Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1853-05-28


These volumes have been reprinted among us b,
the Messrs. Harper, and EHehe has for some tim
been household name among young ladies at board
ina-school, and around the centre tables in ou
draginc-rooms Professional novel readers have
not perhaps even yet quite forgotten the impression
ii made upon them at the time of its first appear
aace in our midst, though they have averaged about
one novel day since Its perusal. Young ladies
and young gentlemen moving in fashionable CIR
cles" have rested from the calisthenics of poking
and watzing, or from scientific experiments in the
circular rotation Of tables to indulge in the mutual
interchange and comparison of opinions as to the
merits and dement's of Currer Bellies /" last; = and
As this pseudonymous parsonage does not execute a
novel quite as rapidly and frequently as Mr. James,
1t never becomes matter of much difficulty for our
drawing-room critics to remember what the "last"
really j. Indeed new work from the authoress
of June Eyre is an event in the literary world to be
duly chronicled and celebrated by the "reading
public" The ennuye'd constituents of this class,
consisting Of general readers" chatty society men,
subscribers to circulating libraries literary mantua-
makers, and boarding-sehool girls aforesaid, have
not forgotten the glad surprise with which they
were treated in the advent of Jane Eyre. 1t was a
Tonne Jonche that Initiated even their pampered
palate. 1t proved that the materials of literary
ndu yet DeeH all uSeu up py
prising craft of novel mongers 1t sent new pulse
and thrill through many heart which had got
the dropsy from indulgng too freely in the "weak,
washy, and everlasting food of modern fiction 1t
was clear that g Currer Bell" had immortalized
herself or more than the stated period of nine days,
and that She would take her rank among the first of
our novel writer's if she could only be kept from
making haste to write herself down.
Atter short interval Shirley appeared, with
enough IF difference from Jane Eyre to justify us
IN calling ii aooel and with enough of similarity
to make the reader miss the piquant relish with
which he Lad devoured the antecedent volume And
cores Ialstte," which to nothing than
Jazz Ere enlarged and intensified Miss Bronte flor
shat drop the de plume for the real of
thore4s always rss with remarkable power; and
co5se she cannot While by the vgor of her style
she eonrives to throw the strongest air of reality
her entire story she its effect by lanentable lack
of versimilitude in adjusting the sequences Of her
rative. With descriptive powers that constitute her
painter words she sometimes lets herself down to To-
uions neXcusabe for their carelessness and vugarty
Possessing most envable mastery of the choicest Eng
ish she yet loves to nterlard her dction with perpe
tua of French phrases and always foiss in
one or two Of German.
esviIette" is an autobiography, in which Lucy Snowe
details for benefit history Of her life and progress
as schoolmistress Miss Bronte has evidently afec
tonpehan she ofcourse would the scholastic
art It's in pedagogy that her genius frsest Jane
Eyre was charity scholar, and teacher in charity
school, and then governess, and then full-hedged
schoolmisress The chief hero of Shirley is private
tutor who falls in love with his pupil the "eopardess
Shirley" herself. And in "vilette' have nothing
but schools school school mistresses and school,
girls from beginning to end And yet it is than
fair to allow that Miss Brones characters interest
ing in themselves and by virtue Of their relations
the outer world. 1t is not rank, position circum-
stances which give either dignity beauty to human
nature she most loves to conceive it. The solitary
striving of friendess and homeless orphan girl; the
lonely musings of humble but aspiring the self
reliant and self sustaining energies Of who scorning
20 the bread Of ideness dependence goes forth
alone mingle in the battle of e compose the quail
ties for which her heroes and hersnes alike most
distinguished regard merely the external features
IN their life and history But it is in the midst Of life
like this that she introduces the feelings the yearnngs,
and the aspirations which the cultivated mind and the
human heart entte their possessors CHERISH but which
social distinctions and the Of daily toll threaten to
preclude the opportunity of realizing and enjoying
Democracy be- Mr. Bancroft metaphyscally defines it
the supremacy Of man over his accidents" then
Mis- Brontes novels democratic in the fullest Of
the word. II is woman and not lady; man. and not
so5eaan whom she makes the chosen depssitaries Of
all that gives dignity and worth to humanity and
then the most approved way according to the true
aosestyle she shows how in the plodding, drudg
ing governess-
All thoughts, all feelings, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
AN are but ministers Of love,
And serve to feed its fame.
She requires q very small allowance Of personal pull
shritude wi which to endow her herones it is enough
they just escape being positively ugly The ADVENT
tous accidents" Of rank and wealth she either who'll
iiscards or sets very little by them, make
weights in her estimate Of human worth.
We cannot think Miss Brontes productions pleas
ant agreeable reading Her books do not please how
ever much they may interest She does not look
life on its bright side. Well may it be said that she car
ries us through her pages wild and desolat
heath with sharp east wind blowing the hair into GU
eyes and making the blood Jingle in veins there
Ssath perhaps in such drive excitement there cerain
rs, but for us not much peasantness She keeps us
consant "worrment' about the fate Of her favortes
Their life seems destined from the be full Of pain
assembling the biographies which Pauina descants
Che tale before u.s. where the wayfarer joune
ward but alghts near or fingers SO long as
give the hand chance Of realizing grasp To liv
peace and be happy is the probable lot Of but fe
among mortas yet it from these few that the old move
lists selected their subjects and then sought enlist
sympathies in behalf Of hero and heroine when miso
s,rne disappointment and a thousand odd caprice.