SOME RECENT FICTION.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1728, 19 April 1913, Page 9

SOME RECENT FICTION.

THE DANGERS OF CULTURE. • 1 1 The American young lady who is the 1 heroine of Miss (or Mrs.?) Bridget -Mac- : lagan's "Mistress of Kingdoms, or Smoking Flax" (Duckworth and Co., per George ■ Robertson), possesses a rather baffling personality. A self-conscious, highlystrung college girl, she is blessed with a , moth't-r who is emotionally religious, and finds her rather trying. A young artist, who plays at being Bohemian in the silly, c sort of way they do in New York, alternate- ' ly gushes over and bullies her, much ! apparently to Miss Barbara's delight, de- ( spite the fact that he is, in most people's ' eyes, a most' unwholesome creature. Just ' when it looks as if tho girl is to fall a ! victim to the amorous Anthony Ladd, the j heroine's father dies,, and off she goes to India to visit some relations, and soon ' falls in love with an elderly, ugly, but ] "most interesting" missionary,'who adores. \ this strange "woman thing,"- from across the ocean. He is almost as hysterical in ; his own way as the. lady, 'for the author j thus? describes his emotion on seeing tho j fascinating Barbara:-"His'heart was beJ having liko a crazy thing. : It. threatened ' jto pound through his coat, to leap and ' tear away like a puppy,- crazv with delight at the sight of .his mistress." Bar- , bora and the ugly, but interesting, mis- \ (denary, are married, but the-lady fiuds i the good works which' are expected of a missionary's wife, somewhat boresoiue. and the erratic creature takes a trip to Paris and- then on to America. Here her wholo'- i nature, so tho author would; have us he- ••'. lieve, is changed 'by tho birth of her child',-: | and, returning to India, she settles"down« with her - husband, and presumably is destined to livo happily over afterwards. The -story is not uninteresting as o. study in feminine psychology, and the Indian scenes are well done. But most readers will find the heroine more' exasperating than fascinating. :and as, for Tony Ladd, ; his actions and language are so complete- i ly ridiculous that, ivhen they are meant - to shock us they only provoke an amused , contempt. . , ; [Other novel reveiws held over.]