s officers "that I spend my time
composing poetry, especially during our battles." But that he did not
write for the sake of writing must be clear to anyone who reads the
book, even if the author had not declared his motive in the preface.
Here he admits that, though "soldiers think of nothing so little
as failure," it was in fact the thought of possible failure that
determined him, at the very start, to prepare from day to day his
defence. Perhaps this is not quite the attitude of one who stakes
all upon the great chance. In another significant passage of
self-revelation he tells us how, on a tour of inspection in Egypt,
he met RUPERT BROOKE, "the most distinguished of the Georgians." "He
looked extraordinarily handsome ... stretched out there on the sand,
with the only world that counts at his feet." Whether in ordinary
times the world of art is or is not the "only world that counts,"
I cannot say, but I am certain that to a soldier entrusted with
an enterprise of so great moment the only world that should have
"counted" at that hour was the world of war. If the chapter which
describes the failure that followed the landing in Suvla Bay exposes
the incapacity of some of his officers to inspire their men with that
little more energy which would have ensured a great victory, it seems
also to expose a certain want of compelling personality in the High
Command. But of the military questions here raised I make no pretence
to judge, and in any case judgment has been passed on them already.
The interest of the diary lies in its appeal as a human document.
It is the _apologia_ of a man who, for all his criticism, often
apparently justified, of the authorities at home (there are passages
which he must surely have suppressed if Lord KITCHNER had still been
living), sets down scarce a word in malice and but few in bitterness
of spirit; who appreciates at its high worth the devotion and
gallantry of his officers and men; who, whatever qualities he may have
lacked for his difficult task, reveals himself as loyal at heart and
generous by nature.

* * * * *

Miss RUTH HOLT BOUCICAULT (a name with a double theatrical
association) has written, in _The Rose of Jericho_ (PUTNAM), a novel
of American stage life which I should suppose comes as near to being
a true picture as such stories can. She derives her title from
the convenient habit of the desert rose of detaching itself from
uncongenial or exhauste