During the present century, and especially since the World War, the vogue of the detective story has been enormous. Its popularity (like that of the "Cross Word Puzzle") may be due to the demand for some "compensation" for tired brains which find the occupations of daily life an insufficient stimulus, and have despaired of tackling the riddle of the universe. The morbidity of the modern sex novel also tends to drive back the reading public to ingenious story-telling. On the whole, detective fiction seems to be a recreation to the author as to the reader, and some of the most successful examples of it belong to the bibliography of writers who would prefer to be remembered by more enduring work. A. E. W. Mason has condescended to the art, with the hap piest results, in At the Villa Rose and The House of the Arrow. G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown, distantly modelled on Fr. John O'Connor of Bradford, as Sherlock Holmes was distantly modelled on Dr. Bell of Edinburgh, has pressed the roman policier into the service of metaphysics and even of theology. A. A. Milne's Red House Mystery is a paragon worthy of a great humourist. E. C. Bentley may yet go down to posterity as a homo unius libri if he does not attempt to repeat the success of Trent's Last Case, the despair and the model of all detective writers.
Of the authors who have made their name since the war, Mrs. Agatha Christie probably deserves the palm for ingenuity (in The Mysterious Affair at Styles, for example, and The Murder of Roger Ackroyd) ; but some of her work is disfigured by sen sationalism. On the other side, there is a tendency to undue labori ousness of detail in the writing of F. W. Croft and R. Austin Free man. G. D. H. Cole's work may be taken as a good example of detective writing which is conscientious without being pedantic. In general it seems fair to observe that authors who only write one or two detective stories (Philip Macdonald, for example, au thor of The Rasp) are more readable than those professional craftsmen who turn out a new book with every season.
(R. A. K.) Other Mystery Stories.—Riddle stories are mystery tales based on a question and answer which in no way call for or depend upon the work of a detective, either professional or amateur. Among the finest riddle stories are Poe's "The Oblong Box," and "The Gold Bug." In more modern times Kipling proved him self a master in this line, with "The Sending of Dana Da," and "His Wedded Wife." Collins' "The Woman in White" is a riddle story, and a perfect example is Frank Stockton's "The Lady or the Tiger." De Quincey's "The Avenger" and Bulwer's "A Strange Story" are classic riddle stories. The distinguishing feature of the riddle story is that the reader shall be confronted with a number of mysterious facts of which the explanation is reserved till the end. Aroused curiosity, sustained suspense and an unexpected but
satisfactory final revelation are the chief requisites for the plot.
The ghost story, strictly speaking, is a tale of the supernatural. From the days of the Witch of Endor, the superhuman personage has held an exalted place in literature. Shakespeare, Dickens and Washington Irving number among their characters ghosts who became famous. Kipling and Marion Crawford have added to the list. The ghost story must fall into one of two classes. Either the ghost is a spectre or it is a machination of a living person. But in either case, fear is the dominant note, and ghost stories include apparitions or other hair-raising horrors that fill readers with shivers of delight. "The Horla" by Maupassant and "What Was It?" by FitzJames O'Brien are typical and famous ghost stories. Kipling's "They" is in the front rank, as is Henry James's "The Turn of the Screw." "The Shadow on the Wall" by Mary E. Wilkins is a perfect example.
From the ages of antiquity the puzzle has held its own among mental activities ; and puzzle, in its broader sense, includes all branches of mystery stories. The dictionaries define puzzle as "a riddle, toy or contrivance which is designed to try one's ingenuity." This is the crux of the mystery story. It is designed to try the reader's ingenuity at re-solution, and as an athlete rejoices in his muscular prowess, so the mental acrobat revels in concentrating all his brain power on an analytical problem.
(C. Ws.) MYSTICISM, a phase of thought, or rather perhaps of f eel ing, which from its very nature is hardly susceptible of exact definition. It appears in connection with the endeavour of the human mind to grasp the divine essence or the ultimate reality of things, and to enjoy the blessedness of actual communion with the Highest. The first is the philosophic side of mysticism ; the second, its religious side. The first effort is theoretical or speculative ; the second, practical. The thought that is most intensely present with the mystic is that of a supreme, all-pervading, and indwelling power, in whom all things are one. Hence the speculative utter ances of mysticism are always more or less pantheistic in char acter. On the practical side, mysticism maintains the possibility of direct intercourse with this Being of beings—intercourse, not through any external media such as an historical revelation, oracles, answers to prayer, and the like, but by a species of transfusion or identification, in which the individual becomes in very truth "par taker of the divine nature." God ceases to be an object to him, and becomes an experience.