The Press. — London, England, 1855-06-16 00:00:00

576 deeply interesting to lovers of Ireland. Of course, if one Irish member speaks, five others must attack him, and five more must batter his sssailants, so that an Irish row helped on the evening until half after :due. Then the Speaker retired, with views which strangers interpret according to their respective natures—it being a moot question, and variously decided, whether the right buuour able gentleman goer to take a chop, a yawn, a cigar, a shower-bath. or a sherry-cobbler. Be returned. A cry of order—down go the galleries—members to their places— reporters learn forward—the Speaker glances at the Go veil:anent—a ministerial hat is moved—a Minister rises for a moment, murmurs a few words—and the Speaker's voice proclaims that at last the work of the night is on. Then, crowded, and not in the best of temper, the house addresses itself to listen. We may laugh—but the sight of a constitutional assembly of free men waiting an expo sition from the Minister of a Constitutional Sovereign, is a fine one, and suggestive of many a bloody historical page, turned before that leaf was reached. The following hint upon the regulation of our jokes and our lives at the same time ought not to be lightly passed over : Never joke with dull people ; a joke's lost if it's not understood, and a friend if it's misunderstood. Wait for a safe audience, and in the meantime, talk about the weather, and the advantage of railways in prumutiug communication. One of the most amusing episodes in the book concerns Miss Angela Livingstone, a pretty actress at a minor theatre, and her lover, Mr. Paul Chequer bent. We have not space to notice the ball in which they figure, and the disturbance caused by Paul's tipsy jocularity, and the subsequent police investiga tion ; but every one who has spent a morning in a police-court will testify to the truth of this eloquent and impressive passage : The Beak (magistrate] seated himself, and for some time there passed before him a portion of the grim phan tasmagoria of depravity, want, and brutality, which every morning surges up to the judgment-seat from the turbid sea of London existence. The wife, foully battered and bruised by her husband, came as usual, and hardly raised her swollen eyes to deny his counter-charge of drunken ness and aggravation. The mother was there to beg the law to protect her from the child that robbed and kicked her, and the sullen and vicious cub replied with a lie of starvation and ill-usage. 'the baby was laid, all bones and bruises, before the minister of justice, to testify that a beast's dam is kinder than some baptised and married mothers. Vile women, hoarse and pert, told their shame less quarrels, and bared their flesh to show the wounds of nails and teeth. A brawny ruffian, his bead and face seamed with crimson plasters, pleaded that drink bad maddened him, and hoped that the blows he had received before he could be secured, might atone for his having muti lated three or four officers. Children were placed behind a barrier, over which nothing but their shock hair and bright eyes could be seen, to be judged for pilfering, while the Jew fence, or the marine-store-keeping Christian, lurked near the door to hear whether his pupils were to rejoin him at once, or after some whipping and imprisonment. A lithe-limbed pick-pocket took his thirtieth sentence with a pleasant bow to his judge; an Irish beggar-woman sobbed and howled frightfully during the hearing, and then 'bog a stone at the chief clerk's bald head ; a maniac preacher announced hie divine mission, with hideous cries about eternal fire and the undying worm ; and a consump tive gay woman, in yellow satin and a lace bonnet, was bound over not to assault a brown and corpulent hag, who lent her the trappings for her dreadful trade, and exacted in return nearly the last sixpence it produced. Such was some of the " cases "of the day. Take a chair in a police court for one morning, and you will, perhaps, go away with a resolve to do quietly, and to the best of your power, the work which lies nearest your hand, but not to shout very much fur the future when Mr. Sadducee, in the Commons, boasts about this enlightened age ; and Earl Pharisee, in the Lords, brags about this Christian nation. When Carlyon presents his play to the manager, Mr. Dilligroat, he receives some shrewd hints on the theatrical tastes of the day : I don't care what a piece is, provided it has situations. Those are the things. It goes against the temper of you literary gentlemen to know that the pieces which really develop the powers of the actors, send the audience into screams of laughter, and bring in the money—pieces, there fore, which a manager is always glad to accept and produce, are not the work of your white handed, thoughtful men, who think and construct, and study, and re-write, and all that. No, sir, the pieces that do good to the house are chiefly vamped up from old French farces, by the aid of a dictionary, by people who take a business view of matters, do as they are bid, and hack and slice their work to order, until it suits me and my actors, and then take their money. You gentlemen, until you are well broken, write plays to bring out yourselves and your own ideas—not to help the actors and please the audience. Do you know that, Mr. Cal lyon ? It is not possible by extracts to do justice to a novel distinguished by so much variety of character, rapidity of action, and humorous incident. " Aspen C Jurt," notwithstanding its liveliness, is eminently a thoughtful book, reflecting shades of" many-coloured life" in their native brilliancy or depth with the power of a skilful artist, and the feeling of a mind to which, from its wide sympathies, the celebrated " Homo stm" of Terence is peculiarly applicable. A gallery of characters might be culled from the book, plainly drawn f.om life, and, whatever their virtues and vices, strongly human in all their lineaments. Mr. Brooks, in I is first novel, has achieved such dec ided success that we hope shortly to meet him again upon this ground. THE PRESS. Very different to "Aspen Court" in aim and cha racter will be found Eustace Conyers.* It be longs to that order of novels exceedingly abundant just now, iu which moral questions are presented to us through the medium of heroes and heroines. We worship Minerva in a muslin dress, and shrink from philosophy without an amour to sweeten it. Whether this condescension to the indolence of the age be really inevitable might form the subject of an interesting discussion ; but we must at present assume that it is ; and, considering who have pre ceded him, it is no disparagement to Mr. Hannay to say that this is the class of novelists in which he must rank. In " Eustace Conyers" a weighty political and social theory is attached to the rather slender thread of a nautical tale. But it is superior to others of a similar class in its earnestness and its freshness. The young men who talk politics are not politicians. We are free from the gossip of clubs, and the slang of factories ; we are able to stand off, as it were, from the political world, and get a more comprehensive view of the conflict there waging. It is highly interesting as affording a glimpse of what is going on in the minds of, we doubt not, a numerous class of the rising generation, especially among men of educa tion who are debarred from an active share in ' politics, a conviction, that is, that they have been, to use a vulgar term, " bamboozled" by the democratic party. That the real claims and real merits of the aristocracy have been carefully buried under a load of misrepresentation—in flue, a kind of reaction in favour of feudalism. But we shall return to this subject presently. We have said that the thread of the story is a slender one; we may add that it is composed of very ordinary materials. The hero goes to sea—makes friends—comes home again—falls in love with the heiress of his ancestral estates—is rejected by her father—makes some odd discoveries about the brother—harsh parent dies of disease of the heart— curtain thrown over the last painful scene—on the rising of which everybody is made happy in the most approved and orthodox fashion. But if there is nothing of more than average merit in the plot, the capital delineation of one or two of the characters will more than repay us. The old clergyman, the father of Eustace, is excellent, uniting the charac teristics of Roland and Caxton into one most original portrait; proud of his lineage, partly for its own sake, partly because it is connected with his favorite study of coats of arms, charters, and pedigrees; steeped in classic lore, yet prizing it, if possible, less for its own inherent beauty than for the aristocratic associations with which it is allied ; viewing every question that can be submitted to him under its re lation to one of these two ideas that govern his being ; and his whole character mellowed, as Mr. Hannay might say, by a golden hue of traditions, like an autumn noon by the hazy sunlight of Sep tember. The hero himself is a good, honest youth— straightforward, hearty, and tender—loving his pro fession, respecting his superiors, and fearing his God —a good old hero of the good old times, such as Scott has given us in Roland GrEeme and Quentin Dur ward. A refreshing change after the pre-Raphael itish heroes whom Mr. Thackeray has brought into fashion. Not that these are not of surpassing ex cellence in their way, but they require study; and it is agreeable sometimes to pass on from Mr. Millais to the pleasing groups and landscapes of Frith and Creswick. Many of Mr. Hannay's other characters are very cleverly drawn, though, perhaps, not quite so natural. Henry Mildew, the able and ambitious Oxonian, who is depicted with considerable know ledge of the world, though with less of that portion of it which is known by the title of university men. They have many peculiar faults, but flippancy and premature selfishness are not among them. Don Emmanuel, the Brazilian Epicurus, who may be true or not, for all we know : travellers see strange sights, and the Don may be one of them—only we think Mr. Hannay should have made him a Mormonite. That would have been new, and in strict keeping with his character, for the Don cannot "form a con " caption of the beautiful apart from the idea of en " joying it." However, his conversation affords Mr. Hannay the occsAion of one of his best sayings : The Don would pluck a rose of Sharon and put it in his buttonhole as indifferently as any other. Oh, the subtle epicurean warming his while hands al altar fires. Of the others, Hilderstone is a mere man of straw, and Poor does nothing adequate to the prominence given him. While as to the rest of the young naval officers, Messrs. Pearlstuds, Frogleyfox, and Co., we hardly know whether to consider them a joke or a blunder. These young gentlemen toss off the con dition of Europe or the philosophy of life in a couple of pointed epigrams ; quaff their claret and chide their duns with the graceful ease of a Sheridan ; and display generally a precocious manhood which we have never met with in youths of twenty either in colleges or mes.rooms. Whether such line spi.its * Esisiace Conyers. A Novel. By James Hannay. Author " Singleton Fontenoy. London: BUPA And Blaoksti SATURDAY, are fair specimens of sailors we will not undertake to determine ; but it is certainly a revelation for which the British public was not entirely prepared. We are inclined to think that here Mr. Hannay h as let his wit get the better of his judgment, and has forgotten that however much the service may be im proved it is not radically changed ; that a Chester field among middies is not a leas anomaly than a Benbow among admirals. _ Mr. liannai's style is throughout worthy of our highest commendation. Whether he is plucking a parvenu, describing a period, or dissecting a preju dice, painting the soft beauty of an English gir., or the peculiar richness of an English landscape, whether love-making, fighting, or carousing be the subject of his pencil, we are sure to have a picture that arrests the attention. Every word tells. He never labours to make us understand him, because he is thinking more of his subject than his readers ; and he is always clear, because his language is the impress of clear conceptions. We subjoin an ex tract from his description of modern country houses Every trim little shrub just beginning to sprout has a " cocky " air, as if it would say, " Sir, a bead gardener, with a large income, and a staff of men, looks after me," The sleek lilies in the very neat ponds seem to observe, " Sir, if you pull us, you will be given in charge !" No Dryad dare haunt the grounds, or she would be arrested for trespassing.— Vol. i.,p. Ib7. The peculiar political tenets of which "Eustace Conyers" is intended to be the exponent are rather to be gathered from the general tone than from any distinct statement. In the first place we are at once to discard the delusion that the aristocracy of this country is represented by the peerage. The descen dants of the feudal landholders, whether titled or otherwise, rich or poor, are the real aristocracy; and if we measure them by this standard we shall find that to their ranks belongs a far larger proportion of England's worthies, past and present, than the country has been accustomed to believe. Milton, Ben Jonson, and Dynes Clinton, Scott, Shelley, Coliingwood, Nelson, and Napier, are cited as in stances. The aristocracy, therefore, have not become effete ; the old Norman blood is as potent as of yore ; and half the evils of the day are attributable to the fact that wealthy plebeians are perpetually buying out the old gentry and usurping their places both in the country and the Government. This is the natural result of our commercial development. But we cannot have our cake and eat it; we cannot nourish at the same time the virtues of the soldier and the huckster. Here, by-the-bye, we may as well observe that as to the question of " blood" Saxon and Norman are in reality quite on a par, the Normans being only a later emigration of the same Scandinavian race; for it is a mistake to suppose that the companions of Hengist and Horse were akin to what we now call Germans. The English Saxon is the brother of the Dane, and both, as well as their Norman conquerors, come alike of that famous old people whose descen dants are still, like their forefathers, the lords of the ocean. A second point is a vindication of the character of our ancestors : It must be remembered (bays Mr. Hannay) that if they had the lion's share, it was because they were the hone, which is surely an excellent reason. And again, p. 17 : The purchasers of land (i.e., the present ones) hate never attained that relation to the people which belonged to the old families. Feudal superiority is founded on personal excellence ; but money is a brute force—s me chanical thing. Hence we may educe three distinct propositions. First, that our feudal ancestors perfectly deserved what they won; secondly, that their descendants are not as a rule degenerate ; and, thirdly, that the feudal system itself called into play a much higher class of feelings than our present one—a mixture of plutocracy and oligarchy—the force of the latter neutralised by the timidity of the former. These maxims, combined with a sympathetic appreciation of courage, devotion, and gentleness, constitute Mr. Hannay's theory, on which we pass no opinion our selves, but the enunciation of which we may without the slightest exaggeration pronounce the most signi ficant symptoms of the times since the appearance of "Coningsby." Mr. Hannay is no academic dreamer, no hired advocate of some crotchetiy capitalist. He is a perfectly independent and perfectly sincere wnter : and these are the conclusions to which a lung study of the past, and a sagacious observation of the present, have conducted him. Frank Hilton+ is a military novel on what may be called the Lever principle; full of dashing exploits, extraordinary Arab horses, and still more extraor dinary men and women. The " business " allotted to the different characters is distributed on the good old time-honoured principle of " aivisiun of labour," all the scoundrelism being performed by one gentle man, a sicked captain of dragoons; all the hair breadth escapes and generous self-sacrifices by