and the latest one that appears is marked by an idea that is so good and so much to the point that we wonder why it has not been seized upon before. The idea is that of giving, in the illustrations, the characters of the book the costumes and the environment of the days in which Bunyan lived and wrote. All the scenes of the story, Vanity Fair, the Valley of the Shadow of Death, the Valley of Humiliation, Doubting

Castle, the Delectable Mountain, the Slough of Despond, grew out of the familiar country about Elstow and Bedford, and without doubt the people of the story were in Bunyan's brain arrayed in the

cavalier and Roundhead dress, which in the illustrations of the present edition is

used for the first time. In England this new edition is being sold at the price of two guineas; but the American publishers, the Messrs. Fleming H. Revell Company have decided to issue it at a popular price.

phemous, and entirely failed of the notoriety for which the author had hoped. When we spoke of it in these pages we had no idea who the author was, but we characterised it as "a vulgar and impudent humbug," and we have since come to the conclusion that we erred on the side of leniency. At any rate we had utterly forgotten the book until the other day we picked up My Mamie Rose. Not

that the two books

are so much alike, but one somehow suggests the other. The Journal of Arthur Stirling was dishonthroughout; on the other hand, Iwe believe Owen Kildare to be sincere. Only his

est

book seems to be unnecessary and he seems to have missed such opportunities as he had. We do not wish to be thought to be speaking disrespectfully or lightly of an early body of workers who undoubtedly do an immense amount of good and whom we reregard with admiration, when we say that My Mamie Rose is simply the "experience" of a reformed Salvation Army sidewalk exhorter, expanded into a book of three hundred pages.

The Story of Owen Kildare. Last spring there appeared a book entitled The Journal of Arthur Stirling, which purported to tell the story of a young genius striving for recognition in New York, how he wrote a great book, how he eked out a living as a car conductor while waiting fame, how he met with constant rebuffs from fat-witted publishers, how a wicked editor basely deceived him, and how at last, utterly worn out he put an end to his life by throwing himself into the Hudson River. The book was a worthless thing, utterly silly, hysterical, and at times blas

In a letter, which the publishers "feature" prominently on the cover wrapper, Mr. Hall Caine is quoted as writing of My Mamie Rose as "a real transcript from life." As the greater part of the book is given up to an account of the pleasures of the Bowery and experiences in such edifying resorts as Tim Callahan's and Barney Flynn's and Billy McGlory's, we venture the opinion of the Earl of Paw

tucket in the play, that Mr. Hall Caine is probably "spoofing-talking through his hat." At any rate we hasten to acquit him of the specific knowledge which his unqualified statement seems to suggest. Briefly, the true story of Owen Kildare as told in My Mamie Rose is that he was born in Catherine Street in 1864, orphaned in his infancy, and adopted by a childless couple, became a Park Row newsboy, then a "beer slinger" in a tough Bowery dive, then won some local fame in the prize ring and became a bouncer in an infamous resort. That was Owen Kildare's life until he was thirty years of age. He could neither read nor write, but acquired a comfortable living by guiding sightseers through the slums, and by various methods of "graft." But one day he met a little school teacher and protected her from insult in the approved Chimmie Fadden style, and that was the beginning of his regeneration. taught him to read and write and made a man of him. She was the Mamie Rose,

She

but she died one month before they were to be married. Her work, however, was done. Owen Kildare kept up the struggle, and at the present time is beginning a career as a literary worker which his publishers regard as "promising." We regret to say that we do not entirely share their optimism.

An Exposer of Municipal Corruption. Few sociological articles of recent years have aroused such interest and discussion as Lincoln Steffens on the corruption and mismanagement in the government of the leading American cities. And they have served a purpose. St. Louis was at first angry, called a mass meeting to deny everything and denounce Mr. Steffens and raised a fund to protest and prove its innocence. Soon afterwards when Mr. Steffens visited St. Louis he was well received and asked to write another such article by the very man who was charged with the organisa

tion of the public's protest. The article had aroused the town. After it appeared 200,000 buttons, bearing the inscription "Folk and Good Government," were worn on the streets to make plain the public's approval of the young district attorney, who, after being elected by the machine, owned no master but his conscience, and fought practically alone for the arrest, conviction and imprisonment of the bribers and grafters who were looting St. Louis. This alone was acknowledgment of the truth of "Tweed Days in St. Louis," and "The shamelessness of St. Louis." Although an associate editor of McClure's Magazine, Mr. Steffens still calls himself a "newspaper man." "And these articles," he said "are straight journalism. I made no attempt at fine writing, I thought merely of telling the story. This month's magazine will contain my last 'story'-at least for a while on the criminal condition of our municipal governments. It will be about New York. Soon I shall begin a series along the same lines on the States."

Mr. Steffens's boyhood was spent for the most part on horseback in riding for days at a time over Sacramento Valley with gun and fishing-rod across his saddle-bow. From Sacramento, California, he went to the military school at San Mateo, then to the University of California where he was graduated in 1889. To pursue further the study of philosophy, sociology, history, politics, and political economy he went to the Universities of Berlin, Heidelberg, Leipzig, and of France. It was his father's idea that he acquire a thorough academic training and then prepare to engage in business. But in Leipzig he fell in love with a fellow student at the Sorbonne and married her secretly in London. After quietly studying at the Brittish Museum, he sailed for New York. It was then that Mr. Steffens found himself with two people to support and no taste for dependence; he tried his hand at fiction. His first story he copied carefully and Louis Loeb, whom he had met with other artists in Paris, illustrated it and took it to Harper's. It was accepted and Mr. Steffens received $45. "I thought," he says, "here's a living-I can write one a week. But it was two years before I had another story or article accepted by

a magazine. In resplendent raiment and a top hat I sought to persuade newspaper editors to give me a trial, but not only my appearance, but my academic course stood in my light. At last, I got a position on the Evening Post on space. They did not want me, but simply took me because of my persistency. I worked in a panic of fear. My first assignment was about a clergyman who had retired and another had taken his place. The first week I earned $1.75. Of an indolent nature, that experience was the best possible for me. Scared, with responsibilities on my shoulders, jostled by men, not theories, I 'hustled to beat the band.' I made good and was put on rapid transit. Henry J. Wright, city editor of the Post, kept giving me assignments just a little over my head. Then there was a panic in Wall Street, and our financial reporter being in London, the Post was caught. I was asked to cover Wall Street. It was a trying assignment for a green man. First I went to a few of the principal bankers. I told them my predicament and the Post's, and assured them if they would give me the information I would never break their confidence, and would make up in accuracy and carefulness what I lacked in knowledge of the Street. In consequence the Post had many beats, and I knew things weeks before they occurred.

"When, in 1893, Dr. Parkhurst set out upon the trail of vice and corruption in New York City which resulted in the appointment of Mr. Roosevelt as President of the Police Board, I was detailed to Police Headquarters, and remained there several years. It was there I 'got on to,' political and police methods, particularly those of corruption. I had studied books; there I studied realities and conditions to such advantage that now I can go into a strange city and with my knowledge of New York methods understand their peculiar methods of corruption. Although confronted with positive realities and learning of partly successful ways of relief I have never lost the theoretical interest garnered by years of study." As in his articles on corruption in the cities in McClure's Magazine, Mr. Steffens did not mince matters, and no one's position in the community was a surety of his non-exposure in the Post. He was of acknowl