"Elsie's Motherhood"[20] is a story in which piety of the Sunday-school kind is curiously contrasted with villany in the shape of Ku Klux outrages. Elsie's children are all sweetness, obedience, and kisses, and live in an atmosphere of goodness that is revolting because it is monstrous. There is a suspicion of political purpose associated with the appearance of the book just at this time which does not improve it.
--The author of "Near to Nature's Heart"[21] shows abundant powers of invention, but his imagination is not sufficiently well regulated for the production of a natural or even plausible story. The individual who is so intimate with nature is a young girl whose father has fled from England and hidden himself in the forests of the Hudson river on account of a quarrel with his brother, which he (erroneously) supposes to have been a fatal one. His seclusion is so complete that his daughter grows up almost without the sight of man or womankind except the three who are in her father's hut, and the consequence is a partial reversion to the wild state from which we are nowadays supposed to have been somewhat removed by the process of evolution. The author dresses the nymph in a style that ingeniously indicates the character he desires to paint. "Her attire was as simple as it was strange, consisting of an embroidered tunic of finely dressed fawn skin, reaching a little below the knee, and ending in a blue fringe. Some lighter fabric was worn under it, and encased the arms. The shapely neck and throat were bare, though almost hidden by a wealth of wavy golden tresses that flowed down her shoulders. Her hat appeared to have been constructed out of the skin of the snowy heron, with its beak and plumage preserved intact, and dressed into the jauntiest style. Leggings of strong buckskin, that formed a protection against the briers and roughness of the forest, were clasped around a slender ankle, and embroidered moccasins completed an attire that was not in the style of the girl of the period, even a century ago." This nymph was fishing, and for a float used the bud of a water lily! This is quite characteristic of the author's idea throughout. In losing civilization this girl put on all the supposed graces and none of the known brutishness of the wild state. The result is an incongruous character, but it is quite in harmony with the general notion that the natural state is one of greater perfection than that we really dwell in. As for the story, it relates to Revolutionary times, introduces Washington and the Continental army, with battles, dangers, and other lively and thrilling situations. In plot it is crude and rough. The author makes the artistic mistake of introducing religion as a principal element of his tale, though it does not relate to a time or to persons characteristically religious. The variety of incident, the presence of historical characters, including Washington and "Captain" Molly, and a certain _quantum_ of real skill in the author, will no doubt make this book acceptable to the uncritical, but it does not deserve the attention of others. We notice that the publishers announce the "fourteenth thousand," which is the best indication of the book's popularity.