with the story of her and "Clayhangex" the author seems no nearer to giving us the final volume of that "trilogy."

Hall Came must be feeling rather like an "Aunt Sally"; at a fair just -aiow for he is being shietLat from, al sides, thoughperhaps he looks upon it all as just so much free advertising. Still one hardly thinks he can liko being publicly repudiated—as he has been—-bj practically every one of the eminent divines of various scots whom he represented as being so awfully keen on "The Woman Thou Gayest Me."

These included tho Bishop of London. who, according to the ''Manxman, really had more or less of a hand in writing "The Woman Thou Gayest Mc," the Rev. F. B. Meyer, pastor of Christ Church. Westminster Bridgo road, who was supposed to be, red-hot with enthusiasm over "Tho Woman Thou, etc," and tho Rev. R. J. Campbell, who was stated by Hall Came to have invited hint to speak on tho subject of his book at the City Temple, the former church of tho famous Dr. Joseph Parker.

The first ono of these clergymen to deny the soft, impeachment was the Rev. F. B. Meyer, to whom Hall Came issued an apology for having "inadvertently" included him in Ids list of clerical patrons. Then somebody enquired of the Bishop of London, if ib really were true that he had helped ■with "The Woman Thou Gayest Mo," and received the illuminating reply from the Bishop's secretary, that "Dr. Ingram knew nothing whatever of tho contents of Mr Caine's novel, having not yet read it." Then up spake- the Rev. R. J. Campbell to tho effect that he certainly had not invited Hall Came to talk about his much-puffed novel at the City Temple pulpit. It appears that there is a small literary circle in connexion with Mr Campbell's church, and the latter, in resoonso to a letter from Hall Cnino on the subject of the "banning" of his book by the libraries, told him that the members of this circle would be glad to listen to his views on the subject did ho care to address them.

Hall Caino's reply to these denials, it must bo confessed, consists mostly of, shuffling. Ho asserts that ho really did once hare a talk with tho Bishop of London more or less about the subject dealt with in "Tho Woman Thou Gayest Mc," and as for the other clerics it is all a regrettable mistake. Meanwhile the- "Manxman" is assailed, and vigorously, too, from a new religious quarter. Father Bornard Vaughan,. the' modern Savonarola, rises in something like wrath to denounce "what he calls "the inconsistencies and absurdities' 1 of Caino's novel from a Roman Catholic point of view. It seems that "The Woman Thou Gayest Mβ" is wrong in Catholic doctrine, practice, character. Priests and nuns behave in'its pages as they would .never behave in life, and there is an Irish bishop who has no single trait or characteristic of his kind, who is weak in theolojjy and weaker still in sense. Perhaps Father Vaughari's "roast ,, will increase the sales of "Tho Woman. Thou Gayest Me." One forgets how many hundred thousand of it had gono off at last accounts. ... But one really thinks .that its author must feel just a little uncomfortable.