HEATHEN DAYS

A third panel in the Mencken autobiographical kaleidoscope, as the once near, now sage Mencken presents a potpourri of events and personalities from 1890 to 1936. This might be a sifting of the wheat from the chaff of material left over from Happy Days and Newspaper Days; it is certainly not second string material, for it is fresh and entertaining and delightful reading. He tells how the most popular man in the neighborhood fell from grace when he went a-courting; how a Shetland pony made his life and his brother's a misery; he talks of the Y M C A and its effect on him, his career at the Baltimore Polytechnic, of early newspaper days, of hangings and press agents and musiciane; of an abortive filing at the vice-presidency of the U.S.A., of a theatrical producer and his girl, of a trip to Europe before the war and an audience with the Pope; of prohibition, the Soopes trial, musings on Carthage, on modern Jerusalem, on cratorical politione and so on. Easy manner, with many a sidelight and excursion to provide comfortable and salty old slippers' reading. You've an established market there — don't miss it.