The Placer herald., 1857-01-10

imagined that destitute women turned nov
elists, as they turned governesses, because
they had no other "lady-like" means Of
getting their bread. On this supposition,
vacillatng syntax and improbable incident
had a certain pathoes for u.s. like the extrem-
ely supererogatory pincushons and Hide
vised nightcaps that are offered for sale by a
blind man. We felt the comodity to be
nuisance, but we were glad to think that the
money went to relieve the necesstous, and
we pictured to ourselves lonely women strug-
Cling for maintenance, or wives and daught
ers devoting themselves to the production of
copy out Of pure heroism, perhaps to
pay their husbands debts or to purchase
luxuries for a sick father. Under these
impressions we shrank from criticising a
lady's novel: her English might be faulty,
but we said to ourselves her motives are IL
reproachable; her imagination may be unin-
ventve, but her patience is untiring.-
Empty writing was excused by an empty
stomach, and twaddle was consecrated by
tears But no! This theory Of ours, like
many other pretty theories, has had to give
way before observation. Women's silly nov
els, we are now convinced are written under
totally different circumstances. The fair
writers have evidently never talked to a
tradesman except from carriage window;
they have no notion of the working classes
except as dependents" they think five hun
dred a-year miserable pttance; Belgravia
and "baronical halls are their primary truths
and they have no idea Of feeling interest in
any man who is not at least great landed
proprietor, if not prime minister. 1t is
clear that they write in elegant boudoirs,
with violet-coored ink and ruby pen; that
they must be entirely Indifferent to publishers
accounts, and inexperienced in every form
of poverty except poverty of brains. 1t is
true that we are constantly struck with the
want Of verisimilitude in their representa-
tons of the high society in which they seem
to live; but then they betray no closer ac-
quaintance with any other form Of life. If
their peers and peeressess are improbable,
their literary men, tradespeope, and cotagers
are impossible; and their intellect seems to
have the peculiar impartlality of reproducing
both what they hare seen and heard, and
what they have not seen and heard, with
equal unfaithfuness.
There are few women, we suppose, who
have not seen something Of children under
five years of age yet in "Compensation,"
recent novel of mind-and- Millinery species,
which calls itself a "story of real life" we
have child Of four and half years old
talking in this Ossanic fashion,
"'Oh, | am so happy, dear grau'mamma;--
person; he is like every thing beautiful, like
a. IL ~ a.,
from Ben Lomond;- or no, better Mom that
he is like what think of and see when
am very very happy; and he is really like
mamma, too, when she sings; and his fore
head is like that distant sea- she continued,
pointing to the blue Mediterranean; there
seems no end-no end; or like the clusters
of stars like best to look at on a warm fine
night. = * < Don't look so. Il i
your forehead is like Loeb Lomond, when
the wind is blowing and the sun is gone
in; like the sunshine best when the lake is
smooth. x So now-I like it bet
ter than ever. \ y X it is more beauti
full still from the dark cloud that has gone
over it, when the sun suddenly lights up all
the colors of the forests and shining purple
rocks and it is all reflected in the waters
below"
We are not surprised to learn that the
mother Of this infant phenomenon, who eX-
hibits symptoms so alarmngly like those
of adolescence represented by gin, is herself
phoenix. We are assured again and again
that she had a remarkably original mind,
that she was genius, and ''conscious of her
originality" and she was fortunate enough
10 ,br, o1c n
man of "most original mind"
This lover, we read though "wonderfully
similar" to her in "powers and capacity"
was 'infnitelv superior to her in faith and
development" and she saw in him "'Agape'
so rare to fnd-of which she had read
and admitted the meaning in the Greek Tes-
lament; having, from her great facility IN
learning languages, read the Scriptures in
their original tongues" OF course. Greek
and Hebrew are mere play to a heroine;
Sanscrit is no more than b c to her; and
she can talk with perfect correctness in any
language except English She is polking
polyglott, Creuzer in crinoine. Poor men.
There are so few of you who know even
Hebrew; YOU think it something to boast Of
it, like Bolingbroke, you only understand
that sort of learning and what is writ about
it," and you are perhaps adoring women who
can think slightingly of you in all the Sc
mitic languages successfully. But, then, as
we are almost invariably told, that heroine
has beautifully small head" and as her
intellect has probably been early invigorated
bv an attention to costume and department.
we may conclude that she can pick up the
Oriental tongues, to say nothing of their da-
ects, with the same aerial facility that the
butterfly sips nectar. Besides, there can be
no difficulty in concevng the depth of the
heroines erudi,on, when that Of the author
ess is so violent.
In laura Gay" another novel of the same