The Sun.
London, England, 1863-10-07 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Next Door. By Mrs. Thomson, author of "Con-
stance," &c. Three vols. Hurst and Blackett.

With saddened feelings we opened the pages of
Mrs. Thomson's new work, and with similar senti-
ments—sentiments that disarm all criticism—we
now introduce it to our readers. Between the
composition and the publication of this story, its
talented author has been called away. The hand
which so felicitously guided the pen of the novelist,
and which has so often charmed many readers, will
delight us no more. Very melancholy is the little
fly-leaf announcement prefixed to the first volume
of this new novel, which tells us that the work was
ready for publication some little time back, but that
its appearance was delayed, first by the death of
the author's son, and then, by the lamented death
of the author herself. No presentiment of these
approaching sorrows, however, cast their shadow
over the pages of a fiction which may rank with
Mrs. Thomson's happiest efforts. It is essentially a
domestic novel, abounding with capital sketches of
character, and containing many home scenes of vivid
interest. The heroines of the story are two very
charming sisters, Ada and Rosamond Walworth,
the daughters of a sea-captain, who, during their
father's absence, are residing in seclusion with
their mother—a good-hearted, genial, vulgar
woman, supposed to have been a cook. At the
opening of the tale their abode is Bruce Cottage,
a furnished villa on the banks of the Thames.
"Next Door" reside Mrs. Clive, a serious, punc-
tilious, matter-of-fact merchant's widow, and her
son Charles, an undergraduate of Oxford, a very
dutiful son, who is, nevertheless, glad to escape
from his exacting mother and his prim, old-maidish
cousin Jane, to spend his time upon the river which
flows by the garden side. There his studies of
Aristotle are sadly disturbed by glimpses of the fair
inhabitants of " Next Door," whom his strait-laced
mother formally declines to visit. Here, in the
first chapter, is a pretty scene most gracefully
described ;

" WITH THE STREAM."

It was about that delicious time in a summer's afternoon
when the sun's heat begins to abate, and a fresh breeze to
announce the approach of evening. That part of the Thames
possessed neither interest nor beauty. Bruce Cottage was
at the extremity of the village, and after passing its weeping
willows, and boat- house, half hidden in trees, a flat shore
on either side, and a long expanse of meadow, were diverki-
fled only by the various reeds, coltsfoot, water persicaria,
grasses, and withiea, which disguise the river's edge, with
here and there, in spring time, a splash of the golden ranun-
culus to give colour to that complicated border—and this
sameness lasted for hours.

Nevertheless it was pleasant to these two girls, who hated
constraint, and loved to hear the plashing of the water be-
neath the oars.

It was still warm, and Ada, at last, threw her bonnet
quite off, and detaching with her boat-hook a spray of wild
hop which grew on the extremity of a hedge intersecting a
field, wreathed it round her head, looked up at Rosamond,
and smiled. The smile was transient, and the perfect fea-
tures composed themselves into that look of classic repose
which belongs to sculptured beauty in ages past ; and so fine
was the form of her head, as she rested it on her hand, that
even Rosamond, careless as she was in such observations,
was struck by the beautiful listless face and form, and by
the thoughtful eyes which were bent upon the water.
On a sudden, a violent shock was given to their boat,
Rosamond was supposed to be steering, but she had for-.
gotten her task. Some one had run up against them. The
boy was seated with his back to the helm; no one saw
whence the shock proceeded until an outrigger darted
quickly by them, and a young man, dressed in a close vest
of dark blue flannel, and with a cap on his head—such as is
worn ty Oxford boating men—was seen for an instant and
then disappeared. But, in a minute, before Ada had looked
around her, and the flush on Rosamond's cheek had died
away, he reappeared. This time his cap was in his hand;
he came leisurely and advisedly close to the side of their
boat.

" I have to beg a thousand pardons," he said, colouring,
and bowing very deferentially, first to Rosamond, but his
eyes rested on Ada's face. "I really don't know how it
happened ; whether I ran against you, or you against me."
He hesitated : " It must have been my fault."
;4 I do not think we have suffered any injury," answered
Ada, turning upon him those eyes which he had often
wished to see more nearly than in certain transient glimpses
which ho had already obtained.
" And it was my fault for steering so badly," said
Rosamond.

" And will do us good—humble us, and be a warning to
be more careful," added Ada, with a smile and a bow, and
on they glided, leaving the outrigger and its expert master
quite enamoured by those few words, those blushes and
glances.

He was too gentlemanly to attempt to meet them again,
so they rowed on languidly and lazily, contented with the
delicious breeze and balmy odours from the reeds and wild
flowers on the banks.

And by way of contrast, let us take from a later
volume the following sad glimpse of a dismal
wedding :

" AGAINST THE STREAM."

No flowing drapery, as at the present day, concealed the
bride's blushes, or rather, in the present instance, softened
her pallor. A. costly bonnet, or rather hat, with white
flowers round it in garland fashion, showed her face, which
wore, even then, the look of hurry and eagerness upon it
which it had done for several days. Her dress was very
rich, of a gorgeous satin, made with a train—long
enough to act as an apology for the shortness of the
bodice of her dress, made, as it was then called, as a

spencer.

" She's not looking well to-day," whispered Miss Ather •
ton to Mr. Temple, " but she really is handsome."
"Yes, poor thing I" Mr. Temple thought, "I can see
that ;" but his eyes were riveted on Rosamond. "What a
face that was," he thought, " so full of varying," and, he
fancied, " contending emotions—timidity—expectation—
fear." She fared something, ho saw. She seemed to
forget herself, and not only herself, but ihe holy ground on
which she stood—the altar before her—the relatives and
friends who stood there, even her father, and to remember
that thers was only one being in the world, her sister ; and
when the clerk, sorting the company, as he termed it,
gently pointed out to her her place, she almost rushed for-
ward, and turned quickly to her sister, as if afraid that
there was something wrong there.
But Ada was unmoved. Once only she betrayed some
feeling ; it was when their hands were joined together, she
attempted for an instant to draw hers back. Was it that she
shuddered ? What shook the snow-white wavy flowers in
her bonnet ?
What a solemn silence there was in that old church, so
remote as it was from all the fashionable world of Brighton;
you might have heard the poor old Captain, indeed, breath-
ing heavily ; you might hear Rosamond's rich taffeta gown
rustle as she bent forward to look at her sister's face, but
those sounds soon died away.
The voice that spoke words of condemnation to her who
stood before the altar ceased at last, and then the silence
was broken indeed.
Ada then seemed to recover her senses ; she turned first
—not tater husband, but to her father, and hid hereelf in

his arms; the old man bout down his head on hers; the
little bustle of congratulations was suddenly checked;
every one wag touched; the solemn bond—the solemn bles-
sing, uttered in deep, earnest tones by the father—the war-
ring elements, howling through the half•opened doors—the
storms which were gathering round the old tower, and
whizzing through every crevice inside and outside of the
building—the pale anxious looks of the loveliest of the
bridemaids—the nervous, unjoyous aspect of the bride-
groom, formed such a prelude to that after life, of which
this was an epoch, as the notes of a requiem would do to a
a tragedy.

The course of true love in the instance of the Next
Door neighbours, it will be seen, does not run more
smoothly than is proverbial. Manifold are the
trials and troables that befit! Charles Clive and Ada
Melmoth ; but the manner in which poetic justice
is dealt out in the closing chapters of the story is
cne which, although novel-writers delight in it, we
cannot regard with favour. In this instance no less
than two deaths are required in order to bestow
happiness upon t No individuals, who have rendered
themselves unworthy of that boon by their treacher-
ous faithlessness to their first affections. However,
" all's well that ends well," and we will not spoil,
by further explanations, the interest of what is
really a very interesting story. Some portions of
the scene are laid at Brighton, of which place, as it
was in years gone by, we have the following accu-
rate description :