The Sun.
London, England, 1850-11-19 00:00:00

HARRISON AINSWORTH'S ROMANCES.

Vol. X 1.---. TACK SH 1,3 PPARD.

There. is a dignity in the silence preserved by Mr.
Ainsworth in reference to his literary assailants.
Jack Sheppard" appears in his new and popular
form without any prefatory notice whatever. We
cannot but regard the circumstance as in the highest
degree honourable to the disposition of the novelist.
Nevertheless, while appreciating the amenity of tern •
per evinced by the omission, we cannot but regret
that the author of " Jack Sheppard" has not given
utterance, in some measure at least, to those senti-
tuente of indignation which must inevitably have
been long cherished by him with regard to his
literary assailants. After so many virulent attacks
as have at different periods been directed against the
popularity of Mr..Ainsworth's writings, with a view to
deteriorate his reputation, we should have rejoiced to
hear from the lips of our author himself some reply,
no matter how scornful or incidental. Not that we
regard his popularity as needing any vindication, iu
reference either to the selection of hi 3 subjects, or to
their treatment as romances. On the commencement
of the present admirable re-issue of his collected fic-
tions we took occasion ourselves to expose the folly,
not to say the egregious injustice, of assailing Mr.
Ainsworth as the first offender in a style of narrative
which had been tolerated more or less in most of his
literary predecessors and contemporaries—in some
instances eulogised even in terms of extravagant
enthusiasm. It can scarcely be forgotten by the
lovers of modern literature, that in answer to a
charge somewhat similar to the one here hinted at,
Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton penned a response to the
hypercritics, in the form of a most cogent and mas-
terly pamphlet. In that brochure the poet-novelisa
taking his text, as it were, front the higher orders of
imaginative composition, maintained that the CODS.i•
deration of crime was the essential prerogative of the
tragic dramatist, and that upon the same reasoning it
was also a no less allowable theme for the tragic
romancist. /Etchylus may be said, indeed, in a great
measure to have based his. celebrity upon the accept-
' ance of this principle. Shakspere again, with a like
appreciation cf the veritable attributes of the "poet"
or creator, infused the same ghastly truth into
his most remarkable masterpieces. It would
be somewhat difficult, we conceive, to show that
the atrocities perpetrated by Clytemnestra have ever
i been surpassed by the most villanous criminals whose
sinister histories have been recorded in the pages of
the Neugate Calendar. Neither to our thinking
would it he less embarrassing to demonstrate the
existence of a greater amount of depravity in the
housebreaker, whose hands were never stained with
blood, and whose principal shame was that of having
adopted burglary as his profession, than in the re-
morseless thane whose investiture with the diadem of
royalty arose out of one of the most dastardly inur-
&vs ever perpetrated—that of an aged guest slumber-
ing under his roof—and whose continued
possession of the sceptre was attributable only
to a series of bloody assassinations. The heinous
infamy of Macbeth has never yet been considered suf-
ficient to remove him beyond the pale of our sympa-
thies. Yet criminals we might almost say infinitely
small in comparison are regarded as altogether with-
out the reach even of our regard or consideration. It
may be said, or rather is said, that in the one instance
the grossness of the crime is in a manner sublimated
by its poetic treatment, whereas in the other instance
the felon is submitted to our notice in his natural as-
pect through the homelier medium of a prose narra-
tive. Tnan this we can conceive no more shallow or
more preposterous argument. Instead of justifying
the dramatist at the expense of the novelist,
the circumstance does exactly the reverse.
For, assuredly, vice may be invested with
attraction and crime with a sort of diseased
sublimity by their celebration in the lofty numbers of
pi asy:—while the portraiture of either the one or the
other in the humbler guise. of a prose description re-
veals their more obvious and undeniable characteris-
tics. Hence it is that the delineation of the darker
phases of humanity by the hand of the novelist ap-
pears to us calculated to be beneficial rather than
pernicious—revealing atrocity in its true form, and
dragging before us crime in its very nakedness, not
tricked out in the pump of a poetic masquerade. A
fanciful theory has been advanced by Mr. Disraeli,
if we recollect rightly, in his psychological romance
of " Contarini Fleming"—to the effect that the poet
having breathed out his soul to the world, first in
ballads, then in odes, then in epics, then in drams,
after employing as he medium of his inspiration all
the ingenious styles of composition, the idyll, the
elegy, the sonnet, the hymn, the psalm, and the la-
mentation, has at length, in a more perfected age of
civilization, adopted, as the vehicle of his thought,
the form of the rhymeless and rhythmless, but still
poetic, romance. Whether this notion be strictly •
correct, or otherwise, it is certain that the novelist
is the child, or descendant, of the poet, and that, as
one epoch spoke through the tragic or comic drama,
our own speaks through the prose romance. As
the heir of the poet, the novelist is, therefore,
entitled to the use of those great prerogatives for-
merly enjoyed by his predecessor, and, among these,
not one is more inestimable in its influence or more
capable of judicious employment, than the preroga-
tive according to which crime and criminals may be
delineated. Fielding felt this when he penned the
history of that most despicable wretch, the thief-
taker " Jonathan Wild"—Godwin felt it'when he made
the interest inspired by a murder the main-spring of
" Caleb Williams"—Scott felt it when he caused the
evil practises of Dirk Hatterick to infuse a charm
into the pages of " Guy Mannering"—Bulwer
when he celebrated the life of the highwayman
" Paul Clifford" Dickens when he painted
the grim and bloody figure of Sykes flying
from the corpse of his paramour, in those
powerful chapters which precede the close of " Oliver
Twist." Actuated by the same sentiments, Harri-
son Ainsworth wrote his enthralling romance of
" Jack Sheppard." A narrative of more absorbing
interest we cannot call to our recollection. Once
commenced, it is idle to think of putting it aside
until read to its conclusion. Every leaf contains an
incident, and these incidents are chiefly of the most
-breathless character. From the storm on the Thames,
magnificently described at the outset, to the exe-
cution of the hero, with which, of course, the
story is brought 'to an appropriate termination,
• the work rivets the attention of the reader, and
that too by the strong and legitimate power of the
descriptions. Throughout "Jack Sheppard" the
crimes of the more diabolical characters introduced
are always held up to unmitigated detestation, as
may be especially seen by reference to Jonathan
Wild—the Jonathan Wild of Henry Fielding! Poetic
justice is done to the vices and felonies of the hero by
his being ostentatiously conducted to the gallows at
Tyburn ; and our sympathies are excited towards
Jack simply because of his possession of some excellent
qualities, or through the admiration very justly ex-
cited by his daring and even wonderful escapes from
confinement. In the person of Thames Darrell
and in that of Winifred Wood, the author
has well vindicated his capacity for - the de-
lineation of the more gentle aspects of
humanity. Mrs. Sheppard herself, the mother of the
burglar, is charmingly conceived, and it is impossible
not to recognize fine traits of a better disposition
'than might be expected even in poor Blueskin.
Among the most vigorous portions of the work, al-
i was s excepting the account of Jack's escapes from
incarceration, is the passage relating to the assassina-
tion of Sir Rowland Trenchard in the well-hole, by
the thief-taker and his Jewish satellite, Abraham
Mendez. It reveals in the intellect of Mr. Aina-
-1 worth that supreme command Over the horrible
which, if -he had been a painter instead of a novelist,
would have induced him to portray such incidents
as that transpiring in the prison of Ugolino. For our-
• selves one of the most masterly and interesting chapters
I'
in the romance is the one in which Jack is visited at
Newgate by Sir James Thornhill, Gay, Figg, and
llogarth.. Happily, however, for Mr. Ainsworth, fhe
time has passed by when a detailed criticism on
- " Jack Sheppard" was requisite to introduce it to pub-
lic
consideration. All that remains fn. us at present
is briefly to notify the fact of the present republica-
tion, a republication the more interesting when it is
remembered thet this eleventh volume comprises.
perhaps, the most remarkeble of all the fictions of
Harrison Ainsworth, with the single exception of
the "Miser's Daughter."

GREAT EXHIBITION, 1851.—Messrs. J. and R.
M'Craf'ken, of No. 7, Old Jewry, have this day received
a further consignment from the Russian Commission,
consisting of 129 packages, which they are taking steps
tc, deposit with the previous consignment under the re-
gulltions established by the Board of Customs for the
custody of the goods from the northern ports, until the
buddibg in Hyde-park be ready to receive them.
LIE EXHIBITION or 1851.—Notwithstanding the
additional_ gallery accommodation which it has already been
sdetermiucd shall be attached to the building
.in Hyde-park,
it appears that still further Space is .deemed requisite, and to
provide for which Mr. B. Edgington has, at the request of
Mr. Digby Wyatt, attended several days, and given nume-
rous suggestions to effect the required extension by means of
monsfre tents, kze., and yesterday was desired to furri,h
estimates for the same. It is understood that the increased
space to be thus given will comprise an area of about 350
square feet.

EXHIBITIO:4 0' 1851.—Her Majesty's Commit.-
sioners have received information that the President of the
United States has give❑ orders to the Secretary of the Navy
to place at the disposal of the United States exhibition com-
mittee a vessel of the national marine, of such a character es
will be most useful in convevieg the articles destin..d for the
Industrial Exhibition of London free of charge to the con-
tributors

TIDE ELECTION OF LORD RECTOR or GLAGOW
UNIVIIRSITY.7The majority for Sheriff Alison is, numeri-
cally, a majority greater ,than has ever declared itself since
the triumphant return of the .late Sir Robert Peel. Mr.
Macaulay, it is true, had a majority in each of the four
nations, but his numerical majority was not so large as that
.of Mr. Sheriff Alison. • The-prevailing- sentiment appe rs to
be that Lord Palmerston wi!l not expose Mr. Maeatilay to
the invidious task of recording his vote against so large a
numerical majority of the voters.— Edinburgh Courant.