10
THE HONGKONG
TELEGRAPH.
FRIDAY, ́AUGUST
6, 1937.
BOOKS Edited by Roger Pippett
Empire Suicide
THE DEFENCE OF THE EMPIRE
By Sir Norman Angell
(Hamish Hamilton, Gs.)
OCIALISTS and Liberals should put this book at the top of their reading list, master
the electorale.
They will thus combine duty with pleasure, for the book is written with nil Gir, Norman Angell's entrancing skill in argument and mastery in exposition, and in the immaculate literary style which he has made the complete servant of his thought.
Iis subject is the "new John Bull": the new "Old Guard of Im- foreign policy of the perialism," of the Colonel Bilmps, the Chelten- han Majors of the Tory Right
How shall we explain, he asks, the astonish- ing fact that for the last six years the foreign policy of the "Old Guard of
has been precisely Imperialism that which threatens the Empire most acutely, which has, singe by stage, weakened its defensive posl- tion in actuality and has also spread wider and wider about the world the ophulon that the Empire is done for "7
About the amazing political fact there can be no argument. Since 1831. the defensive position of the Empire has been wenkened in the Far and Near East, In the Eastern and West- ern Mediterranean and in Western Europe.
Japan ng begun to establish her power on the Chinese intialand, men- acing British outposts on the name mainland and, at one stage removed. India and Australia.
Italy's conquest of Abyssinia, laken with her possession of Libya, may well make the British position In the Near East untenable. Franco, if he wins. And if his German and Italian allies are established in Morocco, with com plete the closing of the Suez Canal route. the life-line" of the Empire, and the longer Cape route will be threatened by Gerning bases in the Canaries.
The single-handed defence of the Empire has already becoins impossible against a concerted attack-ani would it be otherwise than concerted?-by the "three great carnivores."
If I were the case that these cu croachments on the defensibility of the Empire were inevitable owing to the impossibility of preventing them, then
PAMPHLETS
NUTRITION: THE POSITION IN ENGLAND TO-DAY, by O. C. M.
· M'Gonigle, - ELD.. (Industrial Christ- Inn Fellowship, 2d.). Stockton-on- Tuea forthright Medical Officer of Health on the conditions which breed malnutrition in a system of cross- mica which is profoundly unsatis Inctory,"
FACTS OF UNEMPLOYMENT, by H. J. Hutchinson, (Industrial Christian Fellowship, ad.). An analysis the causes and distribution of unemploy ment which underlines the urgency of "deliberate and organised "action. FIFTY PACIFIST POINTS, by the Rev. A. G. Pritchard. LC.C. now. ling, 36, York-road, 8.W.11. 13d. pust free). The pacifist case, clearly and honestly stated. But no new argu- ments.
O
rate.
THREE COMRADES
By Erich Maria Remarque (Hutchinson, 84. &d.)
LD soldiers never dle: they don't even fade away--in the world of fiction, at any
c
Like Siegfried Sassoot Herr Re marque has-and always will have- the War on his mind. The accent of the old soldier predominates. And, as in All Quiet on the Western Front The Road Hack, so in his latest novel the theme of comradeship persists. Robert, Otto and Gottfried, sur- vivors of 1914-1915, miret again in Berila shortly before the Hier coup. Robert. who tells the story, and Gottfried, are repair mechanics and relief drivers in a small garage run by Otto, who is also the proud owner of Karl, looking car which can actually pan anything in sight.
battered-
In the course of one of Otto's wild races, Robert meets Pat and falls love with her. A rich man's girl, he feels despondently. But to his de lighted surprise, sito falls in turn for him. They depart for their honey- moon. Pat is taken . And his friends get a specialist to her after a tremendous night rkle.
Not long after she has to go to an alpine sanatorium. Things slump from bad to worse with the others. They Gott. are forced to sell the garage.
fried is shot by a Nazi. Otto motors Robert to the sanatorium, where Pat is dying, retums to Berlin, sells Karl and wires Hobart the money a week or so before Pat dies.
Comradeship, love and death--these
the author's Inpiration. And how forcefully he stages them, how sensi tively be sets their backgrouíid, so that detall Ilves-the deceptively avery
pale queue outside_a shabby car, cinema Robert's room lit by a Turia's night-sign. the city drifting in a rai Pat's cap bobbing in the blue ascii of the sea.
From All Quiet to Three Comrades, Herr Remarque, has travelled a long way, But he has not altered. ・ This simple and moving tals häs ils roolà In the trenches. Por--and this, fimt Bik 2. Inut, la Zia algnificante-he is a Man
Who Will Never Forgut.
FUN AT THE BALLET
Bentley's One of Nicolas illustration5 to his high- spirited and most amusing "Ballet-Hoo" book,
(Just published by the Cresset Press, 53.),
they would have to be made the best uf
But the astonishing fact is that ench of these encroachments has been alled with pleasure by the "Old Guard. Japan, Italy, Franco, Miller ол And been egged -all have applauded, excused or defended by the very imperialist circles who, before The War, would have been hysterically call upon Britain to save herself before It was too late.
Why?
First, says Sir Norman, the British capitalists are genuinely afraid of what war will do to Capitalism, and their first thought reaction is to clear out of the way, even if he only way upen is, effectively, retreat.
Second, they are unwilling to take steps that might have the inevitable effect of enharrassing Fascism at the expense of Socialism. Communism or egalitarian deniserncy,
Third, dislike the League and of everything it stands for in the way of a new international order is stronger with the Old Guard than fear for Im perial security. They hate the new world order, as witch-doctors hate physicians. If the Empire enn be de- fended only by policles which will win resounding successes for the League. abolish Imperialism and build a world of justier and treedam-then so much the worse for the Empire,
Bucialists and Liberals should be making these facts known to the Britishi peuples. The "defence of the Empire." for them, becomes more and raure the defence of Britain and of four smallish Dominion democracles, This defence is part of the general de fence of democracy and law against Fascisin: and this vital "defence of Empire the Old Guard consistently
R. F. betrapa.
LOIS IN LOVE
By Lewis (bhs
(Dent, 75. 6d.)
OIS,
that sensitive child, adored her father, a man who could never be relied on to re- nember her birthday, but had "a way of appearing at unexpected moments with the most magnif- cently useless presents."
He sent her to boarding-school and, then to a less expensive day-school- and then disappeared from her life for ever. On which Lols packed her trunk and went to work on the stall of n country orphanage.
How he fell in love with Mr. Wesion -the letters they wrote to each other, their meetings, his strange ayoldance of her, her disappointment and his kimate return-that shall be Mr. Cibbs' story.
There are many false notes and some affectations. For the author is at keeping is waiting. Lots in Love is not, the novel he has it in him to write. But it is sympathetic and quietly con. trolled. And it has an attractive air of the inevitable.
R. P.
"Pardon!"
O
BONS OF THE EAGLE By Ronald Matthews (Methaca, 128. Gd.)
LIFE IN
Fall European States new or old, Albania is, surely, the least known. But, niso surely, A it is not the least important. penalty of its geographical plac- ing is that it is one of Europe's
danger zones."
It is a poor country, a weak coun- try- "backward" country--it lles only thirty miles across the straits from Otranto. It is the first stage on the route of any Italian penetration of the Balkans.
Such penetration is not surprising. It has nothing to do with Fascism, It came very near to military conquest after the War. Wilson, Lloyd George and Clemenceau gave Italy the man- date for Albania (a charming and generous act!)
But the Albanians proved disrespect- ful to the trenty-makers and trouble. some to the Italians-co troublesome that in three months of guerilla war they persuaded the Italian troops to the Italian Govern)- withdraw and ment to "return" the mandate:
Since then the Italians have been
It is creeping back by other means. a dangerous business, this pushing of a And Big Power into the nikana Albania, the point the push, should
be interesting because of all this, even it wore deadly dull in self.
But in point of fact, as any reader of Ronald Matthews' Sons of the Eagle will quickly agreo, IL is, so far from being dull, a fascinating. picturesque and exclting land.
Mr. Matthews has not-and I am grateful-written n portentous poli- tical treatise, He has given me at any rate exactly what I wanteil: a "por- trait of Albania." carefully, honestly and at the same time brilliantly
painted.
Necessarily it is a composite por trait. It has a vivid personal impres sion of King Zog," the loneliest rufer in Europe." It has sketches of the strange .impact of West and East in DuraZZO and Tirana: of the hillmen of thic high valleys where the blood feud is still the law; of the Bektashi monks, whose secret rites may link with Jasonry.
Il touches tears, because the history of Albanin in tragedy and ila ballads and legends are those of a tragic race. And it has laughter. In fact, it really is a good book-a very good book. And what more in to be said? W. N. E
MURDER IN HOSPITAL
Josephine Bell' (Longman's, Green, 75. 6.)
"A MOST origi al piece of work"
was the scientific verdict on the killings in this story. Bo it was --and the person in question, find- ing hospital to be practically a murderer's pamdise, might still have been bumpling them off unnoticed but for a sideline in strangling-
You will like this book, too, for 15 lively, Informed sketches of everybody, students and ataif, from patients with lots of agreeable technicalities about blood sugar curves and neuto anaphylaxis thrown in. P. E. II.
RAPID REVIEWS
ENGLAND UNDER TRUST. Do- scribed and Blustrated by J. Dixon- Sealt fAlexander MacLehöre, 7e: Gd.), Being a description of the principal properties held by the National Trust, from Dunkery Beacon to Carlylo's House. With a preface by Professor a. M. Trevelyauı.
A GREAT LORD, by Paul Frischatter (Cussell, B. d.). An historical romance of the Napoleonte era, staging the rise and fall of n schem- ing Polish nobleman, from his visit to Paris to his return to obscurity when the Emperor fails.__On__the____ grand scale, but leisurely. DEATH ON THE BOARD, by John Khodo (Cottins, Ta, Ga.). Five most ingenious murders aro scattered through this story. Though the who and the why can soon be guest. you will read on happily to the end, A well-written, workmanlike tale of detection.
MATTHEW SILVERMAN, by Vicior
Canning (Hodder and Stoughton, 7. Cd.). Sketches of life in a country town-as seen through the
of the local newspaper office and the home of its pro- prietor. Full of humour and pleasant observation. AVALANCHE, by Gordon Wayward
A LYRIC
H
CRADLE OF LIFE By Louls Adarato (Gollance, Ba. Gd.J
ERE is a distinguished and fascinating book which I am unable to classify. It is not nction or fact or exposition, but a mixture of all three.--
Written throughout in the first person, this story of peasant life in Croatia before the War, tells how a fost child, Rudolf, is recog- nised by his maternal grandfather and transformed overnight to lording in a castle. So far, you any to yourself, this is fiction, founded on the author's childhood memories.
And then a doubt creep in. It is as though Louis Adamic had invented Rudolf only to find Rudolf taking over the pen.
But, anyway, they both want to say tho same thing-people who naturally good are often forced by but circumstances to behave badly.
the change the circumstances and natural goodness will come out on top. Meanwhile, don't condemn: try to understand.
And because Louis-Rudolf is far more of a poet than a preacher, he nakes that tragic peasant, Dora, the
T11 significant figure in his tale. world would brand her a murderess: Rudolf sees her as the symbol of women everywhere who give all they -have for the sake of the children who
depend on them.
A strange, lyrical and remarkable book-wili nu ironical ending. Life is going to get happier and happler for these peasants. But to-morrow an Archduke is coming to Sarajevo. And n bomb will be thrown.
TWO THOUSAND ·MILLION MAN-
R
POWER
By G. E. Trevelyan (Gollancz, 7s. G.J
ECALLING the far-off-and- long-ago days of 1920, you are probably startled now and again to find how different you were then and how different the world about you seemed, Have things changed so much? Or is it you?
Miss Trevelyan's intelligent novel will start the same haro and also help you to catch it. For ale traces n double graph--bistory as recorded in newspaper headlines side by side with the contemporary history of two young people in London.
Fortunately, there are not two thou- sand million Roberts and Katherines. But there are a good many of them working off their destiny behind a deceptive facade of well-being and activity. A thoughtful story, skilfully composed.
R. P.
RINGSIDE
ONLY PAIN.15 REAL By Robert Westerby (Barker, 71. Ed.)
THIS tale is Rough Stuff, but the Goods. Written in the clipped American style, using every trick of understatement and suggestion, it will keep you on tip- toe all the time.
Van and John Logan are twins. Van is a glant and as hottest na the day: John is puny, wily and degenerate. with a talent for music.
Van breaks into the boxing racket. He wins his fights and is on his way to the championship when he discovers that John is "playing him for a sucker," + that he hates being always second fiddle to Van. He is being battered and hammered for the sake of someone who loathes and deceives him-and "only pain is rent.".
But there is more to the story that that. Mr. Westerby gives you hair- raising description of riding the (Imvelling without a ticket on a freight train), brief but vivid glimpses of young American intellectuals and several terride fights.
reds
The characterisation is conventional and you extremely effective. It is pl end of the author's confident technique that he can sketch a crooked boxing promoter and his vain, greedy wife in a few snatches of dialogue and let a murder take place off-stage.
This in not, however, a book for llic squeamish, There is, for instance, a record of the tarring and feathering of "a bunch of teda for the crime (1) of organising a union. meeting which is the most powerful plece of writing that has come my way in a long time. Yes, Mr. Westerby understands more then boxing. He has seen men tako the count from life...
R. P.
(Golianes. 78. 64.). A arst novel CANTON AGENTS
new
about life in a Swiss nanntorium, which is at theme for writer to attempt. Eined Thomas Mann wrote thai masterpiece, The Magic Mountain. A fresh, lively, honest essay in story-telling in ita own way.
BUILDING A COTTAGE, by Esther Meynell (Chapman and itall, 78.6d.). A delightful successor to the author's Sussex Collage, describing the pino- ticn1 aspecta of homo-making---
for
FRID
Thongkong Telegraph.
bricklaying. Inth-and-plaster, joinery WM. FARMER & Co.
and so on. Not forgetting the lightning-conductor.
COUNT THE "TELEGRAPHS" EVERYWHERE
Victoria Hotel Building:"
Shameen, Canton. Tel. 13501.
LIVING
Dangerously
MORE explosives are being made
during 1937 than in any year since the Great War, not only be- cause Britain and other nations are laying up huge atores of explosives
also be for defence purposes, but cause dynamite and its companions are more and more taking the place of the man with the pick and shovel. Many think of explosives na being exclusively for use in lethal weapons, but most of the great engineering love feats of this century would been impossible without them.
A single pound of dynamite will break away eight tons of rock, and inining and Irrigating projects which demand the removal of vast masses of stone can be carried out with
im- speed that would have been possible a tamudred years ago.
To the ordinary man a visit to a high explosive factory is an ardeal. I tried to convince myself that I frame of must adopt a scientifle
ind. Explosions just didn't occur- unless something went wrong!
My galde explained the safeguards now adopted, told me of the few oc- cidents he had seen in twenty-five years' dally contact with enough ex- plosives to send a goodsized city u in dust, sald he would rather be in a factory than cross the recalled that hundreds of men ente to the factory every morning with as Ittle worry ns I went to my office, but still
The Supreme
street. I
Offence
"Empty your pockets!" I got rid not only of my matches, but also my fountain pen, knife, keys, and colns. I kept my pencil-there is no metal metal in it. Carrying matches or objects is the greatest crime, enough Just to make to get man the sack.
il more difleult, pockets are couraged, and even sewn up.
dis-
A pair of rubber shoes were provided for me. My guide showed me his own special shoes, built with- out a single nail, in them.
of
Everywhere you see evidence precautions to Avold not only sparks. but even friction, for friction means heat, and safely depends upon tem- perature control. Thermoincters are the most important instruments In the factory of death.
When the glycerine is injected into the mixture of nitric and sulphuric 10 be acids the temperature has
liquids watched, and the flow of controlled. Sometimes the tempera- ture insists on rising. The men can- If a not simply turn tall and run, "brew" of perhaps thousands of pounds of nitroglycerine went up, the damage would not be limited to that single building.
Without Trace
The guide keeps talking about the
reaction that is! chemistry of the laking place, but somehow I feel more interested in what would hap- pen if the temperature started to go up.
"It's perfectly all right as long as there are no foreign particles," I am teld, "and as long as the ingredients cooling those are pure. You see, catly keep the temperature down... ..Well, of course, sometimes It does Roup. Then the operator 'drowns'
running the nitro-glycerine by into a tank of water."
it
He did not add "and hope for the beat," but that is what I felt. Actual- ly the nitrating process, thanks to the ret carch workers, is no longer the most dangerous. It is foreign partic- les in the package of the explosive. of or perhaps the accidental dropping
you see, the a foul, or perhaps. ...
what difficulty about finding out mukes particular charge of high explosive gu up is that it leaves very ttle evidence afterwards, and it is not often the man who makes the mistake lives to tell the tale.
But as we moved to another buil- ding, where the nitro-glycerine
my guide told me of some purified, remarkable escapes. He told me of
aminer who, strictly against the rules packed with each charge, cut u knife. a stick of dynumite with The stick did not blow up, but when he closed the knife afterwards one tiny particles were detonated. The man escaped with the loss of his hand.
Metal Banned
Then there was the man who was blown up and stripped of every inch shoes. of clothing, Including his which were found several hundred yards away, but escaped without a scrutch.
Nitro-glycerine is a temperamental explosive. It is not as bad nu come of the explosives used for detonators, and
it does not blow up if a fly alights on it like nitrogen iodide, but it is too The nervy for use. So it is combined
other substances. with some mixing is carried out by wooden machinery. There is not a piece of melal in the place, unless it is lead, which is used for some floors because it will not strike sparks, Dynamite will stand amount of knocking about.
-certain
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r
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7 Pres. Grant 10 Pres. Jackson
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"Midnight' Sept," 24°
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OUR BRITISH CROSSWORDS
ACROSS
letting to juck senso, 1 Seems
crabs eat inder (hyphen, 7, 7). 9 Treats very breezily
10 London suburb that should be quite silent after 11.30 p.m. 11 Flag.
12 Man who makes sails.
13 Hall of the Middle Ages still
reserved in London.
10 Do you know the Roman field in Ely? It should be sougirt with zest.
17
Not so sweet: In fact, it sounds
a nasty one to catch.
10 Performs a leech's function. 22 Up-to-date lists.
In the 25 Jaines's orders.
story books a stick of dynamite ex-20 They still show where the flog- plodes when it is thrown, but actual
Ring was, In Wolcs.
ly a train-load of dynamite has been 27 This game is not vulgar in spite
of its round. derailed without a single silek firing.
Moreover, it can be controlled. The 30 Made with her best. experts can bore holes and place the 31 Recount, charge so that a neat square foot of stone is blown out of the concrete of the ground floor without the tenanla of the first storey knowing anything about it.
There are thousands of men eng- aged in making exposives every day. It is rather strange to find that they are a good risk for insurance that their death-rate is no different from
hundred other trades.
Perhaps they get used to lving in the presence of concentrated death. the For
me two hours spent in proximity of enough high explosive to blow a city sky-high is enough,
Ha Harh Custalla
32 Thoroughfare of a famous old
Indy brev.),
(two words,
DOWN
8 Glowing. 14 Credited
with having a pull with his fellow countrymen,
15 All the best.
18 Indecorous, indeed to insist that
I'm not boastful.
20 Where the lamb is still to be
found in London.
21
Perfumed.
22
Should one smoke in this when
the conductor calls, “No smok- ing allowed"
23 Put by itself.
24 Beats an egg any day.
29 Competent.
20 This iron was used by St. An-
thony, but not for golf.
'Yesterday's Bolution
MACEBE A RERO 1B)
E LE GX DAIR ALONE REPAIR O LWEL E O NADOB TANNIN PRINTED"
TIH MEBBIE
12, 2, nu-
M
i Tense not in the grammars, 2 Dangling without a head: this
may be catching.
* Let on.
4 Is truly an ansgrain.
Climb down.
Τη
coming down outskie, or go- up inside, you will find this alonic.
7 Does ple turn out to be an
avent? Yes
FU
O LEAR
Ja
FAYET
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