The Press. — London, England, 1858-08-14 00:00:00

• .- -.- :,. 1' H E P It t E SS, AUGUST 14, 1858. albite becla,'llnd call aloud, " Steht auf," or " Levez•vons; w hich call la promptly obeyed. The toilettes ere so briskly e ed that soon after six they sit clown to " first t r r ,, f :ost," after which both rooms meet Mother for m orning prayer, which are French or Ciertnan on niter . na te diqs, see , I . et as it may be the day of the Frend i t ea cher. From seven to half-past seven is " rl yw e t; p e nit n i n o n-time "; then the French class. At half past eight ; s he " s econd breakfast "—a slice of bread and butter. Thrce several classes till up the time from nine t twelve. Then dinner; after which either n walk or exercise in the g rden. From two to four, work, music, drawing. die. at four, vesper—i.e., bread and butter or fruit. Till five, walking or exercise in the garden again. From five till half past six, preparation of lessons; then ripper. At • b s tf.past seven, service in church, on returning from which there is occasionally time for duin g a little, but generally we prepare for bed. As the school is evidently unexceptionable in point of,. moral and physical discipline, other iirls might be glad to follow the autho .iess's example, provided the instruction is really as good as it is said to be. We should have liked to know what hooks were used, and what subjects studied, and whether the character of the education was on the whole of a useful or of an ornamental description. The authoress fa vours us with only very slight and incidental notices on the subject, and bestows a considerably • greater degree of space on the amusements, friendships, religious ceremonies, and festivals of the little community. The latter element, in deed, is the most prominent in the book ; and in this respect it rather reminds us of Miss Wethe rail's novels ("Queechy" and " The 'Wide, Wide World"), which were wickedly said by some re viewer to be mainly devoted to the great topics of religion and cookery. In the description of a religious society, we can hardly have too much of the former of these subjects—it is in part, we imagine, what the authoress went to Kiinigsfeld for, and what we read the book for—but the bills of fare are, we presume, very much what they are in all similar places in Germany—always plentiful and often succulent—and it is hardly ne cessary to chronicle so much eating and drinking with such excessive minuteness. l'ope recommends us to board with saints it' we wish to enjoy solid dinners, and the Moravians, though not, probably, to be accused of luxury, are not behindhand in their appreciation of . the good things of this life. What Lord Jeffrey noticed as the German propensity to "cockering" comes out strongly all through the book, which, in fact, rather smells of bread and butter. The authoress seems to have fallen without difficulty into these habits, and the recurrence of these feasts, and the good cheer they elicited, is chronicled with a minute regularity which shows that the topic is one of heartfelt interest. As the fair diarist truly re marks (p. 37), " I may not unwisely consider " what will or should be" the " impression of " me. Little characteristics often betray them " selves quite unconsciously to the parties." Thus on August 17th, two days after her arrival, we hear of the " children's feast," at which she is presented with " a round fluted sponge cake," encircled with chocolate drops ; on the 19th there is a " love feast" in honour of the "silver wedding" of a brother ; on the 25th the " Missions feast," consisting of " very sweet tea, " flavoured with cinnamon, and large buns "; on the 26th " papa's" birthday, which is celebrated by the consumption of coffee, cakes, and lemon cream ; on the 29th the " brothers feast," sig nalized by the appearance of " rich sago soup " and roast veal"; on the 30th conies the writer's own birthday, when she receives " a large " almond tourte and a sponge-cake lamb ;" on the 31st the " widows' least ;" on the 7th of September the " feast of married people"; on the 11th we hear of a " silver thistle" brought by " Louise," which contains " a sort of choke " tolerably nice to eat"; on the 12th, of the "potato feast," when Sister Beatrice came out .5 great force, " cooked famously," and made " pancakes, fritters with sauce, apple-fritters, goldechnitten (i.e., light bread fried in batter "and eaten with sugar and cinnamon), stewed apples, stewed plums, baked " pots " toes, &c." After this grand field-day, no gastronomic entry occurs till Oct. 9th, when "Sister It." 's birthday occurs, and Beatrice has the felicity of supping with her on " wine soup and veal patties." November 13th, 14th, and 16th, we find the " elders' feast," the " house feast," and the " feast as thanksgiving for liar yest"----of but slight alimentary importance. Christmas, however, is not far off. On Dec. 6th the C hrigt - C l ll l 4 (wile et Konigsfeld, as elsewhere in Germany, is made the medium of presents) brings for Beatrice (inter alia) two packets of Basle gingerbread and "fancy sweetmeats in the " shape of a lobster, a ham, two bottles of wine, " and my initial B in sugar!" On the 13th, Sister B. returns the delicate attention by the offering. along with spill-boxes and the like, of " a sweetmeat representing a nice little roast pig " in a dish of gravy," flanked by cakes of ginger bread. On the 18th, " Sister Z." 's tea party includes a variety of nice things—" white and " brown bread and butter, veal, ham, sausages, " and almond cakes." On Dec. 23rd there is a somewhat significant entry—" one of my old headaches." On Jan. Ist, Beatrice, though so journing in a land flowing with wine and milk, if not with honey, has melancholy thoughts of the flesh-pots of England—" where, I dare say, they " are sitting round a table covered with roast " beef, turkey, ham, sausages, mince-pies, and " plum-pudding." On the sth, however, there is a triumphant note,—" And I have actually " eaten Christmas plum-pudding" Sister Z. having prepared it " precisely according to " mamma's recipe ; and I carried some of it to " the inspector and inspectress, who were both " amused and pleased." " Out of the abundance " of the heart the mouth speaketh,"—and out of the abundance of the mouth too. The view of Constantinople reminded Albert Smith of the drop-scene of a London theatre ; Sister Beatrice, when snow falls, finds " the ground already as ".white as a gooseberry-tart sprinkled with sifted " loaf-sugar." (Why is snowy ground more like a gooseberry-tart than any other kind of tart ?) She is "quite interested in the rye because it makes "my favourite black bread." On an excursion in the Forest, she gives us the bill of fare at a hotel—" (tries soup, bouilli, horse-radish sauce, " red bilberries preserved in vinegar, radish-salad, " sausages, veal-cutlets, spinach, fried potatoes, " sponge-cake, macaroons, and almonds "—to which " we were hungry enough to do credit." Sister Beatrice has not, certainly, specified her share of these comestibles; yet somehow we can not help picturing her to ourselves as a plump little thing, who likes to " carve for the children" at their dinner, and is wise enough to take a plate of hot soup after dancing, if she can get it. If, like Shenstone, we " found out a gift for our fair," and our fair happened to be Sister Beatrice, we trust we should have sufficient tact to abstain from molesting the wood-pigeons, and to offer instead a few of the eggs of that delicious bird the plover, with their delicate opalescent albumen showing, ceu candida lilia vitro, through a matrix of aspic-jelly. The enamoured youth in Boc cacio, who killed and dressed his pet falcon for his mistress's supper, might perhaps have %Lind in Sister Beatrice as generous an appreciation as the story actually records of his tremendous sa crifice on the altar of love. Sister Beatrice will no doubt be surprised, if not amused, to observe how often such entries are to be found in her little volume.• They are so prominent a feature of it that we really could not pass them over ; but it must not be supposed that she has not a good many other bumps beside that of alimentativeness—veneration, order, music, and language being evidently among them. She writes a thoroughly good style, has a clear method of narration, and a vivid sense of the picturesque. The following is a pretty scene :- 9.14 th, Sunday.---After service this warm evening, every one was glad to breathe the open air; but I remained walkirg up and clown the corridor, pausing every now and then to watch the various little groups out ofdoors, strolling round the square, or stopping to chat, while the musicians in some unseen quarter played and sang hymns. Here a married couple were taking a quiet evening stroll ; them a papa and mamma, armin•arm, with their little daughters walking orderly before them ; now a party of boys, turning the corner with their master, all subdued into quiet by the sweet and solemn innsic, the youngest boy holding the teacher's hand, and, apparently, having some confidential communication with him. On the footpath stood two little girls, one relating twinething in a very animated style, which, in conehision, made the other fairly jump for joy! Every now and then my solitary observations were pleasantly interrupted by a Sister passing in or out, always with a friendly smile and word for ale. And she is alive to all the circumstances of interest which occur during her stay, and has her little word, generally to the purpose, for each of them. She is warmhearted too, and her greatest grief—even worse than the dreaded loss of her canary—is the marriage of Sister Z., whose fiance becomes almost hatefld • We intend to review a work ou Cookery in a week or two, end then the " English Girl" cm take her temp, 779 I wns in the room with Sister R. this afternoon, when her brother came in to coffee, and, hearing him approaching said with a gig)), " Here lie comes ! " On which she laughed, and added, " Der biiae mann,nicht water?" "Yes," I replied," I don't like him at all, nnw." However, his bright smiling eyes and pleasant countenance, and the cordial tones of his voice as he entered, made me secretly own myself that I did like him notwithstanding, and that he was not so very nnwoi thy of my preciona Sister Z. after all. But a man who comes when lie i 4 least looked for or wanted, and unexpectedly mans up one's favourite friend, can hardly fail to seem sotnething of the ogre. Oh, I hope he will he able to winks her happy ! This morning, she certainly seemed a little depressed—both Sister It. and I remarked it. His age is very suitable for her ;he must be some years older than his sister. It does not exactly appear what is the usual age for the young ladies of the establishment, and it would of course be ungallant to ask ; but we infer that they must be caught young, for we find mention made of a certain "Julie," who is frequently the walking companion of the diarist, and who in fact felt herself too old for the school when she first cum, having previously been introduced into society; so that our little treats and amuselients seemed to her in— supportably trivial and childish. She soon became different, however, though she still has more of the grown woman than of the girl, ho'h in manner and speecli. S!ie is stout and with a shapely waist; her forehead is rather broad; she has un petit me: retrousse, and brown hair nicely braided, with a good complexion. She is beginning to think much more seriously than she did at first, and to be very desirous of negniring all the good she can here, as she sensibly says it may hereafter be very useful to her. Her only fear is that the influence of her relatives, who are gay people, may have an opposite tendency. We sincerely trust that "Julie " has not relapsed, or become gay. Another point on which we should have been glad of a little more information is the economic condition of the settlement. How is it supported in so much comfort ? Has it any trade with the profane world without ? Where does that fatted calf come from that is always being turned into roast veal—is he an autochtlion or an alien ? and what kind of commercial aspect does the colony present ? Sister Beatrice, should her work, as is not impossible, reach a second edition, might usefully add a few notes on these and similar matters. We trust she will have the opportunity of doing so, for it is certainly extremely well written, and, for a first attempt in literature, it must be con sidered a success; nor do the little peculiarities to which we have drawn attention make it less amusing. There is only one thing which has puzzled us in it, and that is to discover at what "part of it" the editor, as stated in the prefatory note, was " completely taken by surprise." We have experienced no such emotion, except from our general observation of the freshness, navietC, and pleasant style of the writer. She has not begun badly, and on her next appearance may probably enjoy a decided triumph. The settlers she describes are in many respects to be envied. There seems to be nothing like cant or pre tension about them, and, from the indications which this book affords, the tone of moral and social feeling must be such as to cause those who have left tnem to look back with frequent regret to a life so peaceful and so good. In temptations victoriously overcome, in kingdoms governed, and evils subdued, there may be a higher life than the Moravian, yet to their community may certainly be applied the words of St. Bernard : " Bonum est nos hic esse; quia homo vivit purius, " cadit raring, surgit velocius, incedit eautius, " quiescit securing, moritur felicius." PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.—Auouar 12. Bertha Dariey ; or, Life in Her Husband's Curaeies. By L. H. B. J. Blackwood. Adventures of Mrs. Colonel Somerset in Cep-aria during the War Edited by J. D. Fenton. Hope. Tegg's First and Second Book for Children. Tegg and Co. Sermons. Thomas Yard, M.A. J. H. and J. Parker. Supplementary Despatches and Memoranda of Field- Marshal Arthur Duke of Wellington. Vol. 11. Murray. Common Senile ; or, Humbug Attacked in Arts, Science, and Literature. A Poem. Mr. John Bull, Jun. Mountcastle. The Parsee*: their History, Manners, Customs, and Religion. Doiabhoy Framjee. Smith and Elder. Deerbook. A Novel. Harriet Martineau. Ditto. Franikigh Hall. A Novel. Three Vols. Hurst and Bleckett. The Channel Islands; A Guide to Jersey, Guernsey, Sark, Herm, tc. Frank F. Daily, Esq. E. Stanford. A Guide to the Cathedrrds of England and Wales. Mac kenzie Walcott, M.A. E. Stanford. &Word's Paris Guide, with three Maps and a View (tithe Champs %sees. E. Stanford. An Account of the Mutinies in Ondh, and of the Siege of Imentow Residency. Martin Richard nubbins. Bentley. A Journey due North: News of a Residenee in Russia in the Summer of PC)Ii. George Augustus Sala. Bentley. Hews of Sun and Shade. Partridge, tee p c tewr &oval. Dr. Wan. LeUdy, M.A., M.R.C.F. • ' Whittaker awl Co