Books: Fair-Haired Carpeteer

THE FLYING CARPET—Richard Halliburton—Bobbs-Merrill ($3.75). Though he describes his activities during the last two years as “loafing about in my airplane,” energetic Author-Adventurer Richard Halliburton was really keeping his nose pretty close to his chosen grindstone—publishable, lecturable adventure. Many and far-fetched have been fair-haired Mr. Halliburton’s stunts: swimming the Hellespont, climbing Fujiyama, swimming the length of the Panama Canal (in many an installment), living on a West Indies island à la Robinson Crusoe. His books (The Royal Road to Romance, The Glorious Adventure, New Worlds to Conquer) have sold more than 250,000 copies, not counting $1 reprints. In his Wright-powered Stearman biplane, The Flying Carpet, piloted by one Moye Stephens, Halliburton rode leisurely from London to Manila. On the way they stopped at Timbuctoo, spent two months with the French Foreign Legion in Morocco, visited Petra, Bagdad, India’s Taj Mahal, claimed the first airplane photograph of Mt. Everest (Halliburton publishes a blurry picture which he says was taken at 18,000 ft.), were entertained by Dyak headhunters. For vicarious thrills of thoroughly professional daring, The Flying Carpet can safely be recommended to ladies’ social circles.