The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1876-02-05
Magazine Notices.
The February Harper.

Harper's Magazine for February contains
sixty-fve illustrations, and an exceedingly in
teresting variety of reading matter
The opening illustrated paper on Lyme treats
not only of town interesting as being the
birthplace of the present Chief Justice of the
United States, bnt of region selected for the
commencement of empire by Cromwell, Hamp-
den, and several English noblemen. The
article carries us back over two centuries. and
is full of Interesting gossip, humor, and ro-
nance. 1t is remarkable study ia American
genealogy. Lyme is especially memorable for
its lawyers, ''having produced more than any
other town of its size on this continent" in
cluding eminent judges, senators and governors
Porte Crayon's Confessions of Candidate
with twenty characteristic pictures, illustrates
some humorous features of district politics in
the hill country of Virginia.
Vassar College, bv Anna G. Brackett, Is an
Intelligent criticism, in the main favorable, of
representative female college. 1t shows how
the girls live, as we'll as how and what they
study; and the illustrations, of which there
are fourteen, are the result of happy selec-
ton of subjects.
The number contains two biographical
sketches, both illustrated-one of the late DIR.
John Todd, aud the other Of the Hon. Alexan-
der H. Stevens. The article on DR.. Todd is
contributed by George Cary Eggleston, and
that on Mr.. Stephens is from the pen of Henry
W. Cleveland, formerly his private secretary.
Mrs. Mary Treat contributes some original
and, to scientific headers, very interesting in
vestigations concerning the valve of the utric-
ular, differing in result from that arrived at
by Mr.. Darwin in his recent work on Insec-
tvorous Plants.
The two notable papers of the number how
ever are the first book of George Elot's new
novel, Daniel Deronda, and the first of two
articles by Edwin p. Whipple on the First
Century of American Literature. Daniel
Deronda is to be issued in five books, of which
the present instalment, bearing the title The
Spoiled Child, is the first. The book opens in
German gambling hell, in which we see the
Spoiled Child, Gwendolen Harleth, playing
roulette, and Deronda watching her. The
woman, as we are told, is of the Lamia type,
her form and motion suggesting the adjective
serpentine. But she is best described in the
dialogue about her:
"a striking grl-that Miss Ha,leih-unlike
others"
''Yes; she has got herself up as sort of SER
pent now, all green and silver, aud winds her
neck about a little more than usual"
"Oh, she must always be doing something
extraordinary. She is that kind of girl, 1
fancy. Do you think her pretty. Mr.. Wander
noodt?'
every. A man might risk hanging for her
i mean fool might"
"You like nez retrousse then, aud long, mar
row eyes?"
"When they go with such an ensemble
"The ensemble du Serpent?"
If you will. Woman was tempted by
serpent; why not man?
''She is certainly very graceful. But she
wants a tinge of color in her cheeks: it is o
sort of Lamia beauty she has,
son the contrary, think her complexion
one of her chief charms. 1t is a warm paleness;
nose with its gradual little upward curve is
distracting. And then her moutb-there
never was prettier mouth, the lips curl back
ward SO finely, eh, Mackworth?'
think so? 1 can not endure that sort of
mouth. 1t looks so self-complacent, as if it
knew its own beauty-the curves are too i'm
movable. 1 like q mouth that trembles more"
"For my part, think her odious," said
dowager.. sit is wonderful what unpleasant
girls get into vogue"
She is one "always the princess in exile"
who commands the best:
"How was this to be accounted for? The
answer may seem to lie quite on the surface;
in her beauty, q certain unusualneSs about her
a decision of will, which made itself felt in her
graceful movements and clear, unhesitating
tone, so that if she came into the room on a
rainy day when everybody else was faccid and
the use of things in general was not apparent
to them there seemed to be sudden, sufficient
reason for keeping up the forms of life"
81 am forced to doubt whether, even
without her potent charm and peculiar filial
position, Gwendolen might not have still have
played the Queen in exile if only she had kept
her inborn energy of egoistic desire and her
power of inspiring fear as to what she might
say or do. However, she had the charm and
those who feared her were also fond of her, the
fear and the tondness being, perhaps, both
heightened by what may be called the rides
cence OF her characteristic play of various,
nay, contrary, tendencies. For Macbeth's
rhetoric about the impossiblity of being MANY
opposite things in the same moment referred
to the clumsy necessities of action, and not to
the subtitle possibilities of feeling. We can not
speak loyal word and be meanly silent; we
can not kill and not kill in the same moment;
but moment is room wide enough for the
loyal and mean desire, for the outash of MUIR
derous thought and the sharp backward stroke
of repeatence."
She felt ready to make her own Destiny"
''well equipped for the mastery of life." She
had Spontaneous sense of capability some
happy persons are born with" She is the
strong, sef-sustaining woman, capable of COM
batting and conquering everything but herself
Here is one of the most characteristic para
graphs of the first book:
Pity that Offendene was not the home of
Miss Harleths childhood, or endeared to her
by family memories! A human life, think,
should be well rooted in some spot of native