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Leader (1850-1860), 9th June 1860, Edition 2 of 2, Page 16

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      Lady Mokgajs".* A Mong The Changes That ...

      favourable ; but , according to Mr . ' Fitzpatrick , that able journal owed its existence to her ladyship . It is morally impossible to give our readers any detailed account of this disappointing book . Its topics are innumerable , and are so jumbled together , that we feel confused while wading through it . Lady Morgan was very well , bnt she hardly deserved ; such a defer . ee as the one on our table . Some of her works are able ; and she appears to have been good-natured and sympathizing . Morewithbut before her

      over , she was somewhat hardly dealt ; long death , which happened in 1859 , she appears to have outlived all the troubles and heart-burnings of her youth , and to have been surrounded with all that should accompany old age . "Vv e thus take leave of her , and invite the reader who is desirous of learning more of her history to study Mr . Fitzpatrick ' s indefatigable volume . It it be but a poor biography , they will find abundance of amusing details relative to the Irish stage of seventy years ago , and much gossip , literary and theatrical . Should it reach a second edition , we recommend another remse . '

      Lastlralh Arundelwhose Downright 548 The...

      lastlRalh Arundelwhose downright 548 The Leader and \ Satm'dayAnalyst . [ June 9 , 1 SGQ . - _ ¦ « ¦ « TT ^ 1 A' -J ** T Akl ^^^ d- * r \ j-l ^^^^ T » % » m t * ¦ ^ V r

      Psychological And Othelt Novels.* It Is ...

      PSYCHOLOGICAL AND OTHElt NOVELS . * IT is with much satisfaction that we hail the advent of Mr . "VVestland Marston , the popular dramatist , in the character of a novelist . "A Lady in her Own Bight" is * we believe , his first production of the " kind ; his efforts having been hitherto chiefly confined to poetical and dramatic compositions . Naturally , the author ' s reputation in the two above-mentioned branches of literature has excited considerable interest and curiosity respecting his present undertaking , an interest which we confess to have shared in no ordinary degree . The work is precisely the style of novel we should have anticipated from Mr , Marston ' s peculiar turn of mind . The story is a perfect masterpiece of chaste and delicate conception , couched " in spirited and eloquent language , abounding- in poetical fancies , high-toned aphorisms , iand slegantly-turned figures of speech . Seldom have wemet with anything more beautiful ,

      perfeet , or fascinating than the heroine of this work , Caroline of Eainfoi-d . Tile reader at once perceives that the author has here not only presented him with a new phase of character ^ but that he has imposed ugon himself a difficult and , at first sight , an almost impracticable task , ultimately to succeed in which requires on the part of the writer the most delicate and artistic finish in the portrayal of human feelings and emotions , the keenest and most unerring insight into the deep , mysterious springs which regulate the actions of the heart and brain , and an intimate acquaintance with the morbid sensibilities and mindless conventionalities of society in general . Mr . Marston has proved himself fully equal to the occasion ; indeed , his genius never appears more brilliant than when lightly stripping off the outside covering which shrouds the deeper workings of our inner nature , and exposing the whole complicated machinery in its nakedness and truth .

      Iii Iris heroine , Caroline , lady of Rainford , Mr . Marston has had ample opportunity for the display of his extraordinary powers of diving into the heart and root of character . Intellectually and personally endowed with all the fairest gifts of nature , and posthisiilad

      sessing , ' rril > ~ rewer , ina » . v" ^ stirling-quaUtie 8-of—heai ^ r- - y-jn her own right" mars her own happiness , and Jays herself and conduct open to gross misapprehensions and misconstructions , by an over-refined fastidiousness of taste . She has formed an ideal standard of moral excellence ; in her mind this latter must be accompanied by a fair and noble exterior ; the outside proportions must artistically correspond with the internal graces , or she fails either to recogniseor appreciate their existence ; she does not know the intrinsic value of a " rough diamond , " She has conjured up a world of imaginary heroes , where the manners are as faultless as the heart is great and noble ; and she has not yet learnt to draw the distinction between the life of romance and the life of reality . In her opinion a breach of etiquette is the greatest of social crimes ,

      and no man who neglects the petty formalities of conventional life , however praiseworthy may be his conduct in more important concerns , will be dignified as a hero in the eyes of the lady of Rainford . And yet is Caroline not only pure and noble in herself but an enthusiastic admirer of deeds of heroism , courage , and self- > sacrifice in others . This character is beautifully delineated by the author , who of course leads his heroine through the ordeul of bitter experience , till at last she perceives her error , and makes a final recantation of her falsely , conceived doctrines . Our readers , however , must not run away with the notion that Caroline of Kainford is the only important personage in the novel ; her mother , the

      Dowager Countess of Kainford , Boauchamp Faulkner and Jialph Arundel , not only occupying prominent positions , but being all subtly conceived arid elaborately worked out by the author . The Dowager , a weak , ambitious woman , morbidly sensitive to the world's opinion , to which feeling she would have sacrificed the happiness of her daughter , had not circumstances and some gleamings of a better ' natnW ' aT"le 1 iVgtK 7 : re " atraij ( ie"d ''" liev ^ ' Beauchamp Faulkner , the polished , subtle , refilled man of the world , whose universal distrust of the whole human : species and irreverent disbelief in the nobler and diviner attributes of man , becomes the source of his own bitterest disappointment , and'

      ultimate destruction . And y , p , honesty of purpose , scorning to couch itself in homed phrases , shoots ' straight ahead in the required direction , neither turning to the right nor to the left , regardless of the startled nerves ot more refined but less genuine spirits , which prove , unequal . to the shock of his vehement ' but virtuotis protestations . The story ot the sufferings and death of little May Dawson , a sometime sojonrner in the valley of humiliation , and whose infinite yearnings after txie true spirit of . Christianity is simply and naturally told , forms a touching and interesting episode to the book . would have been ^ ^ . . ^

      " Mainstone ' s Housekeeper , " by Eliza Meteyard , a most interesting and fascinating novel , had the authoress only compressed it into about one-half the space which it at present occupies , A few omissions in the overcrowded dramatis persona would , also have relieved the stage of much unnecessary confusion , and greatly assisted the reader in distinguishing andindividualizing ' the more ' important characters . At present , there is such a needless arrav of personages whose actions have nothing to do with the progress of the story , and the story itself is so lost and entangled amidst the tortuous windings of desultory and extraneous matter , that the general effect is considerably lessened . That Miss Metayard should have allowed herself to fall into these errors is the more to be regretted , since her present production possesses much that is in the The character of her

      highest degree praiseworthy and meritorious . heroine , Charlotte Waldo , with her large Christian heart , abounding in love for her fellow-creatures ; her simple , unaffected energy of purpose , not to be quelled by any untoward accident of time or circumstance ; her watchfulness over the welfare of all around her , and chiefly her love and reverence for her old master , and the personal sacrifice she makes in order to secure his happiness , is all truthfully and touchingly delineated . The old master himself , with his strange idiosyncrasy , las conscientious integrity , his nervous imbecility , and blind idolatry of his " little Tullia , " is also an admirably drawn specimen of eccentric human nature . The language ( with the exception here and there of a little tautology , which the authoress will do well to guard against in future ) is not only graceful and fluent , but occasionally full of deep pathos ; and poetic feeling . Notwithstanding the faults above mentioned , we can heartily recommend this novel to the

      perusal of the public . . The author of " Artist and-Craftsman" has evidently undertaken the present work with a view to the promulgation of -his individual opinions and prejudices against the " dramatic art" in all its branches . He has taken a somewhat one-sided view of the subject upon which he expatiates , and tramples underfoot with amazing celerity all the , hard * won _ Jaurels placed upon the brow of the successfur artist . He utterly ignores the divine inspiration vy hich dwells in the soul of every true disciple of art , and urges him or her irresistibly onwards in the career to which they were born ; -he thoroughly repudiates the theory that all " special gifts " are more or less emanations from the divine spirit , and designed to serve ! some " special purpose . " He resolutely refuses to acknowledge that genius in virtue of which an individual man or woman can exalt themselves above the trivialities which -surround their everyday life , and enter as though in a mesmeric trance into the spirit of the grandest passions and emotions . The author comprises this , in - ^ ionj . unctioii-jvith .-many other noble attributes , in his category of the " frivolities" of art . In order to bTing forward his theory oftlTB utter worthlessness of theatrical exhibitions , he makes his heroine a singer ( a young lady , by the bye , full of noble and generous impulses , notwithstanding her profession ) , whom he describes as having " raised all manner of dust-clouds before her moral eyesight , " by such arguments as " the loftiness of assthetical culture , and the mere ideality of the creations of genius , " and he knows not . " -what other transcendental trash besides . " Verily our novelist is somewhat uncharitable towards his brethren of the ¦< " Thespian art . " The idea of the utility of'the stage as a moral and educational vehicle does not seem to have entered into his limited range of vision ; he simply cannot recognise anything real and Hubstantia ! beneath what he considers so flimsy and transparent a covering . It is not our intention , however , to quarrel with the author for his opinions , based , as we feel them to be , upon false premises , and are quite willing to extend to him the meed of praise to which his present work entitles him . His story is interesting , though somewhat tedious and exaggerated ; his language exhibits great breadth of style , and much occasional pathos ; and his characters are generally well conceived and consistently developed . It is , in fact , despite the author ' s dissertations on a subject with which he is little acquainted , a work of considerable merit , and will doubtless claim a fuir share of public attention .

      * A Lady In Her Oton Right, A Norol. By ...

      * A Lady in her Oton Right , A Norol . By Westjland Mauston , MacmiHan & Co . Mainstone ' s Housekeeper . By Emza Metevard ( " Silverpen" ) . Three Tols . Hurat & Blaokett . Artist and Craftsman . Reprinted from the Dublin University Magazine . Maomillun & Go .

      New Poems.* We Commence Our Notices Of N...

      NEW POEMS . * WE commence our notices of new poems with some remarks on an old poet , whose worlcn have been lately reprinted . We refer to William Dim bar , the Scottish poet , whose name is better known than his productions . Scarcely a vestige of them , we are

      * The Life And Poems Of William Dunbar: ...

      * The Life and Poems of William Dunbar : By James Patterson . W . P . Nimmo . Poems containing tlib Cittt of tho Bead . By John Collett . Second Edition , revised ana enlarged . Longmans . Htffvot of all Moods ; a Collodion of Poems , original and translated . By SnortT En Pi km ) . Ward and Look . Somo of my Contributions in JlJiymo to Periodicals in JJygone pays By n . Septuagenarian . W . Blaokwood and Sons . Old Fashioned Wit and Humour in Verso . By Wim-iam Jackson . JameB Blaokwood .

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), June 9, 1860, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_09061860/page/16/