The Sun.
London, England, 1855-05-18 00:00:00

LIT ER AT URE.

Grace Lee. By Julia Kavanagh. 3 vols. Smith,
Elder, and Co.
Miss Kavanagh's abilities, both as a romancist c .
and an historical writer, are already well known. ' .
Her first and least ambitious work was a tale for
the young, entitled "The Three Paths," which
showed the different results of a rash and head-
strong disposition, a cunning and crafty temper,
and a prudent and well-principled line of action.
Her next tale, "Madeleine," was the touching re-
cord of the struggles and sufferings of a young girl
of Auvergne; who, alone and almost unaided, raised
and maintained an hospital in her native village.
Her next attempt was an historical one, and though
the subject selected was not the most pleasing, it
was executed with great ability. It was on " Wo..
man in France during the Eighteenth Century."
She subsequently produced more pleasing records
of feminine achievements in her " Women of
Christianity," a brief account of some of the most
illustrious of the many remarkable for their piety,
benevolence, and heroism. " Nathalie," her only
novel, possessed much interest and originality.
The two chief characters were drawn with much
ability. This ability the reader will not fail to re-
cognise in the pages of " Grace Lee," though of all
her works of fiction it is the least pleasing. This is
partly to be ascribed to the striking improbability of
some of the incidents, but chiefly to the two
chief actors in the drama—the hero and heroine
—John Owen and Grace Lee. Grace herself, with
her learning, her talents, her generosity, and
all her other virtues, has something about her not
quite feminine, and, consequently, not quite at-
tractive. Her intellect seems to have a greater in-
fluence than her heart. In moments of danger and
distress, or of excited feeling, she is always ready
with her clever speeches—never discomposed, never
off her guard. Not that want of self-control is to
araveiretoune,e
do
or e
sa
ncourageous
co n con-
-
tempt for the vicissitudes of fortune to be despised,
bbuetco in casethecommended
of
a s
G
trol of feeling, but the absence of feeling to be
controlled. However, she, may lay Claim to be con-
sidered a very remarkable character, and we should
imagine that her prototype was not very easily met
with. She is certainly the most interesting person
in the book, for the hero falls very far short of the
heroic standard. Without adopting the old idea.
that heroes and heroines should be pieces of unin-
teresting perfection, to secure the reader's interest
they should have some distinguished traits, some
noble qualities, to awake admiration. It is not the
moroseness and reserve of John Owen that dete-
riorate his character, for sometimes these reserved
and haughty characters are the most attractive; but
he seems to have no firm and settled purpose, no
high and ennobling aspirations. Had he remained
true to his ambition even, and instead of retreating
to the Welsh hills, remained and fought the battle
of life with energy and determination, the reader
could have forgiven him all his faults of mind and
manner. But ho surrenders the fight, at least for
a time, and falls in love with Grace Lee. Had he
only been constant to his vehement affection, he
might yet have awoke sympathy ; but when he
forsakes his idol on so frivolous a pretext, and.
hastily formsfirstone engagement and then another,
the reader loses all patience, and begins to awake to
a sense of the ludicrous. Many incidents in the
plot are very unpleasing, and we feel the less
inclined to tolerate them from an authoress who so
plainly shows us she could do better if she tried.
Where are the gentle and pious attributes of
Madeleine —where all the graceful, feminine
qualities of Nathalie, always charming, even in her
caprices ? The chronicler of the " Women of
Christianity" has no need to give us such a brusque
and independent lady as her model heroine ; and
as for a hero, it will be hard indeed if she cannot
surpass John Owen. The talents of the author are
evident, however, not only in the construction of
the book, which, to say the least of it, displays
much ingenuity and originality, but in the elo-
quence of the style and the fervour of the descrip-
tions, as the following extract will show. It is
from the conclusion, when John Owen is meditat-
ing on his fruitless search for Grace, who has been
lost to him for seven years through his own folly
and pride :
" The thought he had so long repelled came and pre.
vailed in that hour.
" ' Grace is dead,' ho thought, stopping short.
' Grace is dead, ay, I feel and I know it ; the grave
has closed on her. Where ?—how ?—I know not ; I
shall never know. Unconsciously I may tread on the
earth that hides all I have vainly coveted to possess.
Oh ! that with me, too, it were over, that this unquiet
fever of life were still, and I sleeping somewhere by her
side, a deep, a long slumbr2r. Happy I thrice happy are
ye, ye dead I.'
" And for the first tinva for years, ambition, that
master-passion of his life, folded her wings, and, wearied
of her long flight, pined for repose.
" But brief was the rest of that ardent heart. Strong
in his will, he recalled Grace ; he bade her return, not
pale, but vivid as the light of day ; not dead, but over-
flowing with the fulness of life. Ho looked at the setting
sun ; the dread round orb slowly sank down to a yellow
horizon, encircling the dark earth likes golden sone,
then melting in the hollow air into vast depths of palest
blue. But below all was splendour, all was light and
flame ; a wooded slope was still a forest of bronze and
gold, a tame field a purple sea ; the dust-worn way a path
of light leading to a burning world. In that fervid glow
he sought the loved and lost image he had ever known,
all warmth and all light, and again, with passionate long-
ing, there rose an inward cry from the depths of his
heart, an unuttered voice that said : 4 Come back, Grace,
come back !
" Suddenly be breathed deep. Dream or truth, he
saw and heard her. He saw an isolated dwelling, a
poor home, rising bare and lone by the road side, an
open door, a narrow room, with hoarded floor, with
white-washed walls, with gilt-edged books on a low
shelf, with bright crimson and yellow flowers in the
window, with the rich sunlight streaming in ; and half
lost in the evening gloom, an old man who sat grey and
blind in a deep arm-chair, whilst in the bright red light
a woman leaning back on a low seat with a heavy book
on her knees, read in a clear, musical voice, in a foreign
tongue, a tongue long dead and unspoken, a strain of
full and ancient verse."
* * .r- * ..

"Like a vision come to him at his bidding from the
depths of the west, he saw her through the flood of living
gold that flowed behind and around her."
*.* * * *

"The sea-worn mariner that bag found land, the tra-
veller that rests after the burning desert crossed, never
knew so deep a sense of freshness and repose as this
wearied man of the world in that moment. Ab, love
there is something in thee beyond the light fondness of
youthful lovers ! Thy spring is all hope, thy summer
is all life, but deeper in its ardour, more beautiful in its
mingled passion and strength is thine autumn."

Mr. Truefitt, of the Burlington Arcade, has enlight-
ened the public as to the objects and purposes of his
really exquisitely decorated salon—namely, `• A Toilet
Club," new in its essential characteristics and select in
its subscribers. A something of this kind was much
wanted'at the west, and we know of no one better able
to carry it out in its integrity than Truefitt, who has a
'perfect right, in the abundance of his appliances, to give
his patrons the novelty and comfort of apartments fit
for royalty itself.

- - GRAND-TRUNK RAILWAY OF CANADA.—The statement
in
sGuoptvpheoerrntrme ecentfromnt
mt a .hadeyv
pipe erroos from
pboasbl:.proposal fora
f obreai
ndCanada
fresh
u ce
induced
granth
roat
nwtti
ofte
withdraw
Provinciald9raoow,
otoboeiir.
to the Grand Trunk Railway is affirmed by the best in-
formed persons on this side to be wholly erroneous. The
measure is understood to have been made the subject of
a fierce party contest, and it will consequenty l serve as
the pretext for political attacks and personal vitupera-
tion ; but, with regard to its ultimate success, no doubt
appears to be entertained. At the same time, the posi-
tive allegation in the-e advices that the entire works of
the line will be stopped unless the demand of the con-
tractors be complied with is also stated to be without •
foundation. Assertions to that effect have been widely
perhaps,
vedraan d. parties
disseminated in the province, but the company announce
open 255 miles in August or Sep`-ember next, and_ will
that, whether the grant he made or withheld, tphues.,yNnwziltll.
have carried the line through from Brockville. to Toronto
lin one or two years from that date. —Times.
SPEEDY
.....elrg
rSeTaRtULTair i s ows arßhi 'ilueGthartbi
tEtt:h)eAiuresT:
Englishn
ntßhionAeta: extraordinarily
shoopairvoelljtstth it the same
ink that was wanted
time in which the Ciiinean.Railway has been exe-
sThAoKrItNGS.
gene-
rally
nation has
alsolus t, ,e d
ik- aaons
otpnwdeentad.:::
.. el .er
rndtvi
o.a'C't l tolbeY.
er)
within
21eetsharree year, the last important 1
to complete the line of rail from London t
Mediter-
ranean Sea. Its length is
160
mile,,
between o the
of Lyons and Avignon. It is a doubts the cities
class, with stations complete. 0 ouble road, of first
to six miles of tunnelling It nit there are from four
stu-
pendous granite cuttings,* passes through some and spans three of the largest rivers in France. with fine bridges
of 1852 before the first lt was the middle
THE MAILS sod WS& turned.
mail steamship -ON, May 17,—The Royal
Atrato, Captain
noon with the fortnightly Woolley, left this after-
and paniac,
55as mails for the West Indies
value in jeweller I)
sedngers, 7,0001. in specie, 4,0001.
with the homeward clan a full general cargo. The Tay,
peoted daily. The 13ortion of the above mails, is ex-
steamer Madrid, _Peninsular and Oriental Company's
Captain Cook, with the mails for
Vigo,this afternoon Oporto,
Lisbon, Cadiz, and Gibraltar, sailed
afternoon with 33 passengers, 13,7521. in specie
for Lisbon, and 22,4001. for Cadiz—total, 36,1521.,
besides the usual cargo. The Iberia, Captain Christian,
with the next homeward portion of these mails, is ex-
pected about the 25th inst. The Euxine, Captain Weeks,
from Alexandria, Malta, and Gibraltar, with the India.
and Mediterranean mails, is looked for about the 23d
inst. The Sultan, Captain Burney, will leave with the
India and Mediterranean mails on the 20th. The Iberia,
should she return in time, will convey the Peninsular
mails of the 27th. The Tagus, Captain Joy, lately re-
turned from the India and Mediterranean station, is
duties
undergoing repairs previous to resuming her on
the Peninsular route. The United States' mail steam-
ship
St. Louis, Captain Wotton, with dates from New
York to the sth inst., is expecili—, eu to arrive on Friday
or Saturday.