The Sun.
London, England, 1855-12-06 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Lilliesleaf. By the Author of " Margaret Mait-
land," &c. 3 vols. Hurst and Blackett.

This work, we are informed at the commence-
ment, is a concluding series to the " Passages in
the Life of Mrs. Margaret Maitland of Sunnyside,"
which some time ago appeared. The numerous
readers who admired and appreciated that excel-
lent production will be gratified to renew their in-
tercourse with so pleasing a circle as the one which
is there met with; while those unacquainted with
the previous story will find no difficulty in enter-
ing at once into the interest and being acquainted
in the details. In this particular the plot is ex-
ceedingly well arranged, the authoress having con-
nected the links of the two narratives so that they
might be read as one, while at the same time this
second division could be perused per se, without
diminution to its comprehensiveness or effect. The
change we mark is the natural one, to be expected
no less from the lapse of time than from the effects
of circumstances. The characters have not altered
fn themselves, but the great difference of the posi-
tions in which they are placed calls forth other
qualities and developes hidden traits. Mary, the
daughter of the Manse, the niece of Mrs. Margaret,
is the most interesting of the group. The trials
and doubts that she encountered in youth were
nothing to the cares and troubles that are here
chronicled. Grace, on the contrary, was almost
entirely sheltered from the storms that lowered
over the dwelling of her early friend. Allan Elphin-
stone of Lilliesleaf, who was the husband of Mary,
was not to be compared to Claud Maitland, who
married Grace. Allan was possessed of a restless
spirit, and, with a good disposition and excellent
intentions, he wanted stability and was deficient in
self-control. There could not have been more try-
ing deficiencies to one who, like Mary, had been
bred up all her life in strict rule and principles—
who had the highest motives for exertion, and the
purest pleasure is their fulfilment. There was
more of romance in the circumstances of Grace and
her young sister Rhoda, but the interest is attracted
to Mary; she is the centre to which the thoughts turn
and the object on which the attention fixes. No
one can fail to be concerned in her behalf. She
appears so true to herself and to her family—teo
generous to allow to any one that it is her husband
who is in fault, while at the same time she will
not deny her own convictions, nor sacrifice her
principles of right to present convenience. She
might have joined Allan, and left behind her the
plans of her young days, or she might have set
herself up as an isolated instance of virtue beside
her husband and his giddy set. But she contrived

to effect the change by adopting neither course.
Mary had early learnt not to be conformed to the
world ; but the work of her maturity was to in-
duce her husband to fulfil the harder task of being
transformed from the world, in which he took no
real interest, nor derived any substantial enjoy-
ment. Not that she desired him to stay at home.
The possessor of large estates had many public
duties to perform, and must necessarily mix much
in society ; but then May desired that he should
aspire to an exalted standard, and be intimate with
the noble in spirit, the upright in conduct, and
the superior in intellect. Allan had chosen the
most frivolous of the differing grades of society,
and it was not in such an atmosphere that his cha-
racter could derive vigour, or his good feelings and
impulses have scope for advance or development.
Grace's trials were totally different, but during
the comparatively brief period of their duration
they were severe. Her father was a most unfeeling
and unprincipled man, and could not but be con-
trary to Grace in all his undertakings. Not con-
tent with trying to rob her of her mother's pro-
perty, he was constantly importuning her for money,
►nd at last insisted on leaving in Grace's care her
step-sister Rhoda. Grace would willingly have re-
fused, but she knew not how to reconcile to herself

leaving the young girl to the care of such a man,
while in her quiet home she might learn right, or
would be sheltered from wrong at least. Rhoda
came, and very little peace was there for a time at
Oakenshaw. She would not be satisfied, and,
with her vagaries and impatience, she ren-
lered every one as unsettled and un-

Jurpose-like as herself. It was some time
,efore the benign influence of Aunt Margaret
oould at all calm or pacify this unruly guest, but
after a little while her gentle but firm manner had
some effect. Rhoda is what a passionate affec-
, -ionate disposition may be imagined to be ; with no
one to direct her or gain any of her confidence
from attachment she suffered greatly. Yet with
.$.ll the better nature shining through the clouds of
ter errors, she does not attach or interest like
Grace or Mary. It is to be questioned if any of
~he characters possess the genuine simplicity and
oarnest devotion of the narrator of the passages
'sere described. In her calm retirement years
passed by Margaret Maitland without working
my of those deadly changes, or exerting any of
those baneful influences, which those experience
who are engaged in the turmoil of the world, or
nixed up with the hardening cares of social exis-
tence. There appears truth in the remark she
made at the conclusion, that "it takes the like of
In 0, a single gentlewoman, unacquainted with fash
aid trouble, to carry pure to the end of mortal
lays the first grand thoughts of youth." It might
lie declared with appropriateness of the declining
years of such an existence—
" Thy thoughts and feelings shall not die,
Nor leave thee, when grey hairs are nigh,
A melancholy slave ;
But an old age, serene and bright,
And lovely as a Lapland night,
Shall light thee to the grave."
There is a pleasure to be derived from the perusal
of works like the one before us that the most bril-

liant compositions may not always afford, and an
advantage to be gained that mere power of
language, or graces of expression, may not
possess. We feel that what passes before
us is natural, that the real and likely are
described in life, both in thought and action. In
the details of the simplest occurrences in the home
life of Grace or May there is truth, and that is so
well depicted in all the various phases of their
careers that the impression is vivid and the realisa-
tion complete. Whether it be a solemn warning or

a simple lesson to be conveyed there is no disguise
or mystery ; we " learn from the wisdom of age,
and are cheered by the sallies of youth." There is
)t the same grandeur that characterises "Adam
Gnome of Mossgrey" to be recognised in these
pages, nor are they endued with the same attract-
ing interest that so enthrals the attention of the

reader of " Harry Muir." Many may prefer the
•irst portion of the story, when Grace and May
appeared in their spring of youth, to the latter days
of the strife and struggles of maturity ; but for all
these objections or counter-attractions there is an

undeniable merit apparent in " ',liliesleaf," and a
charm in the conclusion of a noble life, that awakens
sympathy and engages admiration. The pure in
purpose, the lofty in thought, the glorious in
ion, are the themes here descanted upon, and the
deeds here wrought. The lover of simple narrative
will be pleased by the conciseness of the plot, and
the few characters met with, while the thinker will
acknowledge the influence of those better feelings,
those mighty aspirations, that give principle to be
the guide of motives, and inspire the spirit of self-
sacrifice and devotion. We are shown in their
native energy and intrinsic strength those bright
and enduring qualities and attributes which ap-
proach the most nearly to the standard of excel-
lence, and adorn and elevate the mean and simple
of human. existence.

ifen and Women. By Robert Browning. 2 vols.
Chapman and Hall.
Fifty portraits of men and women, lightly
sketched off in profile by the cunning hand of the
author of " Paracelsus.' Blooming with youth,
wrinkled with age, ugly as sin, beautiful as virtue,
gentle and simple, matron and maiden, bearded
veteran and smooth•faced stripling—here they se-
verally are, one and all pencilled delicately in
pen-and-ink miniatures, kit-cat, full-length, sit-
ting, standing, some of them, indeed, literally
speaking likenesses. It is by a happy thought that
Mr. Browning has thus strung together as in a
motley coronal fugitive pieces, as varied in sparkle,
and colour, and value, as would be a circlet formed
of gold, and lead, and silver, and tinfoil, and peb-
bles, and pearls, and bits of coloured glass—beryl,
and flint, and topaz, and clay, and malachite.
For the several fragments making up the whole of
this strange poetic chaplet are no less singularly
contrasted with each other than materials thus
respectively, as the case may chance to be, most
precious or most worthless. It is as if we had had
poured into our hands the unsifted produce of some
rich digging newly discovered and hastily worked
upon the auriferous banks of the grand old Pac-
tolus—an occasional nugget of rare size and purity
glittering out among a predominating mass of
commonest sand and rubble. Mr. Browning comes
anew before his readers with this advantage—that
it is now some time since the issue of his last me-
trical production. He has this no less obvi-
ous disadvantage, however that that last
effusion of his was an egregious failure to all
intents and purposes. We speak, of course, in
allusion to his scarcely comprehensible and decidedly
repulsive poem entitled "Christmas Eve and Easter
Day"—a poem wholly unadorned by a single
beauty, save in the instance of one solitary couplet
where the fountains in the Piazza of St. Peter's, at
Rome, were exquisitely described as—
" Growing up eternally
Each like a musical water-tree !"
Disappointed, however, in the instance of this
latest outpouring of our author's thoughts in ver-