The Press.
London, England, 1858-02-20 00:00:00

NEW NOVELS.

1. Gaston Bligh. 113 L. S. Lavenu. Two Vols.

London: Smith and Elder.
2. Uncle Ralph. By the Author of " Dorothy,"

&c. Lotplon : John W. Parker and Son.
3. Dawn and Twilight. By the Author of " Amy
Grant," &c. Two vols. London :J. H. Parker.

1. •Gaston 13ligh " would deserve to be considered
the best novel that has appeared for many months
if the writer's notion of life and its obligations were
at all equcl to his (?) manner of telling a story. We
had lately occasion to remark (PREss, Dec. 20, 1857)
that the novels inculcating the most questionable
views of duty were at the present day generally
written by women. If the one hetore us, as would
seem by many of its characteristics to be the case,
is the work of a masculine hand, we can only lament
that the intellectual or moral disease complained of
has communicated itself to a writer whose apps.
rently wide eAperience and great general ability
might have been expected to preserve him from suoh
contagion. Gaston Bligh is the only son of a widow
who, in overstrained obe.lienee to her deceased hus-
band's wishes, brings him up by strict rule and
method, with every possible care, but without the
least show of affection. This plan of education en.
tirely fails wi;.h the boy, who is wild and reckless,
and has no love for any one but his aunt, Mrs.
Godwin, who alone understands his character. One
day, in a paroxysm of juvenile rage, he sets fire to
his mother's house, which is burnt down ; soil,
though he repents and behaves well afterwards, is
never again trusted by either mother or aunt. After
distinguishing himself at Oxford, where his o.treer
is quite unexceptionable, he falls in with his cousin,

188

Miss Godwin (her mother being dead), and a
mutual attachment is the result. But the young
lady, though the match is desired by all parties, and
though she has actually accepted her lover, retracts
her consent. The reader is surprised? So was
Gaston Bligh. Miss Godwin satisfies him by pro-
ducing her mother's last letter, in which she is
charged " to make a friend of Gaston, but nothing
more ;" and, though suffering intensely, is thence-
forth inexorable to his suit. Gaston goes abroad,
and, after a year's travelling, meets a young heiress
with light hair. Women with light hair are oiten
very dangerous. Miss Smith was so : a sort of fast
mermaid, with yellowish green locks, exquisite fea-
tures, and " grey eyes like a shallow sea " (reminding
us, by the way, of an equally formidable damsel in
" Guy Livingstone"). Gaston fascinates and is fas•
cinated ; cots oat his rivals—which is part of the
fascination—and in one night loses 20mila at bil-
liards and wins the heiress. Sirens, however, are
not safe till you actually have them in church and
the ring round their finger—perhaps not then. From
a delirious waltz with his charmer Gaston is sum-
moned to the side of his lost love, Sylvia Godwin,
who has never recovered the rupture of their engage-
ment, and to whom the news of his fresh affiir proves
a death-blow. After her death Gaston has a fever,
from which he recovers to find Miss Smith carried
off by a lord, and, being now poor, he denotes the
residue of his life and cue-impaired fortune to works
of benevolence and quiet social amelioration. Our
summary gives no idea of the very great power with
which the story is told, the epigrammatic piquancy
of the conversations and reflections, and the depth
of occasional remarks, which will come home to the
experience of many a reader. The whole book
sparkles with esprit, and the characters talk like
gentlemen and belies, not like cubs or cockneys.
The author's mind seems quite saturated with good
poetry, and the descriptions show pictorial feeling,
and are not introduced too often. Altogether, it is
very enjoyable reading, and we rise from it with the
impression of the author's extreme cleverness. But
there is a but. We should not have analysed the
story in the tone we have used, had we not felt the
very strongest disapproval of the conception and
principal motive of the story. To patronise and
foster a youth, and become his friend aad protector
—to persuade him that he is understood—to accept
his repentance for his faults—and to forbid a beau-
tiful girl with whom he will inevitably associate, and
as inevitably fall in love, to make him "more than a
friend "—all the while giving him no warning, and
even alluring him by the bait of the permitted friend-
ship—is a refinement of cruelty which none but a
very exemplary person would have thought of, and
only a very strongminded person would have carried
into execution. On the part of Mrs. Godwin there
is the fallacy of supposing that one's daughter is to
marry cote but a perlect character, and the pre-
sumption of desiring to play the part of Providence
even after death. On the part of Miss Godwin there
is an overstrained view of filial obedience, and the
pet absurdity of recent heroines, that self•sacrifice is
a good thing in itself, independently of the objet for
which it is made. We are required to allow-1.
That Sylvia was bound to adhere to her mother's
wishes; 2. That by consequently going into a con-
sumption and wasting her lover's life she was effect-
ing the purification of his character and her own,
and doing an act acceptable in the sight of Heaven.
All tliis we utterly disbelieve and deny. No casuistry
will make us admit that we are forbidden to take
happiness which is placed within our reach, and is
not in itself Inconsistent with divine law ; and it is a
morbid view both of divine law and moral obligation
which asserts that we are bound to obey the direc-
tions of a person who is necessarily ignorant of the
circumstances on which we are to decide and the
changes of character in those who are to be affected
by our decision. We do not, of course, expect the
author to modify at our suggestion what we consider
the perversity of his views; but, at any rate, we may
warn our readers against being led away by the spe-
ciousness and brilliant talent with which they are
presented. We should be only too glad if we could
see another novel by the same hand, written with
equal power and pervaded by healthier ideas.

2. We have already had occasion to express our-
seives favourably of the works of this authoress, and
we are glad to be able to repeat our praise in the
present instance. Unpretending as:tier stories are, they
have the merit of accomplishing all they profess, of
being written with entire good taste and good feeling,
Anil of adhering to a high standard of cor duct with.
ont any of those overstrained and morbid views of
moral obligation which are unhappily so prevalent in
stories of a similar class. " Uncle Ralph" is de-
cidedly the best work of fiction its authoress has yet
produced. It is superior to " Dorothy " in know.
ledge of life, to " Da Cressy " in pathos and dramatic
force, and to " Still Waters " in general interest.
The characters are clearly brought out, and the
motives and impulses by which they are actuated are
of a genuine, healthy, and human kind. They talk
As people do in common life, but perhaps with a less