NEW BOOKS

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIII, Issue 25, 22 June 1905, Page 4

NEW BOOKS

Australian C.T.S. The Australian Catholic Truth Society have added to their fast-growing list of admirable publications the two following important biographies by Cardinal Moran : ' St. Brigid,' and 'St Columkille.' Each consists of about 50 pages demy Bvo. and the price — a modest penny —brings them) within the reach of every Catholic in these colonies. 'The Society is to be congratulated in havimg am,ong its contributors so distinguished a scholar as the Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney. His Eminence is one ol the greatest lhing authorities upon the lore of ancient Ireland, and he has compressed within the modest compass of these two pamphlets the results of the best and most up-to-date scholarship bearing upon the lives of St. Brigid and St. Columkille These publications should command an extensive sale and find their way into every Catholic home in these countries. The veteran journalist, Mr. Benjamin Hoare, has contri"b|ute(J to the Society's publications an excellent Catholic slory for children— ' Little Ernie's Birthday Gift' (Id). The Society's publications are obtainable from all Catholic booksellers advertising in our columns. ' The Last Days of Jesus.' Mother M. Loyola (the Bar Con\ent, York) is well krlown in Great Britain as a writer of books for children. The latest publication from her gii'tod pen is 'The Last Bays of Jqsus.' It is a companion \olumc to her book, ' The First Days of Jesujs,' and tells m a simple and; taking way to the httle ones i lie incidents in the life of our Lord from I T is, entry into Jerusalem till ll i s Ascent into heaven The si'/e of the book is 1 1 in by B£in. It contains ] 0 illustrations, i'we of which are full-page colored pictures of a rather gaudy Kind R. and T. Washbovirne, 1-1 Paternoster Row, London (Price, stiff paper cover, f>d , linen, Is.). ' A Bush Girl's Songs.' A morbiH pessimism is one of the featuies introduced into Australian song by Gordon and Kendall. The spirit of desDonQency has been continued by their mote or less neurotic imitators e\cr since. The young Australian Cajtholic poetess, Miss 'Rena Wallace, has broken clean away from the gloomy and depressing influences of the traditional .school of Australian poetry, and, in her recently pullished (book, ' A Bush Girl's Songs,' has come before the woild with notes as fresh and joyful as the matin song of a lark Her book (.of o\ or 150 pages demy Bvo ) is maiked throughout with a cheerful optimism, and betrays no trace of the melancholy of what may be called the l older ' Australian poetry In fact, there is in her book \ery little local color She tells, indeed, of the hot Australian noon. ' when birds sit panting in each dim retreat.' <\nd sometimes tlie fragrant wattle hH'ossom peens out from a oh ink in her \erse, as when she sings in ' My Dear One ' :— ' Bright are the golden dyes The wattle bloom waves in the air— But never so bright as the tint that lies On the gold of mv darling's hair.' What is, however, really Australian in her poetry is the flooding sunshine of her atmosphere. For the rest her models— if, indeed, she- took any, which we doubt — are, flor some of her measures, Poe, and for her ' Isolt,' a powerfully descriptive mediaeval romance, Tennyson ; for 'Rena Wallace seems to sing, as a bird sings, because her heart ks full of sone;. She is a ready versifier, strains not after effect, and her theme is (witli the ex-

ception of an occasional religious poem) : 'love's young dream,' bright, pure, true, idyllic. The young poetess shows genuine feeling, ajid her sunshiny heart is ever telling that true aftection wears the crown and carries the sceptre, and that sorrow and sacrifice have their compensation in this life as well as in the next. Here is a specimen (though in form by no means the best) of her songs of the heart :—: — ' Were I a bird with silver throat I'd pour such hoav'nly strains about me Tha.t you, for whom I'd sing each note, Would not be one brief hour without me. So lavishing I'd make my song With love's divinest rapture ringing, You could not choose the whole day long But hang enchanted on my singing ! ' Were I a rose-bud gemmed with dew Blowing within your garden, sweetly, So rich I'd bloom— so bright of hue— I'd win your generous praise completely ; And, standing iby, the while I shed My sweets around me and above me, You'd pluck me from my od'rous bed, And for a space, at least, you'd love me t 'And, since I'm neither bird nor rose t But just a simple loving woman, Give me your heart, and I'll disclose A thousand sweetnesses all human. You could not choose but feel delight In love that has no bounds — no measure — I'd live to make your whole life bright, Or die to 'give you one hour's pleasure ! ' Miss Wallace is a true and promising poetess. She has already done Australian literature a distinct service by introducing into its poetry the element of freshness and wholesome optimism which it so greatly needed. (Published by Angus and Robertson, Sydney ; pp. xii., 140 ; 55.). ' Ballads of a Country Boy.' The ' Cioufntry Boy ' who has written these Ballads is the well known Irish author, Seumas MacManus, of Mountcharles, in ' Ould Donegal.' His book of ballads is an unpretentious little volume. It is dedicated to the cherished memory of ' one at whose feet the Boy had laid his love '—to wit, Ethna Carbery, his wife, ' boloved by Eire, to whose sad soul she sang sweetest songs.' To the memory of that gifted writer some of the ' Country Boy's ' sweetest verses are sung. One of these (' The House with the Green Door '—that is, the grave) is) a gem of poetic thought and expression. We quote the last three stanzas :—: — ' It opened but once before, Ontce_ it will open again, The house with the green door, And noiseless bolt and chain. ' Many my fruitless journeys ; Yet, sometime the light will burn, And friends watch late in my house, And I shall not return. * I shall have found my welcome, And a wide-thrown green door ; And I will tarry, in my Love's house Shut close for evermore.' The poem w.as written by the little 'House with the Green Door ' where all that the ' Country Boy ' loved lay cold. He was left 'on the Lonely Road,' and her sweet spiiit went ' To the mystical land, where all are young. Where the silver branches have buds ofl snow, And every leaf is a singing tongue.' Reuma-s MacManus's modest book of Ballads deserves to be as widely known ajs his stories, which have brightened so many firesides in every land that gives a home to 'the sea-divided Gael.' They are penetrated through and through with the atmosphere of Ireland— with its folk-lore, its history, and its stories told by the inglenook. Mountain and moor, cabin and cottaJge and farmhouse look out at you from the ' Ballads of a Oountry Boy ' , and you hear sarcastic Thurisk and many a peasant and fisherman talk and sing to you in the mellow aj'oeryts of Donegal. Here is a scrap from a lament to the famous old hedge-school masler, Michael Maguire ; ' No ; Teddy may forcet to keen A dhrop of something nate, Mat Murphy may forget to growl, Ned Lynch forget to chate— And Frank Maguire forget to rhyme. And Tully Mack to pray — But, throth, we won't forget you, Mick, Although ye're in the clay ! '

The author is a lover of mountain and moor and lake and tfriary brook. He knows their every mood and his leeling for them runs through all his verse. Here :s, in part, how he tells of his mountain waterfall :— "Like lance from an ambushed one, glimmering, shimmering, flung, Over the -brink of the mountain 'tis hurled : Like Love to the arms of Love, from the grim heights above Headlong it plunges into a new world. . . 1 Tossing like white-maned steeds, hissing like windswept reeds, Flashing, and crashing, wild wave over wave — Rising in anger, falling in clangor, Like armor-clad knights on a field of the brave.' There i 9 a fine swing and rhythm in Mr. MiacManus's poetry. It is lite Ireland itself— the land of the tear and the smile— in being both sad and merry. Several of the poems are very suitable for school recitations, and all will be as welcome as a whiff of Irish air to many an exile who longs for a glimpse of the blue hills of Ireland. (Cloth, pp. vhi— loo ; published by Gill and Son, Dublin ; procurable through all booksellers advertising in our columns ; 6d.).