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    Four Novels. A Lobt Love. By Aahfonl Owe...

    is by no mbans si happy one . A young lady has contracted along engagement With an officer for whotn she feels no very strdng attachment . During his absence from England she meets with another man who powerfully attracts her , and who , after some preliminary difficulties and delays ,. apparently returns her love , and proposes marriage to her . She breaks her engagement with the officer , and accepts him . Times passes on ; until , on the eve of their marriage , she discovers that he has a first love whom he secretly prefers to her . Upon this she gives him up . He accepts his liberty , and marries the object of his first choice . The deserted officer returns to England and to the forsaken lady—prevails on her to reconsider her refusal to marry him—and gets her at last to become his wife . Such is the bare outline of the storj ' . Its most obvious defect is that it shuts out the heroine from the reader ' s sympathy . Neatly and skilfully as the more pardonable motives which lead her to break her engagement are set forth , still she has broken it , and when her second lover treats her as she has treated the

    unlucky officer , no resider can lament the retributive justice which thus overtakes her . The book is , in short , the history of a jilted jilt ; and if it had been less delicately and eloquently written , it would have sunk altogether under its unsympathetic subjeet . As it is , the authoress is entitled to praise for having made the best use of her bad materials . Passages of charming writing , neatly and happily-uttered truths , excellently-observed bits of character , and clever descriptions of scenery which never exceed due length , creditably distinguish the book from novels in general . And , more than this , the work gives us fiiir reason , to hope for better things from the writer . Give her a good subject , and she is capable , as we think , of producing a much better book than the very elegant volume which stands at the head of our present list .

    The scene of My Brother ' s Wife is laid in France , and the authoress seems to have boldly aimed at combining within the compass of one story the characteristics of the sentimental novel , the art-novel , and the dramatic novel . She has succeeded better than might have been expected in executing an injudiciously-complicated design . The hero is anticipated in winning the affections of a very charming cousin by his brother , and , upon that , leaves home to cure his wounded sensibilities by foreign travel . This is the sentimental part of the book . The art-division of it commences with a very clever sketch of a strange half-mad musician , whom the unsuccessful lover meets with in Germany . And the dramatic part fills the closing passages of the work with the death of the hero ' s brother , who plays false to hifwife , gets into bad company , and is assassinated by the accomplice of a wicked prima donna with whom he has fallen in love . This last part of the story is by far the best . The method of treatment adopted must have been su <™ ested , we imagine , "by those breathlessly-interesting chapters of Bleak

    House in which " Inspector Bucket" by slow degrees discovers the hand really concerned in the murder of " Mr . Tulkinghorn . ' * At the same time ( supposing that our idea is a correct one ) , it is due to the authoress to say th : it she has followed a great example with a -dramatic feeling of her own which very few contemporary novelists appear to possess . Some of the details in her " murder case " are excellently and originally imagined , and the interest is most successfully suspended , from chapter to chapter , to the end of the mystery . Of the characters in the story , generally , " Fletcher , " the musician , is the best , because the most individual . The style , though too frequently defaced by Germanisms and by transcendental affectations of phrase , is in many parts so graphic and eloquent as almost to atone for certain minor blemishes in taste and defects of art in the earlier and middle portions of the book . With all its faults , however , M y Si-other's Wife , has one rare compensating merit , which we gladly dwell on in closing this notice

    — it can interest the reader . Of the two dull books on our list , we have little to say beyond putting ttic sad fact on record that we have found them remarkably hard reading . Cleve Hall is the latest of a lon # series of stories of the moral and religious sort , which have sold freely in the moral ami religious market , but which , as it appears to us , are for the most part utterly destitute of any literary merit whatever . The especial sermon in fiction now before us is full of good pattern characters ( appropriately set off , of course , by bad ); full of lung , prosy dialogues' which lead to nothing but moral conclusions and pious truisms—full of everything , in short , but interest , fancy , invention , and fair observation of life as it is . This sort of book may possibly do moral good to the unfortunate young people who will be set to read it ; but we feel quite certain that it must , at the same time , send their minds to slcon in the most lamentable manner . Good advice , by itself , is a very excellent thing ; but good advice which cannot possibly address juvenile humanity except through the medium of an utterly wearisome and clumsy story , it to cnuuic

    becomes a species ol moral outrage winch we liiul impossible on any respectable or pious grounds whatsoever . We readily admit that Cfcve / lull is filled to bursting with excellent intentions ; but we protest against it for all that , because it is , in plain words , a wretchedly dull book . In the , preface to Constantino , Captain Spencer informs us that he has chosen for subject " tliat stormy period in the world ' s history when the Moslem hosts of Mahomet II . planted their sanguinary standards on the crumbling walls of Constantinople . " Here , again , the author has the best possible intentions—of the historically-instructive kind , this time—and yet he wearies us dreudlUlly . His book shows patient research and careful workmanship . He has evidently tried earnestly and industriously to do his best ; but he must excuse us if we tell him candidly that ho has no turn for writing fiction . That ouo all-important art , the art of telling an interesting atorv . ho Joes not possess . Neither his plot nor his characterfl

    lay any hold on the attention or the heart of the roador ; and wo put his book down with the unpleasant conviction that the author made a mistake when ho selected fiction as his medium for addressing the public . When ho next seeks to instruct them on an historical subject , we suggest , with all possible reapoct , that ho should carefully restrict himself to the historical iorm .

    ¦¦ -- : UEVES OF THE QUEENSCNF JENCfcLANP . ¦¦ ¦** Lives of ike Queens of England , of the House of Hanover . By Dr . Derail . In Two _ Volumes . Richard Bentley . pa . Dora * has executed his task with considerable humour . The phrase js , perhaps , strange as applied to an historian ; we will , therefore , substitute the more appropriate word—flippancy . But unhappilythe Doctor ' s vivacity has betrayed him into a still greater fault , that of inaccuracy . And as if these two blemishes were not enough , he has been guilty , not only of familiarity of diction , but of positive vulgarity of thought . ; He has stooped to the stage trick of introducing unfavourable allusions to Russia and the

    Russians , and has apparently imbibed all the small bitternesses of the day . This is truly an unpardonable fault in a chronicler of past events , with whom a dispassionate judgment is the first and most positive duty . It is true that in his second volume our author , claims to be " rather a storyteller than a historian , dealing more with anecdotes of persons than " with parties and politics . " But he should , at least , nave taken care that his anecdotes were all authentic ; nor is there any excuse for his indulgence in funny -writing , the bane of contemporary literature . After bestowing thus much of censure , we are , however , constrained to admit that the learned Doctor is an excellent " gossip , " and—to use his own words—that he has succeeded in " affording not much less amusement to the readers than if

    he had been twice as ambitious , and therewith , perhaps , infinitely more tedious . " The most bitter foe to royalty would be puzzled to find more striking illustrations and arguments in favour of his views than are fltonished in the lives of our sovereigns of the House of Hanover . A more degraded and utterly effete family never swayed the sceptre of any nation , through con > secutive generations . It would almost seem as if Providence itself had shrunk from the responsibility of continuing such a race , and so left it to the decision of chance . The Duchy of Brunswick was divided into seven portions on the death of George L ' s great-grandfather , and the seven heirs came to the conclusion that , if they all married , " the ducal gem would be ultimately crushed into numberless glitterings but not very valuable fragments . " They therefore agreed that one alone of their number should enter the holy state and raise up an heir to the dukedom .

    The seven brothers , in pursuance of their plan , met in the hall of state in their deceased father ' s mansion , and there drew lots , or threw dice , for reports differ on this point , as to who should live on in . single blessedness , wearing bachelor ' s buttons for ever , and which should gain the prize , not of a wife , but of permission to find one . The lucky prince -was George , the sixth son , and he experienced little difficulty in finding a princess willing to be the mother of a new race of Brunswick princes . The lady , cavalierly wooed and ready to be won , was Anne Eleanore daughter of the Landgraf of Hesse-Darmstadt . In this strange and comical manner was perpetuated the family destined to give a new dynasty to England . But more ominous was the manner in which the house of Hanover was nominated to the succession . ** The solemn question of naming the heir to the throne was intrusted to ... Sir John Bowles , who was then disordered in his senses , and soon after quite lost them . " And what sort of man was he whom the nation chose to rule

    over them ? " George Louis was mean in person and character . . . . ^ He was the lord of small virtues ; and his insignificance of person was insi g ^ - nificant only because it bore not about it any manly stamp , or outward promise of " nn inward merit . Having espoused a virtuous , accomplished , and beautiful princess , he early abandoned her for a woman whose mind was as coarse as her person was obese . On vague and unsubstantiated susi picions he condemned the unhappy Sophia Dorothea to long years of isolation in the dreary castle of Ahlden , and even at her death refused to recognise any degree of relationship between the hapless lady and himself or their children . " But his ire burst forth into an explosion of rage when he heard that his danghter , with the Court of Prussia , had gone into mourning for the death of her mother . " His own death was the result of a surfeit on melon , though previously warned of the consequences , but even this was less <* ros 3 than his indulgence in stale oysters when in health . 1 here were only two other things that he loved , according to Macaulay , " punch and fat women . " And this was the first monarch of the Hanoverian line who

    wore the crown of Great Britain and Ireland . His son , George II , was even worse . A bad son , a faithless husband , a tyrannical father , a . coarse sensualist , a foulmouthed , passionate churl , he polluted the throne , and would have disgraced a tavern , fortunately for the country the Queen possessed sufficient tact to guide her wretched consort in all essential matters appertaining to public affairs , while , like most weak persons , he plumed himself on his independence . It is said that ho sneerod at Charles I . for being governed by his wife ; at Charles II ., for being governed by his mistresses ; at James , led by priests ; at WUliam , duped bv men ; at Queen Anne , deceived by her favourites ; and at his father , who allowed himself to be ruled by any one who could approach him . And ho finished his catalogue of scorn by proudly * asking , " Who governs now ? " The courtiers probably smiled behind their jaunty hats . The wits , and some of them were courtiers to * answered the query more roughly , and they remarked , in rugged rhyme and bad grammar— You may strut , dapper George , but twill all be in vain ; We know 'tis Queen Caroline , not you that

    reign—You govern no more than Don Philip of bpani , Then if you would have us fall down ami adoro you , Lock up your fat spouse as your dad did before you . Of the king ' s undignified manners and language , an amusing " »*» " <* ' * given at the time Sir Robert AVnlpolo ' s Excise bill had brought both CourC and Ministers into great disfavour with the people . raiu , ifostod hia The king on this occasion was as excited as his consort b t ho man o feelings in » dilforont way . He made Lord Horvoy repeat the nu . »< £ £ * ftt each thwarted the views of the crown , and he grunted forth a * ™ l * V to ™™ Z . & o king , name . " Lord John Cavendish , " began IIorvey . f l S j awthcr » - J whimsical » Lord CharlCaVeudbh" " Half mad / " " Sir Ml an LcnUhcr . nn i

    es . ^ ^ fj ^ r » £ r Tn ^ s rreude ^ t . » » An Iri * ^ f ^ J ^ ^ " ™ [ ^ A P ¥ mf 9 » said aeonje . " -ho never votes twice onM-h < . o s ¦ ^ Again , on the pooaaioi . of the 0 P ^ P ^ P ^ S ^ if the prelates as « * Bill , " the hereditary defender ot tho laith spo *"

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• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 11, 1855, page 773, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/ldr_11081855/page/17/