The Lancaster ledger. [volume] (Lancaster, S.C.) 1852-1905, 1854-01-11

largely helped,--nay, in the first instance,
perhaps, created--by the attention which
Mrs, Opie excited and retained as NOVELIST
She was ssught and priced as one Of the
women OF genius of her time,-and the list
then included Harriet Lee, Charlotte Smith,
Madam D'Arblay, Mrs lnehbald, the Porters,
Lady Morgan, Miss. Edgeworth, and Ann
kadcliff: Most Of these pioneers, II not pos
itively Inventors of fiction--who opened in
Romance, historical and supernatural, in To-
mestic fiction, and in the National tales
paths that the proudest men (as Sir Walter
Scott bears witness for us) were only too
glad to follow further, when their turn and
time Of appeal to the public come.
Were they now published, Mrs Opie's
"Simple Tales" her "Tales of the Heart"
her "Father and Daughter" Qha most popu-
lar, perhaps Of Ger novels,) wc.;in, os
thought TO want both body and soul,-to BIO
poor 40 regards invention, slight in manner
unreal in sentiment--and they are so if they
be tried against the best W, itings of the
authors Of "the Admirals Daughter" and
"Mary Barton" and Jane Eyre In their day
however, they were cherished and wept over
rs moving and truthful. They won for
their authress n continental reputation and
one Of them, The Father and Daughter"
in its translated and dramatised form M the
opera "Aguese," with Paers expressive mu.
sic, (soms of Paer's bcst) and hmbrogett's
narrowing personation of the principal char.
acter, will connect Amelia Opic's namo with
opera so long MS the chronicles of music
shall DO written.
In these pursuits, accomplishments and
successes, the girlhood, married life, and
hrst years of widowhood of Amelia Opie
passed over. Then camc change-strange
though not without Its parallel in the history
OF woman OF beauty, genius, and social sue
cess. She bscame tired Of the world, its
pomps, pleasures and vanities, aud attracted.
1t is believed, by the influence exercised over
her mind by NJ Joseph John GurneY, of
Earlhnm, (the brother Of Mrs. FRI, and one
OF the most learned and refined of Quakers)
hmells OPie sought and obtained n mem
oership OF that sect, of which the ordinances
admit neither music nor tale telling, nor the
entrance OF frivolous and imaginative gaiety
IN any form. When she repaired to London
from Norwich, it was tv the Friends Yearly
Meeting, or to the platform of some philan-
throPie assembly, on which the slave, the
prisoner, or s"me other "dcsolatc and op.
pres"ed" creature was the magnt of attrac-
tion.
What was more noticeable still, by way of
at, >tlng the sincerity of n neophyte, Ame-
liz Ops did her best to force her old self, the
novelist. INTO her new uniform of staid silk
bonnet ana dove-colorcd shawl. After hav-
ing ceased for some years from imaginative
creation, the ne sly hedgcd Friend suddenly
the authcrcss Of Illustrations Of
Lying, work in hic5 fiction, by thought,
word or work, was Mhilosically denounced
in series OF small fic;io.'s. This was fol-
lowed by Dctraction Dispinyc3, n second
draught from the same fountain. But nci-
ther In the world she had quilted, nor 10 the
world she had entered, were these hybrid
attempts to reconcile "old things with new"
received with any extraordinary compla-
cency. The fame of The Father and Daugh-
ter, and OF the opera "Agncse," could not
be got Of, could not be dyed drab; and,
for its sake, the worldly world Of critics for
gave the fcebleness and unconscious disen-
genuousness of Amelia Opie's later attempts
to reconcile callings, habits and associations,
essentially and sternly irreconcilabic.
Alter some years Of these new efforts.
Amelia Opie gently and gracefully .cilla.
ted back 20 some place and pleasure in the
world, where her earlier and, we think, her
more real life had been led. She was once
more seen, though sill rs friend, in gen.
eral society--and when seen there, was al
ways welcome for the vivacity of her man.
nrr, the kindn'ss Of her heart, and her ancc.
dotcs and "reminiscences Of gone by worlds
Of art and fancy. BY those who were per-
sonally acquainted with her, Amelia Opie
must be always pleasantly remembered! by
those who knew her not, she can never be
overlooked, when the works and claims of
tho English authoresses Of the nineteenth
century have to be summed up.