The Press. — London, England, 1856-06-28 00:00:00

618 But if both were obstinate in error, their ob stinacy led at last to brilliant results. It was by perseverance in the operations resolutely adhered to by Lord Raglan that Sebastopol fell at last ; and it is the saddest remembrance of this great siege that our heroic field-mar shal did not live to witness the triumph of his sagacity and endurance. It is open for the Baron to insinuate that the Imperial plan developing the "highest strategical science " might have been attended with more fortunate results still ; but the des• perate attempts of the enemy to induce the allies to take the field, show that the scheme of external operations would have been gladly welcomed by him. The Baron would have shown infinitely more prudence had he re frained from all effort to damage Lord Raglan's reputation on account of his rejection of the Imperial plan ; and we think further, that greater wisdom would have been shown had the plan itself been preserved among those historical documents which are not destined to see the light until there is no longer danger that they will be discussed in a spirit of partisanship. The simple statement of facts is the best refutation of the Baron's very clumsy efforts to depreciate Lord Raglan's name in respect of this passage of the expedition. English readers will certainly conceive a higher opinion of the military genius of their commander from learning how great were the difficulties he had to contend with, and how powerful were the influences brought to bear upon him to induce him to abandon the prosecution of the mighty work in which he was engaged. As for the Baron's style, it defies descrip tion. It jumps from the past to the present tense with unaccountable rapidity. The Emperor is Alexander the Great, and the French troops—every soldier is, of course, a hero—love nothing so much as to be swept away by grape-shot, except to shout " Vive l'Empereur," and to fall on each other's neck in loving embrace. When, at the commence ment of the war, Marshal St. Arnaud reviews a French division in presence of the Sultan:— He sees France—France the warlike, France the pro tectress ; and for, perhaps, the first time a smile rests upon those pale lips, and his cheeks are flushed. At the Alma : During the battle, when the Marshal galloped from one point to another, the wounded, as he passed, half rising mad seeking to drag themselves towards him, while waving in the air their mutilated arms, tried out— " We have them ➢farshal—we have them." The enthusiasm of battle blended with the enthusiasm of victory. The valour of the French army is dis honoured by the bombast pervading this book. We hope their noble deeds will not long want a more faithful chronicler. In addition to its other faults the narrative is extremely vague, and totally deficient in the minute informa tion which it is the especial province of con temporary writing to convey. A single letter from " Our Own Correspondent" of the Times or Herald is worth all the stilted nonsense that all the Baron de Bazancourts in the world over penned. Erlesmere ; or, Contrasts of Character. By L. S. Lavenu. Two Vols. London: Smith and Elder. " ERLESMERE " belongs to the same class of novel as the stories of Miss Young, " The Heir of Redclyffe,'' &c., nor is it inferior to them in ability and in the exhibition of internal conflict, though the incidents are more stormy. The whole class depends for • its interest much more on the growth of feel ing, and the development of character, than on the narrative of external circum stances. Such novels aro mainly subjective; in the opinion of Goethe not the best or healthiest style of fiction, though it results naturally from states of society which have much leisure, and little call for the activity which compels attention to outward things. A pretty story is told by Lord John Russell of the widow of that Marquis of Tavistock, the son of Junius's Duke of Bedford, who was killed by a fall from his horse, soon after his marriage. Her loss preyed on her spirit ; her physician saw hei sinking, without power to save her. One time, observing her hand closed, he opened it, and discovered, that she THE PRESS. held a miniature of her lost lord. " Alas, Madam ! " he said, " while you cherish this " malady, my art must needs be vain." After her death, surly Johnson took part in a con versation in which her fate was deplored. He thought it a pity she had not been a char woman and compelled to work for her bread, as her care would not then have settled about her heart. The hand of little occupation, says Shakespeare, bath the daintier sense. In a refined and orderly state of society, sub jective fictions there always must be ; so let us hope that, on the whole, their influence will wisely be exercised, not to vitiate internal life, but to prevent it from stagnating. The dedication to " Erlesmere " affords a key to its construction, and for that reason is worth quotation : To my Mother and Godmother.—As those who dwell by still waters picture to themselves storms, that they may the better appreciate their own happiness; so I, who lived in the calm shelter of your affection, have portrayed in this book such storms of life as were unknown to my home•atmcsphero : therefore, to you, who made existence what it was to me, I dedicate this story of a darker life. Hence, as may be supposed, the " storms " de picted are rather conceived by the imagination than imitated from reality. The author throws his action back to the time of the great French Revolution, when ideas were unsettled, and there was wider range of individual sentiment than in our own day. Mr. Ede, a gentleman of the Lord Stanhope type, very liberal, rather weak, and scarcely sane, is suddenly left a widower with twin boys, the elder feeble and shy, the younger handsome and confident. With them, as his ward, is left the brother of Mrs. Erle, one Stephen Harley, a student, impregnated with the sceptical philosophy, but not satisfied with it. He is a doubter, uncertain what to believe, yet not content with unbelief—cynical but passionate, with ardent aspirations, yet no heaven. The character of Mr. Erle, though he lingers but a short time on the scene, is conveyed by a few skilful touches. Stephen mourns for his sister's death with that bitterest of all sorrow which knows no hope : His guardian's voice disturbed him. " Oh, Mary ! oh, my wife ! beet of women, my life will be one long mourning for thee." The words, so like a translation from Marmontel, dis turbed not merely his attention, but his tone of being. The numbing cold at his heart was disturbed by a sharp momentary anguish. He was again the scorner of all pre tences, of common men, and of their common pursuits. The children are objects of care to both Mr. Erle and Stephen : " Shall we go and see them in the trirsery ? " asked Stephen. They had reached the ball-door as he spoke. You forestal me, my dear boy ; from this hour I devote myself to them. Oh, Mary, look with pleasure on my love to your legacy ! " " Curious how belief in a future life will break in, when for a moment dogmas are forgotten," thought Stephen. . . . " Please, sir," said the nurse, fearing that the gentlemen were forgetting the twins. " I think it would be well if Master—l mean the eldest young gentleman —were christened." " I'll consider, nurse," sai I Mr. Erle, hastily. "I am inclined to think it would be useful. A certificate is often wanted." " Sir, it might be well to have it soon done. The doctor thinks him very delicate. Poor child, he's not well shaped for health." " How? What! Is anything amiss ?" " He will come straighter, sir, if he be well minded." " Good God! is he deformed ?" Curious how God is appealed to when feeling is ex• cited," thought Stephen. Mr. Erie soon disappears from the scene, and the twins are left in the guardianship of their uncle Stephen, and of Sir Harry Effingham, a military disciplinarian. His wife, Lady Effingham, is very fair and gracious, one or those amiable persons whose suavity arises from want of feeling:— With every tender, every gracious part, Say what does Chloe want? She wants a heart. The Effinghams have a daughter, Mildred. Lady Effingham thinks it would he highly con venient, as the estates join, ifahe were matched to Herbert, the eldest twin ; Sir Harry is in favour of Herbert's enterprising, high-spirited brother, Cecil. Mr. De Broke is a clergyman of the neighbourhood, and, while the whole party are riding out one day, speculates on the favour with which Herbert is received by the Effinghams : " Lady Effingham is markedly civil to him, certainly. But it is natural enough; besides, I know his father SATURDAY, wished a union of Effingham and Erlesmere. At his death, Herbert scarcely promised to attain his present manhood." " Oh, yes ! the boundaries of the estates run together," said Stephen, musingly. " True, 1 had half forgotten." " Cecil is Sir Harry's favorite ; but he has to push his way in the world before he can marry." " Did you serve your time to a conveyancer, De Broke?" " Eh! no, of course not." " I think it would be well for young clergymen to do so; and short forms for passing and settling estates might be annexed to the service for matrimony; they seem a necessary part of the ceremony." " Ah! you have odd notions, Harley." In due time Mildred Effingham's character unfolds. She is wilful, and has that strange kind of self assertion often seen even in children as they feel rather than are conscious of innate superiority over those by whom they are surrounded. She is attracted to Stephen Harley, the sceptical student, by the same un definable sympathy that leads plants to their proper sources of nourishment and support. She has then three admirers, each essentially distinct from the other; and when this posi tion is marked out the narrative rises in fasci nation and power. It is not necessary to follow it further. It is clever, sometimes eccentric, and in parts extremely poetical. But it is much rather fantastical than natural. It is a mere show of what persons with assumed characters might do under assumed coudi• tions. There are many passages towards the close of the second volume of extraordinary force, tragic circumstances being revealed in those momentary flashes of dramatic fire which are far more effective than laboured de scription. Such, for example, is the passage, made up of exclamations, in which the form of the mangled, bleeding Cecil meets Mildred and Stephen, as, all sense of shame and re morse lost in the transport of triumphant sin, they are about to quit her threshold. In this and . similar passages there is exaggeration, but also power. The author has fine faculties of poetic perception. If he chooses to cult:• vate his talents, and to graft upon them what he specially wants, actual experience of life, he may rise high as a novelist. How it is that some writers as retired as himself should have the faculty of conceiving modes of life totally opposed to the quietude of their own existence, is a mystery to be sought only in the unaccountable range of human sympa- thies. A writer may personally be pure, Yet depict hideous vice—may be selfish, yet charmingly exhibit generosity—may be regu lar, yet paint all the allurements of passion. What could be a greater contrast to the orderly money-getting life of Richardson as a printer in Salisbury-square than the trials he depicted of Clarissa Harlowe ? From whence dirt he draw his pathos ? Where did he get his knowledge of the heart? Or how did the late Miss Bronte, in her country retreat, acquire the mastery of character and motive which she undoubtedly possessed, though often exer cised most fantastically ? Something of this intuitive faculty, most wonderfully shown when the temper is serene, the heart pure, the affections regulated, and the judgment cool, Mr. Lavenu possesses. But this faculty is liable to mislead, and the author of " Erlesmere " seems to us just one of those writers who have need to curb their conceptive power by all the restraints of ex perience and study. Gabriel. By Bessie Rayner Parkes. London : Chapman. WE are not sure that we comprehend the full scope of this little poem. It is in some way connected with the poet Shelley, who appears to be the object of the young lady's most sincere idolatory ; but beyond this general truth we are left in darkness. The poetry itself is a clever imitation of that of the Laureate. The music of it is perfect, and the language and images bespeak a truly poetic vein of thought. The few stanzas following are descriptive of the scenery of Shelley's early home, and his associa tions : For miles these beeches rise and fall, And ripple like some inland sea; From bough to bough the wood-birds call, And squirrels nest in every tree : Blue depths of distance melt away As far as vision may discern, And all the open slopes are gay With foxgloves and the tangled fern. II