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    appearance ; and also that pathologists have reco rded cases of cancerous sores emitting light . This question need not here be complicated with any inquiries as to whether the phenomenon known as animal luminosity be due to electricity or to the exhalation of some phosphuretted compound ; whatever may be the cause , the effect of phosphorescence in animals is umnistakeably not that of burning their bodies , nor of anything else in the neighbourhood ; so that the fact of phosphorescence is of no avail here . To any chemist maybe left Professor Apjohn ' s assertion , " When putrefaction occurs in the dead body , experience proves that phosphorus is evolved among the gaseous products in union with hydrogen ; and there seems little reason to doubt that this is one of the gases which are

    occasionally generated throughout tlie different textures (/ /) of the livrng system . Now if this be admitted— ( ah ! if!)—as phosphuretted hydrogen inflames upon contact with the atmosphere , we shall have a perfect and simple solution of the difficulty of Spontaneous Combustion . " I have now done with the theories assuming a positive statement . There is another and still more common argument to be met . It is said , " May we not conceive that disease generates certain conditions which render combustion probahle P" How arrogant it seems to quash so modest a query ! " May we not conceive P "—shall we assume to know all possible conditions P

    Unhappily we cannot conceive them ; we think we can , but cannot . We can only affirm that there may be the conditions . If we could conceive them we should know them , and knowing , state them . Let me transport this assertion elsewhere ,, and ask , " May we not conceive that the lightning generates certain conditions in the iron lamp-post which render the transmutation into an elm tree probable ? " You laugh in my face . You know we can conceive no conditions of the kind , but only assert that

    ¦ we can . Directly we begin to specify what the conditions are , we tumble headlong into the absurd . You do not profess to know all the conditions possible to a lamp-post , but yoA do know many which interdict its transmutation ' into an elm , and until the precise conditions which are to effect that transmutation are specified , and shown to be really effectual , you decline to believe the thing possible , and utterly laugh to scorn the argument founded on any one ' s saying he can conceive conditions which Le does

    not specify and prove to be operative . And now to terminate polemics . If these letters have failed to carry conviction to your mind , they may at least effect one of their main objects —viz ., induce you to make some qualifying statement in the preface to Bleak Souse , so as to prevent the incident of Krook ' s death from promulgating an error . I call upon you to investigate the state of opinion on this matter as carefully as you can , and should that investigation fail to shake your belief in Spontaneous Combustion , then at any rate , I call upon your candour to state in your preface that although you believe in authorities

    the phenomenon , it is a belief rejected by the highest scientific of the day—authorities liable to error , assuredly , and perhaps in error on this very point , but nevertheless deliberate and positive in their rejection . Your genius has moved with beneficent power in so many other directions than that of Physiology , it would cost you nothing to avow a mistake , even were you not countenanced by a host of very respectable authorities , as is the case in this mistaken hypothesis of Spontaneous Combustion . Believe me , my dear Dickens , Yours faithfully , G . II . Lewes .

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    CURRER BELL'S NEW NOVEL . Villette . By Curror Bell . 3 vi > ls . Smith , Elder , and Co . In Passion and Power—those noble twins of Genius—Currer Boll has no living rival , except George Sand . Hers is the passionate heart to fool , and tho powerful brain to give feeling shape ; and that is why she is so original , so fascinating . Faults she has , in abundance ; thoy aro so obvious , they lie so legible on tho surface , that to notice them with more insistance than a passing allusion is the very wantonness of criticism . On

    a former occasion , and in another place , we remonstrated with her on these said faults , but we now feel that tho lecture was idle . Why wander delighted among the craggy clefts inul snowy solitudes of tho Alps , complaining ut tho want of verdure and of flowers P In the presence of real Power why object to its not having the quiet lineaments of Grace P There in a Strength clothed with Gentleness , but there may also be Strength rugged , vehement—careless of Beauty . Goethe , indeed ( who was " himself tho great sublime ho drew" ) has somewhere said , —

    Nur din gesMLiqte Kraft lcehrel zur Anmuth zuriicJc—Only tho fulness of Power moves with the calmness of ( inure , which is truo of perfect C raeo ; yet thorn are few in whom Power roaches this fulness , and of tho fow Currer Bell is not . is it not enough for us to accept her as sho is P One may say of Curror IJoll that her genius finds a fitting illustration in her heroes and heroines—her itoehestors and Juno Kyres . They aro men and women of deep finding , clear intellects , -vehement tempera , bad manners , ungraceful , vet loveublo persons . Their nddress is brusque , unpleasant , yet individual , direct , free from shams and conventions of nil kinds . They outrage " good taste , " yet they fascinate . You disliko them at first , yet you loam to love them . r Pho power that is in them makoH its vehement way right to your heart . Propriety , ideal outline , good manners , good features , ordinary thought , ordinary speech , aro not to bo demanded of them . Tlioy aro tho Miraboaus ofroiuun . ee ; and tho

    from the unsatisfying hero , and cling to the man are powerful ! It is like placing a clever agreeable novel beside Jane Eyre . Janet captured all our hearts ; not because she was lovely , ladylike , good , but because she was direct , clear , upright , capable of deep affections , and of bravely enduring great affliction . If any one pointed out her faults , we admitted them , but never swerved a line from our admiration . We never thought her perfect , we loved her for what was loveable , and left the rest to be set down to human imperfection .

    whose brain and heart idolatrv of a nation follows the great gifts of a Mirabeau , let " Propriety look never so " shocked . " It is the triumph of what is sterling over what is tinsel , of what is essential to human worth over what is collateral . Place a perfectly well-bred , well-featured , graceful considerate gentleman —a hero of romance , vague and ideal—beside one who is imperious , coarse , ill-tempered , ill-featured , but who , under this husk of manner and of temper contains the kernel of what is noble , generous , loving , powerful , and see how in the long run human sympathies will detach themselves

    And so of this story we have just read . Villette has assuredly many faults , and novel readers , no less than , critics , will have much to say thereon . More adroit " construction , " more breathless suspense , more thrilling incidents , and a more moving story , might easily have been manufactured by a far less active , inventive , passionate writer ; but not such a book . Here , at any rate ,, is an original book . Every page , every paragraph , is sharp with individuality . It is Currer Bell speaking to you , v not the Circulating Library reverberating echos . How she ha 3 looked at life , with a saddened , yet not vanquished soul ; what she has thought , and felt , not what she thinks others will expect her to have thought and felt ; this it is we read of here , and this it is which makes her writing welcome above almost every other writing . It has held us spell-bound . ' -

    _ _ _ , ., - ,. . Descending from generals to particulars , let us say that , considered in the light of a novel , it is a less interesting story than even " Shirley . " It wants the unity and progression of interest which made " Jane Eyre " so fascinating ; but it is the book of a mind more conscious of its power . Villette is meant for Brussels . The greater part of the scenes pass in the Netherlands , not unhappily designated as Labassecour . People will wonder why this transparent disguise was adopted . We conjecture that it was to prevent personal applications on the reader ' s part , and also to allow the writer a greater freedom as to details . The point is , however , very unimportant . _ . . _ , icture of

    The story begins in England . Charming , indeed , is the p Mrs . Bretton ' s house , and the little love affair between Polly , a quaint child of six , and Graham , a youth of sixteen , who pets her as boys sometimes pet children . We hear this child objected to , and called " unnatural . " To our experience , the child ' s character is perfectly consonant , and the only thing we could wish in the delineation is that which we miss in all portraits of quaint precocious children , —viz ., a more vivid recollection on the artist ' s part of the childlike nonsense and whimsicality which accompany the demonstrations of feeling and intelligence . Children do frequently think and say things , the wisdom and maturity of which are startling—children constantly rival genius in tho bright originality of their remarks—but these very children also say childish foolish things , and to convey a true picture of the child , both the foolishness and the " old fashioned" remarks must be contemporaneous

    There is no true pudding made only of plums . Currer Bell has indicated , but not with sufficient distinctness , the childishness of Polly ; what she has ? done better is the depth of childish love . Can anything be more sweetly touched than this : — " Polly going ? "What a pity ! Dear little Mousie , I shall be sorry to loso her : she must come to us again , mama . ' " And hastily swallowing his tea , he took a candle and a , small table to himself and his books , and was soon buried in study . "' Little Mousie' crept to his side , and lay down on the carpet at his feet , her face to the floor : muto and motionless she kept that post and position till

    bedtime . Once I saw Graham—wholly unconscious of her proximity—push her with his restless foot . She receded an inch or two . A minute after ono little hand stole out from beneath her face , to which it had been pressed , and softly caressed the heedless foot . When summoned by her nurse sho rose and departed very obediently , having bid us all a subdued good-night . " Wo purposely abstain from giving any hint of a story all will read ; our extracts shall bo pieces justijica'lives , and that is all . Here , for example , is a snatch out of one of the episodes . Who paints with a pencil like this ?

    " Ono February night—I remember it well—there ( Mine a voke near Miss Marchinont ' s house , heard by every inmate , but translated , perhaps , only by one . After a calm winter , storms were ushering in tho spring . 1 had put . Miss Marehinont to bed ; I sat at the fireside sewing . The wind was wailing sit the windows it had wailed all day ; but , as night deepened , it took a new tone—an accent keen , piercing , almost articulate to tho car ; a plaint , piteous and disconsolate to tho nerves , trilled in every gush . " 'Oh , hush ! hush ! ' I said in my disturbed mind , dropping iny work , and making a vain effort to stop my ears against that subtle , searching cry . I had hoard that very voice ere this , and compulsory observation had forced on me a ts had

    theory as to what it boded . Three times in the course of my life , even taught me that these strange accents in the storm— - this re . sl less , hopeless cry—denote a coming state of the atmosphere unpropitious to life . Kpidemic diseases , I believed , were oflon heralded by a gasping , sobbing , tormented , long-lamenting east wind . Hence , I inferred , arose the legend of the Hanshee . I fancied , too , 1 had noticed—but wna not philosopher enough to know whether there was any connexion between the eircumfltuncos—that we often at tho same time hoar of disturbed volcanic action in distant purts of tho world ; of rivers suddenly rushing above their banks ; and of strange high tides Howing furiously in on low nea-eoastH . ' Our globe , ' L had miid to myself , ' . seems at such periods torn and disordered ; tho feeble amourist uh wither in her distempered breath , rushing hot from Hteaining

    volcanos . " I listened , and trombk'fl ; Misa Marchmont slept , " About midnight , tho storm in one half hour foil to a dead calm . The fin which had been burning dot * d , glowed , up vividly . I felt tho air clMiure , and bt

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    February 12 , 1853 . ] THE LEADER . 163

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 12, 1853, page 163, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1973/page/19/