The Sun.
London, England, 1863-02-04 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

A Daughter of Eve. A Novel. By Hain Friswell,
Author of " Sham," " Ghost Stories and Phantom
Fancies." 2 Vols. Bentley.
This is a mast striking work, full of brilliant de-
scription, exciting incident, and ably drawn cha-
racters. The style throughout is animated, and
the dramatis personae most life-like. The chief
point on which the story turns is kept secret in the
most artistic manner until the conclusion, and one
seldom meets with so well defined a plot, sustained
throughout with such care and caution, and at last
taking one by surprise. The circumstances are most
painful, but that does not detract from the interest,
indeed it serves to increase the excitement, as no
straightforward conduct could have created so much
confusion and caused such fearful suffering. Some
of the chief actors in this fitful drama of life are
sketched in a finished style, sharp and satirical
are the decisive touches put to their portraits
and the heartless roue, the cold hard man of the
world, the cunning schemer, the wild enthusiast,
and the selfish woman of fashion and her train of
senseless followers; the unfortunate outcast, who
brazens out her shame by affected indifference, and
the more mediocre mortals, who pursue their course
ie an humbler style, all appear before us in their
strength and their weakness, in their sin and their
subtleties, in their wilful perversion of gifts, and
their conceited assumption of graces Mrs. Vesey
Boultbee is a leading personage in these chapters,
and is thus introduced :—" Mrs. Vesey Boultbee
was in the ton; not the observed of all observers;
not the very cream of the cream, perhaps, but of
very good standing. She was a good woman also,
but had a women's tongue—her only fault, she said.
She gained, however, as much as she lost by that
instrument, for her sayings and doings brought her
into notoriety. Society talked often of what Mrs.
Vesey Boultbee said and did. Mrs. Boultbee was
known to everybody, from the royal personages
downwards. She did not dine at the palace, per-
haps, but the people in the palace often heard of
the bustling, energetic, good-natured, gossiping
Mrs. Vesey Boultbee. Happy in herself, particu-
larly pleased with her position in the world, and
thoroughly satisfied with her entourage, Mrs.
Boultbee, woman of fashion and bon ton, fulfilled
her duties of life, which seemed to be those of
making matches, advertising jewellers and mihiners,
proclaiming what was the last new method of
spreading the table, or serving the soup, curling
the hair or wearing the ribbon, and fluttered on
through life with the gaiety of a butterfly, which
thinks it is doing a good turn to the bees of exis-
tence. But it is certain that some of the bees, so
far from thinking themselves benefited, be-
came grumble-bees, rather than humble bees,
and railed against such delightful butter-
flies as Mrs. Vesey Boultbee." The devices
to which this lady had resort are most entertaining
to notice. She wished to visit Paris but dreaded
the expense, hence she hit upon a plan which suc-
ceeded in a wonderful manner. She selecteel a
friend who was as Eager to ape her ways as she was
those of the real grandee, and asked her to share
expenses. She contrived that the visitor should
take the heaviest share of payment in return for the
inestimable advantages she enjoyed of a presenta-
tion to the French Court and the endless gaieties of
a recherche class. Mrs. White, the favoured fair
one, in her turn was now a grande dame, and quite
extinguished some rival claimants to the honour of
being among the elite of the fashionable world.
The news of the trip to Paris spread discomfiture
among the clique at Surbiton. " Mrs. Waite
forged ahead' of her two companions. She was at
once accepted as the leader of the ton at Surbiton,
and the alderman's widow hid her diminished head,
whilst the wife of the excellent proprietor of the
patent medicine, who had always been of a serious
turn, felt that the world was a very vain, wicked,
and foolish world, and that it was not worth cul-
tivating. She therefore abandoned the pursuit of
fashion, and, taking a seat in the chapel of a popular
Dissenter, told all her friends that she had at last
found what she had long been seeking—the way
to a higher and a better world." The adventures
of little Ishmael also are characteristically described,
and the event of his joining the housebreakers gives
a true picture of the manner in which idleness
leads to mischief and to crime. " Pauline,"
is another natural delineation. Her career of dis-
grace had not hardened her heart, though it had
roughened her manners, and it is only in accord-
ance with the spirited style in which she defended
her house that she should come forward in the same
fearless spirit to protect her prisoner. There was
sufficient evidence of good intention in both these
pariahs of society to justify the account here given
of their prosperity in a foreign land, where they
would be removed from pernicious influences, and
able to start afresh in the great highway of life
after their devious wanderings and crooked paths.
Mr. Saul Vennem is a very likely presentation of
K disagreeable man, who was invited everywhere
and tolerated by everybody because he was
rich. " A man cannot well have a very
large fortune without being asked to the
houses of his friends." He was a selfish, arrogant,
and pretentious man, but covered with a cloak that
hides a multitude of sins in the shape of a golden
disguise, ho went merrily on his way and enjoyed
himself, as he trade it the object of his life to serve
and please himself. Count de la Biche, who plays
rather an important part in this story, .s a real
villain. Ever ietent on evil and planning mischief,
he might have dragged at the chariot wheels of his
triumph injured men and ruined women who had
been necessary sacrifices in the cause of his career.
His end is indeed a retribution ; he died by the
hand of the man he had most deeply injured, and
whose succeeding years would. be embittered by the
fearful knowledge he had gained of the Count's
conduct and the deceit practised on him by his wife
and her mother. It was the Count's own wish that
he and Colonel Escombe should fight, and thus he
brought his doom on his own head. " The hour of
reckoning" to that guilty career was a fearful
struggle and an appalling sight. He could hardly
have passed a more painful night than that which
began so brilliantly at the hall of Mrs. Boultbee,
but which saw no morning in this world. To add
to the retribution, his servant David, whom in his
iniquitous and profligate career he had also injured,
contrived to load the pistols, and loaded the Count's
with powder, so that his adversary escaped, while
he fell mortally wounded. The fact of Arthur's
challenging the man who was his own father is
a fearful warning of the denouements to which
crime brings its votaries, and even in tbis
world anticipates the judgments of the next.
The Count thought himself safe from all exposure
or annoyance, and one by one his victims rose up,
like Banquo's ghost, to confront him and to anni-
hilate. All the resources of his craftiness, and the
skilled manceavres el his cunning deserted him in
his hour of need—
"A lifetime's acts, in vain essayed,
Seemed bursting on the artist's head."
When his dying gaze rested on the luxurious cham-
ber he had so decked and decorated with luxurious
refinement to minister to his comfort, he seemed
like the sinner, who bade his s ml take its rest, as
it had much good laid up for many years ;
and the
warning voice proclaimed, "This night thy soul
shall be required of thee." Colonel Escombe is
rather a weak men, who seems more ready to run
away from a difficulty than to stay and face
it in the beet manner. This book, which
chronicles the sad careers of so many
daughters of Eve, presents us with two happy ex-
ceptions in Florence Escombe, and her governess,
Miss Parsons. Florence is a fine disposition and
an attractive- maiden; she, too, had to taste of the
cup of bitterness that sin had filled for her house-
hold, but she rallied from the shock, and never
knew the real extent of the calamity. Miss Par-
sons is an estimable woman, who has passed through
many scenes of trial and suffering with a heroism
that would have done honour to any one, however
exalted they might be. She was the mainstay of
the unhappy home of the Escombes, and by her un-
tiring kindness and patient watchfulness she did
her best to make crooked things straight, or
at least to mitigate the extent of the
unavoidable calamity. The description at the
commencement of the dismay that seizes on
Colonel's friend at his mysterious melancholy, and

the strange modes which they adopt to discover the
cause of the calamity, are very ludicrous. At last,
after the fashion of candid friends, they increased
the evil they had sought to remedy, and after hav-
ing begun the search with the laudable desire to be
of service as friends, they performed the
part of enemies in their unwise sayings and
goings. The Doctor looked so mysterious
and tapped his forehead, that the excitable and en-
thusiastic Mr. Allington Pye took the idea " that
his friend Colonel Escombe was settling down into
melancho4 madness." He spread abroad this
agreeable intelligence, and the result was that half
the town was talking of Colonel Escombe's men-
tal calamity. Those who desire to peruse a most
stirring and spirited narrative cannot do better
than possess themselves of this work, which will
infallibly prove of interest and excitement to all
who peruse it. Its sketches are so animated, its
style so brilliant, and its numerous characters so
well defined and so vividly illustrated, that the re-
sult is a novel of unusual attractions and supe-
rior excellence. It is most probable that " A
Daughter of Eve" will attain a great success, awl
that the reading community in general will give a
unanimous vote in its favour, in consideration of its
many claims to notice in design and execution, in
vivacity of style and vigour of execution.

African Hunting from Natal to the Zambesi. By
W. C. Baldwin, F.R.G.S., with illustrations by
Wolf and Zwecker. Bentley.
The fascinations of a hunter's life are, to some
minds, irresistible. Not content with following the
old customs of their forefathers in fox-hunting or
deer-stalking within the boundaries of their native
kingdom, they must needs betake themselves to
the rougher and more dangerous tasks of tiger
shooting in the jungles of India, elephant hunting
in Ceylon, or pursuing the various races that range
the wastes of Southern Africa, scarcely more wild
and savage than the human beings around them.
The exploits of Mr. Gordon Cumming were the first
to draw attention to this new hunting ground, and
subsequently M. Du Chaillu, by exploring districts
untrodden by Europeans and by securing specimens
of a species only previously known to geologists,
attracted much notice. Mr. Baldwin, however, has
been equally adventurous and can claim the dis-
tinction of being the first European who
reached the Zambesi from the Eastern coast.
Mr. Baldwin is one of those who find pleasures in
the fatiguing and dangerous exploits of the chase,
accompanied, as they often are, by hard fare,
insufficient water, sleeping on the damp earth, and
journeying amidst hostile tribes, which the easy
and regular life of cities can never afford. It is true
his eight years' experience seems to have made him
somewhat weary, and to have satisfied even his
ardour for the chase. He left England for the
avowed purpose of enjoying a hunter's life, but his
first adventures after arriving in Natal were suffi-
cient to discourage a less eager spirit. He joined
a party being formed by Mr. White, a famous
elephant bunter, for an expedition into the Zulu
country, and great was the rejoicing of the young
adventurer when he was allowed to join it. " Such
was my keeness for the sport, that I verily jumped
at the proposal to sleep under one of the wagons,
both of which were crammed full up to the very
tent, and one topped up with a boat keel uppermost.
But I would, then, rather have slept in six inches
of water than not have gone at all." Notwithstand-
ing the hardships he had to encounter, he was at
the outset delighted with the expedition. "It was
the very thing of all others I had been longing for,
and in those days I worked like a horse, and the
older bands were very glad to be saved the trouble."
It was the pursuit of pleasure under difficulties,
however, for the rain was very frequent, especially
at night. The waggons would only shelter three of
the party, so the other six had to manage as best
they could, and the result was often sleeping in
a pool of water. " The grass, which grew to a
tremendous height, was so saturated that one might
just as well walk through a river, so
there was no use in putting on dry
clothes in the morning." The result of such
exposure i❑ the unhealthy season in that marshy
country might have been anticipated. Fever and
ague struck down the adventurous party one by
one, pursuing them with a surer and more deadly
aim than that with which they hunted the denizens
of the forest. The author himself, looking back on
the undertaking with his present hardly earned
knowledge and experience, styles it " seeking out
death ;" and adds, "If older heads had only been
placed upon the shoulders of the enterprising and
the young, I might not have had to tell how out of
nine hunters who went out full of vigour and hope,
in all the ardour of enterprise, Gibson and myself
alone returned, enervated and prostrate after months
of insensibility in Kaffir kraals. I would gladly
forget and must pass by some of the details of that
trip." It seems strange that " Elephant White,"
as he was styled, being an old and experienced
hunter, should have entered upon such a rash ex-
ploit. The survivors of the party were nearly
a twelvemonth before they recovered their
health, and having had enough of hunting
for a time at least, Mr. Baldwin settled
down on a large farm on the high lands of
the Inanda, trading in cattle with the Kaffirs.
After two years of this solitary, life he found its
monotony unendurable and started on another
Zulu trip, continuing his wanderings with more
or less interruption for five or six years. Of the
last three years of this period he says, " I have led
but a vagrant sort of life, doing little good for my-
self or anybody else, except supplying the ungrate-
ful half-starved Masaras and Maecalacas with
abundance of flesh. I have scarcely ever been
still, and must have journeyed over some twelve or
fifteen thousand miles at least, and that at much less
than foot pace, having been through the Transvaal
Republic, Free State, and part of the Old
Colony, twice down to Natal, and twice round
Lake Ngami, and now over the Zambesi into Ma-
kololo and Batoka lands; and it is now, I think,
nearly time to come to a halt." In the course of
these wanderings his adventures, accidents, and
escapes were, as might be conjectured, very nume-
rous. Sometimes his provisions failed, though this
was the rarest of his misfortunes, owing to the plenti-
ful supply of game and his skill with his gun; the
scarcity of water was a greater and more frequent
trouble. Sometimes he lest his way in the wild and
trackless country ; sometimes he fell among un-
friendly natives; once all his attendants deserted
him in the middle of a solitary waste, and,
to add to their kindness, relieved him of the
care of his horses at the same time. Very often
accidents deprived him of his best horses and dogs,
or tigers carried off his oxen, and lions breaking
into his encampment helped themselves with more
liberality than consideration. Add to these the
perils of hunting such animals on land, of
bathing in company with crocodiles and hippopo-
tami, and the dangers threatening man and beast
from the scourges of the country—ague, fever, and
the fatal lung-sickness among cattle—and we shall
have some idea of the pleasures of a hunter's life in
Southern Africa. We have an account of a narrow
escape in bunting elephants, when owing to a sud-
den jerk of the horse's head the curb-chain came
undone, and the bit turned round in his mouth.
The elephant who was charging his adversary was
then not twenty yards off. The rider dug his spurs
into his horse's sides, and, leaning over as far as
possible, passed close by the infuriated animal. The
horse rushed on through the tangled bush, with the
huge enemy close in the rear. As soon as he could
arrest the frantic speed of his horse, Mr. Baldwin
jumped off, and succeeded in despatching
the elephant, after giving him ten shots
and sustaining three more savage eharges._table
Elephant hunting is, of course, a very profitable
sport says
sport from the value of the ivory, but
both risk and labour. It:Two blank
dveryays hardest
riding
five life our author, the
entailsthe
to a vley
sso
pace
. eat ; a drink of
where the
ing in the bush with Masaras tell you they have drunakn,dsleep
ha e. nituhrasnn aocttahani
nfegoho7:
the saddle, under
the wah
ole broilingd ay_stuwno,
muddy water in the morrnngontodfianndeirrt,y tortoise-
shell, which serves for breakfast,
taontteesreids
yterinthree half-starvedoMsuacscaersassfiunl
neveraadkbayi:usstliwkahendatthyisou may expect."
f.i sup-
per;jo wi a 11,3 gdaaf
followed seeing
On another oceasion