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Haif Mei fun of Easter is sending BOOKS to flics speçtal foks traditions of A m e riea n culture. Their history is to be found ti The Fiowering of New En gland. And now Mr.. Marquand cornes aiong <whope '«The Laie George. Aplet#»- won 'the" Pulitzer prize last year), and he proceeds -to debunk that g r oup of philosophers, thinkers, writers vaguely kriown as trans- cendentalists, by making ail man- ner of fun of their descendants. The Bri famiiy, living £rom one generation to another ti the an- cestral mansionon Wickford Point, just north of Boston, are a group of wild,' inconsistent, neurotic peo- pie who feel that the world-and this iricludes Mr. Roosevet-owes them a livinge. They neyer have, 50 f outc come nestea rwill es to oee the ere they feel ie life of the le author re- Iril." It's a * ~ pw~ /: Carl.Vagi Jorçn in s e kk ographyi, "Benjamin Franklin," on which he has beenr at ivorlk for a decade, set Jiimself thre task of portraying t he great American in full anrd rouiuling stature. Rie ias freed him from the Poor Richard mold in vhich ire iras so long been cast. Patriot, a new Chinese novel, it is true, but one whose Japanese setting excels the Chinese., Wu. I-wan, ýson of' a wealthy Chinese banker, lu sent to Japan for safety by his father, when the-public authorities discover the young manrisl invoived in. radical His Chinese home life, stufty. and. filied with constraint, l191n sharp* con- trast to the simpllcity, the cleanli- ness, the beauty of the Japanese resi- dence into whlch he is taken by a business friencj of the old banker. lapauese Gardeus .Here flowers are1 exquisitely ar-. ranged, gardens metlculously tended, houses aiinost furniture-less and equipped wlth screens, which serve as slidlng partitions. Everything ap- pears crdered and happy. Pearl Buck places ti contrast first the externalities of the Chinese and Japanese, then penetrates the more subtie psychoicigical differences of the races. Japanese girls, like Wu I-wan's wife (lie marries the daughter of the family into whjch he goes to live), thougli universdty bred andi proud of their modiernism. must r eci DY- il Mr. Marquarid tells lis story ti the first person, as a cousin o! the family and~ he appears to be the oniy one who even distaritly verges on the norin. But even he, exas- J, who was his beautiful ely devoted tc eried toz was org Pat t] ays in é who wi ke famnily AU5AJLLAVieineitbiLflhity of recurrent. earthquakes, and, a self-control that transcetids fear and personal desire are, Wu I-wan comes to learri, esserê- tially Japanese characteristics. Even in the face of a tremblor and tidal wave his wife maintains her com- posure. and- how its natives put up à tail fight to 1clouer -to-us,ý ions stem the tide. lau are ourc and Again, an d agairi these regional and htUs.