than those writers who make haste to submerge the difficulties of our
holding-place in the universe under a flood of false and sentimental
assumptions. Maupassant was a true and dutiful lover of our earth. He
says himself in one of his descriptive passages: "Nous autres que seduit
la terre . . ." It was true. The earth had for him a compelling charm.
He looks upon her august and furrowed face with the fierce insight of
real passion. His is the power of detecting the one immutable quality
that matters in the changing aspects of nature and under the
ever-shifting surface of life. To say that he could not embrace in his
glance all its magnificence and all its misery is only to say that he was
human. He lays claim to nothing that his matchless vision has not made
his own. This creative artist has the true imagination; he never
condescends to invent anything; he sets up no empty pretences. And he
stoops to no littleness in his art--least of all to the miserable vanity
of a catching phrase.



ANATOLE FRANCE--1904


I.--"CRAINQUEBILLE"


The latest volume of M. Anatole France purports, by the declaration of
its title-page, to contain several profitable narratives. The story of
Crainquebille's encounter with human justice stands at the head of them;
a tale of a well-bestowed charity closes the book with the touch of
playful irony characteristic of the writer on whom the most distinguished
amongst his literary countrymen have conferred the rank of Prince of