The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1897-09-07

ter Besant, Crawford, Mrs. Steel, Bar
RE, and so on. When I'VE 1900 novels
are published each year it is extremely
necessary to be very careful in selec-
ton.
Mr.. Frederick Harrison, one Of the
best Of English living writer's and a
most competent critic, is to publish
soon a Life OF William the Silent"
The sweet n engaging character of
the late Mrs. Oliphant is being pre-
scented in nan English publications.
Mr.. w. w. Tulloch writes of her in
London Bookman'' as follows:
'In her own house she was every
thing hat was gracious and generous,
hospitable and considerable. One met
there very pleasant, but seldom very
intellectual or literary, people. She
used to say that she liked ordinary
human people best. One who knew her
well-a clever man, though he dis
| claims the Observation-Disclosures me that
| his impression when in her society was
| one of wonder that a person of such
| intellectual ability, Of such varied and
| extensive reading, and such a powerful
writer, could take any pleasure or in
| terest in h conversation of a person
| like myself But the fact is, she did
not care for people too obviously intel
lectual or literary"
Mr.. T.. c. DeLeon. a we'll known
southern writer, has published another
| novel called "Crag-Nest." We have
| seen it we'll praised in a southern
daily.
Mr.. j. H. Turner, Of England, has
published a book on the now very ia
nous BrOnte family made so by the
genius of two obscure young m
and the gifts of a third-all sisters
Charlotte, Emily and Anne. Mr.. Tur-
| ner writes in vindication of the fathers
character, Rev. Patrick Bronte, Of the
| Established church. Some ne-an old
man-is reported in To-Day" an Eng
lish monthly, as saying:
Charlotte always wore a green dress
rather a dull shade-some sort Of
| stuff, not silk, certainly. Why, I've
known that lady sit silent throughout
a whole evening! Fancy that! Never
| opened her lips; but her eyes were busy
! all the time! And she could speak, COO!
| Your modern women only gabble!"
The celebrated historian and critic
| of France, now deceased, H. A. Tame,
is often wrongly called Henri. The
London Quarterly Review for July
made it. His real name was Hippolyte
Adolph Taine.
The great Oxford English dictionary,
| edited by DR.. Murray, has at last fin
| ished the D. This great undertaking
tween thirty and forty years. 1t will
hardly be completed before A. D. 1910,
| although the material gathered for the
other words in the alphabet is very
great.
An Englishman, w. F. Poe, some
time ago published a two volume biog-
raphy of the late fine wit, very success
full playwright and great orator, Rich
! ard Sheridan. We have seen no special
notice Of it and do not know anything
| of it's real value.
We certainly have great admiration
for the pure, noble, great Gladstone.
- - AAiN&N " A1"A NJ - - " 'Noy
| man in study and writing books and es-
| says and will be SO in December next
if he lives. We have less confidence in
his taste in literature than in anything
else. He has heretofore given indorse-
| ment to new novels that failed to JUS
tify his good opinion. The famous
Lord Macaulay, a contemporary who
died in 1859, of Mr.. Gladstone, and in
the thirties, we think it was, reviewed
Mr.. Gladstone's first book, Church
n State" had a very doubtful, care
less taste in novels, and relished the
poor as we'll as the good. Mr.. Glad
stone is recently reported as saying
that in this century there had been
but two great novelists-Sir Walter
Scott and George Eliot. If that is his
judgment is made still more apparent.
Scott is first of course. We have writ
ten a dozen times in the last quarter of
a century hat he was the greatest
creative mind since Shakespeare, and
in any land. We do TT doubt it in the
ACoSl. AS " ItOISt A-.4OI SIle WdS u1-
doubtedely a write: of high mental
gifts. and her novels are very superior,
T-;ing her It the head of all female
writer's in modern times. Her best nov
els ave her earliest, because after
awhile she ceased to aim so much at
stcry AS to be a teacher and reformer.
He: later nove!s are extremely intel
lectua.. are heavy and far less artistic
and dramatic. BY almost a concensus
of opinion mons British critics of the
last thirty ears ~Thackeray outranks
all novelists of the Victorian reign. We
have no doubt that the judgment is
sound and just. He was the greatest
master as to style OF all British novel;
lists. We would say that after Thack-
cray in pure genius and charm Dick
ems stands next. And that too beyond