The Express.
London, England, 1868-04-30 00:00:00

Mamie My%le. A sketch. By L.MALINI; WTNCH. I
II ids. London : Chapman and Hall, ISM. 1
The Commas of Castle thaatll. By JANET floe- I
sex. .9 vols. London : Macmillan and Co., 1
Ml/68
, By Mrs. EILOAKT. 3 vols. London : Hurst
and Blackett, 1868. 1
Margie Clyde is a simple and neatly told story of
a young girl who was wooed for her fortune, and
then neglected when hor father a untimely death
rendered her a beggar, but who never ceased to '
hoe the man who had used her so hardly. Even-
tually she dies of a broken heart. The situations
are admirably contrived. There is neither strain-
ing after effect nor breach of probability. One of 1
the personages makes a remark which proves that
the author is well aware of the fictitious style
which too many novelists affect in their dialogues.
The occasion of it is a dinner party at which the
guests conversed with greater sense than point,
that is, they talk very much as they weld(' in real
life :•—••• 'How is it, Sir John,' observed Mrs. Hope
Vera, with a pretty shrug of her shoulders, • that .
one never hears the witty and brilliant converse,"
tion one reads of in novels?' Net er is rather
sweeping, isn't it f— or your social experiences in t.
that line have been unusually unfortunate,' he
replied. ' I have often listened to %%hat our Attie- I
riven friends would call very •• tall talk." Temple-
ton, for ens, can be agreeable enough wheAr I
jAdibigralk Like rued burrieters j sA our hue ,
as you know, has plenty Of :Wif.--.lroKiiitoune, too,
t is considered' rather a shining light at the Foreign-
' office ; but, I conclude, in a mixed party like this,
dead weight tells,' and he indicated his country
friend with a smile. 'lf you call that dead weight,
there s a good deal of it in society,' said Mrs.
Vere ; and I think she was about right." Of course
the difficulty would be to attract readers, were
m,velists to aim at being accurate when recording
conversation. If the usual talk of dinner-parties
and ball-rooms was literally reprod need in a novel,
we should have to peruse the same inane phrases
time after time, because half the utterances on
these occasion are steniotyped expressions. It was
• nw. clever speeches, however, which stole away
I Margie tayde.s heart. Sir Claude Conyng-
I ham), whom she met at her first baU, fascinated
i her by his manner, and his undisguised
' preference for her. A young girl is apt to lay
I great stow on attentions seriously paid when she
lis but on the threshold of life. Thus Margie was
won before she was aware, and the conquest was
I made the niore easily because Sir Claude bad made
a study of the hest method of capti rating youthful
and innocent hearts. I hte of the personages justly
says 1,1 him :—" If men are too poor to marry
I they ought to be too proud to Hirt." This was
not his case : he was ready to marry, but he de-
I sired a partner both lovely and rich. As sour,
then, as 3largie la:conies dependent ore others lie
mints his atblitionn to another heiress, cud sue-
Ccrtbi in his object, although not without ulti-
mately having to forego an increased fortune
which he deemed secure. Mrs. Pere, who plays a
disreputable part, is one of those clever Wit
It!..iii;:htless ladies who sacrifice every tiling for
pleasure and excitement, including even 'heir re-
putation. She lived mihs.ppily with her husband,
refusing to enter into any of his pursuits or Ay'''-
. pathise with his preferences. " She was one of
those natures common enough in society, whose
delicate softness and bloom outside tempt you to
i believe that they are throughout loveable and
, tender, until some unexpected (lay you conic in
1 tontact with the hen! bitter stone that is in the
i heart of the peach." Her husband humours her
whims : she neglecta him to plunge into a whirl
of what ladies call gaiety. Filially he returns
home to find that his wife has tied in the company
of a man of fashion. The whole story is a sad
but truthful one. It is less startling in its inci-
(kids thou, finished and correct in its details. What
ae like best in it is the sobriety of tone, the ab-
scace alike it ti ickery and extravagance.
I None but a %cry field or rash writer now yen-
' tares to publish a novel which contains hist...lick!
personages. It has been decided with great
I unanimity that such a work must be either im-
perfect or misleading, either tell too little or contain
nlisstatenients. The example of Sir Walter Scott
is valuable for reproof rather than imitation. He
ILA unusual facilities for portraying with ac-
ceracy as well as effectiveness bygone personages,
and reanimating the scenes of the past. Yet he
failed in convoying either • trustworthy impres-
si in of the personages or a correct version of the
aithira of the period whereof he treated. Where
he failed inferior men could have fared no better.
But the difficulties he was unable to surmount
were not greater than lie in the path of anyone
who would introduce the stirring events of the
that French revolution along with its sanguinary
heroes into the domain of fiction. The
authoress of the Connell.; of eastl, Conocll
has made the attempt. She has furnished
I au additional illustration of the unwisdom of cum-
' billing, or endeavouring to mingle historical facts
with fiction. Those who are unversed in history
will form misconceptions of the persons she pro-
fesses to portray ' • those who are well acquainted
with the facts will turn with displeasure from her
picture. This is the more to be regretted, because
she might have dispensed with the personages
whose presence she deems essential. What is
• equally lamentable is that, in order to point out
• the blunders or improbabilities in her historical
details, it would be necessary to write nearly as
much as she has done. Site writes of Robeapierre
' and Dantoa with the familiarity we might employ
• toward. statesmen whose voices we have heard and