POLLY THE PAGAN
Her Lost Love Letters
BOOKS BY
ISABEL ANDERSON
The Spell of Belgium$3.75
The Spell of Japan3.75
The Spell of the Hawaiian
Islands and the Philippines3.75
Polly the Pagan1.90
THE PAGE COMPANY
53 Beacon Street——Boston, Mass.
From an ideal portrait by DeWitt Lockman
Polly
POLLY
THE PAGAN
HER LOST LOVE LETTERS
WITH A FOREWORD BY
BASIL KING
THE PAGE COMPANY
BOSTON
MDCCCCXXII
Copyright, 1922,
By The Page Company
All rights reserved
Entered at Stationers’ Hall, London
Made in U. S. A.
First Impression, September, 1922
PRINTED BY C. H. SIMONDS COMPANY
BOSTON, MASS., U.S.A.
I dedicate
this book with love
to my cousin, Mary Brandegee,
who is as dear to me
as a sister.
“She vanished through the fingers like a card inthe hands of a magician.”[Pg v]
FOREWORD
Of the many subjects open to the novelist none is more fertile ininterests than the international theme, and none more arresting inappeal. Clash of character being the starting point of drama we haveit amplified in the international by both sympathy and dissonance.Mutual attraction between individuals will sometimes overleap racialdifferences in point of view; and yet racial differences in point ofview will always be at war with mutual attraction between individuals.All contrasts, all complexities, are focussed on this single stage,while one gets as nowhere else the conflict which each new-borngeneration cannot but wage against the dictation of the ages. On thiscrowded scene bring in that American element to which the dictation ofthe ages means relatively nothing and the wealth of the dramatic fieldbecomes obvious.
It is curious, therefore, that it has been so little touched. It hasbeen entered, but not[Pg vi] very far. The great Russian and Frenchnovelists, with their concentration on the life immediately roundthem, in the main ignore it. The English have worked it a little, butnot often, and not with much insight. The truth seems to be that theEuropean n