The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-05 00:00:00

LITERATURE•

The Shadow of Ashlydyat. By Mrs. Henry Wood,
author of "East Lynne," ko. Three Vols.

Bentley.

The authoress of " East Lynne" now ranks
among the most popular writers of the day. Her
works belong to a certain extent,
it may be said,
to the sensational school ; but the main secret
of her success, we believe, lies in her powerful
command of the emotions. There are a pathos,
and a tenderness, and a depth of feeling in her
writings unsurpassed by any of her contempo-
raries. In " East Lynne this power was very
effectively revealed, but the subject was in
itself unattractive. Lardy Isabel Vane, the heroine,
repenting of her desertion of her home, came back,
it may be remembered, to watch, es a governess,
over her own children, one of whom was sink-
ing into the grave. The situation was one
that effectually called forth Mrs. Wood's peculiar
powers; but, while sensible of the emotions so
vividly portrayed, our sympathy for the sorrow-
ing mother was almost lost in our reprehension
of the faithless wife. Far other wise is it in "The
Shadow of Ashlydyat." Maria Godolphin, the
heroine, is one of the sweetest. gentlest, most
loveable, and most loving of devoted wives. Her
girlish happiness ; her idolatry for her husband, and
her child; her sadden awakening when her idol is
shattered, and the stern realities of life befall her—
all this is portrayed with inimitable skill. George
Godolphin, tlaria's husband, gay, careless, hand-
some, fascinating George, is a portrait, no doubt, true
to the life. He is the managing partner of a bank,
and the younger brother of Thomas Godolphin, of
Ashlydyat. Without being" wilfully dishonest,"
George, in his easy, inconsiderate way, thinking
only of the present hour, aloes nous, le de-
luge," contrives to bring a very cataract
of sorrow and shame upon the hearts
of all who love him. Thomas Godolphin is a
beautiful character, an honourable, upright man,
doomed to
,an early grave—but striving, while
life enables him, to maintain the honourable
position he has inherited from his father. When
his blind confidence in his brother George is re-
paid by the closing of the bank shutters, and the
bankruptcy of the old and distinguished firm, the
peculiar character of the elder Godolphin is im-
pressively and most forcibly revealed. As a proof
of Mrs. Wood's pathetic power, so true to nature
in her painting of emotions, let us quote the fol-
lowing heart-breaking scene :
You must not think that Maria conformed to the usages
of an invalid. She was up before breakfast in a morning,
she did not go to bed until the usual hour at night, and
she sat down to the customary meals with Meta. She has
risen from the breakfast-table now, on this fine morning,
not at all cold for the late autumn, and Margery has carried
away the breakfast-things, and has told Miss Meta, that if
she'll come out as soon as her mamma has read to her
and have her things put on, oho can go and play in the
garden.

But when the little Bible story was over, her mamma lay
down on the sofa, and Meta appeared inclined to do the same.
She hustled on to it and lay down too, and kissed her
mamma's face, so pretty still, and began to chatter. It was
a charming day, the sun shining on the few late flowers,
and the sky blue and bright.
" Did you hear Margery say you might go out and play,
darling ? See how fine it is.''

" There's nothing to play with," said Meta.
"There are many things, dear. Your skipping-rope and
hoop, and-"

" I'm tired of thew," interposed Meta. " Mamma, I wish
you'd come out and play at something with me."
" I couldn't run, dear. lam not strong enough."
"When shall you be strong enough ? How long will it
be before you get well ?"
Maria did not answer. She lay with her eyes fixed out-
wards, her arm clasped round the child. "Meta darling,
I—l—am not sure that I shall get well. I begin to think
that I shall never go out with you again."
Meta did not answer. She was looking out also, her eyes
staring straight up to the blue sky.
" Meta, darling," resumed Maria, in a low tone, " you
had two little sisters once, and I cried when they died, but
lam glad now that they went. They are in heaven."
Meta looked up more fixedly, and painted with h'r finger.
"Up in the blue sky ?"
" Yes, up in heaven. Meta, I think lam going to them.
It is a better world than this."
"And me toe ?" quickly cried Meta.

Maria laid her hand upon her bosom to press down the
rising emotion. " Meta, Meta, if I might but take you with
me !" she breathed, straining the child in her agony. The
prospect of parting, which Maria had begun to look at, was
indeed hard to bear.

•' You can't go and leave me," cried Meta, in alarm.
" Who'd take care of me, mamma ? Mamma I do you
mean that you are going to die ?"
Meta burst into tears; Maria cried with her. Oh
reader, reader I do you know what it is, this parting be-
tween mother and child ? To lay a child in• the grave is
bitter grief; but to leave it to the mercy of the world !
there is nothing like unto it in human anguish.
Maria's arms were entwined around the little girl, clasping
her nervously, as if that might prevent the future parting ;
the soft, rounded cheek was pressed to hers, the golden
curls lay around.
"Only fora little while, Meta. If I go first, it will be
but for a little while. You—." Maria stopped ; her
emotion had to be choked down.

"Itis a happier world than this, Meta," she resumed,
overmastering it. "There will be no pain there ; no sick-
ness, no sorrow. This world seems made up of sorrow,
Meta. Oh, child I but for God's love in holding out to
our view that other one, we could never bear this, when
trouble comes. God took your little sisters and brothers
from it ; and—l think—He is taking me."
Meta turned her face downwards, and laid hold of her
mother with a frightened movement, her little fingers clasp-
ing the thin arms to pain.
" The winter is coming on here. my child, and the trees
will soon be bare : the snow will cover the earth, and we
wrap ourselves up from it. But in that other world there
will be no winter: no cold to chill us; no sultry summer
heat to exhaust us. It will be a pleasant world, Meta, and
God will love us."

Meta was crying silently. " Let me go, too, mamma."
"In a little while, darling. If God calls me first, it is His
will," she continued, the sobs breaking from her aching
heart. " I shall ask Him to take care of you after I am
gone, and to bring you to me in time; I am asking Him
always."

" Who'll be my mamma then ?" cried Meta, lifting her
head in a bustle, as the thought occurred to her.
More pain. Maria choked it down, and stroked the
golden curls.
" You will have no mamma then, in this world. Only
papa."
Meta paused. "Will ho take me to London, to Mrs.
Pain ?" _ .

The startled shock that these simple words brought to
Maria cannot well be pictured: her breath stood still, her
heart beat wildly. " Why do you ask that ?" she said, her
tears suddenly dried.
Meta had to collect her childish thoughts to tell why.
" When you were in bed ill, and Mrs. Pain wrote me that
pretty letter, she said if papa would take me up to London
she'd be my mamma for a little while, in place of you."
The spell was broken. The happy visions of heaven, of
love, had been displaced for Maria. She lay quite silent,
and in the stillness the belle of All Souls' church were
heard to strike out a joyous peal on the morning air. Meta
clapped her hands and lifted her race, radiatat now with
glee. Mods require not time to change in childhood :
now sunshine, now rain. Margery opened the door.
The Charlotte Pain hero iailuded to is a capital
character. A reckless, good-natured, ,4 faav, and
indiscreet lady, the cause of much sorrow to the
simple Maria. As to the Shadow of A.shlydyat,
which gives its name to the book, hero is the
legend to which it owes its origin—
" Has George never told you the tale ?" replied Janet.
" Never. He says he does not remember it clearly
enough." have cause to remember
" It is to be hoped he may never
it more clearly I" was the severe rejoinder of Janet. For a
Godolphin to forget, or to profess to forget, the house's tra-
dition, was rank heathenism in the mind of Janet.
" Will you not tell it me, Janet?"
Janet hesitated. " One of the early Godolphins brought
curse upon the house," she at length slowly began. " It
was that evil ancestor whose memorywe would bury, were
it practicable ; he who earned for himself the title of the
Wicked Godolphin. He killed his wife
" Killed his wife I" interrupted Maria, somewhat
startled.
" Killed her by gradual and !Mg-continued ill-treat-
ment," explained Janet, whose voice had sunk to a hushed
tone. " He wanted her out of the way that another might
fill her place. He pretended to have discovered that she
CZoin wasins brave as she wes
' daughter of the
was not worthy : than which assertion nothing could be
more shumefui and false, for she was ono of the best ladies
and the Wicked Godolphin turned her
egwvoacorrdri.ocr itresahtieoc(hid.aierdd ; Sdhoe
c‘ovraastnai
nDs:
coffin out of the house on to the Dark Plain, there"—point-
ing down to the open space in front of the archway—" there
to remain until the day came for interment. But he did
not wait for that day of interment to bring home his second
wife."
" Not wait I" exclaimed Maria, her eager ears drinking
in the story.
" The manners in those early days will scarcely admit of
an allusion to them in these," continued Janet: "they
savour of whet is worse than barbarian—sin, The laths,

Richard de Commins, heard of his child's death, and
hastened to Ashlydyat, arriving by moonlight. The first
sounds he encountered were the revels of the celebration of
the second marriage ; the first sight he saw was the coffin
of his daughter on the open plain, a pall covering it, and
two of her faithful women attendants sitting, the one at the
head, the other at the foot, mourning the dead. While he
halted there, kneeling to say a prayer, it was told to the
Wicked Godolphin that De Commins had arrived. He—
that Wicked Godolphin—rushed madly out and drew his
sword upon him as he knelt. De Commins was wounded,
but not badly, and he rose to defend himself. There en-
sued a combat, De Commins having no resource but to
fight, and he was killed ; was murdered. Weary with his
journey, enfeebled by age, weakened by grief, his foot
slipped, and the Wicked Godolphin, stung to fury by the
few words of reproach De Cummins had had time to speak,
deliberately ran him through as he lay. In the moment of
death, De Commins cursed the Godolphins, and prophesied
that the shadow of his daughter's bier, as it appeared then,
should remain to bring a curse upon the Godolphins'
house for ever."

" But do you believe the story ? ' cried Maria, breath-
lessly.
" HOW much of it may be true and hew much of it addi-
tion, I cannot decide," said Janet. "One fact is indis-
putable : that a shadow, bearing the exact resemblance of
a bier, with a mourner at its head and another at its foot,
does appear capriciously on that Dark Plain; and that it
but some grievous ill followed for
never yet showed itself,
the Godelphins. It is possible that the Shadow may have
given partial rise to the story."
" Janet," cried Maria, leaning forward, her own tones
hushed, "is it possible that one, in dying, can curse a whole
generation, so that the curse shall take effect ?"
" Hush, child I" rebuked Janet. "It does not become
us to inquire into these things. They are far, far above the
ken of our poor earthly wisdom. Ido not attempt to enter
upon it. Were I to say, of my own decision, God does
permit this curse to remain and to take effect upon us, the
descendants of that wicked man : were I, on the contrary,
to fling it from me in derision, to say it is folly, no such
thing as a curse can hold its effect, all that has happened
to us of ill, happens by accident, the appearance of the
Shadow is but an accident, induced by natural causes,
though we cannot find the precise clue to them—l should be
only a degree less wicked than the dead-and .gone Godol-
phin. We must be content to leave these things. They can
never be decided, until all the mysteries of this lower world
shall be cleared up, by means of that Light which has not
yet entered it. Controversy on them is utterly bootless,
worse than profitless; for there will be believers and disbe-
lievers to the end of time. You wished me to tell the story,
Maria, and I have done so. Ido no more Ido not tell
you it is to be believed, or it is not to be believed. Let
every one decide for himself, according as his reason, his
instinct, or his judgment shall prompt him. People accuse
me of being foolishly superstitious, touching this Shadow
and these old traditions. I can only say the superstition
has been forced upon me by experience. When the Shadow
appears I cannot shut my eyes to it and say, 'lt is not
there.' It is there ; and all Ide is to look at it, and spe-
culate. When the evil, which invariably follows the ap-
pearance of the Shadow, falls. I cannot close my heart to
it, and say, in the teeth of facts, No evil has happened.'
The Shadow never appeared, Maria, but it brought ill in
its wake. It is appearing again now; and lam as certain
that some great ill is in store, as that I am talking with you
at this =meat. In this point lam superstitious."

We cannot say that we, ourselves, suite approve,
as critics, of any such spiritual mysteries as these
being employed in imaginative literature. Mrs.
Wood, moreover, is capable of exercising sufficient
power, and that, too, with singular ability in the
realms of Truth and Nature, to render her indepen-
dent of any mere " mysteries" with:a view to the
production of sensational effect.

popular Edition of Lord Macaulay's _History of
England. Part 11. Longman and Co.

Having commented at some considerable length
upon the peculiarities of this admirably well thought
of edition of Lord Macaulay's grand torso of Eng-
lish History at the time when the initial number
first made its appearance, all we have now
to notify in its regard is the simple fact
of its • continuation. The second instal-
ment of the work now issued simultaneously
with the magazines for December, closes with Macaulay's
wonderfully graphic account of the circumstances atten-
dant upon the death of King Charles the Second. That
profligate monarch breathing his last, very far indeed no
doubt from what the poetical old medial val religious came to
speak of familiarly as the "odour of sanctity"—but at any
rate with a serious, though tardy, sense of Religion at the
very last I When Chifflnch was hustled oat of the royal bed •
chamber after lettin gin that ever apropos Father Haddlestone
who took so conspicuous a part in furthering the escape of
the young king after Worcester at Boscobel, and who now
administered to the dying
monarch all the meted consola-
tions at his command. Reading the impressive narrative
written by the luminous pen
as it has been picturesque!),
of Macaulay, one realises the actual scene in imagina-
tion far more vividly than even when looking at
that glowing canvass upon which Mr. Ward, the
Royal Academician, a few reasons back, depicted the con-
fused group of courtiers in the ante-chamber, with the
right hand of H.R.H. the Duke of York, afterwards King
James the Second, protruding through the doorway to take
in the glass of water for the parched lips of the expiring
sovereign. We are more than over impressed, now that the
serial issue of this popular edition of Lord Macaulay's
History of England may be regarded as fairly in progress
—we are more than ever impressed with the importance of
it as a means of popularising his resplendent reputation.

The Christmas Number of London Society for 1863.
A wonderful shilling's worth of innocent and
interesting light literature has here been provided
most seasonably by the enterprising publishers of
London Society. It has been the peculiarity of that
popular illustrated magazine, ever since the date of
its original commencement, that in the getting up
of it, in the very material of the paper on which it
is printed, in the variety and elegance of its embel-
lishments, it is a periodical of nothing less than first-class
excellence. If the literary contents are in no degree to be
compared, as a rule, with even the average of the contribu
tions contained in that other still more popular illustrated
shilling monthly, the Cornhill--in regard to the embellish-
ments, the Cornhill is nothing to be compared to London
society. Even (we say this) though a man of powers like
Millais is among the number of the Cornhill illustrators
In point of fact, as a rule, we take the engravings in the
Cornhill to be about as execrable, as the engravings in
_London Society are exquisite. Lavishly and luxuriously
pictorial though the latter periodical is, month after month,
it just fairly surpasses itself in its extra number for the
Christmas Holiday time. Here before us is a brilliant
specimen of how far it does, after this fashion, as we have
said, surpass itself. We don't know that we have ever
seen. a more ample shillingsworth of tale, verse, fun, frolic,
and romance, intermingled with the prettiest, quaintest
oddest, drollest, gracefullest engravings by way of embel-
lishment. After the editor's Christmas Greeting the first
story, leading off, is one by Mark Lemon, the Editor of
Punch —a story about a Christmas Day in. a Jew's house.
A number of other amusing narratives of the most diversi-
fied character make up the literary contents—contents
illustrated by fully a score of choice engravings by artists as
gifted in their various ways as C. W. Cope, R.A., as Daniel
Maclise, R.A., as Kenny Meadows, Alfred Crowquill,
Hablot Browne (i e. Phiz), Wm. M'Connell, W. Brunton,
H. Sanderson, M. Ellen Edwards, C. A. Doyle, and last
and not by any means least, George H. Thomas. Indeed,
the folding picture by Mr. Thomas, opposite pags 20, re-
presenting " Christmas with Sir Launcelot," we take to be
the gem of the whole number. It reminds us of a wonder-
ful picture of Christmas, pencilled a year or two back by the
same elegant draughtsman, a picture of marvellously ela-
borated fun, grace, and beauty, drawn by him for the
Illustrated London News. We can and do very heartily
commend this number of London Society to every one in
quest of innocent mirth at Christmas.

The _Ease, Shamrock, and Thistle Magazine.

" Don't be flowery, Jacob!'.' was the ejaculatory
entreaty addressed byEbenezer Scrooge to Marley's
Ghost, on that famous Christmas Eve when the old

hung (luckily for us all) had the visitation. NVe
cannot, however, find the heart to say ditto to Mr;
Scrooge, when visited on the eve of this corning
Christmas by the flowery periodical before us. Ths B:ci
the Shamrock, and The Thistle, is worthy of its name,
reflects credit upon the Caledonian press froinch it
emanates. Twenty numbers have already
this young competitor for popularity among
magazines now iesuinz month after month from the various
PPtehael cue
swodt
h
at
of
publishing houses of the United Kingdom, is by this time
fairly out of its teens. The nestling of yesterday is no
longer callow, is no longer even a fledgling—it is now strong
upon the wing, and sustains its flight full well. The con-
tents of the new number for this current month df Decem-
ber is unusually varied. A nineteenth instalment of
" Quicksands on Foreign Shores," a series especially re-
mailable as having been edited from the very commence-
ment of the tuagazine, by Archbishop Whately—yields us
Al• charming chapter on " Friends Meeting." That eta.
vent Shaksperian commentator Mr. J. 0. Halliwell,
has a tenth of his Roundabcut Letters upon Stratford -
on-Avon. The pleasant commentator on our Great
Boz, gives us, as his sixth paper on " Dickens's
Works," some entertaining pages on Oliver Twist. Eliza-
-6A Sheridan Carey, the gifted poetess, contributes some
melodic ze .stanzas, entitled. "Friendless and Fallen."
too,with "Fire-Side Musings." Numerous
Quallon is tiers,
other papers he !p to makeup an especially seasonable num
ber, but they are Atogether too numerous to be inii-
vidualized. ConspieunCit among the contents, however,
aro Two pierces de resistance—avo chapters from "The Life
and Adventures of Jacob Morrisn," and two capital chap-
ters in continuation of that thorougiily Chaxles-O'Malley-
like serial now adorning this Caledonian Press Magazine
month after mon% "Misses an Matrix:levy, glad by M.

Knollys." Among all the contributions of this very read-
able magazine, the one last particularised is, Without any
doubt, about the most readable. It has a dash and "go" in
it that carries the reader along in spite of himself.
We nce4s must turn the pages, amused as we read, and
close each number, looking out eagerly for the next in-
stalment.