The Press. — London, England, 1855-05-26 00:00:00

Nittraturt. NEW NOVELS. ACCORDING to geologists there is a principle in nature by which life is continually tending to higher forms. How delightful it would be, and to the critic especially, if a like principle prevailed in regard to manifestations of the intellect in individual minds, and if the latest births of time were always the best. We should then have the pleasing task of congra tulating authors on a perceptible advance in their successive productions, and Should be spared the ungracious duty of whispering into many a loved and honoured ear such honest counsel as Gil Bias tendered to his patron the archbishop. In some departments of intellect, and particularly those which exercise the rea soning powers, the mind often retains its clearness and vigour to the last. But in what concerns the imagination there is usually a period of ripe fruition, a distinctly-marked epoch to which we can refer the most perfect intellectual oroductions of their author, and past which the process of decay commences. We know no exception to the rule, save in the case of those—shall we call them most blest or most unfortunate ?—who left the tale of their lives half told—whose genius was suddenly extinguished when it had attained what, to judge by its splendour, must have been its meridian—and who left exam s les only of its continual ascent in the heaven of invention. For the rest, from Homer to Walter Scott, genius seems to obey some such law as regu lates the vigour of physical life, and harshly as " Quod fuimus lauda" may sound, we are often compelled to remember it when perusing the works of old favorites. There is enough in Mrs. Marsh's new novel* to justify the fame she has gained as one of the most original and pathetic writers of fic tion in modern day. In eloquence and senti ment the work may vie with her best tales ; but in the inventive portion there are marks of the exaggeration into which all mannered writers are apt to fall when the freshness of their fancy has worn oil. Mrs. Marsh, for example, was always inclined to dwell too much on that hot-house kind of culture in humanity which if real is yet exceptional, which imparts to children the feelings and susceptibilities of men and women, and con nects all the struggles and distresses of exist ence with bread-and-butter and muslin. The heroine of this book is introduced to us in the nursery, of course. When informed that by the death of her father she has become a great heiress, the amiability of her infantile charac ter is portrayed by her preferring her old doll to a promised new one : " Great what I Heiress I What's that ? I'm not great— I'm very little, still. Look, what little arms I have—why, they're not bigger than Miss Dolly's arms, I do declare. I wish I knew what you were talking about, Nursy. Miss Aubrey lam ? I don't like Miss Aubrey. I'm Imogene. 1 like to be Imogene." "Oh I but you'll like better to be Miss Aubrey, won't you? and ride in a coach and four, and have two footmen with powdered hair, and canes in their hands, hanging be hind, and rosettes and ribbons as long as my arm at the horses heads. . . . And, bless me, Miss Aubrey, you must part with that nasty old dull ; it's not for such as you to play with such a filthy old thing as that." Imogene hugged her doll to her honest little heart. " But I love Dully, Nursy, because everybody's cross to her and calls her ugly but me." " Oh, but you musn't give in to such fancies, now. You'll have lots of beautiful wax dolls, now, and you maid throw that dreadful thing away to the dogs." " Dolly," said the little girl, looking into the face of her hroken-cheeked old friend, " don't you be afraid—never mind what Nursy says—l won't let you be thrown to the dogs, that I won't, and! won't love the beautifullest wax doll that ever was born in the world better than you. No, that I won't. Go, lie you there, and don't be afraid, and I'll get you up and dress you as soon as Nursy has done me." One touch of nature makes the whole world kin. The heart of Nurse swelled— IL 11C Lion.. va a..•• " And ain't it a heart of gold ?" she said, ns she lifted her little treasure from the bed, with a xiss so honest, that fora moment all the visions of her own and Miss Aubrey's grand- trrforgoaaeit r 1U si • asOhlittieftl fib er on, when the child is : .- • lef;sl4 /jietipsitta state coffin, and told 4444 e of • ;14ivatt rideur.,atetihat she shall wear a go ' ifs ' lta•iiskslinlX for " legs of mutton, " • ? d lit: - , itieass of breall, and pudding too," th•'' •.•. • ‘• o faot the , hungry people who * •• 7 ` . e • ' • bon. By the Author of " Emilia Wyndheiti l : loud*: Thirst and Blackett. THE PRESS. come from a distance to see the funeral show. Later in the book we have a por trait of the young lady in what we fancy the authoress considers the very prime and hey day of womanhood : Imogene Aubrey had that day completed her tenth or eleventh year, I forget which. She was not tall for her age, and seemed as if she would only reach to the middle size ; but possessed a lithe and beautiful figure, as far as beauty can be predicated of a growing young creature of that age. She was dressed in a perfectly simple muslin frock, bound about her waist with a broad blue ribbon, forming an immense bow behind a dress which I thought displayed her figure to the greatest advantage. Two blue ribbons, making bows, tying up her sleeves, and displaying her long slender, lily-white arms ; a black velvet band round her neck, with a small locket, containing, as I believe, her father's hair, completed her costume ; the pleasing effect of which was aided by her beautiful flowing tresses, which, though they had not been allowed to grow very long, /et hung about her in great abundance, and adorned a coun. tenance such as I have never seen elsewhere, and cannot hope to see again. In Lytton's " Caxton," containing some of his finest philosophy, there is faithfully pic tured a boy who in the close mental atmo sphere at home attained a sickly moral growth, but acquired the healthy robust spirit of his sge when placed at school with his fellows. Nothing is more unpleasant to our thinking than pictures of that excitability in youth which brings into activity emotions and passions natural only to a certain stage of maturity. The character of children may be charmingly represented when children are taken as the models ; but in Mrs. Marsh's children one cannot help conceiving that the little creatures are merely made the vehicles for embodying the authoress's own feelings and sentiments. In the latter part of the novel, when her boys are released from Eton—the playing : fields are dangerous ground for a female novelist to tread—and the girls are emancipated from their nurses and sashes, Mrs. Marsh appears to much more advantage. The heroine's de votion to duty shadows forth a noble charac ter, and leads to some animated narrative. Mrs. Marsh has too much of the vis vivida of genuine talent ever to pen a dull book. It would be easy to cull many beautiful passages from these volumes; and, notwithstanding what we consider to be their cardinal defect, they possess sufficient attraction to secure for them welcome acceptance from all lovers of fiction. The world is very tolerant of literary im posture up to a certain point. An author, while avoiding all real names, may represent a MS. as coming into his possession by any kind of machinery—natural or supernatural—which it pleases him to invent. We have read in our time narratives purporting to have been found in chests buried in the earth—in caves by the seashore—to have been revealed in dreams— to have been discovered in cabinets. Where the artifice is transparent no one cares to resent it. Scott himself was allowed to indulge his humour by the introduction of that incomprehensible personage Mr. Jedediah Cleishbotham without question—one reason probably being that no one ever took the trouble to read these most pedantic of prefaces to those most delightful of novels. If the ghost of Sir Walter had ap peared to the Directeur General de la Societe des Archivistes de France, and placed the MS. of Moredun t in his hands for publication, no one would have called in question the veracity of M. Cabany, and the romance would have met with fair notice as a production avowedly in the school of Scott. Even the tale of the old German, and his bequest to M. Cabany of his writing-desk containing the precious MS., might have passed muster as an allowable fiction. But when the handwriting of Scott is closely imitated, and M. Cabany in an elaborate introduction maintains the literal truth of his story, and supports it—we admit with considerable ingenuity—by reasons drawn from Scott's life, and from the peculiarities of his character, then the case against the Directeur General becomes one of literary forgery ; and we warn him in all fairness that unless he hastens to avow his stratagem, and declare that he only intended by perseverance in it to test the critical acumen of our country. his reputation, not only as a man of letters, but as a man of honour, will be irreparably + Atomism : a Tale of the Twelve Hundred and Ten. By W. S. London: Sampson Low and Son. SATURDAY, blasted, and that the odium of falsehood, which neither the genius of Chatterton, nor the ingenuity of Ireland, could overcome, will bear him down, and set a brand on his name which will render it infamous in every literary society of Europe. Why such extraordinary pains should have been taken to countenance a fraud which it was scarcely possible should obtain even momentary credence, it is not for us to explain. But such pains are not, as M. Cabany would insinuate, any proof of au• thenticity, as the history of literary impos ture is full of evidences of the like elabo rate falsehood. On his own sho wing—if Scott wished this work to be published anony mously as an experiment, that he might ascertain whether he could not open a new vein, it is most unlikely that he would have given away the MS. written in his own hand. Falsehood is often too cunning for its own purpose ; it overshoots its mark, and ;s de tected by the elaborateness of the artifice it adopts to insure success. Why does not M. Cabany reveal the name of the German who bequeathed him this legacy ? Why not make reference to those living mem bers of the German's family who sent him the writing box after their relative's death? Why not call as witnesses to his veracity some of those persons who, he says, were intimate with the German, and familiar with his " often-repeated assertion that he expected to " be, or was, the possessor of an original " manuscript by the reat Scottish novelist, " Sir Walter Scott" ? When any person asserts that he has evidence at hand to support his word gravely called in question, yet fails to do so, the inference is obvious. The ostentatious manner in which M. Cabany advertises himself as the proprietor of " Moredun" does afford some reason, though surely of the basest kind, why the deception should have been originated, and why it should have been maintained. It is unfortu nate that in the most conspicuous cases of literary fraud the object should not have been to puzzle critics and test the discernment of literary societies, but to make profit in some way by the transaction. We alwa) s thought that Sir Walter com mitted a grave error in expressly, and even, as we find by Mr. Warren's revelations, in voluntarily denying his authorship of the Waverley novels. His falsehood added to the weight and strain put on his faculties, and perhaps by concealing from his friends the real nature of his engagements with the Bal lantynes contributed to the lamentable mis fortunes of his declining years. That tendency towards deceit or mystification which was the one great blot in his character was un doubtedly the primary cause of all his dis tresses. To be sure, if an author is willing to put himself on exactly the same footing as a shop man in a linendraper's business, or hold that he is at liberty to Make what misrepresenta tions he pleases for the purpose of selling his wares to the best advantage, the apology which Scott made for his conduct may be held valid, and in that case, too, M. Cabany may consider himself justified in carrying the practice a little further than Scott ever anticipated. If an author is at liberty to assert that he never wrote works which he did write, may not some adventurer fasten on him works which are really not his ? Perhaps this was the view which first suggested the publication of " Moredun." M. Cabany seems to suppose that the array of all his literary titles to dis tinction will secure support for his assertions in the teeth of the strongest probabilities. Character, on a question of evidence, should weigh for something ; but how fatal is the position of any man who basely trades on reputation he has won, and enlists his honours in the service of degradation ! These remarks are made because such attempts as this one by M. Cabany must, if persisted in, have an injurious effect on the literary character. What he is bound to do is this, either to admit that he has been playing a part already carried too far, or bring for ward witnesses in support of his statement, and place his whole case in the hands of some literary men competent to pronounce a just decision on it. If he has really set forth the