essentially immoral. "Captain Mansana" is a story of Italian
life, based, so the author assures us, on actual characters and
happenings that had come within the range of his observation during
his stay abroad. Its interest does not lie in any particular
problem, but rather in the delineation of the titular figure,
a strong and impetuous person whose character suggests that of
Ferdinand Lassalle, as the author himself points out to us in a
prefatory note. "Dust" is a pathetic little story having for
its central idea what seems like a pale reflection of the idea
of Ibsen's "Ghosts," which had appeared a few months before.
It is the dust of the past that settles upon our souls, and clogs
their free action. The special application of this thought is to
the religious training of children:--

"When you teach children that the life here below is nothing to
the life above, that to be visible is nothing in comparison with
being invisible, that to be a human being is nothing in comparison
with being dead, that is not the way to teach them to view life
properly, or to love life, to gain courage, strength for work,
and love of country."

In the play, "Leonarda," and again in the play, "A Glove," the
author recurs to the woman question; in the one case, his theme
is the attitude of society toward the woman of blemished
reputation; in the other, its attitude toward the man who in his
relation with women has violated the moral law. "Leonarda" is a
somewhat inconclusive work, because the issue is not clearly
defined, but in "A Glove" (at least in the acting version of the
play, which differs from the book in its ending) there is no lack
of definiteness. This play inexorably demands the enforcement of