TRAVEL BY PROXY.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1906, 14 November 1913, Page 7

TRAVEL BY PROXY.

MB, H.*o. WELLS AND SIS LOCAL 1 COLOUR. ' ,| In his latest novel, "The Passionate i'Tieacb, just; published by Macm.iila.n,' i\l.r. U. (j. Wells, in. tho course of bis stirring stow, sends Ms h&a on a long : tour abroad during which ho serves' iu Hiei war in South Africa, pays a visit to India, ami studios the United States on its own soil. 'In reading fee chapters/' IS ,$? J fau '> r ' m the Sydney ileraW, I was inuuh struck with tiro ascUraey -and vividness of destaip'tions oi tho scenery, and tho profanditv of op-pj'Scintio-ij. of. tho vastly different" nationalities described, ami discussed. 'iWo were m respect of each country certain touches which any who had visited the places would recognise, Never' bavins hoard, of Mr. .Wells setting forth on' these long lottrneys, I wrote Asking ],i m whan ttiey had been aecoinnllshed. |[is reply Was brief and to the point.'- 'I have never «lU r ! 1 SoiltJl Afri * a ot I,tdia >' ho wrote, lius Admission increased the marvel of tho twoJc. Were this storv of travel tho record of one who lital boon to Blaues in tho ordinary course of life tho narration,, would, rank on a lofty piano of picturesque description. WrttW hy a man who never looked on the Ranges, or was nearer the war in South Africa than the home-end o£ tho telegraph; wire they rtre ahWJn? As was finely s«id of Do-' t ' }\ T ' } M!s hitH fto '"* «f fr-ritin.ff what lie has not.scori with the assumed' fidelity of the reporter who had kept an all-ansorwag eye upon tho object.' Tim* famous .Storm <sf 1701 trom the' seclusion of Newgate, and wrote of the pla<ruo «s if ho had been aft eyethough the pfegiio devastated X/mooai before ho was born,"