Page:Adams - Essays in Modernity.djvu/213

Rh ease, with all the fun of the fair and the fat morsels thereof thrown in with liberal hand. His vogue was the most universal one of our time. His popular limitations were plentiful enough, his cheap effects were glaring enough, to win him the applause of the intellectual groundlings, the noisy, imperious 'pit' of our contemporary theatre of art. Yet his achievement was so real and striking, his contribution to literature was so undeniable, that no one possessed of candour and intelligence could refuse to take him seriously. He had revealed to us, if partially and askew, still with singular power and vividness, what Anglo-India meant—what the life of the Anglo-Indian civil servant and soldier meant; and he had lifted the short story, as an expression of thought and emotion, a whole plane higher than he had found it. In return for this, not only did he receive the golden wages of an enthusiastic appreciation, but the passionate and general instinct repaid his revelation to us of broader and more animating horizons by the revelation of himself to himself. The cry was, 'Tell us of India—tell us of our redcoats! You can—will—must!' A year ago, in reviewing his tales, I was complaining of the injustice of the dedication of Soldiers Three to 'that very strong man, T. Atkins,' whereas there was little or nothing of T. Atkins in the book, but merely the old long-service