The Sun.
London, England, 1864-07-27 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Atherstone Priory. By L. N. Comyn, Author of
"Ellice, a Tale." Two volumes. Longman and
Company.
A Domestic Novel, this is, of the most charming
character, Perhaps altogether it is rather too diffuse
in style, too "spun out" in some of its incidents and
descriptions. But—in this, like that " dimpled, sur-
prised-looking capital face" of Scrooge's nephew's
wife, with all its shortcomings, whatever they
may be--"satisfactory, oh, perfectly satisfactory !"
As in one sense a mere material objection,
and yet as in another sense a wholly ins.
material objection to the book as a book,
we would say at once that it seems to us
rather a pity that it should have been published
precisely in the form in which it has been published !
In other words, that it should have appeared as two
rather unwieldy volumes, instead of, in the old
orthodox novel-form, as three volumes of reasonable
dimensions. For although Miss or Mrs. Comyn's
book—(which it ought to be, we know not, but the
sex of the work, as we may say, is altogether un-
mistakeable !)—although this newly published
fiction by the author of " Ellice, a tale," comes fcrth
merely as a domestic story in two volumes, the two
volumes within which it is comprised have been ex-
tended to the length of no less than 1,102 pages.
Yet bulky though the book is, the reader of it will
hardly find it a bit too long. Homely though the
incidents it relates, it will securely hold the atten-
tion of the lovers of a purely domestic narrative—
through it's upwards of One Thousand and One
hundred pages of thoroughly English Entertain-
ment. It might be objected to it by the more cap-
tious, that the title is somewhat of a misnomer—
seeing that the larger of theseavvo volumes—that is
to say the second one—refers hardly at all, except
towards the close of it, to that scene of all the varied
incident recour.tea t. wit, I, Atherstone
Priory." Still, even in regard to that at once specious
and captious objection, we conceive that the au thcress
might reply, and with good show of reason enough,
that "the cottage by the sea," where the more sor-
rowful incidents of the plot are described as having
occurred, solely acquire an interest for us during
the chief part of the second volume by reason of its
being inhabited for a while by people we, still, to the
last, mainly associate with Atheretono Priory.
Once, and once only, does the writer forsake
the even tenour of her way in order, we
presume, to afford her admirers come notion of her
capabilities—if she pleased—as a Sensationalist.
Whatever her motive in doing so, we would earnestly
recommend her never again to adventure into those
regions of extravagantly romantic and impassioned
sentimentality which may be said to hnvo dictated
the chapter in which—(this is the one flaw in the
narrative, even, we would say, in the writing of it'
certainly in the conception of it)—the chapter in
which Percy is described as waiting, in a
sort of ambush, with murder in his heart,
by the moonlit " pool among the hills,"
for his supposed enemy, Arthur Darrell. The
authoresS may take our word for this, at least, that
she can never hope to compete,with Miss Braddon
as a sensationalist, though she may, if she lists,
count very confidently upon proving a for-
midable rival to Miss Yonge, that most charming
among all our living domestic novelists. And we are
very much mistaken, indeed, in our estimate at once
of the powers and of the predilections of L. N.
Comp], if the latter would not herself
immeasurably prefer entering the lists with
the authoress of a "Daisy Chain," instead of with
the authoress of " Aurora Floyd." There is some-
thing kindred, indeed, in the genius which wove the
"linked sweetness" of the " Daisy Chain," and that
which has here built up the homely architecture of
" Atherst one Priory" peopling it afterwards with the
numerous Family of good Dr. Ten cant of Atherstone.
A manufacturing town is that said town of Athere
stone. A place dingy and smoky enough in itself.
But with a green oasis in the midst of it, in the
shape of that large scrambling old garden, full
of flowers, and fruit, and vegetation of all kinds,
grassy-lawn and shadowing lime trees, rose bushes
and orchard boughs, embowering three sides of that
old Priory Mansion, which presents its fourth side to
the main street of the beforementioned manufactur-
ing borough-town of Atherstone! It is surprising
now that we have come to the end of the story, as
it its told to us in these two bulky volumes, it is
surprising to UE—h eck n eye d, and, as we had
fancied, somewhat used-up novel-readers—how
profound an interest the writer has here
contrived to awaken within us in regard
to the various members of this home groupe !
Doctor Tennant himself, although the very embodi-
ment of good-nature, appears tco slightly and
casually in the course of the narrative, to secure
from us, we must confess, very much of our
sympathy. His second wife again is such a cross-
grained cantankerous old harridan that even when
she relents at the very end of the book we don't
care for her the snap of a finger and thumb !
Doctor Tennant, it should be here mentioned at
once, has two children by his first wife—dead, this
latter, long before the story opens, dead so long
indeed by that time that the Doctor has been
married again for a good many years, having by
Mrs. Tennent No. 2 as many as seven children.
Captain, afterwards Major, eventually Col. Percy
Tennant, is the good doctor's first-born by his first
wife—and this Percy it is who is the hero of the
book. His sister Mary might be described as the
good angel of it. Not the heroine of course, however,
—as will have been manifest in the mere fact of its
being her brother who is the hero. The heroine's
part is allotted, almost avowedly, as one
may say, at the outset to the adopted child
of the house, an orphan cousin, wilful, charming,
lovely, loveable, litt'e Lisa! The child wife.
as she becomes (just midway in the story) of Percy
Tennant. As to the seven children brought to Dr.
Tennant by his second wife, the cold-eyed, cold-
hearted matron already mentioned by us in
terms strongly expressive of our repugnance,
they partake, most of them, we suspect, rather
too much of her nature, and too little of
the kindlier nature of her husband, to win
our regard very cordially. Isabel, until towards
the end of the book, is simply odious, with her
jealousy and her slanders—her jealousy the meanest
her slanders at once the most detestable in their
nature and the most disastrous in their consequences.
Her sister Elinor, again, is barely tolerable all
through the work—a s;:, silent, secretive valetudi-
narian lover, not in the ;Cast worthy of Arthur
Darrell, who, while in the ear:.ier chapters one of
the most delightful of all the charam:ers introduced
to our notice, lighting up, as he &me; the old-
fashioned sitting rooms and the green terchard-
garden at Atherstone Priory, with his wild fun
and frolic, becomes really and truly quite spoilt ft ,r
us directly he falls into that fatal attachment of his
for Elinor. Fatal, that is, not to him, but to one
upon whom the mystery of it throws for a while
such very lamentable suspicions, Charming little
Lisa, that is—the child wife of poor, deceived,
purblind Percy Tennant. The tangled skein of the
plot of the novel, however, we will not precisely
attempt here to unravel. The gordian knot of it
may be found by those who list, unwound most
deftly and skilfully by the authoress—unwound by
her in all its intricate involutions save one—the
which central core of the knot of the plot, as one
may say, is severed only by the grimly sheers of
Atropos ! Compensation, however, of some kind is
given to us at the very last, where compensation
has seemed at first a thing impossible—namely, after
the grief caused by our loss of poor Lisa! Tho
young wife and mother leaving in solace
to her husband and to the reader Little Lisa's own
alter ego Tiny May ! An enthralling home story—
very real of its kind—is this new domestic talc by
L. N. Comyn : a fiction in which the fair promise
given by the writer through the gracious outlines
and delicate colouring of her " Ellice" (so far as we
know, her maiden work), are not simply fulfided,
but are, we would rather say, realised so very
happily, that we have every confidence in the still
further rise, advance, and development of her
reputation.

go Whittington has
----
EATING LIVE RATS.—Geor
been tined £5, with the alternativo ot 30 days' imprisonment,by the Glasgow magistrates, for having an exhibition of a
man and a woman eating live rats in his show booth in
Gaol-square.

Calor .

HER MAJESTY,

OSBORNE, July 26.
Her Majesty, accompanied by her Royal Highness
Princess Louis of Hesse, aad her Royal Highness
Princess Louise, walked and drove about the
grounds yesterday.
The Countess of CaMon has been succeeded by
Dowager Countess of Mount-Edgcumbe as Lad)"
In
Waiting.

The Prince and Princess of Wales.
On Monday evening the Prince and Princess,
attended by Lieut.-General Knollys, Capt. Grey'
Col. Kingscote, and Mrs Stonor, left Frogmore
House about file o'clock, the Prince and PrinceEs
each driving a pair of ponies, and proceeded
through the Long Walk to Virginia Water. °°.
reaching the lake their royal highnesses amused
themselves with boating and fishing, and after'
wards dined with their suite in the Fishing Temple
on the banks of the lake. The royal party returned
to Frogmore late in the evening.
Yesterday afternoon the Prince of Wales, attended
by Capt. G. H. Grey, drove from Frogmore Noll°
in a pony carriage to the banks of the Thames, at a
point between the Albert and Victoria Bridge'
Windsor Home Park, for the purpose of inspecting
a steam-ship propeller, invented and patented by
the Messrs Germann Brothers, of Old Windsor'
The propeller, which has been applied to an iron
experimental boat, 45ft. long, 3ft. Gin. deep, and
sft. beam, drawing 2ft. tin. at the stern and 12i0•
forward, consists of a small flat blade, 6in. by 1O10"
fixed to an axle and crank placed at the side of the
keel near the stern, and is driven with great 044
day with a very peculiar motion, reeenahlivg,
in some respects the paddling of the foot °'
the swan while swimming. His Royal Highness
and Captain Grey having gone on board the boat'
made a trip down the 6tream to the Old Windsor
Lock, running about seven miles an hour, though
this speed is said to be nothing like what con 11)
attained with the 'proper amount of horse-pawer;
While proceeding down the river a small model l'
the propeller was exhibited to the Prince, the wort`
ing of which was thoroughly explained by Mr.
Germann. His Royal Highness appeared roueh.
pleased with the simple and effective manner of its
working, and remarked that the motion was macil
preferable to that of the screw. On reaching tbe
locks the craft's head was turned up stream, Blld
the Prince's party steamed back to the B°Ys
grounds in the lime Park, from whence they bad
started, and having landed, the Prince drove We
to Frogmore House. eel
In the evening the Prince and Princess luau
another trip to Virginia Water in pony carriages
accompanied by a distinguished party of visitors
and their suite. The Royal party were to dine /-
i,
the Fishing Temple, covers being laid for fourteen'
Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cambriee
arrived at the Windsor station of the South
Western Railway at 1.52 yesterday. On leavill
the train the Duchess drove to Frogmore in one °
the Royal carriages to visit the Prince and Princess
of Wales. Her Royal Highness returned fr°s3
Frogmore at ten o'clock, by special train.
The Prince and Princess will leave Frogni°l°
early this morning, and travel, via the Sae"
Western and the South Coastlines, to Chichester,which they will reach about a quarter before tWoto
Their Royal Highnesses will proceed at once
Good wood House, and thence to the course, is
tlm
to see the Stakes run for.

The Duke and Duchess Montpensier, with their
i
suite, left Tunbridge Wells yesterday for Starkey's gote►
•
St. Leonard's, for sea bathing. They return to their telly'
porary residence at Tunbridge Wells in a few days. ,
Her Imperial Highness the Grand Duchess Mar:o
of Russia and suite loft Claridge's Hotel yesterday for Tor:
quay, where her Imperial Highness will remain for absill
two months. '
The Marquis and Marchioness of Abercorn svd
family will leave Chesterfield House in a few days for Beer
desert, Staffordshire.
The Marquike and Marchioness of Downshire ava
Lady Alice Hill left town yesterday for East Hampstead
Park for a few dus.
The Earl of Derby continues to improve iv
health. The noble earl and countess will leave St. Jarnes4l4
square the latter end of the week, for Knowsley Palk'
The Earl and Countess Amherst have left tog"
for their seat, Montreal, Sevenoaks, Kent.
The Earl and Countess Bective will leave Ovilj
early next week for their seat, Underley Hall, Westraorlat'a

ALARMING CARRIAGE ACCIDENT .—A very ser 1°• tILS
road accident occurred at Oichard Mains, ill
parish of Traquair, Innerleithen, on Friday aftereoe.4
under the following circumstances :—Mr. Sohn. 111;
butler, and Miss Langlois, housekeeper to Lady 1-'°o
Stuart, Traquair House, with Mrs Addison and her 01'3,
little boy from Edinburgh, were on a visit to the glens {tee
yelling in the Traquair house phaeton. Immediately 6%9
leaving the glen gate on their return, the horse, Nyllicl4cia.
somewhat spirited animal, started off at full SPeedl cis.
tinned to run at this rate till it passed Orchard Itlains, al
Lance of a mile, Mr Hope, who was driving, being °II- ;
to draw it up. Here the road makes a bend before e°713„.01.Pd
to a bridge, and in taking this turn the 'lactose °f
from the middle of the road and run up againstP the I-d
one of the parapets of the bridge. The inmates of °r
,-oet
Mains, who saw the accident, were immediately Oa
les -'
hurt:
when they found the whole of the party more or
e It.
and all,with the exception of the little boy, unable 5113,3t0
Mr Hope an .d Mrs Addison were lying in the Qh9iirs' fronl
which they had been pitched over the bridge, which --et. tD°
12 to 14 feet high. The boy also had been thrown oy-eaal.
bridge, and was lying on the bank by the side of the stone f
' Miss Langlois was lying between the carriage and °
to
the walls of the bridge. They were all soon cenvel._eo
Orchard Mains, and a messenger despatched to Insane. of
for
The
Dr Cox, who was promptly at the scene of the a the
e boy, who escaped with least injury,
much stunes,7o
facea and slightly bruised. Mrs Addison was
nd bruised, but is not seriously hurt. Mr kloPel Whlt Ito
insensible for some time after being taken out of the "" epf.
must have been drowned had not assistance been l'the et
After being taken to Orchard Mains he fainted two or
tiTer.eB
times. He was much stunned, and received several 13,1'i'; i$
on the back and other parts of the body. Miss Lalig'°.i
ape are .fly the most seriously hurt. Besides being 13rnla
she received a long deep cut on one of her legs, whic: eieecl
is' cut about
qt ire to be sowed, Fortunately, none of the euffeter"ed to
tny pones broken. The three first were able to Prbi3Oer
Tra pair-house shortly after the accident, and Miss h
10le Ares conveyed home later in the evening. Thoug7lolls'
ing hilt injuries a good deal, they were all going oh
3 01°
atny on Saturday. The phaeton was destroy 0-9 y fro.-
horse escaped uninjured, the trams having come itsvt'
the body of the machine and set it free.—Scoesinto' t beg
A NORFOLK MANSLAUGUTER.—An ingiles,h
been held at Scottow, Norfolk, this week, Wri,'h"o„,ao
ference to the death of a young labourer named $10;
Morter. The chief witness was Charles Wodehonset of
al'
ley, who stated that he had known the deceased l'el;tra
his life. He was a labourer about 25 years 0f age'
employed on lelr Everett's farm at Sloley„ On tile
,t et':
elub feast was heid at the Horse Shoes publichonae'dosa"
tow. About 7 p,m. witness went to the house end 11:1, o'4
beer in the parlour. The deceased, Thomas 11°1',e,;ea
present. He had had soma beer, but was not tla° sc-eotoOP
drink. There were a great many people in the ro°3'dicl e°:
them a young man nesmed Robert Bond. 105:whe,11,
her any altercation be tween Bond and 'Morter, htt-t,t 05';
ht
dire, o
left ti2e public house he ;owed they were tatting
ing each other. They e.wreeti. to fight and fought todl
four rouncis in their shirt sleeves. It was a flat :Alier°o
fight. They also wrestled tigether and twice fell t°o-05 oti
the road in the struggle. the last round there, ad 14%
wrestling, but Bond hit Mon'er on the side of the d 'too;
Mortar fell down. Witness ueent to lift him 111)
him to the side of the road, but ho never heard hielviaeleoP
or breathe afterwards—he was d,eul, The roediealio 4
vain;
showed that the deceased died froae, concussion of Th
ofow.
which might have arisen either froul a fall or
t
jury returned a verdict of manslaugleter again-efoltSs' e
A MAN KILLED BY A VI(VOUS cote-
Monday afternoon, as Thomas Lilly, aged 45' ;;clo°l3,,a°°e'l
the employ of Mr Frank }libber; of t green, 1113,'-o
was putting a bit in the mouth of a thehorse ra3",„-
reared suddenly, and with its forefeet etracs. /jiff ";..
the chest and stretched him on the Vollhd'Aitl at
/731
lifted up and carried into the house, whore he ""
night in great agony. A 0011 via°
VOLUNTEER SHAM e
-neva 0
named Garland, belonging to the 601 woo
Corps, met with a serious accident the otho.t: e"iilegeoare,
engaged in a sham fight. The corps marchee
_niet
of a gentleman in the neighbourhood of Bar-niDel er e °Pef
a sham fight with blank cartridge took Pluecet'he
of the Volunteers was getting over a hedg ia to
his full-cocked rifle was in consequence discheet6
_taceeee.
land's face. The unfortunate man was at onsv....turegaite
the infirmary,
eyesight. and it is not expected that he itt