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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6a6bde4 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #67757 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/67757) diff --git a/old/67757-0.txt b/old/67757-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 2346425..0000000 --- a/old/67757-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3072 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of George Meredith, by Hannah Lynch - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: George Meredith - A Study - -Author: Hannah Lynch - -Release Date: April 1, 2022 [eBook #67757] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Emmanuel Ackerman, David E. Brown, and the Online - Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This - file was produced from images generously made available by - The Internet Archive) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GEORGE MEREDITH *** - - - - - -GEORGE MEREDITH - -[Illustration] - - - - - GEORGE MEREDITH - - _A STUDY_ - - BY - HANNAH LYNCH - - Methuen & Co. - 18, BURY STREET, LONDON, W.C. - 1891 - - [_All rights reserved_] - - - - -To - -ROSAMOND VENNING. - - -MY DEAR MISS VENNING, - -Will you, when you read this little book of mine, find fault with -my unmeasured Hibernian enthusiasms and antipathies, and quote your -favourite Greek advice--μηδὲν ἄγαν? So that you bring to the reading -of it some surrender of your reserve and a break in that classic -moderation that we poor barbarians do not quite understand--violently -tinctured as we are by nature--it will be a fresh debt added to the -life-long debt I gladly owe destiny for that memorable first meeting in -Athena’s charming little city. - -The thought of it waves memory back into broad sunshine untravelled -by clouds, among sun-stained marble pillars and rose and mauve tinted -hills, girdling purple waters, and the long silver olive plain of -Attica. Do you remember still our first walk along the cactus-bordered -path to the Acropolis? Was it not of ‘Tragic Comedians’ that we talked? - -So now, years after, I offer you in grateful remembrance this little -gathering of ideas you may not wholly share, but will not wholly -reject, through affection for your friend, to whom so wide a difference -would be nothing less than a real misfortune. - - HANNAH LYNCH. - - PARIS, _February, 1891_. - - - - -PREFACE. - - -A couple of months ago I was asked to give a lecture in Paris on a -modern English writer, and I naturally selected my favourite, the -subject of this little book. It was afterwards suggested to me that -the lecture would bear expansion, a task I the more readily undertook -because I was happy enough to learn that my humble effort had sent at -least three intellectual foreigners to the fountainhead to study for -themselves the novels of Mr. Meredith, curious to see if I had not -overrated his merits, as is the habit of enthusiastic disciples, and -greatly astonished to find their expectations disappointed, and my -estimate unexaggerated. - -While still engaged upon this work I received from London Mr. Le -Gallienne’s book, ‘George Meredith,’ and not having by me copies of -‘Modern Love’ or the other poems of Mr. Meredith, I availed myself of -his quotations of the famous sonnet and ‘A Meeting.’ I have also taken -from Mr. Lane’s Bibliography, added to Mr. Le Gallienne’s book, the -dates of the appearance of each of the novels, as my own copies all -belong to the recent uniform editions published by Messrs. Chapman and -Hall. - - HANNAH LYNCH. - - - - -CONTENTS. - - - CHAPTER PAGE - - I. THE GRADUAL RECOGNITION OF GEORGE MEREDITH AS A NOVELIST 1 - - II. MEREDITH’S STYLE AND INFLUENCE 25 - - III. THE NOVELS OF GEORGE MEREDITH: ‘RICHARD FEVEREL’ AND - ‘RHODA FLEMING’ 53 - - IV. ‘EVAN HARRINGTON,’ ‘THE ADVENTURES OF HARRY RICHMOND,’ - ‘SANDRA BELLONI,’ AND ‘BEAUCHAMP’S CAREER’ 89 - - V. ‘THE EGOIST,’ ‘DIANA OF THE CROSSWAYS,’ ‘TRAGIC - COMEDIANS,’ AND ‘SHAVING OF SHAGPAT’ 117 - - VI. GEORGE MEREDITH’S MEN AND WOMEN 153 - - - - -GEORGE MEREDITH. - - - - -CHAPTER I. - -THE GRADUAL RECOGNITION OF GEORGE MEREDITH AS A NOVELIST. - - -It is our habit to class under the name of light literature all -fiction, from that of Richardson to the ephemeral stories of the latest -London favourite, though, as a matter of fact, even that historic -bore, Gibbon, is not heavier reading than the novels of Richardson. -We accept the term ‘light’ literature in a high sense as well as in a -low one, and to the high class of light writers belong our old English -masters and friends, Fielding, Scott, and Thackeray. These writers were -purely and simply novelists, and if they showed themselves to the -thinkers in their just interpretation of the motives whence actions and -complications arise, and the consequences to which they lead us, it was -hardly because they thought so much as that they observed exactly, and, -with the exquisite intuition of genius, penetrated life and its meaning -by the road of sympathy rather than reflection, and unconsciously gave -the colour of philosophy to their reproduction of observations. - -Men of wide sympathies and humorous observers, which are the two most -truthful qualities of portraiture, they were able to enter into all, -or nearly all, phases of existence, and under the influence of the -personalities and the scenes they portrayed, give us what I take to -be a false impression--that of having deliberately thought out each -one. The falseness of this impression is proved by the confession of -Thackeray and Dickens, that no one could be more completely surprised -than either by the doings and sayings of their various characters. -And this confession is borne out by the mixture of exuberant spirits -and sentiment that colours all the works of these novelists. Serious -thinkers are neither prone to exhibit high spirits, like schoolboys -let loose among pens and paper and a reckless abundance of ink, nor -tears of sentiment, like a distraught heroine recording her melancholy -impressions. Writers of this sort, however great and universal, -are ‘light,’ because their double aim--for which we cannot be too -grateful--is to touch us by the tragic or homely sorrows of existence, -or to amuse us by the absurdities and tricks of our fellows, and if, -by chance, they should happen to instruct us through the great lessons -of life they unconsciously teach us, it is due to the simplicity and -directness of their genius. And this is the estimate we English readers -will ever preserve of Thackeray, in spite of the severe pronouncement -against him beyond the Channel by our more artistic brethren. He may -preach, as the eminent French critic, M. Taine, complains; but we are -glad to be so sermonized, and return to him as to a friend who can -never fail us. He may digress, but we are thankful for such digressions -as his, and feel that we would not yield his faults for the more acrid -greatness of Balzac. - -But this latter half of the nineteenth century has produced quite a -different sort of novelist; one whose mission is deliberately chosen, -heavily weighed, and unweariedly fulfilled. Not in the least anxious -is he to amuse us, or rouse soft and pleasurable emotions in us. The -artistic exactions of the dilettanti are unregarded by him, and his -voice carries far other than the note of caressing persuasion in it. -He does not court our suffrage, rather does he seek to break and -bend us before the sweeping storm of thought, and carry us through -new paths into a world where no word is idle, no action or instinct -without its most serious consequences; heedless of the fact that we -may entangle ourselves inextricably in the briars and brambles of a -strange phraseology, indifferent to what may be our mental suffering in -endeavouring to follow him, and decipher his oddly-clothed meaning. - -This kind of writer is a thinker first and a novelist afterwards, -and not a thinker only, but a scientific psychologist. The novel is -to him the sum of his mental labour, as the system is that of the -metaphysician. The simple art of the first story-teller, Homer, and of -Scott, no less differs from his method than from Kant’s ‘Kritik.’ His -appearance, taking into account the materials of which his peculiar -genius is composed, and the bewildering use he makes of them, is -rare; and if, happily, he should obtain a hearing, after long strife -with the general stupidity of the blockheads and patient endurance -of the bites and barks of literary puppydom at his heels, he is sure -to create a revolution in the world which subsists on amusement and -distraction by this new way of popularizing philosophy through -fiction and the rose-lights of imagination. His chance, of course, -very much depends upon diction, and this explains to us George Eliot’s -immediate recognition. As the first of the modern analytical novelists -in England, she had the good fortune to start by a simple and facile -style, within reach of the least intellectual reader. Hence, those -who did not want to be compelled to think, could, without twist or -turning, without racking their brains, or grasping a distracted head -in their palms, follow her story even when they ignored the profound -mental consciousness from which it sprang. But picture the catastrophe, -the wide convulsion and fright her first appearance as the author -of ‘Daniel Deronda’ would have created! She would have had to wait, -at least, as long for recognition and admiration as her great and -inadequately appreciated successor. - -Remote from her in point of style, though still of her school, by -reason of severe thought worked to a conclusion, oftener than hers -an unanswerable interrogation, is the only living master in English -literature--George Meredith. He stands beside her and Tolstoi in the -rank of serious intellectual workers, though we may doubt if foreign -nations will ever reach the glib acquaintance with his name and the -titles of his books that they are pleased to boast with those of -the Russian master. Mr. Meredith is above and beyond all a thinker, -less simple and direct, less wholly preoccupied with the mission of -improving humanity and beautifying life, than either George Eliot or -Tolstoi. Perhaps he has a healthier conviction that the world is very -well as it is, and that in the main it is all the better that we are -neither so muddy nor so pink as realists and sentimentalists would have -us believe, but are just comfortably spotted and well-meaning to escape -excess of censure or admiration. - -The British race, we know, has never been remarkable for brilliancy, -nor, to any special degree, has it given evidence of perspicacity. -But nowhere has it shown such an inexcusable and comical consistency -of stupidity as in its slow recognition of Mr. Meredith, and its -blundering acceptance of him when once a few laudatory reviews have -revealed to it the existence of a prophet in its midst. We have -had among us for more than thirty years a giant, and a race of -pigmies, noted for nothing but the absence of genius, of even marked -individuality in their stream of literary production, that flows -on continuously and uneventfully, gape and blink at the odd sound -of his voice, and persist in regarding him as a grotesque monster. -He brings us the fruits of his colossal intellect in masterpiece -after masterpiece, and because he applies some hard knocks to our -understanding, never bright and always fearful of the new, we either -turn from him in cold neglect, or else we grow witty with the wit -of pigmies, at his expense, and accuse him ‘of breaking his shins -over his own wit.’ That which we do not understand, we decide, with -the superiority of the inane and the ignorant, to be not worthy the -understanding. Used as we have been to the lucid prose of Thackeray -and the brilliant vulgarity and homeliness of Dickens, spoiled as -our literary talent has been more recently by the flood of bloodless -fiction poured into the circulating libraries and fast bringing the -monthly magazines to a deadlock of incompetency and unimaginative -drivel, can we wonder, though we may deplore, that the taste for -excellence and vigour has diminished? - -That his first novel, ‘Richard Feverel,’ should have passed unheeded, -in spite of the remarkable review which the _Times_ gave it in 1859, is -something to wonder at, for surely such a book might have been expected -to startle the best of his country into superlative praise, and meet -with immediate popularity. It had already been preceded by a volume of -notable poetry, by that extraordinary _tour de force_, ‘The Shaving -of Shagpat,’ and by ‘Farina, a Legend of Cologne.’ Yet these were not -sufficient to convince his fellows that in their presence stood mighty -genius claiming the poor return it is in our power to make it--the -hospitality and welcome of our minds. Does such denseness deserve -pity or blame? For churlishness it cannot be called, as the neglect -shown the great is never deliberate. Two years were we left to sharpen -our wits upon the pages of ‘Richard Feverel,’ and, mayhap, acquire a -taste for qualities utterly novel to the age and, in a measure, to -the nation--for something more than English characteristics go to the -forming of a writer like Mr. Meredith--and in 1861 we were asked to -make what we could of ‘Evan Harrington.’ The story appeared in _Once -a Week_, and was illustrated by the late Charles Keene, under the -title of ‘Evan Harrington; or, He Would be a Gentleman.’ Mr. Stevenson -makes doleful mention of a serial of Meredith’s that nearly wrecked a -newspaper financially, and presumably this was the unlucky experiment, -from which it may be gathered that ‘Evan Harrington’ had no greater -success than ‘Richard Feverel,’ and that the hour of recognition had -not yet dawned. Explain it who can. Was there not a grain of perversity -at the bottom of it? And can there be a more thankless task than -that of labouring against the tide of fatal dulness, or an unkinder -solitude than that of a man who is a head and a half above the tallest -of his fellows, and can neither lift them up to his level nor descend -to theirs? There are compensations, certainly, but these only serve -to mitigate the sufferings of intellectual isolation, and, to the -artist, can never fill adequately the place of generous and hearty -appreciation. Wrapped in his philosophic cloak, the thinker may make -shift to do without his fellows, and call them by hard names, but -to the artist and the poet, sympathy and the warm praise of living -voices is like sunshine to the human frame. But reliable, if rare, -critics had begun to find him out. In 1862, when his second book of -poetry appeared, ‘Modern Love,’ the _Spectator_ chose to assail, as -an unfledged beginner, the man who had given such work as his to the -world; whereupon Mr. Swinburne, wrathful, though not invective--rare -chance!--wrote a letter that all disciples of Meredith remember with -gratitude. But it is still hard for us to understand how the career of -any man of letters could be so slow, and appreciation so long grudged -him, as has been the case with a penman of so pronounced a type. That -he should excite hostility, being himself of no tender fabric, is -comprehensible and easily explained by the impatience and sense of -irritation that he often rouses in the breasts of his admirers. But we -can recognise the qualities and greatness of the writer who provokes -our hostility, and generously give him that which is his due, while -not withholding that which he excites. Writing of ‘Modern Love,’ -Mr. Swinburne, who is certainly upon his own ground in criticising -a brother poet, says, ‘Every section of this great progressive poem -is connected with the other by links of the finest and most studied -workmanship,’ and that ‘a more perfect piece of writing no man alive -has ever turned out’ than the noble sonnet beginning, - - ‘We saw the swallows gathering in the skies.’ - -Bear in mind this was written by the third living English poet in the -year 1862, of a comparatively unknown poet, while yet Browning and -Tennyson were writing their best. And then explain how it is that -Meredith the poet is still less known than Meredith the novelist, and -that until very lately reading people, if asked about George Meredith, -invariably corrected the rash questioner by the suggestion that he -doubtless meant _Owen_ Meredith. With Owen Meredith they were familiar -enough, but George Meredith? They would shake their heads and tell you -that they never heard of him, or if, perchance, they had, invariably -added the rumour that they had also heard: ‘A perfectly unreadable -writer, I believe, whom nobody--possibly not even himself--understands, -and very few try to understand.’ - -Five or six years ago I imagined this incredible ignorance to be -exclusive to Dublin, where we are not very assiduous in the pursuit -of literature, or of anything else but the fortunes of the political -heroes of the hour. But upon crossing the Channel, and finding myself -in the blessed atmosphere of literary fervour and progress, I was -amazed to see how few were the literary persons I met who knew much -more of Mr. Meredith than his name, and even here I was more than once -confronted with the inevitable Owen Meredith. That the lovers of Mr. -Rider Haggard and John Strange Winter should not read his works is -but the completion of their intellectual taste; and strange, indeed, -would it be to see a copy of ‘Diana of the Crossways’ in the hands of -these worthy persons; but that the readers of Shakespeare and Thackeray -and George Eliot should shun him--this is where the incredible and -inexplicable eccentricity of public taste displays itself. And yet in -1862 he had written: - - ‘We saw the swallows gathering in the sky, - And in the osier isle we heard their noise. - We had not to look back on summer joys, - Or forward to a summer of bright dye. - But in the largeness of the evening earth - Our spirits grew as we went side by side. - The hour became her husband and my bride. - Love that had robb’d us so, thus bless’d our dearth! - The pilgrims of the year wax’d very loud - In multitudinous chatterings, as the flood - Full brown came from the west, and, like pale blood - Expanded to the upper crimson cloud. - Love that had robb’d us of immortal things, - This little moment mercifully gave, - And still I see across the twilight wave - The swan sail with her young beneath her wings.’ - -It may be argued that the long delay in the acknowledgment of his -sovereignty is due to himself, to his obscurities, his ruggedness, his -enormous intellectual difficulties offered the reader, like five-barred -gates, to leap, and, in the event of failure, fall against, stunned -and aching all over from the force of big mental bruises. But Browning -is fifty times more obscure, more rugged, more difficult. It is true, -Browning’s apotheosis, in somewhat ironical form, lies in a Browning -Society that, perhaps, may achieve a glossary and a full compilation -of notes. Whereas, all the poet asks us to bring to him is a little -thought and some brains. As Browning has his lucid and melodious -words, when the simplest may understand him upon a first reading, so -has Mr. Meredith--a fact that does not seem to have served him to such -popularity as Browning enjoyed. Can anything be sweeter, softer, more -musical than this little poem ‘The Meeting’?-- - - ‘The old coach-road thro’ a common of furze, - With knolls of pine, ran white: - Berries of autumn, with thistles and burrs, - And spider-threads droop’d in the light. - - ‘The light in a thin blue veil peer’d sick; - The sheep grazed close and still; - The smoke of a farm by a yellow rick - Curl’d lazily under a hill. - - ‘No fly shook the round of the silver net; - No insect the swift bird chased; - Only two travellers moved and met - Across that hazy waste. - - ‘One was a girl with a babe that throve, - Her ruin and her bliss; - One was a youth with a lawless love, - Who claspt it the more for this. - - ‘The girl for her babe humm’d prayerful speech; - The youth for his love did pray; - Each cast a wistful look on each, - And either went their way.’ - -And still are we confronted with the mystery of such a poet’s -unpopularity. Explain it by the unattractiveness of his difficulties, -and what have you to say against the soothing charm and the exquisite -simplicity of such lines as these, that linger in the memory, not only -because of their delicate music, but because of their vividness of -picture and the autumn sadness that lies upon it. In workmanship the -poem is equal to the best of its sort, and Heine, in his matchless -songs, has never touched us with a pathos more searching from its -unpretentiousness. - -Two years after the appearance of ‘Modern Love,’ ‘Emilia in England’ -was published, and in the same year M. E. D. Forgues translated an -adaptation of it for the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, under the title of -‘Sandra Belloni, Roman de la Vie Anglaise.’ This looks like progress -in public opinion. At least, it may be thought, after thirteen years -of neglected labour in strife with feeble and vitiated taste, the -author of so much brilliant work is upon the point of enthusiastic -recognition. Not so at all. ‘Emilia’ created as little sensation as -‘Richard,’ and we may believe that the subscribers to the circulating -libraries were as little fluttered by the production of the one as they -had been by that of the other--being equally unaware of the existence -of either. The book was not extensively reviewed, and only the happy -few congratulated themselves upon the acquisition. Perhaps their -satisfaction in it was increased by the fact that it was not shared -by the crowd, for though the lovers of an unappreciated novelist may -ardently desire to bestrew their paths with converts, it is not unusual -in them to cover themselves in a sort of fierce and holy pride with -a bit of his cloak of isolation. If he is miserably misunderstood, -do not they share to some extent his misfortunes? And is there not a -very decided superiority--sad, if you will, for none but the churlish -and carping few desire to keep salvation and paradise exclusively for -themselves--in the fact of their mutual want of appreciation? - -‘Rhoda Fleming’ appeared in 1865, and this book seems to have made -a more decided impression, though the writer still remained in the -background among well-known men of letters, and his name, like his -presence, was on the whole ignored. It was published by Messrs. -Tinsley, in itself an instructive lesson in the author’s popularity. -But there can be no doubt that the tide was changing, slowly, it is -true--indeed, imperceptibly. In 1867 ‘Vittoria’ first came out in the -_Fortnightly Review_, a review henceforth devoted to the fiction of -Mr. Meredith, and to which he seems to have contributed a good many -reviews and short poems. After this, in 1871, we meet him in _Cornhill_ -recording the brilliant and ever-delightful adventures of ‘Harry -Richmond,’ and this, coupled with the fact that Mr. George Du Maurier -illustrated the story, and that it ran through two editions in the -same year, gives us breathing-space in our long vent of indignation. -We may now conclude that a portion, at least, of the British public -had awaked, and were capable of relishing such entrancing novels as -‘Richard Feverel,’ ‘Sandra Belloni’ and ‘Harry Richmond,’ in which we -hardly read so much as we drink in life, vividly, eagerly--life with -all its sharp, sweet thrills and poignant aversions, its breathless -alternation of mood and swift race of the passions. - -‘Beauchamp’s Career’ followed in 1876, first in the _Fortnightly -Review_, between 1874 and 1876, and afterwards in Messrs. Chapman and -Hall’s collected editions of 1886 and 1889. Although Mr. Meredith’s -career cannot be said to have been crowned with anything like a wide -acknowledgment, or even anything approaching a fair reward, until he -wrote ‘Diana of the Crossways’ in 1885, which brought him his first -taste of substantial and general success, and cast a retrospective -glamour upon its predecessors, people from the date of ‘Harry Richmond’ -began to know that there was a novelist named George Meredith who was -not _Owen Meredith_. - -Considering all that the writer has had to contend with in the way of -block-headedness, this is most certainly a step in advance. But to -his own especial minority, it is not ‘Diana,’ with all its charm and -its perilous brilliancy, that crowns Mr. Meredith’s career, but that -unique masterpiece, ‘The Egoist,’ which was published in 1879. Here -was a memorable triumph of art, at which we have not yet ceased to -wonder, and which we hold apart from all other books that we have read. -After it he may write ‘Tragic Comedians,’ ‘Diana of the Crossways,’ -and volumes of poems. Anything he writes we are prepared to welcome -with cordial delight and gratitude, but we do not expect another Sir -Willoughby Patterne. We are satisfied with the impossibility of the -repetition of such an achievement. It is not given to many artists to -produce one flawless work, and to expect a second from even such a -mighty one as this would be to prove one’s self insatiable. - -From this time forward, reviews, articles, criticisms--hostile, -humorous, and eulogistic--begin to abound; and by the time of ‘Diana’s’ -appearance, the British public has been made ready to receive the -intelligence that a master is in their midst--a living, breathing -master, such as Tennyson and Browning, and from whom work may happily -still be expected. What effect this announcement may have had upon -the British public cannot be perfectly defined. Being unenthusiastic, -except in the matter of low and familiar literature, it is to be feared -that such news has but moderately moved it, and in the matter of taste, -has not influenced it at all. This new master is unfamiliar to them -in his speech and in his ideas. He does not dwell upon sordid scenes -with visible pleasure; he claims them with a voice that is not of their -common tongue, and faces them without the old-fashioned twinkle of -the grave jester’s glance. If he caricatures humanity, it is not as -Dickens caricatures it, to tickle us into inextinguishable laughter, -nor yet as Thackeray does, in a vein of comic satire. If he calls upon -us to recognise that life is often a sad blunder, and to pity the -blunderers, he is neither sentimental in his claim, nor consciously -pathetic. He indulges neither in the mawkish sentiment of Dickens, nor -in the sentimental tenderness of Thackeray, and as little courts our -tears as our laughter. Brain is what he asks of us, and its use in -reading him. - - - - -CHAPTER II. - -MEREDITH’S STYLE AND INFLUENCE. - - -To succeed in qualifying a style so varied and so strange as Mr. -Meredith’s, and composed of so many diverse elements, would be -difficult even for his peers. Its quality is at the same time rugged -and elusive, obscure and dazzlingly brilliant, witty and profound, -harsh and most musically tender, light as a summer cloud, majestic as -a storm. But his great defect is artificiality. His splendid pages -and his matchless dialogues never lose the obtrusive flavour of the -midnight oil, and we see most of his characters through a blinding -glitter of limelight. This excessive use of artificial illumination, -while fascinating us and compelling our admiration for the writer’s -extraordinary cleverness, wearies us and irritates us at times, and -we long for the mental repose of a whiff of commonplace and a page -or two, by way of interlude, of fluent easy prose that rests the eye -and the brain. There are so many tricks and surprises bestrewing our -path, five-barred gates starting unexpectedly for us to leap; we are -deliberately plunged neck and heels into so many swamps, and bowled -over all sorts of rocks and stones, with the oddest sensations in -conflict, that we more than once pay our debt grudgingly, and, like a -peaceable man knocked down by a bludgeon, are amazed at the liberty -that has been taken with our understanding. In this exuberant display -of his own powers does Meredith show himself to be thoroughly English. -He is unapproachable as a wrestler with words and phrases, and infuses -dead speech with the vitality of blood and muscles. Words with him -are like thoughts--strong, living, tangible to the touch of the -soul. They seem to fly, and mount, and flutter round us, to catch our -breath forcibly, and hold our imagination in the grasp of blood-warmed -fingers. The most ordinary action of life, described by him in a line -or two, is not a photograph, but a vivid revelation, a scene stamped -not on the vision, but upon the mind. When he is not playing queer -tricks with us and keeping every sense insufferably alert, every nerve -strained to catch the meaning that dances tantalizingly before us, -flying hither and thither upon fantastic figures of speech, until the -writer himself seems drunk with his own juggling, he is quieting our -baffled senses by these sharp revelations that have no artificial -glamour about them. He ceases to be the inhuman metaphorist, and -becomes our brother again, and we forget that he ever terrified us. I -open ‘Evan Harrington’ at random, and alight on a paragraph where each -word is vividly set in a perfect whole. There is no twist or turning -here, and as we see the red harvest-moon and the dark water and trees, -so we seem to touch the hand of suffering youth: - -‘Over a length of the stream the red, round harvest-moon was rising, -and the weakened youth was this evening at the mercy of the charm that -encircled him. The water curved, and dimpled, and flowed flat, and the -whole body of it rushed into the spaces of sad splendour. The clustered -trees stood like temples of darkness; their shadows lengthened -supernaturally; and a pale gloom crept between them on the sward. He -had been thinking some time that Rose would knock at his door and give -him her voice, at least; but she did not come; and when he had gazed -out on the stream until his eyes ached, he felt that he must go and -walk by it. Those little flashes of the hurrying tide spoke to him of -a secret rapture and of a joy-seeking impulse--the pouring onward of -all the blood of life into one illumined heart, mournful from excess of -love.’ - -In none of his books do such passages abound as in ‘Richard Feverel,’ -unless, perhaps, in ‘Harry Richmond.’ These two books, and in a lesser -degree ‘Sandra Belloni,’ may best be described as picturesque and -melodious. The writer is less a thinker than a poet, and sometimes he -sings with a sweetness that troubles our vision and catches us queerly -about the throat. - -But viewing him upon the ground of the simple story-teller, we must -admit that this is a ground either foreign to Mr. Meredith’s original -genius, or deliberately shunned by him. The good old fashion, so -dear to Scott and Thackeray, of bringing everything to a definite -conclusion, either for better or worse, and clearing up all doubts as -to the ultimate career of even their minor characters, is a fashion -that he, with some cruelty and much contempt for the ordinary reader, -utterly discards. He cares not a jot for our sympathy, still less -for our judgment. He notes that life is chiefly interrogatory and -unsatisfactory--an unfinished drama rarely terminating with the -rightful wedding-bells or the merited reward; that choice is rarely -justified by results, and that good and evil still remain vexed -questions to be decided, as far as definite decision is possible, -except upon their broadest issues, by temperament and individuality, by -race and sex and training, as faith and love are decided. Look at the -end of all his stories, and you will find yourself confronted with the -unanswerable question which is sure to fix us in the examination of the -lives of each one of us. There is the fatal tide, we know, but can we -dare to say at what precise turning of the road of life we missed it? - -This is the philosophy that ‘Richard Feverel’ exposes--conjectural, -questioning; a drawn game between reason and impulse, between nature -and intellect, between a philosopher’s system and a young man’s first -love. Neither win, because, though a mighty fighter and a Homeric -wrestler with words, Meredith is not of the definite school, and -will not pander to his readers’ tastes either way. Are you for the -mismanaged poor hero, or for the disappointed philosopher, gazing -in the last page upon the system fondly built upon sand, and laid -in ruins by the first breath of purely human disaster? Mr. Meredith -resolves that your sympathies shall be balanced, as his own are soundly -balanced. He leaves you with a question upon your lips, and your -childish reproach is chidden by his silence. - -Richard is the strongest and best hero the writer has drawn, before -he fell in love with the more intricate complexities of woman, and -delighted in her intellectual surprises, her social difficulties and -struggles with iron fate and masculinity. We part with him as he rises -from a sick-bed, widowed and broken upon the outset of brilliant -manhood, enshadowed in a tragic gloom, and who is to explain to us -the evolution of middle-age in this youth of burning hope and rash -promise? Not the creator, certainly. The throes of commonplace -speculation into which he may thrust the ordinary reader trouble him -not, and he is less merciful to him even than Tolstoi. He takes us -from that strong Shakespearean scene, in which Richard reads the diary -of Clare Doria Forey, unveiling her unconscious and reticent love, -only fully measured by her on the threshold of a loveless marriage, -while overhead the candles are burning in her mortuary chamber, and -flickering lugubriously upon the lips that have spoken to him from -‘behind the hills of death’; and without giving us time to clear our -throats of the gathered sensations of pity and pain, he hurls us into -fresh emotions, equally painful, by the death of Lucy, Richard’s -young wife. And after that we learn nothing more of Richard, and are -at liberty to decide for ourselves whether Sir Austin, the broker -system-creator, and Lady Blandish married, like any other pair of -middle-aged lovers, or preferred to continue in the less definite -and secure path of platonic sentimentalities--the one studying the -pilgrim’s scrip, the other adding to its wisdom. - -The fault is perhaps to be laid to our complex, inquiring, and unrobust -age, that men like Tolstoi and Meredith should both be incomplete as -artists and as thinkers. Completeness in art belongs to simplicity of -thought and directness of vision, and these are the attributes of the -real story-teller, who is never diverted from his task by philosophic -conjecture or by psychological problems. Mr. Meredith’s incompleteness -is shown in an affectation of oddness and an artificial glamour that -leave the reader with senses and wits perturbed, anxiously questioning -the gravity of the writer, apprehensive of being laughed at, and not -altogether sure that he has not been assisting at the marvellous -performance of a juggling metaphorist, instead of the discoveries -and exposition of a serious philosopher. This artificial glamour -is more sparingly used in ‘Richard Feverel’; hence, perhaps, its -larger popularity than any of his other works. But it is hardly, as -a whole, so great as ‘The Egoist,’ ‘Rhoda Fleming,’ or ‘Diana of the -Crossways.’ In it the quality of tenderness, noticeably absent in the -rest, abounds, and also a lovely freshness and a visible delight in -youth and in youthful joys. It is a work pre-eminently human, with all -the defects and qualities of humanity strongly marked. Had it been -written in blood, it could not be redder with life. Vitality is its -captivating charm and melody its voice. As a work of art, it may be far -from perfect, and we recognise that it is marred by many impossible -situations, errors of taste and judgment, and a tendency, in the -portrayal of the famous Mrs. Berry, to gross caricature. Nevertheless, -we love it, faults and all, with that strong personal love and a wish -for frequent dipping at its sources that it is the unshared privilege -of truly great and original productions to inspire. How many are the -writers we turn to in all moods, knowing we shall ever find something -new, something helpful in their familiar pages! Shakespeare for the -English mind and for a very few foreigners; Montaigne, and perhaps -Molière, for others. Others, again, decide between Scott, Thackeray, -and George Eliot. Add to this limited sphere a half-dozen of the -world’s best poets, and the circle of comforters and permanent friends -is formed. In such choice company may Meredith present himself with -‘Richard Feverel’ in his hand, and his place will be no mean one in -their midst. Shakespeare himself might offer him the cordial hand-clasp -of brotherhood, and assure him that since the appearance of Beatrice -and Portia, no such women as Diana, Emilia, and his German princess had -ever shot upon the dull world from masculine brains. - -In Meredith’s very faults there is an excess of strength. It is this -superabundance and an impatience of drivelling sentiment that lead him -so frequently to shock our nineteenth-century taste. I think he shocks -us with deliberate aim, deeming our taste questionable and unrobust, -and our fastidiousness unhealthy. These blows directed against our -temple of false modesty are in no book fiercer and more astounding than -in ‘Richard Feverel,’ and in no other book has he risen to such supreme -heights. Here you have at its best the matchless splendour and majesty -of his prose, and pages of prolonged beauty. You have ample scope to -realize the vividness of his interpretation of nature, and the delight -of young love so magically unveiled by him in those three beautiful -chapters on the opening romance of Richard and Lucy--‘Ferdinand and -Miranda,’ ‘Diversions played on a Penny Whistle,’ and ‘Time-honoured -Treatment of a Dragon by a Hero.’ Which of these three chapters to -choose it would be difficult to say, for there is nothing like them in -all English literature for sweetness, melody, and pulse-moving charm. -If I had to pronounce, I should be disposed to give the preference -to the ‘Penny Whistle’ chapter, though, from the fact that the first -meeting between Richard and Lucy is oftenest quoted, I judge it to be -the most popular. - -Match me this exquisite picture in prose or poetry: ‘The sun is coming -down to earth, and the fields and the waters shout to him golden -shouts. He comes, and his heralds run before him, and touch the leaves -of oaks and planes and beeches lucid green, and the pine-stems redder -gold; leaving brightest footprints upon thickly-weeded banks, where the -foxgloves’ last upper-bells incline, and bramble shoots wander amid -moist rich herbage. The plumes of the woodland are alight; and beyond -them, over the open, ’tis a race with the long-thrown shadows; a race -across the heaths and up the hills, till, at the farthest bourne of -mounted eastern cloud, the heralds of the sun lay rosy figures and -rest.’ - -Or yet again, this other: ‘The tide of colour has ebbed from the upper -sky. In the west the sea of sunken fire draws back, and the stars leap -forth and tremble, and retire before the advancing moon, who slips the -silver train of cloud from her shoulders, and, with her foot upon the -pine-tops, surveys heaven.’ - -In these three chapters we have Mr. Meredith not only at his best, -but better than many of the best poets upon their own ground. He -sings rather than speaks. He neither wants to astonish nor affright -us, but solely to enchant us. And who can read him and remain -unmoved--withstand the spell he casts upon us? Shelley was never more -musical, more thrilling, and never so strong. - -But there is much else in the novels of this remarkable writer besides -music and poetry, and the soft showery joys and sorrows of young love. -There are the qualities and deficiencies of his tragic and his mighty -side as a pendant for the grace and charm of the mood we have seen. -Everything in him is pronounced. He has a taste for strong lights and -shadows, for grotesque asides and interruptions; is sometimes crude, -always complex, and often incomplete. His coarseness is akin to the -coarseness that shakes us to amazement in the tragedies and comedies of -Shakespeare, where ribaldry and lovely delicacy go hand-in-hand; where, -swift upon the most fanciful play of thought and scenes of pathetic -beauty, and images as exquisite as a Theocritan idyl, come a burst of -clownish mirth and hideous joking. - -Shakespearean is the word to describe Meredith, both in his defects -and in his qualities. In each is he great, with something of the -unapproachable greatness, the originality, the blood and brains and -nerve, of the Stratford poet, towering over his fellows to-day as -Shakespeare, alive, towered over his. Human to the heels, a seer and a -psychologist in one, no word is lightly written, no character lightly -drawn. He delights in humanity, and almost wickedly revels in its -eccentricities. Hence his tendency to exaggeration. He seizes a queer -character, such as old Tom Cogglesby, John Raikes, or Mrs. Berry, and, -not content with their natural oddities, like Dickens, he must steep -them in the colours of his own imagination; with the result that they -come out of the process caricatures, and we find it exceedingly hard to -divest them of their comic garb, and trace them back to the elemental, -whence they started on their devious wanderings through their creator’s -mind. This characteristic, as M. Taine observes, is peculiarly English. -Since Rabelais’ days the French writers are too hampered by laws and -rules in art, inalterable, like those of the Medes and Persians, -to dare play such tricks with reality and human nature as Dickens, -Thackeray, and Meredith, in their jesting moods, permit themselves. -Scott’s moods had no such promptings, perhaps because he was a better -story-teller than any of the three, and found the humour of life -quite sufficient without the aid of exaggeration. But then there was -no satire or hardness in all Scott’s nature, and manly tenderness and -sympathy were his predominant traits. He wrote stories for the pleasure -of writing them, not to belabour or ridicule poor worn humanity, in -which he kept his faith green and unquestioning as a child’s. - -But, like Dickens, Meredith is a poet, and, like him, has all a poet’s -extravagances and excesses. Scott, as a poet, is never excessive, never -exuberant, and always exact. His strength is employed with a Scotch -perception of its just value, whereas his Saxon brothers waste theirs -with an endless profusion. Not that I would compare Meredith with -Dickens, except in his tendency to caricature, which in Dickens is a -vice, and in his poetical excesses. He tortures metaphor at times, -and lacks measure. This is the complaint French artists bring against -their English brethren. Perhaps their greater physical strength, -added to the Teutonic strain that flows through their blood from the -early ages, runs to excess in imagination, and produces a conception -of the grotesque unapprehended by the French. Certain it is that the -latter escape our violent emotions in literature, and cannot arrive at -an understanding of them. Our sensibilities, strung to common themes, -and unexcited by lawless love and cerebral complications, rouse their -wonder; and the mixture of buffoonery and satire in our great writers -incurs their indignation. For this they say we are not artists, and -ignore the classical limitations of art. And doubtless they are right. -Upon the whole, our works of art are less artistic than theirs, and are -produced in a lesser quantity, while our greatest works sin frequently -against every known canon of art. - -In shedding a double ray of ridicule upon his comic characters, -Mr. Meredith so envelops and twists them in metaphor, now mildly -sarcastic, now a joyous shout of laughter, we cannot tell with or at -us, for we are not in the secret of his comic moods; and at times so -bitingly ironical that we are puzzled and astray. Fain would we know -whether he feels tenderly towards us at our worst, or cherishes an -inalterable contempt for us at our best. For, unlike Thackeray, he -is no moralist. Here, at least, is an English novelist whom M. Taine -cannot accuse of laying down hard and fast rules for our moral benefit. -His two most cynical characters attract some of our sympathy. Whereas -we are ordered to loathe and condemn Becky Sharpe, and feel how much -her railing creator despised her, Meredith allows us to be glad of his -Countess’s acquaintance, and shows us that a cynical, intriguing woman, -full of vulgar pride and not illegitimate ambition, may be interesting, -and not unloved by her creator. He invites us to wonder at her, and not -condemn, and though he may laugh at her weaknesses, and take a wicked -pleasure in exposing them, he cannot be said, on the whole, to show her -any harshness. As an adventuress, she is unsurpassed, and, unlike poor -Becky, lives and dies, we imagine, a fine lady, driven by ambition to -duplicities, but not consciously mean or dishonest. Though a virtuous -woman, her morals are crooked, and her sense of honour is the reverse -of keen. We have seen how such a character in Thackeray’s hands would -develop, and to what lengths in heartlessness his satire carried him. -Meredith’s Countess is possible; but Becky Sharpe is impossible. - -The same may be said of his male villains. Indeed, he has none. There -is something eminently human in the egoism of the wise youth Adrian -Harley. We greet him ever with a cheerful smile, and for one of his -witty remarks would have no, or only a very slight, objection to part -with our last five-pound note. Contrast him with Barnes Newcome, and -you have all the difference between black and gray. All Thackeray’s -bad people are irredeemably bad, and all his good people hardly want -wings to fit them for the angelic sphere. It is true, his female angels -do not inspire us with a very ardent yearning for the joys of Paradise, -if they are to be shared in such extremely insipid and melancholy -society. Eternity with Amelia and Laura Pendennis and Lady Castlewood -could not be described as a captivating perspective. - -But Mr. Meredith must not be acquitted of any pronounced sins against -reality. English taste is such, and its restrictions and exuberances -are so little in accordance with life as it is lived by even those who -paint it falsely, that it is impossible for the English novelist to -escape sins of the sort. In general, Meredith is sufficiently just to -humanity in its faults and in its virtues; it is only when its oddities -catch hold of his fancy that he runs riot, and surpasses nature; only -then is he apt to overdraw his account upon the bank of credulity. - -Take, for example, Mrs. Berry, whom Mr. Le Gallienne, in a recent -interesting study of Mr. Meredith, describes as a character that would -have been a feather in Dickens’ cap. Doubtless, but that is not a -compliment to Mr. Meredith, for what might do honour to Dickens cannot -be said to be worthy of him. Mrs. Berry is witty and original to an -alarming degree. She is a sort of compromise between Mrs. Quickly -and Juliet’s nurse; not quite so coarse as either, perhaps, but more -exhaustively garrulous and obtrusive. In the fifteenth century she -might have been possible and pleasant, but not so in ours. She is an -anachronism that we resent. The fault may be with us, but the fact -remains, that we could not tolerate a Mrs. Berry in the flesh. Of such -a servant a man of genius, or one of a humorous turn, might be glad as -a study; but can we imagine lending a patient ear to her free speech, -a stately and solemn old English gentleman, if capable of understanding -what we call humour, only in its highly starched and faultlessly -correct form? A student of mankind, certainly, after a certain -prejudiced fashion, especially convinced of the inferiority of woman, -as it behoves a poor gentleman who has suffered grievous wrong at the -hands of a daughter of Eve; but one whose collar laughter is never -likely to wrinkle or crush, and whose features under no temptation -can relax into anything broader than a grim stiff smile. Picture this -paternal prig and polished library philosopher being entertained by -Juliet’s nurse and Falstaff’s landlady, and pronouncing both to be -excellent women! - -A gentleman who loved his Lamb and relished his Dickens would put up -with her for the sake of her wit and originality, accepting her as -a possible character, which I am not disposed to do. But no young -girl, with even less of Lucy’s refinement, could submit to her gross -indelicacy in that scene between them in the Isle of Wight. We know -how reticent and shy young girls have become since Juliet’s day; still -more so young brides with the most intimate of their sex--their mothers -and their sisters; how easily affronted are their susceptibilities by -the slightest trending towards ground that they so savagely regard -as sacred. It is as much as one’s life is worth almost to speak to a -very young bride about her married life; above all, if she be deeply -enamoured of her husband, and for her mother to seek to unveil it would -be a sacrilege. Mr. Meredith, who makes straight for nature divested -of the swaddling clothes of sentimentality, and prefers her mud to -the sentimentalist’s spangles and pink clouds, will perhaps say that -the excess of delicacy to which naturally sensitive and fastidious -womanhood has let itself be trained is artificial, unhealthy, and -absurd. I do not dispute that a little more of savage candour would -be an improvement to women, and that excessive delicacy leads them by -a very apparent slope into pruriency. But honesty and candour, with -modesty, are surely better than either without it, and if, for the sake -of honesty and candour, we show ourselves willing to dispense with an -excessive modesty for that of naturalness, surely we must lose one of -the nameless, and not the least, charms of maidenliness! This reproach -I make to Lucy is not only in the case of her tolerance of Mrs. Berry’s -coarse talk, but in the occupation it enters her mind to allot her -undeclared lover, Lord Montfalcon. I reproach, in fact, Mr. Meredith, -with the entire creation, all the more so as she is the only girl he -has drawn upon the old wearisome lines of masculine taste, of the -eternal old-fashioned ivy-type, commonplace, loving and pretty, without -character or interest apart from her second in the immortal duet with -his breathless hero. She is charming, as all creatures lovely to look -upon and purely natural must be charming; but the freshness of youth -and the pleasant daisy-and-buttercup flavour vanished with the years -and increasing domestic cares, what would there have remained in her -to interest us and satisfy a soaring nature like Richard’s? The affair -of the cookery-book irritates and displeases us as much as it did her -husband in the period of the moon of bliss, and the only satisfaction -we extract from it is the inimitable wise youth’s witty description -of it in his letter to Lady Blandish. Bret Harte’s speculative vision -embraced a disastrous sequel to the union of the Judge and Maud Muller -of Whittier’s poem, and we may be permitted to picture Lucy twenty -years after, with a bunch of keys at her waist, still studying the -cookery-book, strong in the fabrication of preserves and home-made -medicines, superintending her children’s studies, and arching mournful -and uncomprehending brows at the moral and intellectual vagaries a man -like Richard would be certain to develop. An admirable wife and mother, -but an inadequate study. - -It has been remarked that for Mr. Meredith’s readers there is no -half-way house between uncompromising hostility and discipleship. You -either bend before him as your master--imperfect at times, genius -having its limitations as all things else that are human, but great in -his very imperfections--or you reject him utterly. How those who reject -him can manage to reconcile it to their conscience, I am at a loss to -understand. But this proves the texture and quality of his influence. -It is immense or it is nought. And by this pronounced feeling he evokes -may he be classed as the founder of a school. He has introduced a new -element into English literature--a healthy and purely philosophic -realism, which differs as widely from the realism of Fielding as it -does from that of Zola. To French wit he brings German profundity of -thought, the whole wrought into a thoroughly Saxon setting. Vividness -of conception, intensity of vision, and strength of diction--combine -these qualities, and you have English such as no other writer has -given us. It is beautiful, with a beauty all its own, and there seems -to be no feat of which it is not capable. He has ransacked our language -until he has wrought it, through a process of bewildering originality, -into a flexibility, a forcible simplicity, a majesty and rhythm that, -in his prose, surpass poetry. Never before have we received such a -lesson in the unimagined resources of language. Never before did we -so understand how written words may be made to seize us, fell us, -captivate us, make vivid and tangible to our mind every image, every -trick of person, every hue and aspect of nature. He does not describe -or paint: he simply vitalizes inanimate objects. And if he had not made -us his debtor in any other way, we must thank him for his great and -perfect disciple, Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson. - - - - -CHAPTER III. - -THE NOVELS OF GEORGE MEREDITH: ‘RICHARD FEVEREL’ AND ‘RHODA FLEMING.’ - - -As this little book is written for those who have the misfortune not to -be acquainted with the novels of Mr. Meredith, I do not think it will -be inadvisable to add to my essay a slight sketch of each one, hoping -thereby to send readers to the head source. Those who allow themselves -to be persuaded thereto will have reason to thank me, even should they -be among the common majority, unable to appreciate to its full value -the new chapter in English literature offered them. - -Much mention has been made of ‘Richard Feverel,’ the novel of Mr. -Meredith’s youth, and, we are told, his own special favourite. The -plot of this powerful story turns from a mixture of graceful mirth, -delicious wit, and profound reflection, to tragedy, upon what I -humbly conceive to be an impossible situation. And this is the sudden -separation of Richard from his young bride. But after noting the -crudities and errors of taste and judgment, which are frequent enough -in the book, and which never once hide from us the lambent flame of -genius that steadily burns through the whole, our fear is lest our -desire to praise adequately should drop us into hyperbole. It is so -much easier to blame than to praise with taste--above all, to praise -judiciously. Our wits will always devise fresh methods for a successful -use of the whip of censure, but in admiration it is less easy to get -beyond the exclamatory period, and the end of simple epithets is soon -reached. - -The stamp of a breathless originality lies upon each character, however -minor, and commingled in their creation is an indescribable mixture -of weight and delicacy, of solid, massive strength and finish to a -hair’s breadth--the finish of a purely-cut cameo. Of the wise youth, -that delightful cynic, turning to obesity, and devoted to his stomach, -it would be impossible to say enough. Every sentence, long and short, -that he utters is a gem of matchless and irresistible wit. Adrian -Harley’s wit is unique, and beside him Sheridan himself must be content -with a lower place. If he breeds a sceptical thought in our breast, -it is the doubt that any man in real life could be so continuously -and unpremeditatedly witty throughout a reasonably long record of -utterances. Though not purposely a leading character, he becomes so by -force of his own individuality, and the pronounced part he plays in the -development of Richard’s career. - -The story opens with a description of the inmates of Raynham Abbey, the -seat of Sir Austin Feverel, the hero’s father. This quaint individual -is introduced to us as the anonymous author of a notable book, ‘The -Pilgrim’s Scrip,’ with one aphorism of which we are startled on the -first page: ‘I expect that woman will be the last thing civilized by -man.’ We see at once that we have to deal with a gentleman who, like -Plato and Schopenhauer, and a long list of intervening philosophers, -holds the amiable sex in scorn. Here we have ‘the imperfect animal’ -of the one and ‘the ugly sex’ of the other more courteously, but not -less contemptuously, defined. There is no pretension to novelty, for he -admits that ‘our new thoughts have thrilled dead bosoms.’ - -Reading further, we discover the clue to his scorn of woman. The poor -gentleman has been wronged upon his hearth, and is a widower while -yet his wife lives. He once had a wife he loved devotedly, and a -friend, a poet, whom he trusted. The one betrayed his love and the -other his confidence. The story is not new, but novel indeed is its -effect upon Sir Austin Feverel. Bankrupt in love and friendship, he -fell upon bitterness. To keep his heart alive, while presenting a mask -of indifference to intimates and relatives, he concentrated all his -hopes upon his baby boy, and, for the child’s ultimate misfortune, -resolved to found a system for his benefit. But he wishes his paternal -tenderness to remain unsuspected by others, and dismisses the nurse who -caught him sobbing over his son’s cradle. - -The inmates of Raynham are certainly a queer collection of specimens: -Hippias, once thought to be the genius of the family, but a premature -victim to strong appetites and a weak stomach, living in the embraces -of dyspepsia, and engaged in a perpetual contention with his dinner. -Algernon Feverel, whose career as a gentleman of the Guards lay in -his legs, until it was irrevocably cut short by the loss of one on -a cricket-ground, when he devoted himself to the direction of his -nephew’s animal vigour ‘with a melancholy vivacity.’ A venerable lady, -known as Great-Aunt Grantley, who spent the day preparing for dinner -and the night in remembering it. Mrs. Doria Forey, the baronet’s eldest -sister, who fixed herself at the Abbey with the intention of marrying -her only daughter, Clare, to the Hope of Raynham. There are two other -Feverel ladies, known as the mothers of two remarkable sons, one our -delightful wise youth, Adrian Harley, and the other, Austin Wentworth, -a noble youth, who had nobly redeemed a common fault in the lives of -young men, by marriage, and ‘was condemned to undergo the world’s harsh -judgment, not for the fault--for its atonement.’ ‘Adrian was noted for -his sagacity, which carried the world, but brought him no friends. His -problem for life was to satisfy his appetites without rashly staking -his character.’ He was polished, luxurious, and happy at the cost of -others, and, while pursuing the maids of earth, enjoyed a reputation -for virtue. The world declared him moral and wise, ‘and the pleasing -converse every way of his disgraced cousin Austin.’ And we ever greet -him cordially, for all his vices, and the ‘edge to his smile, which -cuts much like a sneer.’ - -In this varied domestic circle Richard is brought up, the victim of a -system. He was carefully kept from the corruption of public schools, -and destined to enter upon manhood immaculate and perfect. On his -fourteenth birthday we meet him in revolt against the system, and -flying with his serf, Ripton, from a medical examination proposed by -his father, who understands physical perfection to be wedded to moral -perfection. Ripton tells him that his sentiments are those of a girl, -whereupon the lads quarrel, as only boys and other barbarians quarrel, -and make it up in gallant fashion when they hear voices coming in their -search. Their running leads them to trespass, and brings them into -ugly collision with one Farmer Blaize, who gives them a taste of the -whip, and thus rouses a passion of indignation in Richard’s breast. -He threatens to shoot the farmer, and instead conspires for revenge -by arson. Here we are introduced to a silent and unobtrusive little -maid, Richard’s cousin Clare, who passes through the book a maidenly -phantom, only tragically revealed to Richard and to us by her death and -sorrowful little diary. Her offence with Richard on his birthday for -his neglect of her, and her penetration at night into his chamber, is -the second occasion in her short life for departing from the curious -negation and reserve of her character. She drifts with circumstances, -guided by her mother, and holds her tongue. Of her feelings and -sentiments we are in the dark, until the despair of silence stretches -her upon her deathbed in search of rest. Silent, white, not understood, -she remains for us the most pathetic figure in the book. Neither she -nor the author choose to court our sympathies by any of the ordinary -sensational methods, and her cold pride and his reserve are equally -powerful in securing them. - -Meanwhile, the conspiring Richard, unmindful of Clare, is exciting -profound reflection in the bosom of the wise youth. ‘My respected -chief,’ the latter apostrophizes Sir Austin, ‘combustibles are only -the more dangerous for compression. This boy will be ravenous for -earth when he is let loose, and very soon make his share of it look as -foolish as yonder game-pie!’ Hearing Sir Austin make the round of the -house at night, he remarks: ‘A monomaniac at large, watching over sane -people in slumber.’ - -Sir Austin, marching onward, hears strange talk, between his son and -Master Ripton, of fire and delay, and violence and vengeance, when -Sir Austin condescends to play the spy. He discovers that the Hope -of Raynham has embarked in his own vessel upon the waters of life. A -sensation of infinite pity overcomes the poor baronet, asking himself -what the years will do when one day has done so much; but he is -consoled by the consciousness of his own part of Providence to his -son. Baited and worried by his sagacious cousin, who shrewdly suspects -his guilt, Richard takes refuge in lies. He lies upon a gigantic scale, -to the horror of his father and the amusement of his cousin. But there -is a fine and captivating manliness in his lies. He is a perfect -boy in all his moods--an English boy, barbaric, brave, and pure. -Observing him, Adrian says: ‘Boys are like monkeys, the gravest actors -of farcical nonsense that the world possesses’--which philosophizing -leads him to Hamlet and Ophelia. ‘She, poor maid! asks for marriage and -smiling babes, while my lord lover stands questioning the Infinite and -rants to the Impalpable.’ And when reminded of his responsibilities as -Richard’s tutor, he replies: ‘I take my young prince as I find him: a -Julian or a Caracalla, a Constantine or a Nero. Then if he will play -the fiddle to a conflagration, he shall play it well; if he must be a -disputatious apostate, at any rate he shall understand logic and men, -and have the habit of saying his prayers.’ - -After the arson adventure, the shifts and lies, the failure of a scheme -to help Tom Bakewell out of prison for his own crime, confession, and -the bitter cup of an apology to Farmer Blaize, forced upon him by his -father, Richard comes through the first stage of his ordeal a wiser -and a better youth. There is a solemn reconciliation between him and -the ruffled system-creator; tears, embraces, and a new aphorism on the -part of Sir Austin: ‘Expediency is man’s wisdom; doing right is God’s.’ -Reviewing affairs in an ingenuous letter to his fellow-conspirator, -Richard says of his future divinity: ‘Wherever there’s mischief, there -are girls, I think. She had the insolence to notice my face, and ask me -not to be unhappy. I was polite, of course (British-boy fashion), but I -would not look at her.’ - -This brings us to the blossoming and critical season of the system. -Behold him on the edge of youth, beautiful and strong in body, -guileless and pure. He takes to blushing, long vigils, and consumes -paper--all dangerous signs. The father is distressed, and orders him -to burn his poetic effusions, deciding, since the mention of love is -dangerous at this age, to put everyone at Raynham on their guard. -Servants in love are dismissed, the others are ordered to be discreet -and avoid kissing. The visits of a hopeless curate, in love with -Mrs. Doria, are interdicted, and this excellent lady is ordered to -remove her daughter from the Abbey. In this virtuous solitude Richard -becomes wayward and miserable, rides like fire about the country, and -has discovered the nothingness of all things. Adrian reports him as -extraordinarily cynical. He startles Sir Austin in sentimental fooling -with Lady Blandish’s hand, and finds he has discovered the secret of -life. He discourses pensively with other stricken males about women’s -names, and here we come upon the beautiful introduction of Lucy, the -second of the immortal duet of Meredith. Who does not remember that -lovely passage beginning?-- - -‘Above green, flashing plunges of a weir, and shaken by the thunder -below, lilies, golden and white, were swaying at anchor among the -reeds.’ This preludes the divine love-scenes, the sweet romance of boy -and maid, in a setting of fair landscape, described as no other pen -can describe English scenery. To analyze these chapters, or select any -passages by preference, were as idle as to attempt to catch a sunray -or sketch a flying cloud. They are written in sunlight to the music of -love. To quote from them would be to spoil their beauty. As we read, it -is not only on Richard that the gracious glory of heaven has fallen. -We, too, are under the spell, and, while we read on, remember all we -had thought forgotten and dead in the fold of forgotten years. - -But Lucy is Farmer Blaize’s niece, and consequently no match for a -baronet’s son. Sir Austin has gone up to London in search of a bride -worthy the high gift of his son’s untainted youth. His adventures -are inimitably recorded. We delight in his interviews with Lawyer -Thompson, in his unmasking of that harmless young scamp Master Ripton, -and, above all, in his discovery of a suitable bride, when a few years -have been added, in the daughter of one Mrs. Caroline Grandison, a -female system-creator, whom the author presents as less amiable than -her brother-perfecter of humanity. ‘A perfect woman mirrored in her -progeny,’ Adrian describes her, and admits that he would prefer her to -her progeny. The fates and his father conspire awhile against Richard, -and after separation, illness and other discomposing events, he outwits -his enemies and runs off with a bride of his own choice--Lucy, the -rustic maid. - -Up to this point the book is perfect. But here comes the -stumbling-block. Would a youth, whose purity and innocence would be -sure to give added strength to his first sweeping passion, in the -middle of an ideal honeymoon, still bewildered by his bliss, allow -himself, upon such a flimsy pretext as his father’s indirectly-conveyed -wish, to be separated from his bride? To be kept for months in London -through the shallowest subterfuges? Would either of this passionate -pair, seeing with the eyes of instinct that never errs, submit to this -absurd and unreasonable separation? The Richard we know would have -found a way to balk his elders and keep his bride by his side, or he -would have seen through the plot, and would have flown back to her -after a week’s fretting and fuming in town. This would mean the loss -of a great and tragic scene--his last parting with Lucy--though the -probabilities would not have been outraged. But Shakespeare himself may -incur such a reproach and be not less great, and a poignant situation -may be reached by the road of gross inconsistency and thrill us not -the less. - -Having so far assisted at the launching of youth upon the waters -of happiness, we are invited to assist at something still more -interesting--Richard’s undertaking in the reform of spotted woman, his -fall, his repentance, and his expiation. We are introduced to many -new characters who do not edify us, but only one of whom is nearly -irredeemably bad--one satellite of a worthless but not inhuman peer, -the Hon. Peter Brayder. We have met the famous Berry, anciently the -dismissed nurse, who caught Sir Austin sobbing, and own to finding -her Dickensonian volubility and humour depressing in the extreme. We -greet her with a grimace that does duty for a smile, which broadens -into cheerfulness upon her exit. Much of the society of Mrs. Berry -would, we own, fit us for Bedlam. The book is so living that it breeds -the strong aversions and preferences of actual existence. The very -air of reality about the woman provokes an added weariness. We endure -her and listen to her as a living bore, wondering when and where she -will stop, without the least inclination to skip a line devoted to her -prolonged and disconnected utterances. The humour of her matrimonial -differences and of the final _dénouement_ escapes us, but we tolerate -it as we tolerate the rest of the infinite trials of life. In feeling -that the book would be better without her, we feel it just as we -feel that our sojourn in a certain place, where we spent the summer -or winter, would have been the better for the absence of some other -tiresome sojourner, that is all. We cannot remember the place without -remembering the obnoxious visitor. So we cannot remember ‘Richard -Feverel’ without recalling Mrs. Berry--an excellent woman, in the -main, and an instrument of reconciliation between Sir Austin and his -daughter-in-law; devoted, as bores usually are, and full of all the -virtues. Mr. Meredith loves her, and for that reason we make shift to -put up with her. But we could wish her less obtrusive, and, above all, -less garrulous and gross. - -Richard’s experiences in town, illuminated by the mild lamp of Adrian’s -wit, carry us along with him. He claims our undivided sympathies -whenever he appears, and we are not sorry to have him to ourselves -without his bride. Lucy may conquer the wise youth by the cookery-book, -but as we are not invited to eat of her dinners, we prefer the -unedifying sight of Richard upon the Thames and dining with guardsmen -and light ladies at Richmond, or escorting his Sir Julian by way of -conversion of that indecorous lady to the path of virtue. We like less -Lady Judith, the ardent female Radical who married a decrepit lord to -carry out her principles, and took Richard in hand, until he succumbed, -upon champagne and song, into the arms of the siren. The father who had -given him to the world an immaculate youth was the first instrument of -his fall. He desired him to see what Adrian calls the ‘demi, or damned -monde,’ before entering upon housekeeping--an amiable desire on the -part of a virtuous old gentleman. - -After his fall, Richard awakes to a state of desperate remorse, and -disappears to a remote part of Germany. He has found his mother, as -well as perversion where he had intended to convert, had discovered -the sad little secret of his cousin Clare in her death, and now ‘he is -trying the German waters, preparatory to his undertaking the release -of Italy from the subjugation of the Teuton,’ in company with the -sentimental politician, Lady Judith Felle. When questioned about him, -Adrian says ‘he was going to reform the world--unfortunately he began -with the feminine side of it. Cupid, proud of Phœbus newly slain, or -Pluto, wishing to people his kingdom, put it into the soft head of one -of the guileless, grateful creatures to kiss him for his good work. Oh -horror! he never expected that. Conceive the system in the flesh, and -you have our Richard. The consequence is that this male Peri refuses -to enter his paradise, though the gates are open for him, the trumpets -blow, and the fair unspotted one awaits him fruitful within.’ He views -his fault as a pure woman would, and though knowing of Sir Austin’s -reconcilement to his marriage and his bride, learning, too, of his -paternity, he shrinks from returning to her as unworthy. The scene in -the German forest, after he learns the news, is most beautiful, and a -worthy prelude to that grandly tragic last scene between Richard and -Lucy, when, upon his return, he discovers the plot to ruin his wife, in -which the baleful enchantress proves the most respectable and honest -of the actors. Richard has challenged her husband, Lord Montfalcon, -and hurries down to Raynham, where the fatted calf is ready, as well -as numerous open arms, the kisses of wife and child. The strength of -this parting scene is awful. We feel the wrench of it, and the horror, -and sorrow itself seems too full for tears. After it the catastrophe -of the last chapter is smoothly bridged, and the sadness of Lucy’s -death and Richard’s rise from a sick-bed, numbed with grief, is but a -softly-appropriate drop-scene. - -As a story, ‘Rhoda Fleming’ is, perhaps, the simplest and strongest -work of Mr. Meredith. Certainly it is the best-told story from the -artistic point of view. Like ‘Richard Feverel,’ it ends tragically, -only here the tragic effects are not concentrated upon the end. They -pervade the entire book, and the termination is led up to consistently -almost from the beginning, where we meet the two sisters, with minds -and beauty above their sphere, and see them silently watched by -two young gentlemen. The foreboding is unanalyzable, but it is a -foreboding, and we apprehend storm and contention and sombre lights. - -Sombre the book is throughout, and we regard it as almost impertinent -to yield to the occasional pricks of humour that tickle us into quiet -laughter. How can we bear to laugh at the oddities of mankind, even -at the bidding of such a master, when we see a sweet and pure girl’s -life going to ruin, and understand that the very nature of her is such -that there is no return from the wreck, no after-sunshine to restore -the ravages of storm? Here is no picturesque mingling of lights and -shadows, no lyrical romance, no melodies of the upper spheres, to -imperil the dark remembrance of the _dénouement_. - -The very opening is shadowed. At a village feast, when children danced -upon a mirthful May Day on a green, lapped in the soft beauty of -Kentish landscape, appeared a young woman, who had left her home with a -spotted name, and who was left in silence humbly apart. Dahlia Fleming, -pitying her, expresses to her father a wish to speak to her. The father -stoutly forbade her, and when Rhoda, the stronger, defied him, and -went and stood by the poor girl, he punished her by not speaking to -her for a week. And the girls, reflecting on this, marvelled at the -cruelty of even the kindest men to offending or repentant women. This -is where Mr. Meredith is so original and so just. It is impossible to -go far on the road of life without being frequently confronted with the -unrecognised fact that it is men, and not women, who are hardest and -most cruel to fallen women. It is they in their capacity of householder -who pronounce the verdict of damnation, as this Kentish farmer did, -and it is soft and innocent women who, like these country maidens, -would fain offer them the hand of sympathy and sisterhood. Mr. Meredith -never follows the beaten track of generalities. When he gives us a -generality, it is one of his own discovery, and you may depend upon -finding a very sound truth at the bottom of it. - -One of the drollest and completest of Mr. Meredith’s odd characters -is the uncle of these girls, Anthony Hackbut, a mythical millionaire, -understood by the rustic mind to be vaguely residing in London, and -amassing quantities of gold and genial banknotes. The family look to -him for elevation and fortune. He passes for a miser because he refused -to advance the farmer one hundred pounds in times of difficulties, and -sowed ill-will upon the death of the girl’s mother by urging as plea -his position of great trust in a wealthy bank that prevented him from -assisting at his sister’s funeral; nobly offering, in his opinion, -to defray half the funeral expenses. He referred to funds as worldly -things, and hoped to meet his family in heaven, ‘where brotherly -love, as well as money, was ready made, and not always in the next -street.’ He ended by a hint of susceptibility to the friendliness of -an invitation to spend a vacation in Kent, and offered one of his -nieces the post of housekeeper, should she wish to see London, and -make acquaintance with the world. The seductions were fruit at stalls, -oysters and whelks and winkles, pictures in shops, sights of muslin -and silks, and rides on omnibuses, with an occasional glimpse of the -military on horseback. - -Dahlia is surpassingly fair, and the question of her departure is -submitted to grave deliberation in an assembly composed of Farmer -Fleming, held between a desire to secure the miser’s money and a dread -of London for his daughter; Robert, the sedate and handsome assistant, -in love with the dark Rhoda; Mrs. Sumfit, the cook, a very fat and -loving woman; and Master Gammon, an aged foreman, with the cast of -eye of an antediluvian lizard, who remarked ‘that he never had much -opinion of London.’ Policy and Dahlia’s entreaties prevail, and the -fair girl goes up to the great city forebodingly, we believe. It is -like a division of souls for the two sisters so devotedly attached. A -lovely miniature is sent down to Rhoda in secret, who marvels at its -beauty and at the secrecy. And the next paragraph brings down to Kent -old Anthony Hackbut. The scene is inimitable. The queer old fellow, -with a disconcerting reserve, tosses Dahlia off upon a charge of -giddiness, drinks his beer, because he has not paid for it, propounds -an arithmetical problem to Master Gammon, who retorts ‘that he is paid -to work, and not to think,’ and continues to eat his dumplings to the -fret of nerves of the watchers impatiently waiting for news of Dahlia. -We learn of vestiary elegances and temper, and of an old man left to -take his tea alone; and, like Rhoda, we understand the sadness of it -and, unlike her, suspect its meaning. It is the sadder because of the -farmer’s pride in his handsome daughters, so greatly superior to their -station, and of a conviction that he will prove a cruel judge when -the hour for mercy comes. Rhoda goes to London to rejoin her darling, -her one fear lest this sumptuously-attired young woman should be -ashamed of her rustic garb. Robert, a very masterful and extraordinary -young farmer, the intimate friend of a major and a polished English -gentleman, the prize drinker in his own village and a water-drinker -here, a man of double life and double character, and at the same -time single and truthful in both, has already sharpened her acute -sensibilities for the penetration of doubt of Dahlia. She is dropped -into a bitter depth of brooding by the fact that Dahlia is not there -to meet her when she arrives. It is late at night when Dahlia comes -to fetch away her mother’s Bible, and finds her sister. The surprise -decides her destiny for that night. She stays with her sister, and -sends away the young man waiting for her on the pavement below. - -This young man is the son of Sir William Blancove, in whose bank -Anthony is employed as a clerk. Thus had he met Dahlia, to her cost. He -and his cousin Algernon, son of the neighbouring squire at Wrexham, -were the youths who stood watching the girls one May Day feast. -Algernon is a flippant sinner of the well-known school, generally -beset with debts, and not much troubled with morals. Edward, Dahlia’s -lover, is of other texture--of a perilous superiority, cold-brained, -legal, sharp, and unyouthfully serious. They have a cousin, Mrs. -Margaret Lovell, whose part in the story it is difficult to define. -She does harm, and sometimes appears to wish to do well. Fabulously -fair, brilliant and proud, she plays with both young men, and seems to -play the mischief all round. In the first scene between the youths we -are dashed from a conviction of Edward’s cynicism by a very human and -sincere cry: ‘Virtue, by heaven! I wish I were entitled to preach it -to any man on earth.’ And yet this cry and the flush are contradicted -by his cold perusal of Dahlia’s heart-broken letter explaining why she -sent him away alone. ‘The poor child threatens to eat no dinner if I -don’t write,’ he says, and we pity the girl doubly. - -After this it is no surprise to find Dahlia abroad, and writing home -letters breathing frantic worship of the husband she does not name. -Rhoda’s trusting joy in the news is pitiful--more pitiful still her -loyal endeavour to shield her beloved sister when the farmer’s wrath -explodes over an unsigned announcement of the marriage. In reply to -his cry, ‘Dahlia Blank! Who’s her husband? Has he got a name?’ she -protests: ‘She was very hurried, father. I have a letter from her, -and I have only “Dahlia” written at the end--no other name.’ ‘And you -suspect no harm of your sister?’ ‘Father, how can I imagine any harm?’ -And then the man in his wretched perplexity appeals to Robert, to -whom he had hoped to marry Dahlia: ‘I’m shut in a dark room with the -candle blown out. I’ve a sort of fear you have in that dilemma, lest -you should lay your finger on edges of sharp knives; and if I think -a step, if I go thinking a step, and feel my way, I do cut myself, -and I bleed, I do. Robert, does this look like the letter of a married -woman? I can’t think for myself. She ties my hands.’ To please Rhoda -Robert would have lied, and said it did. ‘Her face was like an eager -flower straining for life,’ but all he could reply was, ‘She says -she’s married, and we’re bound to accept what she says.’ His answer is -remembered wrathfully by Rhoda. - -Hearing that Edward is married to Dahlia, Mrs. Lovell exclaims, -‘Impossible! Edward has more heart than brains.’ She resolves not -to forsake him in his folly, which means disaster for Dahlia, and -ultimately for him. A letter from Dahlia in London brings up Rhoda to -her, accompanied by this uncompromising father. Lugubrious portent, -Dahlia is not visible to them when they call at her lodgings. Her -letter shows that she saw them from the window. The next chapter -unfolds the mystery. Dahlia is weeping and miserable, Edward -uncomfortable and protesting. Like young men who embark lightly upon -such perilous waters, he is irritated by the discovery that women are -‘pieces of machinery that, for want of proper oiling, creak, stick, -threaten convulsions, and are tragic and stir us the wrong way.’ By -way of medicine he suggests champagne and the theatre. To the same -theatre Algernon and Dahlia’s family have gone, and we may imagine the -sensation of their recognition of Dahlia in a box where Algernon has -joined his cousin to help the fainting girl. Algernon only is seen, and -is believed to be Dahlia’s seducer. There is sorrow and the face of -stricken and humbled pride in the Kentish farm upon their return. The -farmer’s sole aim now is to marry his remaining daughter respectably -and forget the sinner. The scene between Rhoda and Robert, in which -she still implores him to say that he thinks Dahlia innocent, is -unforgettable--sharp, strong, and conflicting. He is sorry for Dahlia, -and ready to marry the woman he loves if she will have him. Rhoda -heard him not, ‘her brain was beating at the mystery and misery wherein -Dahlia lay engulphed.’ She will not marry a man who fancies he has -anything to pardon, and when he lamely protests that Dahlia has nothing -to do with her, she bursts out: ‘We are one, and will be till we die. -I feel my sister’s hand in mine, though she’s away and lost. She’s my -darling forever and ever. We’re one.’ - -Pushed by admiration and love, Robert unmasks himself. Some of his -phrases have a Shakesperean ring. He half conquers the fierce, proud -girl by a promise to help Dahlia. He shows himself still stronger in -his interview with Squire Blancove, when the farmer calls to accuse -Algernon and beg to have his daughter found; and still more startlingly -when he returns to his birth-place, and dodges the young men, flinging -written and public insolences at them. Edward, returned to his natural -element, shows a mixture of cynicism and lingering conscience that -he only loses in the fiery ordeal awaiting him, when to his and our -surprise he finds himself in possession of a passionately-stirred -heart. In Robert’s native village, where Edward is staying, we meet -one slimy wretch called Sedgett, who is destined to be the hero of a -horrid conspiracy against Dahlia. Everyone seems to be more or less -mixed up in it--Robert, Rhoda, and Farmer Fleming with a sense of duty, -Algernon in idle villainy, Mrs. Lovett through intrigue, and Edward -as a door of escape from his own responsibilities. Was ever one poor -unhappy girl so beset by friends and foes and cruel circumstances -to drive her to madness? On the part of her family, strength and -stern tenderness resolve for her greater misery; on that of Edward, -vanity and cowardice. Abandoned, she falls ill, goes to a hospital, -and comes out a broken flower, permanently bent by the storm. What -refuge in the eyes of those who unkindly desire her good is there -for her but marriage--with any man whose name she may bear? As for -Edward, in his profound remorse and repentance, all Kentish faces -are turned ruthlessly against him, against his offer of atonement, -and poor Dahlia’s cry for his tenderness. Rhoda is his fiercest and -most pitiless enemy. Dahlia’s letters to him have been suppressed by -Algernon, who himself has pleasurable visions of marriage with the -victim’s sister, and the wild ramping life of the colonies. The general -decision is that Dahlia shall marry the loathsome yokel Sedgett, -without any thought of the barbarous sacrifice, worse than death for -her. And the ruffian is to get a thousand pounds for taking this -tarnished jewel--such is the morality of the majority. Pass a woman -straight from illegal arms into those of a husband, and you wash her -white. The legal repetition transforms the position into virtue. - -Edward himself, though desirous of the conclusion, is wounded and -astonished by it. Dahlia’s silence startles him, and he continually -asks for her letters. He cannot help thinking of her while seeking -the distractions of Paris to forget her. Never for one moment does -he alienate our sympathies completely, and we understand from the -beginning that he is neither a vulgar sinner nor cynic. Indeed, it -is with a sense of personal satisfaction that we greet his return to -England, resolved upon a courageous and manly atonement--a changed man, -unable to get the thought of his unfortunate victim out of his head. In -that fine interview with his father we are proud that he has surpassed -our predictions of him, and we wish he would be left to warm the poor -heart he has chilled to stone. - -But Rhoda is there to shield her sister from what she regards as -perfidious tenderness. Nothing will induce her to believe in the -sincerity of Edward’s repentance, nor accept his atonement. The unhappy -girl, between all these ill-advised friends and protectors, is forced -to an abhorred ceremony, where at the church door she is submitted to -the indignity of being flung off by the ruffian who has married her for -money. Is this human retribution? for it is worse even than God’s! When -later Sedgett comes down to Kent to claim his scorned wife, Dahlia, -to escape him, drinks poison, and when Edward comes, showing upon his -pallid face the touch of wasting grief for all the wringing sorrows -brought about by his own temporary baseness, and Rhoda, melted to him, -calls her sister down to happiness, Dahlia is found by the side of the -bed, ‘inanimate and pale as a sister of death.’ She is brought back -to life, but not to happiness. Wasted and weak, passion in her was -extinguished, and neither the touch of her lover’s hand nor his voice -could ever again thrill her. Robert and Rhoda marry, but neither Edward -nor Dahlia marry. Her heart was among the ashes, and her last words to -Robert are, ‘Help poor girls!’ - - - - -CHAPTER IV. - - ‘EVAN HARRINGTON,’ ‘THE ADVENTURES OF HARRY RICHMOND,’ ‘SANDRA - BELLONI,’ AND ‘BEAUCHAMP’S CAREER.’ - - -The atmosphere of ‘Evan Harrington’ is neither that of sombre passion -nor poignant pain. It has none of the lyrical outbursts that thrill us -in ‘Richard Feverel,’ and we are spared in it any violent shaking of -the soul. We are allowed to view life more temperately, and follow the -fortunes of the characters with an undisturbed exercise of philosophic -calm and judgment. A delicious humour colours it throughout, and we are -back upon the old sea of metaphors that the writer had nearly drifted -from in the simple, undecorated strength of ‘Rhoda Fleming.’ We are -tossed about upon its topmost sprays, that sometimes drench us and -leave us in wonder whether the author will suddenly get serious and, -to use one of his own figures, announce that the curtain has fallen -upon this particular part of his performance, and expect us to cry, -‘What an exciting game it has been!’ Could anything be more boisterous -than the description of the great Mel, the tailor of Lymport? There is -a Homeric exaggeration about him that fascinates while it bewilders. -Was ever such a man drawn since the days of mythological heroes? Great -ladies loved him; he dressed himself up as a footman, and thought -nothing of setting a house on fire for the privilege of carrying in his -arms a titled beauty. He was the guest and boon fellow of lords, and -he measured them; he was a tailor, and he kept horses; he had gallant -adventures, was preposterously handsome and big and glorious; he shook -hands with his customers, and was never known to have sent in a bill. -The writer remarks: ‘Such a personage comes but once in a generation, -and when he goes, men miss the man as well as their money.’ - -We do not make the acquaintance of the great Mel, but his spirit -haunts the scenes of his turbulent career, and we learn of him -through fabulous reports and a family of handsome and distinguished -daughters, and one son, Evan. All inherit their father’s physical -and natural superiority. They pass, as to the manner born, into the -upper sphere, and comport themselves in that select circle with -dignity and ease. Behind them in the town of Lymport the tailor’s -shop, with the name of Harrington upon the door, exists, carried on -by the great man’s widow as a means of liquidating his debts. It is -the successes and disturbances, the intrigues and exposure of this -superior family--born for greatness but not to it--that the book -records; and never was genius more untiringly and extravagantly used -than in the combined efforts of these three lovely ladies and their -brother to conceal the family origin and pass for people of blood. -The partial success that crowns their efforts is but an inadequate -return for such an expenditure of brain in well-conceived and audacious -contrivances. People born with a soul above buttons cannot be blamed -for every laudable effort to find their way into their natural -element! Imagine a single rose-bush bearing flowers of exceptional -beauty in a cabbage-garden, and you will have the incongruous effect -of the tailor’s daughter, the Countess de Saldar, in a middle-class -drawing-room. Grand manners and aristocratic habits were hers, not -by right of breeding or blood, but simply by right of nature. So we -sympathize with her in all her graceful and unapproachable intriguing -to maintain herself in a society to which she had won entrance by her -own unaided genius. - -Contrast the genial spirit in which the writer records the adventures -and difficulties of this splendid charlatan with the spirit in which -Thackeray has painted us his wonderful Becky Sharpe--the broad, -half-smiling approval of the more modern satirist, with the ferocity -of hate of his great predecessor. Not only does Mr. Meredith admire -the woman’s genius for intrigue, but he brings sympathy and affection -to the task of making her intelligible to us. So far from seeking to -make her odious to us, as Thackeray deliberately does in the portrayal -of Rebecca, he leaves it impossible for us to judge her more harshly -than he himself does. Wherever she is, we know that we cannot be dull, -and we are amused and captivated enough to be willing to dispense -with the chill atmosphere of perfect morality and candour. He does -not pursue her with a relentless exposure of her inmost vices. He -preaches no moral after the fashion of the English novelist, and he -takes his intriguing heroine as he finds her--an excellent study in -which he delights. She is no vulgar hypocrite, like Becky, under -the mask of a fine lady. Born in the sphere to which she feels she -justly belongs, she would simply have been a great lady with uncommon -diplomatic abilities and with a genius in the shading and splitting -of social niceties. Forced to play the part of adventuress, she plays -it grandly, and never shabbily. All her marvellous capacities are -directed to the concealment of the family shame and to the maintaining -of her sisters and brother in the eminence to which they have risen. -She is a generous schemer, for her family are included in her enormous -ambition. It is not for herself individually, but for the family of the -Harringtons, for their united glory and stable position that she so -unweariedly plots and intrigues and lies. The three daughters of the -great tailor have respectively married a major, a wealthy brewer, and a -Portuguese count. Caroline, the beauty, is unhappy as the major’s wife, -and finally reaches the climax in exaltation by making the conquest -of a duke. Evan now becomes the hope of the family, and it is on his -fortunes, his efforts to appear a gentleman, seconded by his sister’s -(the countess’s) efforts to penetrate into English aristocratic -society, and secure an heiress for her brother, that the story runs. - -The heiress in whose pursuit Evan is carried off to Portugal to -learn the management of his mouth, how to dress his shoulders and to -direct his eyes, is Miss Rose Jocelyn, one of Mr. Meredith’s brave -and loyal girls, with a sweet spice of naturalness in her virtues and -in her defects, if she can honestly be said to possess any. In her -train we find Evan returning to England, clad like a wandering don in -sombrero and cloak. Rose’s expressed dislike of tradespeople gives him -a hankering to announce himself as such, which honest intention the -countess resolves to thwart, and is herself thwarted by Providence -in the shape of a brother tailor, who comes aboard the _Jocasta_ to -announce the great Mel’s death, and both ruins and saves the situation -by mention of a shop and a uniform. Evan’s experiences on the road -and in the shop are drawn in Mr. Meredith’s best style, and we are -introduced to one of his oddities, Tom Cogglesby, and also to the -suffering countess in low society. On his way up to London Evan is -engaged in an ugly fight in an inn, where he comports himself as the -only gentleman, and those born to the title as cads--not an uncommon -exchange of _rôles_. He meets Rose, and instead of London he, with his -guide and protectress, the incomparable countess, turns to Beckley -Court, the home of Rose’s parents. Here the countess has a field worthy -her great talents. To keep her footing firm, to guide Evan through the -briars of a false position, and help him to win Rose, whom he honestly -loves--this is no small undertaking with such combined forces against -her. Lady Jocelyn calls her ‘a female euphuist, euphuism in woman being -the popular ideal of a duchess.’ - -The pronounced comedian in a book where all the characters pertain -more or less to comedy, is Mr. John Raikes. The tricks that are played -on this young man by fortune and by men are innumerable, and there is -perhaps a flavour of Dickens about him in the prolonged burlesque he -plays. His burlesque lovers’ quarrels and the countess’s intrigues fill -the middle of the book, until Evan breaks his neck in a breakneck leap. - -Here is an opportunity for the countess, which she uses to some -purpose. Unfortunately, she is felled by a stroke of fate, and her -origin is exposed at a dinner-table with the duke. The little shadow -of tragedy peeps here in the married misery of Caroline, the most -beautiful of the sisters, and beloved of the duke. The fortunes of -hero and heroine are fluctuating, and on the whole better for Evan -than might have been expected. He is known to be a tailor, and yet -the half-engaged lover of a beautiful heiress, and the guest of her -parents. It is true, the widow of the great Mel, bent upon honesty, -imperils the situation, and Evan completes the work by taking upon -himself one of the countess’s crimes, is rejected by Lady Jocelyn, and -leaves Beckley Court under a cloud, only believed in by Juliana, Rose’s -rival. The fifth act finds him in London studying tailordom, offered -the protection of Caroline’s duke. Juliana, the heiress of Beckley, -desperately and vainly in love with him, dies leaving him Beckley -Court and all her possessions. Here is a comical reversal of things, -and an opportunity for clearing away all doubts of him by one sweeping -act of generosity. Rose is engaged to his rival, Laxley, and when her -father hears that Evan renounces the estate, and exclaims, ‘He must -have the soul of a gentleman! There’s nothing he can expect in return, -you know,’ cuttingly retorts, ‘One would think, papa, you had always -been dealing with tradesmen.’ The end may be anticipated: marriage for -Rose and Evan, and the consolations of the Church of Rome for the dear -countess. - -‘Sandra Belloni’ and ‘Harry Richmond’ are two of Mr. Meredith’s -pictorial and melodious novels. Pictures and song abound in them, and -breathless vivifying races with passion. Writers are not uncommonly -enamoured of their heroines, and while none of his can claim a lack of -sympathy and admiration on Mr. Meredith’s part, there are three that -stand out as rivals for the post of his heart’s beloved. In different -ways, all leading to the one source, like the various roads to Rome, is -he equally the recording lover of Emilia or Sandra, Clara Middleton and -Diana. These are his trio of perfect and bewitching women--not perfect -in the wooden or puppet sense, but perfect with the lovely perfection -of nature steeped, in the case of two, in the unanalyzable social charm -which he so well knows how to make us feel and thrill to. Clara is -the exquisite maiden of upper England, who could never be imaged out -of her social surroundings; Diana brings to breeding an exhilarating -dash of rebellious Irish blood and a purity of body and mind no less -superlative than her younger sister’s; and Emilia, unlike both, is all -passion and flame mounting on the swell of song. - -It is a long time since I read this entrancing novel, and here in -Paris, where I write, it is not attainable for reperusal. Hence many -of the names of the characters have escaped my memory, though I can -recall their personalities and actions vividly. I am still impressed -with the acquaintance of a wonderful Greek--a Mr. Pericles, a wandering -millionaire, ready upon hearsay to traverse Europe in the trail of -undiscovered musical genius. Staying at the country house of one vulgar -wealthy merchant, Mr. Pole, he unearths something like it in the voice -of Emilia. The Pole family consists of three of those inimitable, -ambitious, and diplomatic ladies that only Mr. Meredith hitherto has -drawn us. I forget their names. There is a brother, Wilfred Pole, a -cornet, one of those limp and flaccid _jeunes premiers_ novelists and -opera-composers are fond of selecting to sing the sweetest tenor in -duet with the heroines. The hero of the novel, as of the opera, is -usually the heroine’s foil, his unworthiness the shade against which -her splendour and strength shine. There is a dreadful Irish widow, -whose name I certainly remember--Mrs. Chumps. This awful creature -is, like the Irishman of English comedy, purely the result of Saxon -imagination dwelling upon our island without the illumination of -personal knowledge of the race or the country. I have here in Paris met -a Scotchwoman who gravely informed me that she was gathering materials -for an Irish novel, though she admitted she had never been in Ireland, -and her acquaintance of Irish people is exclusively confined to the few -specimens of the race she had had the misfortune to meet with abroad. -I shall be curious to see that novel when it appears, and fancy she -is not the first Britisher to represent us to posterity upon materials -for observation so slight and so misguiding. The only sympathy the -lady mentioned appears to bring to her gigantic task is a partiality -for a liquid as peculiar to the lowlands and highlands of Scotland -as to the mountains and bogs of Ireland. May unlimited quantities of -whisky enlighten her and enliven us! for she is bitten by a mighty -hatred of the nameless Celt. Under such circumstances, barring the -stimulus of mountain distillery, the widow Chumps seems to have been -drawn. Her brogue savours more of the Thames than of the banks of the -Suir. Such an Irish brogue is nowhere to be heard in Ireland. And there -is something curiously alien to that country in her denseness and -want of sensitiveness, for we know that pride and sensitiveness are -the curses of the race. She is an old flame of Pole’s--‘me Pole’ she -perpetually calls him, to the horror of the refined daughters and the -elegant cornet; and as Mr. Pole has squandered her money entrusted -to him, he is obliged to endure her overt tendernesses and force his -children to bow to her. This contest produces several lively scenes, -including the sequel when the widow finds she is betrayed and cheated -and her Pole a bankrupt. Mr. Pericles adds to the liveliness, and also -one Lady Something, who is almost in love with Wilfred, and plays an -ugly trick on him and on Emilia by getting him to declare his passion -for her and his indifference to Emilia within the latter’s hearing. -The curtain drops on the degradation of the gallant cornet and the -sorrowful enlightenment of Emilia. There is also a tragic figure of an -organist and impoverished baronet, who loves one of the ladies of the -Pole establishment, and commits suicide because she, loving him, must -marry for her family, and several lively social youths and maidens and -matrons, who act chorus, wittily, epigrammatically, and sprightlily, as -Mr. Meredith’s chorus ever does. Then there are Italian politics--a -favourite theme with the writer--an attractive Welsh brother and -sister, and several unforgettable love-scenes; notably, one great -passionate love-scene at Wilming Weir by moonlight, worthy to rank -with those matchless chapters in ‘Richard Feverel.’ The lover himself -is weaker and more pitiable than the average young gentleman elected -by the novelist to pipe fluted sentimentalities to the sweet thrilling -note of the heroine; a man--or a make-believe of man, which is by far -the commoner article, for true and real men are rarer than true and -real women, rare as these be--who could doubt the delicacy of Sandra’s -passionate cry, ‘My lover!’ and who ‘could pledge himself to eternity, -but shrank from being bound to eleven o’clock on the morrow morning.’ -Writers are sometimes compunctious for the abasement to which they have -submitted their heroines, and spare them the wedding-ring. Sandra does -not marry Wilfred, and we hear of ‘the mellowed depth, the soft human -warmth, which marriage had lent to her voice,’ afterwards in Italy. -I forget whom she married, but I daresay it was her Welsh lover, the -noble Italian enthusiast, blessed with a noble sister. - -‘Harry Richmond’ is truly a delightful novel, and, next to ‘Richard -Feverel,’ ought to be the most popular of George Meredith’s books. -It is all wild adventure, bubbling, bursting fun and lyrical -outbursts. Impossible to catch and analyse its charm. It is a book -written to weave a spell about youth and sober age. Its exuberance is -unparalleled; not the exuberance of Dickens or Lever, but a quaint and -original exuberance of the metaphysician and the poet taken suddenly -to football and nonsense verses. He brings a relish quite other than -that of the habitual jester, fetches from his chest wilder shouts of -laughter, flings his ball, and tosses off his verses with a sincerity -and ardour not known to those to whom such things are in the ordinary -way of life. Or, at least, we are at liberty to imagine he would, -for few of us have had the privilege of observing such a mixture as -metaphysician and poet at play. Who can ever forget the inimitable -and arch-impostor, Harry’s father, Richmond Roy--his captivating -personality, his eccentricities, his feats, and his comet-like passage -across the sky of our imagination? His life is a splendid comedy, -though occasionally the comic muse drops us into farce as broad as any -to be found in the early English dramatists. We are not even allowed -to preserve a decorous gravity at the recital and exposure of his woes -and misfortunes. Molière himself never devised a broader farce than his -_rôle_ in the German prince’s court and his expulsion therefrom. And -Shakespeare himself, had he written nineteenth-century prose, could -never have given us a lovelier picture of a little German princess and -her English boy-lover, with all the proper scenic effects and landscape -beauty. And what, pray, are the rough, swearing old grandfather and -Julia’s husband if they be not English to the backbone, brutally, -faithfully English, like Squire Western and a host of that school? -They are imaged to us pure eighteenth-century--barbaric, powerful, big -drinkers, and men of mighty physique, with whom there is no temporizing -upon the domestic hearth nor elsewhere. This is not comedy, but life. -English, too, are the scenes of Harry’s boyhood, his life in the farm -and in school, where he makes the acquaintance of Walter Heriot, -in love with Julia, the schoolmaster’s daughter, and his life-long -boy-friend; and afterwards the little wild gipsy girl, whom Heriot -betrays. All these pictures, vivid and humorous, carry us irresistibly. - -Afterwards we touch a new chord when the religious sea-captain carries -off the lads for the good of their souls, and one fine morning we -find them straying through a lovely German forest, where they meet -the little German princess--divinest and most witching of serious -little maids--and Harry’s father. The story is like real life, too -complicated, varying, and plotless for a brief summary. Light and air -and warm life-blood quiver and flow through the chapters. With the -writer, we are mounted upon a winged steed, and carried breathlessly -through space. The characters are too numerous for naming, and yet -all have their distinct and special parts. If they are minor at all, -it is simply as the constant succession of faces through our personal -experiences are minor--that is, to us--but not, we feel, in the part -they individually play. We understand acutely that they are not there -solely to please their creator, and do his bidding like puppets. They -are not introduced to teach a moral or propound a theory, or even -consciously to act as chorus. They are men and women, rustics, clowns, -and society men and women, who have their distinct tastes, their -distinct utterances, and their distinct capacities. The epigrammatist -is never absent, and we are always delighted to meet him or her. -Of course, an English commoner, however wealthy, cannot marry the -daughter of an hereditary prince of Germany, and after many adventures, -heart-sorrows, and joys, the countless intrigues of his father, a duel -with an Austrian prince (his rival), and the single kiss of blessedness -bestowed on him as upon Herr Teufelsdroch, poor Harry returns to -England in the pursuance of an equally breezy career, made up of wind -and wave, of storm and soft English sunshine. His father’s personality -tops him, and lends the element of the grotesque to the gravity of his -adventures. We cannot take him seriously with such a background. - -But Mr. Meredith does not wish us to laugh unrestrainedly, and so -he presents us with a figure of exquisite unblemished pathos in -Harry’s sweet Aunt Dorothy, a lady we can never remember without an -odd sensation about the throat. The glamour of purity that makes -no parade of coldness, of divine unselfishness, of uncomplaining, -scarcely-felt suffering envelopes her like a veil of glory, through -which we rather define than perfectly see her. She passes through the -book a beautiful ghost of pale womanhood, shedding beneficent rays upon -her path. As a girl, finding her lover beloved of a weaker sister, she -pleads with him for her, and makes an altar of her happiness for the -younger one. When the sister dies, after unhappy wedded experiences, -leaving a little boy, Dorothy is the boy’s mother and the father’s -secret benefactor. She never marries, and all her money is devoted to -the anonymous discharge of the arch-impostor’s debts, which, in this -spurious offshoot of royalty, we may imagine were royal enough. The -scene in which this fact is revealed is, for fiction, of superhuman -strength--not the restrained sense of modern art, but the battle-axe -strength of mediæval times. Harry marries the squire’s heiress, his -cousin Janet, and deserves repose for the rest of his days. - -Mr. Meredith has written one dull book. ‘Beauchamp’s Career’ would be -almost unreadable, other than patiently read as an exhaustive political -treatise, if it were not for Mr. Romfrey and the face of Renée, that -brings the soft radiancy of a dream to bear upon its intolerable -dulness. Would not this charming description make amends for much? - -‘A brunette of the fine lineaments of the good blood of France. She -chattered snatches of Venetian caught from the gondoliers; she was like -a delicate cup of crystal brimming with the beauty of the place.... Her -features had the soft irregularities which run to rarities of beauty, -as the ripple rocks the light; mouth, eyes, brows, nostrils, and bloomy -cheeks played into one another liquidly; thought flew, tongue followed, -and the flash of meaning quivered over them like night-lightning. Or -oftener, to speak truth, tongue flew, thought followed: her age was but -newly seventeen, and she was French.’ - -Beauchamp himself is an impossible fellow, too wearisomely in earnest, -of a single note, which he twangs in a monotonous variety of tones -from morning until night. We fancy at the start, after the ominous -prologue, that we are fronting a humorous adventure when we find him -a sailor lad, addressing his challenge to the gentlemen of the French -guard. But unhappily we are not shown the French guardsmen reading his -missive, and the episode falls flat. We feel we have been deceived, -and resent the deception. To make up for it, we give our sympathies, -such as they are, to the uncle, a mixture of twelfth-century baron and -unintelligible Whig. He relieves us of the monotony of Beauchamp’s -lance-breaking with society, and his extraordinary conduct in his heart -affairs. No sympathy is due to a man who could go prating politics -through drawing-rooms and missing two such women as Renée and Cecilia -Halkett to fall upon Jenny Denham. Indeed, there are some chapters -in the book that provoke a sigh in the bosom of the conscientious -readers for the useful art of skipping. Noticeably those dealing with -that unmitigated old bore, Dr. Shrapnel, and his everlasting letters. -Mr. Romfrey suggested that his speechifying nephew should be sent into -his element over in Ireland. But no Irish speech-maker of the most -pronounced stage in the disease could ever match Beauchamp by reason -of the latter’s want of humour. Irish orators off the Parliamentary -stage and the public platform are ready to laugh at themselves and at -each other, whereas Beauchamp is in deadly earnest from six o’clock -in the morning until twelve o’clock at night. Surely it can have been -nothing else but sheer weariness that forced the writer to pitch his -hero unexpectedly into the Channel, and bring his career to an untimely -end. Never was catastrophe more inexplicable, and from the artistic -point of view less justifiable, than Beauchamp’s death. We wake as -from a prolonged nightmare with a gasp. Having failed to understand -why he was there at all, we fail still less to comprehend why he is -knocked into eternity in a single last page, and instead of being -touched, we are simply astounded. Of a truth, the drawback to the book -is its politics incessantly harped upon. The subject, treated in the -high colours of Dumas, of the plumed and sabred days, carries a scent -of intrigue and romance to interest us; or the song and chapters of -revolt, conspiracy and revolution have our hearts for a nod. What -should we have done had we waded through all this truly English stuff -of Whiggery, Toryism and Radicalism, without the sweet refreshment of -those Venetian days--the night on the Adriatic, and the lovely morning -at sea under the Alps? Or canvassing with this tiresome hero without -the society of that amiable and amusing idiot, Lord Palmet, whose mind -runs to women, and who murmurs before a virtuous voter in a local -institute, ‘Capital place for an appointment with a woman’? This is -the key of his mind and his moods, but it is refreshing after the dance -young Mr. Beauchamp has led us, and promises to lead us, to the end -sans intermission. - -He is not returned for Parliament, happily for the country, and again -we are rewarded for our trials and patient endurance of them by another -glimpse, all too brief, of Renée in her Norman home at Tourdestelle. -This is a delightful break, but the inconsequence of Mr. Meredith’s -characters! None of them seem to know their own mind, neither the -men nor the women. At one moment we find Beauchamp wanting to run -away with Renée, and Renée holding back. At another Renée running off -to Beauchamp, and Beauchamp virtuously holding back. Again, Cecilia -awaits his proposal, and he is inexplicably silent, though pushed to -claim her by inclination, interest and friends; when he makes up his -mind to propose, she is off to Italy, engaged to a man she does not -love, knowing the man she loves was to arrive the day of her departure -to claim her. Do some people act in this way out of such a novel? -We are constantly expecting Beauchamp to wreck society and create a -revolution. Yet at the end his uncle, the quaint, twelfth-century -baron, says: ‘He hasn’t marched to London with a couple of hundred -thousand men, and he escapes what Stukely calls his nation’s scourge, -in the shape of a statue turned out by an English chisel. No, we -haven’t had much public excitement out of him. But one thing he did do: -he _got me down on my knees_.’ He married Jenny Denham and left a son -behind him. This is all he did besides. - - - - -CHAPTER V. - - ‘THE EGOIST,’ ‘DIANA OF THE CROSSWAYS,’ ‘TRAGIC COMEDIANS,’ AND - ‘SHAVING OF SHAGPAT.’ - - -But however great and individual ‘Richard Feverel’ and the other novels -of George Meredith may be, and however high a place some of us may -accord them in the collection of books that, once read, become our -daily companions--a sort of mental sustenance upon which we speedily -learn to fall back from sheer force of habit--not even ‘Richard’ can be -described as the most individual of Meredith’s works. In it is no hint -given of the peculiar stand this new genius was to take among modern -writers. In it we were not led to scent the great champion, the mighty -swordsman of woman, by his commonplace Lucy and his silent Clare. -‘Richard Feverel’ was like a sun-burst, broken with storm and strife, -flashed upon the insipidity of latter-day fiction and exposing its -perishableness. Of such a writer anything and everything might justly -be expected, but even from him was ‘The Egoist’ a surprise from which -we have not yet had time to recover. - -Here this subtle psychologist concerns himself neither with plot -nor passion; neither with tragedy nor romance, nor with any of what -may be called the passional springs of action and will. If ‘Richard -Feverel’ was an original and bewildering canter along the highway of -fiction, ‘The Egoist’ may be described as a breathless charge into the -unknown, a direct and forcible challenge of the unsuspected. Here we -see mercilessly unveiled civilized man, as he thinks and feels, in the -person of a handsome young squire enjoying every advantage of nature, -fortune and birth. Nothing in him courts rejection of our sympathies. -He is not a villain, and he is a polished, perfect gentleman, well -informed, well mannered, well groomed, and exceedingly well mounted -for a more than spirited ride through the plains and over the hills of -experience. Such a man as Sir Willoughby Patterne, of Patterne Hall, -in command of a rent-roll of £20,000, the ordinary novelist, or even -our old friends, the great Immortals, could only conceive as playing -a successful and a triumphant part through life. Why, in fact, should -punishment and humiliation of the lightest nature pursue a youth in -whom no vicious taste, no fixed vice, is pronounced? And who but a -dissector so utterly merciless as Mr. Meredith could find courage to -drive his dissecting-knife straight to the heart of the conventional -system, and qualify the unrevealed disease of this graceful ornament -of county society by the ugly name of egoism? the malady of the Ego? -Who else but this captain of woman could draw us maidens bold enough -to read the man and reject him, in spite of the big social bribes he -carries in his hand? Ah, this is Mr. Meredith’s great and original -note, once he has relieved his youthful soul of the romance of ‘Richard -Feverel.’ Woman is his study, especially young militant womanhood, -and what a study he has made of her! Upon this theme not a single -male writer, living or dead, since Shakespeare, can approach him, -and to it he brings modern subtle penetration added to Shakespeare’s -purely natural instinct. Not only has he caught the bloom and poetry -of womanhood, and made her visible to us to the soul--this were the -achievement of the poet and the artist of very exquisite perceptions; -but he has got at the very root of her nature--quite another thing. -Women reading him gasp at his revelations, such as they would never -dare to make or dream, so completely hedged round are they by the -conventionalities of fiction. When they take to writing stories, they -either set themselves limitations in the portrayal of their female -characters stricter than their brothers, or to hide their own ignorance -of themselves (a mystery for us as much as for men) set off at a -galloping pace into the realms of improbability. - -In all fiction there is not another girl so enchanting and healthily -intelligent as Clara Middleton--none described like her. In addition -to the attractions of birth, breeding, and beauty which the writer -thoroughly relishes, are those of sensibilities that can be delicate -without affectation, a delightful wit untainted by smartness, singular -good taste and tact, and honesty of soul. Here is a sparkling young -woman as clear as daylight, as fresh as the morning dew, beautiful to -look upon, as Meredith’s women always are, sweet and bewitching without -any shabby tricks of mind or habit, who at the same time thinks for -herself, a rare virtue in the male novelist’s heroine. She is all -warm blood and variable moods, as befits her age and sex, but never -once untrue to the finest instincts of maidenhood, and unerring in her -judgment. She is not perfect, her accomplishments are not enumerated, -we never find her playing Beethoven or reading the stars, and somehow, -without one word having been said upon the subject, we get the -impression that she is a young woman of intellectual resources, and -qualified to pronounce upon subjects that engage the minds of sages and -artists, while the music of youth runs blithely through her veins, and -her feet are nimble in a race with a school-boy. It is her struggle -with her lover, the Egoist, that completes the interest of the book. - -Here we have Mr. Meredith purified, polished, complete, without any -break in the unity of his work, or any awkward twist in the even flow -of narrative, based solely upon subtle and most delicate analysis. -The durability of such work is quite as obvious as that of the best -that has already withstood the test of centuries, and when to-day’s -literature comes to be old-fashioned, ‘The Egoist’ will still hold its -place as a lasting monument of psychological diagnosis. - -Of the story itself little need be said, as it hangs upon a single -situation unfolded in one act after a short prologue introducing us -to the chief _dramatis personæ_. And can one possibly hope to explain -how this situation is worked and twisted and unfolded--how illuminated -and ransacked to its most hidden depths for the undiscovered clue of -self, for the unrevealed spring which prompts even our everyday ‘yea’ -or ‘nay’? To endeavour to do so would be to undertake a task only -second to that of the writing of ‘The Egoist.’ Meredith, I should -imagine, would shrink from it. It is simply an analysis of the Ego. The -universal Ego takes the polished and affable form of a young English -squire, the pink of perfection, and highly commendable to ladies of -fastidious tastes, the eye of whose soul is turned ceaselessly upon -self. There he walks and sits and talks before our newly-illuminated -vision, naked to the soul, each beat of the heart discovered without -its protection of flesh or garment; not one single young man whom we -meet and part with in fiction, but the large pervading personality of -human existence crystallized to one permanent shape--not Sir Willoughby -Patterne, of Patterne Hall, but the soul of selfishness endowed with a -form that might just as well have been yours or mine or our next-door -neighbour’s. This is Meredith’s most absolute triumph of art, to -which he brought all the resources of his scientific knowledge of -humanity--his powerful phraseology and marvellous metaphor. - -Other writers have drawn us pictures enough of selfish men and selfish -women. They abound in the literature of all races, selfishness being -one of our commonest defects. But Meredith has given a heart and -soul and mind to the vice; in fine raiment and graceful proportions, -smiled upon by the undiscerning, he makes it tread the boards of our -common experience, with the blood and nerves and muscles of manhood. -This is an achievement of which even a man of such singular genius -as his may be proud. Other writers are happy when they succeed in -drawing a type--in immortalizing a single character; but this one -has done something greater, more unique and more imperishable still. -Into space he enables us to stare, marvelling, at something hitherto -barely suspected, now a tangible form with familiar lineaments and -unforgettable tones of voice, a something that we dimly understand -rises up with us and lies down with us, gives the stamp of meanness to -our best endeavours, and misleads us in our noblest aspirations. Sir -Willoughby is the personality of self that floats subtly round us and -centres all our thoughts. It takes a masculine shape because the course -of the world, both civilized and barbaric, is directed by the wheels -of male selfishness. Feminine selfishness has quite another direction. -It affects the domestic circle, the persons and interests immediately -within its scope. It may bring added discomfort to the immediate -victims, but it leaves the world without merrily indifferent, conscious -of superior strength that can always laugh it down, with a vitality -that cannot be sapped and a confidence in laws that form a barrier -against its encroachments. Not so male egoism. This makes straight -for the whole race of women, mercilessly potent by reason of physical -force, and backed by all the laws, written and unwritten, of its own -making. - -It is this crushing exposure of the wide-spread plague, the extension -and mingling of its fibres, the crudity and coarseness of its very -refinement and super-fastidiousness, that gives ‘The Egoist’ a -scientific as well as an artistic value, and commands for it in English -literature a place apart. - -As a work of art, it is, indeed, the most complete and perfect thing -that Meredith has done--a flawless masterpiece without any of the -writer’s eccentric deviations and mannerisms. Perhaps oppressively -witty, though much less so than ‘Diana,’ striking none but the -delicately comic chord, and turning to pathos upon the point of a -smiling curl of the lip, it carries us through a few weeks’ comedy at -a pleasant canter to the accompaniment of fanciful humour and polished -irony. If we come upon an occasional odd effect--a queer simile, a bit -of isolated poetry lapsed into prose, a bar of pure melody dropped into -speech--we recognise with pleasure and delight the author of ‘Richard -Feverel,’ and we greet him with a cordial smile. This other writer is -new to us, but not the less welcome--less serious, more polished and -more fanciful; and while less of a poet, he is more of an artist--less -philosophic, he is much more scientific. The play of wit is less -sparkling and more penetrative. It shines, a soft luminous light, with -undiminished radiance throughout the book, lending itself less easily -to quotation, baffling even the memory by the quality of the flying -phrases. Upon all subjects of daily life has he something original to -say, and he can even be poetical and fresh, and compel our senses to -delighted thrills upon the worn-out theme of woman’s dress--a theme -that wrecks other writers and leaves them dismayed by the dulness and -insipidity of their own description. Read those lines in ‘The Egoist,’ -upon Clara’s dress in a breeze. - -The characters, as I have said, are few. Clara, the heroine, described -by Vernon Whitford, that scholar and student of equable temper, as -‘a mountain echo’--an idea that still lingers with us when we have -closed the book as the sum of her sweetness, wholesomeness and natural -charm--and by Mrs. Mountstuart less felicitously as ‘a dainty rogue -in porcelain.’ Here we gather an added something of her exterior, and -_look_ at a mountain echo with the eyes of fashion, just as we see -through the same sharp and unimaginative eyes ‘the sunken brilliancy -of the lean long-walker and scholar in a Phœbus-Apollo turned fasting -friar,’ and the poetess, Lætitia Dale, upon her vivid stroke, ‘coming -with a romantic tale upon her eyelashes.’ This is one of Meredith’s -tricks--the uttering of pointed phrases by the tongues of sharp, clever -women. Sometimes they are far-fetched; always are they too carefully -trimmed and edged, as hasty phrases have not often the felicity of -being edged. In general it is the fault of his characters to talk too -brilliantly, and he forgets that men and women in their commonplace -moods are not habitually metaphorical and literary. - -As the essence of self-made man, it may be thought that Sir Willoughby -is meant to represent an unpleasant and an unusual type. Not so at -all. If it had not been for Meredith, he might have gone tranquilly -down to the grave, and not even his worst enemy would have had very -obvious cause to scent the wolf within him. We meet him first upon -his majority--a very fascinating and fastidious young Englishman whom -we gradually understand is the letter ‘I’ vivified and made human, -mentally as well as physically straightened to its erectness, and -as uncompromisingly personal. We heedlessly learn of his dallying -with Lætitia Dale, of the silent and unexacting worship of this soft -rhyming representative of ‘starving women’ who endure their hunger -uncomplainingly, and are too proud to offer themselves for the -sensational pity of a world ever in demand of dramatic situations. We -enjoy a secret satisfaction in his discomfiture when Constantia Durham -leaves him in the lurch and runs off with the more cheerful military -figure, and yet we still hardly realize what manner of man he is when -he in turn plants Lætitia and seeks distraction in three years’ travel. -Meredith makes us understand that he is a youth of spurious niceness, -who objected to his betrothed talking freely about male cousins and -friends, and considered the pursuit of competing admirers a stain upon -her. Cloistral purity was his demand in the market; woman emerging from -an eggshell, ‘somewhat more astonished at things than a chicken ... and -seeing him, with her sex’s eyes, first of all men.’ - -How much we thank Meredith for showing us the ‘infinite grossness’ of -this demand! And how we relish his quiet laughter at Sir Willoughby’s -loathing of the ‘dust of the world’ touching the privileged object of -his choice. We conclude that Miss Durham was a young person of spirit -and sense when she ran off with Captain Oxford, and heartily wish her -good luck upon her wedding-tour, while Sir Willoughby abroad is holding -an ‘English review of his Maker’s grotesques.’ What a delightful stroke -that is against the British tourist! Thackeray never matched it. If -you would measure it fully, you have but to stand apart and watch the -faces and listen to the criticisms of our fellow-countrymen abroad. -Everything that is not British is grotesque. - -As the Creator is just as responsible for foreign countries and foreign -races as for Great Britain, these criticisms, as Meredith wittily -points out, comprise a review of His grotesques. It is in such light -and inimitable pen-strokes, to be found on every page, that he shows -us the man made bare to the very heart. All his social virtues are -ruthlessly traced to the meanest source: his wish for cloistral purity -in woman, his regarding the presence of competing admiration as a soil, -to its true Oriental origin, the monster egoism of his prayer that even -beyond death his bride should be his alone, and of his desire to shape -her character to the feminine of his own, without any consideration -for her natural and healthy preference to be herself. All young men -who think it part of the poetry of love to wish to see the unhappy -maiden of their choice reduced to ashes or incense, and transmuted by -love until they literally become ‘the man they are to marry,’ cannot -do better than study the Egoist, and see for themselves the manner -of man they are. The study will fill them with a sense of horror of -themselves and of the accepted notion of the infinity of love which -Clara, listening gravely, conceived as ‘a narrow dwelling where a voice -droned and ceased not.’ In her sharp apprenticeship as the betrothed -of this amiable young squire she learned to become an attentive -listener. Little else was expected of her. But it was the destiny of -this intelligent and impulsive girl to give Sir Willoughby many a rude -lesson in the sex she represented, that left Constantia’s elopement and -free talk of male cousins and friends in the shade as minor offences -against taste and cloistral reserve. After the preliminary descriptive -pages, the book is completely given up to Clara’s struggle for freedom -and her lover’s desperate efforts to retain her, fearful of ridicule -and the ignominy of a second jilting. She rashly compromises herself -with a brilliant Irishman, while unconsciously her heart is given -to the Phœbus-Apollo turned fasting friar to whom Sir Willoughby, -meditating revenge, intends to hand her over upon granting her the -freedom she claims, rejoicing privately in the fact that his own choice -had irredeemably spotted her for another. There is something pathetic -in the poor Egoist’s delusion, and while we heartily despise him, we -are against our judgment forced to pity him when in the strife his true -character is exposed even to his life-long silent worshipper, Lætitia, -and we see the unhappy gentleman upon his knees to that discarded -devotee imploring her to marry him, so that the county should not say -that he had been despised and rejected by three women, one of them poor -and his inferior. His misfortune and abasement are contemptible in -their cause, and contemptibly borne, nevertheless the something in us -which responds to this terrible monster within him begets the pity of -brotherhood. Degraded, shrunken, stripped of the glory of success, we -see in him a monstrous image of ourselves, of all mankind, so that we -are afraid to turn from him and wring hands with the wretch in a kind -of shamed sympathy. We readily admit the pure comedy of this sublime -absurdity in human form reduced to such shabby dimensions and exposed -for the ridicule of posterity, but we cannot laugh very joyously at the -exposure. There is too much truth in it for the comic muse, and the -pathos is too apparent. - -As Sir Willoughby is Meredith’s typical analysis of the male’s -character, so is Diana Warwick his chief type of woman, and just so -ruthlessly as he is drawn is she drawn mercifully--too mercifully, -perhaps, for she is painted in all the glowing colours of love. Mr. -Meredith is not the analyzer of Diana; he is her ardent lover. He -adores her unscrutinizingly, as it behoves the true lover to adore his -lady. He paints her very faults upon worshipping knees, and does not -think it necessary to apologize for her or urge one word of excuse -or deprecation when, following fact, she stoops to a shabby breach -of confidence worthy the lowest new journalist. She is Diana to him -in all her moods, a bewildering and adorable creature, and as such -he expects the reader to swallow her thankfully, rejoicing in her as -he does, wondering at the stupidity and evilness of the world that -condemns her, censuring the meanness of the recreant lover who deserts -her upon discovery of her unexplainable betrayal of his confidences. -If his lady chooses to start out at midnight, fresh from a love-scene -in which she has learnt from her lover a great political secret, to -sell it for a very substantial sum to a London editor, Mr. Meredith -simply follows her as an admiring recorder, and finds it sufficient -explanation to tell us pityingly that she was a child in this world’s -affairs, that she was as ignorant as a child in business matters, and -had no idea of the gravity of her action. This last plea we accept -willingly, for impulsive women like Diana rarely have any notion of the -weight of actions, and never can measure their consequences; but for a -simpleton in worldly affairs she showed a pretty accurate knowledge of -the value of her secret and of its market price, and for a lady to sell -secret information learnt in a love-scene seems to us an unmistakable -fall which, however much we may deplore, we hold ourselves exempt from -admiring, or even condoning, as Diana’s apologist desires us to do. - -As an Irishwoman I cannot but be grateful to this big Saxon giant -for his generous advocacy of a famous country-woman whom posterity -persists in holding spotted. He has taken her up in the teeth of -British opinion, and being deeply enamoured of the splendid creature, -he is not satisfied in proceeding to whitewash her, which would have -been a simple enough task, but he has clothed her in soft cloud and -fine radiance, he has all but sketched her wings, and shown her -standing tip-toe on hard, solid earth with glance strained ethereally -upward. Not by any means an angel, but a young goddess, half woman, -a creature of exquisite freshness, originality, bewildering wit and -soaring intellect, as lovely as Aurora, and as cold, purer still, and -more remote from the contamination of gross masculine admiration, than -Diana. Her mind flies upon barbed phrases. Her commonest words take -the shape of pointed, illuminated arrows. She is the beautiful Egeria -of a young minister of state, the immaterial soul of a polished old -statesman, by whom she almost loses her social head, and is only saved -from the block by the stout defence of her devoted friends. She is -sunshine in a delicate and not happy lady’s life, carrying a whiff of -Irish mirth and wit with her delightful presence into the stately and -decorous gloom of English town and country existence, a mental draught -of champagne wherever she goes, all impulse and brightness and warmth -of heart. And how this masterful knight of hers, turned biographer, -lashes those who were stupid and wicked enough to misjudge her! For -every tear, every painful contraction of brow, they forced her to in -life, are they punished by his unsparing pen. He uses it in her defence -like a true crusader’s sword. He reviews her enemies in an almost -passionate anger, names them, notes every conventional trick and fault, -lays bare the tiniest spot upon which to point his dreadful lamp of -ridicule, and then proceeds to shiver their self-respect to atoms, to -disperse their highly-prized, respectable prejudices, and leaves them -divested of all but heavy British stupidity, that prevents them from -seizing the charm and comprehending the personality of this brilliant -young star shot from the Sister Isle into their astonished midst. Her -freshness is the eternally vernal freshness of the shamrock, her faults -and impulses the voice of a generous race seeking expression through -her ardent soul. He makes her enemies his enemies. He wears her colours -nobly, gallantly, as behoves a gentleman in whom the mediæval strain -still runs. He carries her gloriously through the divorce courts, -leaving her wooden Saxon husband, of narrow, official soul, utterly -abased and shrunken, instead of triumphant in her fall. We behold her -after this crucial ordeal clearer, whiter, more radiant than ever; -nearer to the immortal Diana she images by reason of her new freedom; -clear-eyed as a maiden returned to the forest-mists of unsullied -imagination; and behind her in the mire lies the crushed marital form, -unutterably mean and shabby and foolish with his absurd ‘Yah, yah,’ on -his lips. - -In the case of her English husband and her recreant English lover, her -defender has no worse fault to urge against them than the stiff-necked -prejudices of race. Both we see like respectable carriage-horses in -harnessed strife with a young war-steed ready for dangerous speed and -nerve-upsetting tricks--a potent, self-willed young creature, sniffing -menacingly at conventionality, audacious from excess of purity, -perilously poised upon every incalculable impulse, and in spite of a -powerful intellect, scatter-brained upon all the ugly brinks in her -career. No wonder the unhappy Saxon gentlemen allied to this wild and -too lovely Hibernian lost their heads and turned tail when it came to -a choice of swallowing her whole and entire and following meekly in -her wake, the obedient satellites Mr. Meredith thinks they ought to -have been, with heart filled with gratitude, and eyes full of love and -admiration. - -That they did not do so is their lasting shame and reproach, and he -reviles them as starched officials and stiff-necked Britons. Whereas -another and a less partial biographer would mildly commend them to -our pity, because of their undeniable sufferings at the expense of a -female engine that ran them down and left them in fragments upon her -path, he is only content in piecing the fragments in order the more -powerfully to hold the feeble creatures up to our ridicule. If it had -not been for that fatal newspaper episode, we should have been more -than disposed to share his ardent sympathy, and range ourselves as -warmly as he upon his heroine’s side. But the newspaper episode is -an exceedingly big camel to be asked to swallow without as much as -a wry face, above all to swallow and preserve intact our ideal of a -persecuted, disinterested, and very noble woman. Though not the most -artificial of his books, the atmosphere of ‘Diana’ carries a heavier -scent of the midnight oil than even that garishly brilliant study of -a pair of tragic comedians. There are dialogues in ‘Diana’ that only -stop short of requiring a key--noticeably one after-supper scene when -the air is charged with electricity, and wit oppressively polished -flies hither and thither, broken confusedly upon rainbow sparkles of -thought. Though we are sick of commonplace chatter, the intensity of -self-consciousness and prolonged mental effort involved in such a game -of battledore and shuttlecock, such a desperate intellectual race -for the prize for barbed phrases and skilfully-managed metaphor, are -surely exhausting. Diana and her numerous satellites seem never in the -course of their lives to have enjoyed five minutes’ naturalness, and -never to have known the luxury of mental dressing-gown and night-cap. -Like the sun, their intellects never sleep, know not even the charm -of drowsiness; and it is frequently a strain upon lazy, easy-going -readers, used to Thackeray and Dickens, to follow the unceasing play of -intellectual pyrotechnics. The most beautiful thing in this remarkable -book--next to Meredith’s generous defence of his heroine,--the -tenderest, most naturally, humanly painted, is the sweet and faithful -friendship between two intellectual women, one a soft-hearted, -delicate Englishwoman with the milder and more clinging sentiments of -her race, and the other our vivid Diana, made up of Irish cloud and -Irish laughter, with her robuster and more ardent temperament. This -is a fresh debt that women owe their mighty champion--the recognition -of their capabilities for mutual friendship, faithful love and -generous admiration, which the cynical male habitually denies them. -Emma Dunstane married, loves her bright Tony, as she fondly calls -Diana, above all the world; and Tony, tossed upon a sea of amatory -difficulties, in turn beloved, rejected, and divorced, faithfully loves -her friend Emma above even her faithless and her faithful lovers, of -which Heaven knows she has choice enough. One of them, Mr. Sullivan -Smith, is a sensational and finely-natured Irishman, too apparently -created after Lever to be of value as a serious study. - -The story is well known. A beautiful, witty, young Irishwoman marries -a wooden English official of docketed opinions well phrased. She -is loved by many, notably one other Englishman, Redworth, a fine -contrast with her husband, and Lord Dannisburgh, whose admiration -excites her husband’s jealousy and leads to divorce. Her faithful -friends throughout are Lady Dunstane and Redworth; afterwards Percy -Dacier, at first suspecting and coldly scrutinizing, goes over to her -and finally succumbs. He is a stiff and starched young Englishman, -faultlessly correct and attractive after his fashion, which is the -reverse of a warm one. Diana loves him, but there is a sort of Diana -mist thrown over her love, which shows it as burning a cold clear -light like ineffectual sunbeams upon a glacier. The young minister of -state and she are engaged, and he returns late one night to breathe -a state secret into her ears. This is the blot upon her character, -the irretrievable blot upon her life. When he has kissed her for the -first time--though no word so barbaric and indelicate as ‘kiss’ has -been written in the record by the writer, fastidiously sensitive in -preserving the snowy plumage of his paragon--explaining that he is but -a mortal lover after all, she says the fault was hers that she was -degraded. This is straining at gnats to swallow an enormous camel. -She goes forth from this first embrace to sell his political news -to a leading editor. Fact or fiction, we cannot get the unutterable -ugliness of it out of our minds. But whether Dacier was justified in -throwing her over for the action is for male judges to say. Great and -passionate love, the sort of love such a woman should excite, would, I -imagine, have found a ready road to pardon. Dacier is a cold-blooded -politician, with whom we have not much sympathy, and are not sorry -to see him degraded in his creator’s eyes, and, beside his brilliant -betrayer, shrunken to shabby dimensions. He goes straight off--marries -a pious and virtuous young heiress, and drops out of view. The stricken -lady, reduced to a state of suicidal prostration, about whom the -voices of rumour are for a second time busily and unkindly engaged, is -not without her champions. Mr. Sullivan Smith and Arthur Rhodes meet -on their way to propose for her, and eventually her faithful lover, -Redworth, wins what he gallantly and manfully regards as a prize, and -thus the end is saved from tragedy. We leave Tony too dazzled to know -if her views of life are brighter, and bearing love for a dower to her -husband. Only we continue to wish she had not visited that newspaper -office. - -Equally artificial and brilliant, and of a fascinating brevity, is -‘Tragic Comedians.’ Limelight plays blindingly upon the characters, -and Clotilda and Alvan seem to flash before us like a couple of -splendid meteors, to faint and fade in their own exhausted light. We -blink and gaze after them, thrilled, startled, and subdued by their -resplendency, with a keen sense of the theatrical in their portraits -and in their actions. Garish the book is, but most vivid, of a -fascination not to be coldly analyzed, of a charm indescribable. It is -simply the short story of the wooing of a royal lover, of his lady’s -betrayal of his love, and of her marriage with his rival. Never was -a wooing like Alvan’s, never such a lover. That is why we doubt the -reality, and dream of the footlights. We listen to him and read his -telegrams, and in spite of the Alpine sunlight and the cool mountain -air, we think of fireworks. We read of Clotilda’s golden hair, and we -picture her flying through the clouds, chased by her fellow-meteor and -fronted by the black night of marriage that extinguishes her after his -decent burial. Some of their sayings seem written across the memory -in letters of dancing light, and we dream of the scenes enacted by -this pair of tragic comedians long after we have left them. Of all Mr. -Meredith’s lovers, Alvan is the one who fascinates and thrills us most. - -Taking a general survey of his qualities, we may note that Meredith -the writer and man is always more interesting than even his best -characters. It is how he develops them, what he thinks of them, his -inimitable asides and epigrams, that we look for most. In this he is -not Shakespearian, for whereas we get nothing of Shakespeare in any of -his plays, in all of his books do we get much of Mr. Meredith. And in -none of them too much. The one in which he sinks himself completely -is, to my thinking, except as a remarkable _tour de force_, the -least interesting. This is the ‘Shaving of Shagpat.’ George Eliot -described it as pleasant light reading. This reads like a joke, if so -illustrious and serious a personage as George Eliot could be deemed -guilty of perpetrating a joke so mild. The story and its abounding -verses are more Eastern than probably anything in Oriental literature, -and if we had not ‘Vathek’ as a precedent, we should be disposed -to regard the feat as an incredible one. For after ‘The Shaving of -Shagpat,’ ‘The Arabian Nights’ reads as a model of sober commonplace -and the epitome of everyday experience. Not only is the style Oriental, -but facts and colouring and atmosphere are fabulously so. The -impression left upon the bewildered reader is that of a kind of dazed -passage beaten through a mass of broken jewels in a soft artificial -light, richly perfumed with the heavy odours of Eastern flowers and -scents. Houris and genii; roses, lilies, nightingales; diamonds, -opals, rubies, and sapphires; jets of flame starting into illuminated -fountains from the heart of lilies set in opal lakes; winged voyages -through the pure Eastern air, over cities and plains and sunlit and -moonlit landscape; impassioned Oriental songs, gorgeous metaphor -richly massed through a wearisome brilliance of colours and imagery; -wild amorous speech and tales, and descriptions of feminine beauty to -turn the head of a sage and awaken a throb of envy in the breast of -Théophile Gautier. Conceive, in fact, every strong imaginative effect -heaped in reckless profusion, till, from sheer fatigue of overwrought -senses, we hail with delight and relief the seizure of the Identical, -the final triumph of the barber, and the shaving of Shagpat. There are -many beautiful passages in it, and the humour of the parody is both -subtle and exquisite, but it is too luscious for a single reading, -though we may agree with the poet: - - ‘Ripe with oft telling, and old is the tale, - But ’tis of the sort that can never grow stale.’ - -This is Mr. Meredith, un-English and impersonal, and he pleases us -less. We prefer his human comedy and his home comic muse to this -parody of distant literature. We like best to feel his Saxon iron grasp -and his deep glance ransacking humanity, as it lives and breathes, to -its uttermost depth, and twisting it to every unimaginable revelation. -We feel then in the presence of our prose Browning, earnest even in -his laughter; Titanic, with an unsuspected softness of heart beneath a -rugged and untender manner, and upon a homely shaft of mother-wit ready -to shade from us the scientific penetration of his inward vision of us. -His wit is like a rainbow lighting up a stormy sky, and his mocking -carries no baleful suggestion of a sneer. - - - - -CHAPTER VI. - -GEORGE MEREDITH’S MEN AND WOMEN. - - -Like Shakespeare and Scott, Mr. Meredith is uniformly gallant in his -romances. With the exception of Richard, his young heroes are generally -feeble youths; sometimes pleasant and good-natured, like Harry Richmond -and Evan Harrington, and at others bloodless, make-believe men like -Wilfred Pole and Percy Dacier. But all, as in the case of Scott’s -amiable young men and Shakespeare’s lovers, are merely foils for the -greater worth of the heroines. Imogen, Juliet, Beatrice, Miranda, the -ladies of the gentlemen of Verona, Portia, and Lady Macbeth are all -unworthily mated, and as Mr. Ruskin has said of Scott’s heroes, we -are left wondering at the extreme and unmerited good fortune of these -various young men who have drawn prizes, apparently as rewards for -their amiable and pleasing manners. The fluted tenor of romance is on -the whole an ill-treated personage. We invent him to do the love-making -instead of ourselves with the different ideals of feminine perfection -we imagine. But with his qualifications, his serious merits, we are not -concerned. So long as he is handsome, has the art of using his voice, -his mouth, and his eyes, carries his doublet and hose gracefully, -twangs the guitar of loverhood musically, and recites his sonnets to -advantage--behold the virtues we demand of him. He must be picturesque, -above all, and the bloom of youth must lie upon his cheek, else as -a sonneteer and troubadour is he pronounced unserviceable by the -orchestra. - -Now, the heroine is quite another matter, as Mr. Meredith, following -great examples, shows us. She must claim our sympathy, our love, and -our admiration. She must be surpassingly fair, and no less lovely of -mind and soul. We are to quit her enamoured and regretful, vividly -aware of her attractions, both mental and physical. And this has Mr. -Meredith achieved in the case of all his heroines--maidens and widows. -They are beautiful, witty, pure, womanly, and most captivating. Each -one holds us enslaved as we follow her fortunes. She has but to open -her lips, and we are at her feet. In spite of his harshnesses, Mr. -Meredith remains great by his generous sympathy with the weak. In the -strife between men and women, a strife he never blinks away, or feigns -to discredit because his men choose to fall in love with his women, -he ranges himself upon the side of women always and inevitably--and -what a defence in the ranks of the enemy! He brings no drivelling, -one-sided sympathy to bear upon the subject, but clear, logical sense -and a keen eye for the weaknesses of the sex he defends. He laughs -at woman sometimes, and enjoys a witticism and a taste of cruelty -at her expense. But he makes it understood that his laughter is not -scoffing and his cruelty is not bitter. On the contrary, they but -add flavour to his championship, and make us the prouder of the big -blows he directs against her tyrant. The tyranny of his own sex he -doubts as little as its selfishness, which he has immortalized past -cool endurance for man in the person of Sir Willoughby Patterne. The -conventional woman, all horrors and shivers at the aspect of the -natural and undecorated, made up of drawing-room theories and lap-dog -sentiments, he rejects as unworthy of that which he conceives woman -might be, if relieved from the sentimental trammels and restrictions -that the selfish grossness of man has imposed upon her. He believes -that women would be all the better for living more as men do, and men -for meeting them half-way--one sex modified by the other, and mutually -ennobled; eating healthily in acknowledgment of all healthy appetites, -as opposed to the coarse Byronic view that condemns them to live upon -air and the sentiments. Sandra talks freely of potatoes, fine ones -too, while her sentimental lover writhes and shivers, feeling pelted -by those potatoes, and the founts of love are nearly dried at the root -of his heart. Can a young gentleman with a proper respect for himself -feel romantically disposed towards a young woman, even if she be -divinely beautiful, when she owns to a capacity to dine off potatoes? -or ascend to heaven on an aria when the prima-donna refreshes herself -with bottled stout? For such types, frequent enough, he suggests that -sunlight must be too strong and gross, and wonders why they have not -set their wits to invent some soft extract of a shadowy illumination -wherewith to diminish the terrors and uglinesses of mere nature. - -He acknowledges the influence of woman in no false, Frenchified way, -but accepts it as the strong ordeal and revelation of man. ‘Women have -us back to the conditions of primitive man, or they shoot us higher -than the topmost star.... By their state is our civilization judged; -and if it is hugely animal still, that is because primitive men abound -and will have their pasture.’ - -Of his men, it is the old and oldish young that he draws best. His -social epigrammatists and his grave, elderly gentlemen, or his caustic, -elderly humorists, like Sir Austin Feverel, the immortal wise youth -whose wit never goes to sleep, the gigantic fraud, Richmond Roy, and -his _fidus Achates_; Tracy Runningbrook, Stukely Culbrett, Seymour -Austen, and a host of such others. We must not forget Clara Middleton’s -Irish colonel, a very pleasant figure in ‘The Egoist,’ the German -princess’s father and Everard Romfrey. All these men have a point in -common. Their wits are keenly alert, and they know not how to be -dull. They are also gentlemen. Not that all, or many of Mr. Meredith’s -male characters of high social standing, can lay claim to this -qualification. There is in him, as in Thackeray, a singularly strong -flavour of democracy, and a tendency to reveal us the snob concealed by -the varnish of breeding. The young gentlemen in ‘Evan Harrington’ are -the exact reverse of our ideal of the article. Harry Jocelyn borrows -money from the tradesman he insults before repaying it; gets money from -him to give to a wretched girl betrayed by him, and does not apply it -to the purpose for which it has been given; conducts himself in all -circumstances as an offensive boor and an abject cur. The young lords -and squires around him do likewise. Some of the gentlemen and peers -in ‘Richard Feverel’ are very unpleasant and shady company, and in -‘Rhoda Fleming,’ Mr. Algernon Blancove would find the average clerk in -the back streets of a manufacturing town his superior in manners and -morals. We get some queer specimens of upper-class snobocracy in ‘Harry -Richmond,’ and what, pray, is Sir Willoughby Patterne if he is not a -wondrously decorative and polished snob, contemplating complacently his -own superiority in the mirror of his mind’s eye? - -On the whole, Mr. Meredith is hard on his own sex. Sometimes he draws -a young fool like Lord Palmet in ‘Beauchamp’s Career,’ who can be a -lord, a fool, and a gentleman at the same time; who makes us laugh -and holds our sympathies, there is something so extremely natural -in his idiocy and something so very engaging in his candour; and -then we feel that the author is not hard on him, and has no desire -to excite our contempt. But this tenderness to young men of gentle -birth is rare in Mr. Meredith’s volumes. His laughter at them is not -usually soft-hearted, but grim, as in the case of the youth who bought -cigars to save himself from excesses in charity, and who, after an -ill-digested dinner and wine, sat so long without moving a leg that he -indulged in the belief that he had reflected profoundly, and woke up -with the philosophic intent to forget himself; being under some doom, -nobody caring for him, happiness unknown to him, born under a bad star, -and ‘following his youthful wisdom, the wounded hart dragged his slow -limbs toward the halls of brandy and song.’ - -As an apology for his somewhat merciless dissection of fools like these -young men, Mr. Meredith adds: - -‘One learns to have compassion for fools, by studying them; and the -fool, though nature is wise, is next door to nature. He is naked in -his simplicity; he can tell us much, and suggest more. My excuse for -dwelling on him is that he holds the link of my story. Where fools are -numerous, one of them must be prominent, now and then, in a veracious -narration. There comes an hour when the veil drops on him, he not -being always clean to the discreeter touch.’ - -And so he diligently leads us through the unshadowy mental recesses -of the fool in question, as a sample of others abounding, not -compassionately by any means, with perhaps too pointed a suggestion -of sneer on the tip of his caustic pen. He shows him awaking to the -conviction that England is no place for him to dwell in--a conviction -we cordially share, with the consciousness that England alone could -have produced him--with visions of himself married to a wife who in the -colonies would make butter or cheese while he rode on horseback through -space; saw himself rejoicing her with a declaration of love, astounding -her with a proposition of marriage, and in little more than a week -sailing on the high seas, newborn; ‘nothing of civilization about him, -save a few last very first-rate cigars, which he projected to smoke on -the poop of the vessel, and so dream of the world he left behind.’ - -If this is compassionate treatment of the fools, we wonder what Mr. -Meredith would be likely to regard as severe handling of the genus. -Indeed, Algernon Blancove, as the typical brainless young English -gentleman, of no morals and less manners, runs in several varied -editions throughout the author’s works. We come upon him under -different names, sometimes more of a boor, as in the case of Harry -Jocelyn; sometimes more of a gentleman, as in the person of Ferdinand -Laxley, but ever drawn from the same persistently objectionable type. - -His older men, like Major Waring and Seymour Austen, he touches with -a truly remarkable kindliness; a gentle sadness and reasonableness -pervade the atmosphere in which he steeps their picture, and such -is their humane influence upon him, that he drops, or nearly drops, -metaphor, and adopts the language of commonplace but cultivated -humanity. If, as has been said by M. Taine, George Sand makes us wish -to be in love and the English novelists aim to make us wish to be -married, Mr. Meredith may be accused of a desire to prove to us that -in men middle-age is more attractive and lovable than youth, and that -the sedate sadness that accompanies it but adds to the dignity of life, -its thoughtful measure never exceeding a refined and placid geniality, -and knowing no other discord than a very mild sense of disapprobation. -In his men of this period, and even beyond it, he indeed portrays us -thorough gentlemen, patient and honourable men of dignified habits of -life and of keenly alert wits. Sometimes they have just a flavour of -fire and brimstone unconsumed in an anterior stage, as in the case of -Beauchamp’s delightful uncle. He is a sort of twelfth-century baron -pleasantly masquerading as a nineteenth-century country gentleman, and -more than one romantic young person would be indisposed to hesitate -upon the side of youth, if ordered to make her choice between this -elderly gentleman and his fiery nephew. Nearly on the first page he -enchants us with the honest wholesomeness and vigour of his talk, when, -in reply to something Beauchamp has said, he exclaims: - -‘Damned fine speech! Now you get out of that trick of prize-orationing. -I call it snuffery, sir, it’s all to your own nose! You’re talking to -me, not to a gallery. Cæsar wraps his head in his robe; he gets his dig -in the ribs for all his attitudinizing. It’s very well for a man to -talk like that who owns no more than his bare bodkin life. Tall talk’s -his jewellery; he must have his dandification in bunkum. You ought to -know better. Property and titles are worth having, whether you are -worthy of them or a disgrace to your class. The best way of defending -them is to keep a strong fist, and take care you don’t draw your -fore-foot back more than enough.’ - -Such he walks the book, a stout and resolute old gentleman, with words -of sense upon his lips, capable of manly tenderness and dignified -concessions, and the embodiment of all virile virtues as well as those -belonging to his class. While the charming French girl and the sweet -English maiden hold our senses thrilled, it is this mediæval baron that -soundly raps our nodding judgment, and keeps our wits awake. - -Sometimes, as in the case of Edward Blancove, Mr. Meredith wheels us -round from cold dislike into sympathy and admiration. But not often. -His unpleasant young men are not more susceptible of conversion -than they are usually to be found in real life, and he is not fond -of playing such tricks as this one, wherein we get from the lips of -a coldly argumentative and sharply legal young gentleman, who has, -hitherto, conducted himself as something of a well-bred knave, such -honest words as these: - -‘Plainly, sir, in God’s name, hear me out. She’s--what shall I call -her? my mistress, my sweetheart, if you like--let the name be -anything--“wife” it should have been and shall be--I left her, and have -left her, and have not looked on her for many months. I thought I was -tired of her--I was under odd influences--witchcraft, it seems. I could -believe in witchcraft now. Brutal selfishness is the phrase for my -conduct. I have found out my villainy. I have not done a day’s sensible -work, nor had a single clear thought, since I parted from her. She has -had brain-fever. She has been in the hospital. She is now prostrate -with misery. While she suffered, I--I can’t look back on myself. If -I had to plead before you for more than manly consideration, I could -touch you. I am my own master, and am ready to subsist by my own -efforts; there is no necessity for me to do more than say I abide by -the choice I make, and my own actions. In deciding to marry her, I do a -good thing, I do a just thing. I will prove to you that I have done a -wise thing.’ - -Such words as these would redeem a stormier and a shabbier youth than -Edward Blancove’s; they toss him up from the brink of common rascality -upon the verge of quiet heroism. We are forced by them, not into -condonation only, but into respect and admiring amazement, and we are -almost glad of a fault that has been so nobly redeemed. - -Apart from any other claim he may have upon his generation, Mr. -Meredith’s greatest and most original will ever remain his marvellous -knowledge of woman. All young girls upon the verge of womanhood should -be recommended an exhaustive study of him upon this subject, as a -healthy antidote against the nauseous and abominable travesties of -themselves and their species circulated by the libraries, in which -volumes, however bad the men may be drawn, the women are ten times -worse, fifty times more unnatural, and at least a hundred times more -corrupting to the sane judgment. From him, instead of the current -inanities in which the typical heroine of the circulating libraries -is enveloped past recognition of human sisterhood (thank Heaven! for -a fraternity with the monstrous doll would be a greater grievance -than any we owe unkind nature), will they learn much upon their sex -that will give them material for long and profound reflection. They -will learn that the eggshell appearance of woman upon the boards of -experience is a gross exaction, the remnant of a grosser stage in -man--that the demand is the reverse of a compliment to her. Instead -of that ragged aphorism (clothing of a lie), ‘that the hardest on -women are women themselves,’ they will be offered a higher and juster -estimate of their own natural mercy, and will hear ‘that a woman in -the pillory restores the original bark of brotherhood to mankind,’ a -remark to give them pause and set their brains in another direction. -They will also learn, what they can never sufficiently appreciate, -that ‘what a woman thinks of women is the test of her nature;’ that -‘in their judgments upon women, men are females, voices of the present -sexual dilemma,’ and that in their desire to have a ‘a still woman who -can make a constant society of her pins and needles,’ ‘they create by -stoppage a volcano, and are amazed at its eruptiveness,’ and a word -upon which we cannot too insistently weigh, a gallant word from a male -pen, ‘that the motive life with women must be in the head, equally with -men.’ - - -THE END. - - -BILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD - - - - -TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: - - - Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. - - Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. - - Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GEORGE MEREDITH *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: George Meredith</p> -<p style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:1em;'>A Study</p> -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Hannah Lynch</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: April 1, 2022 [eBook #67757]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Emmanuel Ackerman, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GEORGE MEREDITH ***</div> - - - - - -<h1>GEORGE MEREDITH</h1> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> -<div class="chapter"> -<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/frontispiece.jpg" alt="" /></div> -</div> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/title_page.jpg" alt="" /></div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> -<div class="titlepage"> -<p><span class="xlarge">GEORGE MEREDITH</span></p> - -<p><span class="large"><i>A STUDY</i></span></p> - -<p>BY<br /> - -<span class="large">HANNAH LYNCH</span></p> - -<p><span class="antiqua"><span class="large">Methuen & Co.</span></span><br /> - -18, BURY STREET, LONDON, W.C.<br /> -1891</p> - -<p>[<i>All rights reserved</i>]</p> -</div> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_vii">[vii]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak"><span class="antiqua">To</span><br /> - - -ROSAMOND VENNING.</h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="smcap">My dear Miss Venning</span>,</p> - -<p>Will you, when you read this little book of mine, -find fault with my unmeasured Hibernian enthusiasms -and antipathies, and quote your favourite Greek advice—μηδὲν ἄγαν? -So that you bring to the reading of it some -surrender of your reserve and a break in that classic -moderation that we poor barbarians do not quite understand—violently -tinctured as we are by nature—it will -be a fresh debt added to the life-long debt I gladly owe -destiny for that memorable first meeting in Athena’s -charming little city.</p> - -<p>The thought of it waves memory back into broad sunshine -untravelled by clouds, among sun-stained marble -pillars and rose and mauve tinted hills, girdling purple -waters, and the long silver olive plain of Attica. Do you -remember still our first walk along the cactus-bordered -path to the Acropolis? Was it not of ‘Tragic -Comedians’ that we talked?</p> - -<p>So now, years after, I offer you in grateful remembrance -this little gathering of ideas you may not wholly -share, but will not wholly reject, through affection for -your friend, to whom so wide a difference would be -nothing less than a real misfortune.</p> - -<p class="right">HANNAH LYNCH.</p> - - - -<p><span class="smcap">Paris</span>, <i>February, 1891</i>.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_viii">[viii]</span></p> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_ix">[ix]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak">PREFACE.</h2> -</div> - - -<p><span class="smcap">A couple</span> of months ago I was asked to give -a lecture in Paris on a modern English -writer, and I naturally selected my favourite, -the subject of this little book. It was afterwards -suggested to me that the lecture would -bear expansion, a task I the more readily -undertook because I was happy enough to -learn that my humble effort had sent at least -three intellectual foreigners to the fountainhead -to study for themselves the novels of -Mr. Meredith, curious to see if I had not -overrated his merits, as is the habit of enthusiastic -disciples, and greatly astonished to -find their expectations disappointed, and my -estimate unexaggerated.</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_x">[x]</span>While still engaged upon this work I received -from London Mr. Le Gallienne’s book, -‘George Meredith,’ and not having by me -copies of ‘Modern Love’ or the other poems -of Mr. Meredith, I availed myself of his -quotations of the famous sonnet and ‘A -Meeting.’ I have also taken from Mr. -Lane’s Bibliography, added to Mr. Le -Gallienne’s book, the dates of the appearance -of each of the novels, as my own copies all -belong to the recent uniform editions published -by Messrs. Chapman and Hall.</p> - -<p class="right">HANNAH LYNCH.</p> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xi">[xi]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CONTENTS.</h2> -</div> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="2" summary="table"> - -<tr><td class="tdr"><small>CHAPTER</small></td><td class="tdr" colspan="2"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="tdr" valign="top">I.</td><td> THE GRADUAL RECOGNITION OF GEORGE -MEREDITH AS A NOVELIST</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_1"> 1</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="tdr" valign="top">II.</td><td> MEREDITH’S STYLE AND INFLUENCE</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_25"> 25</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="tdr" valign="top">III.</td><td> THE NOVELS OF GEORGE MEREDITH: ‘RICHARD -FEVEREL’ AND ‘RHODA FLEMING’</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_53"> 53</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="tdr" valign="top">IV.</td><td> ‘EVAN HARRINGTON,’ ‘THE ADVENTURES OF -HARRY RICHMOND,’ ‘SANDRA BELLONI,’ -AND ‘BEAUCHAMP’S CAREER’</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_89"> 89</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="tdr" valign="top">V.</td><td> ‘THE EGOIST,’ ‘DIANA OF THE CROSSWAYS,’ -‘TRAGIC COMEDIANS,’ AND ‘SHAVING OF -SHAGPAT’</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_117"> 117</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td class="tdr" valign="top">VI.</td><td> GEORGE MEREDITH’S MEN AND WOMEN</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_153"> 153</a></td></tr> -</table> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_1">[1]</span> - -<p class="ph2">GEORGE MEREDITH.</p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER I.<br /> - - -<small>THE GRADUAL RECOGNITION OF GEORGE -MEREDITH AS A NOVELIST.</small></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="smcap">It</span> is our habit to class under the name of -light literature all fiction, from that of -Richardson to the ephemeral stories of the -latest London favourite, though, as a matter -of fact, even that historic bore, Gibbon, is -not heavier reading than the novels of -Richardson. We accept the term ‘light’ -literature in a high sense as well as in a low -one, and to the high class of light writers -belong our old English masters and friends, -Fielding, Scott, and Thackeray. These -writers were purely and simply novelists,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_2">[2]</span> -and if they showed themselves to the -thinkers in their just interpretation of the -motives whence actions and complications -arise, and the consequences to which they -lead us, it was hardly because they thought -so much as that they observed exactly, and, -with the exquisite intuition of genius, penetrated -life and its meaning by the road of -sympathy rather than reflection, and unconsciously -gave the colour of philosophy to -their reproduction of observations.</p> - -<p>Men of wide sympathies and humorous -observers, which are the two most truthful -qualities of portraiture, they were able to -enter into all, or nearly all, phases of existence, -and under the influence of the personalities -and the scenes they portrayed, give -us what I take to be a false impression—that -of having deliberately thought out each -one. The falseness of this impression is -proved by the confession of Thackeray and -Dickens, that no one could be more completely -surprised than either by the doings<span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">[3]</span> -and sayings of their various characters. And -this confession is borne out by the mixture -of exuberant spirits and sentiment that -colours all the works of these novelists. -Serious thinkers are neither prone to exhibit -high spirits, like schoolboys let loose among -pens and paper and a reckless abundance of -ink, nor tears of sentiment, like a distraught -heroine recording her melancholy impressions. -Writers of this sort, however great -and universal, are ‘light,’ because their -double aim—for which we cannot be too -grateful—is to touch us by the tragic or -homely sorrows of existence, or to amuse us -by the absurdities and tricks of our fellows, -and if, by chance, they should happen to -instruct us through the great lessons of life -they unconsciously teach us, it is due to the -simplicity and directness of their genius. And -this is the estimate we English readers will -ever preserve of Thackeray, in spite of the -severe pronouncement against him beyond -the Channel by our more artistic brethren.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">[4]</span> -He may preach, as the eminent French -critic, M. Taine, complains; but we are -glad to be so sermonized, and return to -him as to a friend who can never fail us. He -may digress, but we are thankful for such -digressions as his, and feel that we would not -yield his faults for the more acrid greatness -of Balzac.</p> - -<p>But this latter half of the nineteenth century -has produced quite a different sort of novelist; -one whose mission is deliberately chosen, -heavily weighed, and unweariedly fulfilled. -Not in the least anxious is he to amuse us, -or rouse soft and pleasurable emotions in us. -The artistic exactions of the dilettanti are -unregarded by him, and his voice carries -far other than the note of caressing persuasion -in it. He does not court our suffrage, -rather does he seek to break and bend us -before the sweeping storm of thought, and -carry us through new paths into a world -where no word is idle, no action or instinct -without its most serious consequences; heedless<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[5]</span> -of the fact that we may entangle ourselves -inextricably in the briars and brambles -of a strange phraseology, indifferent to what -may be our mental suffering in endeavouring -to follow him, and decipher his oddly-clothed -meaning.</p> - -<p>This kind of writer is a thinker first and a -novelist afterwards, and not a thinker only, -but a scientific psychologist. The novel is to -him the sum of his mental labour, as the -system is that of the metaphysician. The -simple art of the first story-teller, Homer, and -of Scott, no less differs from his method than -from Kant’s ‘Kritik.’ His appearance, taking -into account the materials of which his peculiar -genius is composed, and the bewildering use -he makes of them, is rare; and if, happily, -he should obtain a hearing, after long strife -with the general stupidity of the blockheads -and patient endurance of the bites and barks -of literary puppydom at his heels, he is sure -to create a revolution in the world which -subsists on amusement and distraction by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[6]</span> -this new way of popularizing philosophy -through fiction and the rose-lights of imagination. -His chance, of course, very much -depends upon diction, and this explains to -us George Eliot’s immediate recognition. -As the first of the modern analytical novelists -in England, she had the good fortune to start -by a simple and facile style, within reach of -the least intellectual reader. Hence, those -who did not want to be compelled to think, -could, without twist or turning, without -racking their brains, or grasping a distracted -head in their palms, follow her story even -when they ignored the profound mental consciousness -from which it sprang. But picture -the catastrophe, the wide convulsion and -fright her first appearance as the author of -‘Daniel Deronda’ would have created! She -would have had to wait, at least, as long for -recognition and admiration as her great and -inadequately appreciated successor.</p> - -<p>Remote from her in point of style, though -still of her school, by reason of severe<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[7]</span> -thought worked to a conclusion, oftener than -hers an unanswerable interrogation, is the only -living master in English literature—George -Meredith. He stands beside her and -Tolstoi in the rank of serious intellectual -workers, though we may doubt if foreign -nations will ever reach the glib acquaintance -with his name and the titles of his books -that they are pleased to boast with those of -the Russian master. Mr. Meredith is above -and beyond all a thinker, less simple and -direct, less wholly preoccupied with the -mission of improving humanity and beautifying -life, than either George Eliot or -Tolstoi. Perhaps he has a healthier conviction -that the world is very well as it is, -and that in the main it is all the better that -we are neither so muddy nor so pink as -realists and sentimentalists would have us -believe, but are just comfortably spotted and -well-meaning to escape excess of censure or -admiration.</p> - -<p>The British race, we know, has never been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[8]</span> -remarkable for brilliancy, nor, to any special -degree, has it given evidence of perspicacity. -But nowhere has it shown such an inexcusable -and comical consistency of stupidity -as in its slow recognition of Mr. Meredith, -and its blundering acceptance of him when -once a few laudatory reviews have revealed -to it the existence of a prophet in its midst. -We have had among us for more than thirty -years a giant, and a race of pigmies, noted -for nothing but the absence of genius, of -even marked individuality in their stream of -literary production, that flows on continuously -and uneventfully, gape and blink at the odd -sound of his voice, and persist in regarding -him as a grotesque monster. He brings us -the fruits of his colossal intellect in masterpiece -after masterpiece, and because he -applies some hard knocks to our understanding, -never bright and always fearful of the -new, we either turn from him in cold neglect, -or else we grow witty with the wit of -pigmies, at his expense, and accuse him ‘of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[9]</span> -breaking his shins over his own wit.’ That -which we do not understand, we decide, with -the superiority of the inane and the ignorant, -to be not worthy the understanding. Used -as we have been to the lucid prose of -Thackeray and the brilliant vulgarity and -homeliness of Dickens, spoiled as our literary -talent has been more recently by the flood of -bloodless fiction poured into the circulating -libraries and fast bringing the monthly -magazines to a deadlock of incompetency -and unimaginative drivel, can we wonder, -though we may deplore, that the taste for -excellence and vigour has diminished?</p> - -<p>That his first novel, ‘Richard Feverel,’ -should have passed unheeded, in spite of the -remarkable review which the <i>Times</i> gave it -in 1859, is something to wonder at, for surely -such a book might have been expected to -startle the best of his country into superlative -praise, and meet with immediate -popularity. It had already been preceded -by a volume of notable poetry, by that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[10]</span> -extraordinary <i>tour de force</i>, ‘The Shaving -of Shagpat,’ and by ‘Farina, a Legend of -Cologne.’ Yet these were not sufficient to -convince his fellows that in their presence -stood mighty genius claiming the poor return -it is in our power to make it—the hospitality -and welcome of our minds. Does such -denseness deserve pity or blame? For -churlishness it cannot be called, as the -neglect shown the great is never deliberate. -Two years were we left to sharpen our wits -upon the pages of ‘Richard Feverel,’ and, -mayhap, acquire a taste for qualities utterly -novel to the age and, in a measure, to the -nation—for something more than English -characteristics go to the forming of a writer -like Mr. Meredith—and in 1861 we were -asked to make what we could of ‘Evan -Harrington.’ The story appeared in <i>Once a -Week</i>, and was illustrated by the late Charles -Keene, under the title of ‘Evan Harrington; -or, He Would be a Gentleman.’ Mr. -Stevenson makes doleful mention of a serial<span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[11]</span> -of Meredith’s that nearly wrecked a newspaper -financially, and presumably this was -the unlucky experiment, from which it may -be gathered that ‘Evan Harrington’ had no -greater success than ‘Richard Feverel,’ and -that the hour of recognition had not yet -dawned. Explain it who can. Was there -not a grain of perversity at the bottom of it? -And can there be a more thankless task than -that of labouring against the tide of fatal -dulness, or an unkinder solitude than that of -a man who is a head and a half above the -tallest of his fellows, and can neither lift -them up to his level nor descend to theirs? -There are compensations, certainly, but these -only serve to mitigate the sufferings of intellectual -isolation, and, to the artist, can never -fill adequately the place of generous and -hearty appreciation. Wrapped in his philosophic -cloak, the thinker may make shift to -do without his fellows, and call them by hard -names, but to the artist and the poet, sympathy -and the warm praise of living voices<span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[12]</span> -is like sunshine to the human frame. But -reliable, if rare, critics had begun to find -him out. In 1862, when his second book -of poetry appeared, ‘Modern Love,’ the -<i>Spectator</i> chose to assail, as an unfledged -beginner, the man who had given such work -as his to the world; whereupon Mr. Swinburne, -wrathful, though not invective—rare -chance!—wrote a letter that all disciples of -Meredith remember with gratitude. But it -is still hard for us to understand how the -career of any man of letters could be so slow, -and appreciation so long grudged him, as has -been the case with a penman of so pronounced -a type. That he should excite -hostility, being himself of no tender fabric, -is comprehensible and easily explained by the -impatience and sense of irritation that he -often rouses in the breasts of his admirers. -But we can recognise the qualities and -greatness of the writer who provokes our -hostility, and generously give him that which -is his due, while not withholding that which<span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[13]</span> -he excites. Writing of ‘Modern Love,’ Mr. -Swinburne, who is certainly upon his own -ground in criticising a brother poet, says, -‘Every section of this great progressive poem -is connected with the other by links of the -finest and most studied workmanship,’ and -that ‘a more perfect piece of writing no man -alive has ever turned out’ than the noble -sonnet beginning,</p> - -<p class="center">‘We saw the swallows gathering in the skies.’</p> - -<p>Bear in mind this was written by the third -living English poet in the year 1862, of -a comparatively unknown poet, while yet -Browning and Tennyson were writing their -best. And then explain how it is that -Meredith the poet is still less known than -Meredith the novelist, and that until very -lately reading people, if asked about George -Meredith, invariably corrected the rash questioner -by the suggestion that he doubtless -meant <i>Owen</i> Meredith. With Owen Meredith -they were familiar enough, but George<span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[14]</span> -Meredith? They would shake their heads -and tell you that they never heard of him, -or if, perchance, they had, invariably added -the rumour that they had also heard: ‘A -perfectly unreadable writer, I believe, whom -nobody—possibly not even himself—understands, -and very few try to understand.’</p> - -<p>Five or six years ago I imagined this incredible -ignorance to be exclusive to Dublin, -where we are not very assiduous in the -pursuit of literature, or of anything else but -the fortunes of the political heroes of the -hour. But upon crossing the Channel, and -finding myself in the blessed atmosphere of -literary fervour and progress, I was amazed -to see how few were the literary persons I -met who knew much more of Mr. Meredith -than his name, and even here I was more -than once confronted with the inevitable -Owen Meredith. That the lovers of Mr. -Rider Haggard and John Strange Winter -should not read his works is but the completion -of their intellectual taste; and strange,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[15]</span> -indeed, would it be to see a copy of ‘Diana -of the Crossways’ in the hands of these -worthy persons; but that the readers of -Shakespeare and Thackeray and George -Eliot should shun him—this is where the -incredible and inexplicable eccentricity of -public taste displays itself. And yet in 1862 -he had written:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="first">‘We saw the swallows gathering in the sky,</div> -<div class="verse">And in the osier isle we heard their noise.</div> -<div class="verse">We had not to look back on summer joys,</div> -<div class="verse">Or forward to a summer of bright dye.</div> -<div class="verse">But in the largeness of the evening earth</div> -<div class="verse">Our spirits grew as we went side by side.</div> -<div class="verse">The hour became her husband and my bride.</div> -<div class="verse">Love that had robb’d us so, thus bless’d our dearth!</div> -<div class="verse">The pilgrims of the year wax’d very loud</div> -<div class="verse">In multitudinous chatterings, as the flood</div> -<div class="verse">Full brown came from the west, and, like pale blood</div> -<div class="verse">Expanded to the upper crimson cloud.</div> -<div class="verse">Love that had robb’d us of immortal things,</div> -<div class="verse">This little moment mercifully gave,</div> -<div class="verse">And still I see across the twilight wave</div> -<div class="verse">The swan sail with her young beneath her wings.’</div> -</div></div> - -<p>It may be argued that the long delay in -the acknowledgment of his sovereignty is<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[16]</span> -due to himself, to his obscurities, his ruggedness, -his enormous intellectual difficulties -offered the reader, like five-barred gates, to -leap, and, in the event of failure, fall against, -stunned and aching all over from the force -of big mental bruises. But Browning is -fifty times more obscure, more rugged, more -difficult. It is true, Browning’s apotheosis, -in somewhat ironical form, lies in a Browning -Society that, perhaps, may achieve a glossary -and a full compilation of notes. Whereas, -all the poet asks us to bring to him is a -little thought and some brains. As Browning -has his lucid and melodious words, when -the simplest may understand him upon a first -reading, so has Mr. Meredith—a fact that -does not seem to have served him to such -popularity as Browning enjoyed. Can anything -be sweeter, softer, more musical than -this little poem ‘The Meeting’?—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="stanza"> -<div class="first">‘The old coach-road thro’ a common of furze,</div> -<div class="indent">With knolls of pine, ran white:</div> -<div class="verse">Berries of autumn, with thistles and burrs,</div> -<div class="indent">And spider-threads droop’d in the light.</div> -</div> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[17]</span> -<div class="first">‘The light in a thin blue veil peer’d sick;</div> -<div class="indent">The sheep grazed close and still;</div> -<div class="verse">The smoke of a farm by a yellow rick</div> -<div class="indent">Curl’d lazily under a hill.</div> -</div> -<div class="stanza"> -<div class="first">‘No fly shook the round of the silver net;</div> -<div class="indent">No insect the swift bird chased;</div> -<div class="verse">Only two travellers moved and met</div> -<div class="indent">Across that hazy waste.</div> -</div> -<div class="stanza"> -<div class="first">‘One was a girl with a babe that throve,</div> -<div class="indent">Her ruin and her bliss;</div> -<div class="verse">One was a youth with a lawless love,</div> -<div class="indent">Who claspt it the more for this.</div> -</div> -<div class="stanza"> -<div class="first">‘The girl for her babe humm’d prayerful speech;</div> -<div class="indent">The youth for his love did pray;</div> -<div class="verse">Each cast a wistful look on each,</div> -<div class="indent">And either went their way.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>And still are we confronted with the -mystery of such a poet’s unpopularity. Explain -it by the unattractiveness of his difficulties, -and what have you to say against -the soothing charm and the exquisite simplicity -of such lines as these, that linger -in the memory, not only because of their -delicate music, but because of their vividness -of picture and the autumn sadness that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[18]</span> -lies upon it. In workmanship the poem is -equal to the best of its sort, and Heine, in -his matchless songs, has never touched us -with a pathos more searching from its unpretentiousness.</p> - -<p>Two years after the appearance of ‘Modern -Love,’ ‘Emilia in England’ was published, -and in the same year M. E. D. Forgues -translated an adaptation of it for the <i>Revue -des Deux Mondes</i>, under the title of ‘Sandra -Belloni, Roman de la Vie Anglaise.’ This -looks like progress in public opinion. At -least, it may be thought, after thirteen years -of neglected labour in strife with feeble and -vitiated taste, the author of so much brilliant -work is upon the point of enthusiastic recognition. -Not so at all. ‘Emilia’ created -as little sensation as ‘Richard,’ and we may -believe that the subscribers to the circulating -libraries were as little fluttered by the production -of the one as they had been by that -of the other—being equally unaware of the -existence of either. The book was not extensively<span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[19]</span> -reviewed, and only the happy few -congratulated themselves upon the acquisition. -Perhaps their satisfaction in it was -increased by the fact that it was not shared -by the crowd, for though the lovers of an unappreciated -novelist may ardently desire to -bestrew their paths with converts, it is not -unusual in them to cover themselves in a -sort of fierce and holy pride with a bit of his -cloak of isolation. If he is miserably misunderstood, -do not they share to some extent -his misfortunes? And is there not a very -decided superiority—sad, if you will, for -none but the churlish and carping few desire -to keep salvation and paradise exclusively -for themselves—in the fact of their mutual -want of appreciation?</p> - -<p>‘Rhoda Fleming’ appeared in 1865, and -this book seems to have made a more decided -impression, though the writer still -remained in the background among well-known -men of letters, and his name, like his -presence, was on the whole ignored. It was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[20]</span> -published by Messrs. Tinsley, in itself an -instructive lesson in the author’s popularity. -But there can be no doubt that the tide was -changing, slowly, it is true—indeed, imperceptibly. -In 1867 ‘Vittoria’ first came out -in the <i>Fortnightly Review</i>, a review henceforth -devoted to the fiction of Mr. Meredith, -and to which he seems to have contributed a -good many reviews and short poems. After -this, in 1871, we meet him in <i>Cornhill</i> recording -the brilliant and ever-delightful -adventures of ‘Harry Richmond,’ and this, -coupled with the fact that Mr. George Du -Maurier illustrated the story, and that it ran -through two editions in the same year, gives -us breathing-space in our long vent of -indignation. We may now conclude that a -portion, at least, of the British public had -awaked, and were capable of relishing such -entrancing novels as ‘Richard Feverel,’ -‘Sandra Belloni’ and ‘Harry Richmond,’ in -which we hardly read so much as we drink -in life, vividly, eagerly—life with all its<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[21]</span> -sharp, sweet thrills and poignant aversions, -its breathless alternation of mood and swift -race of the passions.</p> - -<p>‘Beauchamp’s Career’ followed in 1876, -first in the <i>Fortnightly Review</i>, between -1874 and 1876, and afterwards in Messrs. -Chapman and Hall’s collected editions of -1886 and 1889. Although Mr. Meredith’s -career cannot be said to have been crowned -with anything like a wide acknowledgment, -or even anything approaching a fair reward, -until he wrote ‘Diana of the Crossways’ in -1885, which brought him his first taste of -substantial and general success, and cast a -retrospective glamour upon its predecessors, -people from the date of ‘Harry Richmond’ -began to know that there was a novelist -named George Meredith who was not <i>Owen -Meredith</i>.</p> - -<p>Considering all that the writer has had to -contend with in the way of block-headedness, -this is most certainly a step in advance. -But to his own especial minority, it is not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[22]</span> -‘Diana,’ with all its charm and its perilous -brilliancy, that crowns Mr. Meredith’s career, -but that unique masterpiece, ‘The Egoist,’ -which was published in 1879. Here was a -memorable triumph of art, at which we have -not yet ceased to wonder, and which we hold -apart from all other books that we have read. -After it he may write ‘Tragic Comedians,’ -‘Diana of the Crossways,’ and volumes of -poems. Anything he writes we are prepared -to welcome with cordial delight and gratitude, -but we do not expect another Sir Willoughby -Patterne. We are satisfied with the impossibility -of the repetition of such an -achievement. It is not given to many -artists to produce one flawless work, and to -expect a second from even such a mighty -one as this would be to prove one’s self -insatiable.</p> - -<p>From this time forward, reviews, articles, -criticisms—hostile, humorous, and eulogistic—begin -to abound; and by the time of -‘Diana’s’ appearance, the British public<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[23]</span> -has been made ready to receive the intelligence -that a master is in their midst—a -living, breathing master, such as Tennyson -and Browning, and from whom work may -happily still be expected. What effect this -announcement may have had upon the -British public cannot be perfectly defined. -Being unenthusiastic, except in the matter -of low and familiar literature, it is to be -feared that such news has but moderately -moved it, and in the matter of taste, has not -influenced it at all. This new master is -unfamiliar to them in his speech and in his -ideas. He does not dwell upon sordid scenes -with visible pleasure; he claims them with -a voice that is not of their common tongue, -and faces them without the old-fashioned -twinkle of the grave jester’s glance. If he -caricatures humanity, it is not as Dickens -caricatures it, to tickle us into inextinguishable -laughter, nor yet as Thackeray does, -in a vein of comic satire. If he calls -upon us to recognise that life is often a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[24]</span> -sad blunder, and to pity the blunderers, he -is neither sentimental in his claim, nor consciously -pathetic. He indulges neither in -the mawkish sentiment of Dickens, nor in -the sentimental tenderness of Thackeray, -and as little courts our tears as our laughter. -Brain is what he asks of us, and its use -in reading him.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[25]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER II.<br /> - - -<small>MEREDITH’S STYLE AND INFLUENCE.</small></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="smcap">To</span> succeed in qualifying a style so varied -and so strange as Mr. Meredith’s, and composed -of so many diverse elements, would -be difficult even for his peers. Its quality -is at the same time rugged and elusive, -obscure and dazzlingly brilliant, witty and -profound, harsh and most musically tender, -light as a summer cloud, majestic as a -storm. But his great defect is artificiality. -His splendid pages and his matchless -dialogues never lose the obtrusive flavour -of the midnight oil, and we see most of -his characters through a blinding glitter of -limelight. This excessive use of artificial -illumination, while fascinating us and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[26]</span> -compelling our admiration for the writer’s -extraordinary cleverness, wearies us and irritates -us at times, and we long for the mental -repose of a whiff of commonplace and a page -or two, by way of interlude, of fluent easy -prose that rests the eye and the brain. -There are so many tricks and surprises -bestrewing our path, five-barred gates starting -unexpectedly for us to leap; we are -deliberately plunged neck and heels into so -many swamps, and bowled over all sorts of -rocks and stones, with the oddest sensations -in conflict, that we more than once pay our -debt grudgingly, and, like a peaceable man -knocked down by a bludgeon, are amazed -at the liberty that has been taken with our -understanding. In this exuberant display -of his own powers does Meredith show himself -to be thoroughly English. He is unapproachable -as a wrestler with words and -phrases, and infuses dead speech with the -vitality of blood and muscles. Words with -him are like thoughts—strong, living, tangible<span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[27]</span> -to the touch of the soul. They seem to fly, -and mount, and flutter round us, to catch our -breath forcibly, and hold our imagination in -the grasp of blood-warmed fingers. The most -ordinary action of life, described by him in a -line or two, is not a photograph, but a vivid -revelation, a scene stamped not on the vision, -but upon the mind. When he is not playing -queer tricks with us and keeping every -sense insufferably alert, every nerve strained -to catch the meaning that dances tantalizingly -before us, flying hither and thither upon -fantastic figures of speech, until the writer -himself seems drunk with his own juggling, -he is quieting our baffled senses by these -sharp revelations that have no artificial -glamour about them. He ceases to be the -inhuman metaphorist, and becomes our -brother again, and we forget that he ever -terrified us. I open ‘Evan Harrington’ at -random, and alight on a paragraph where -each word is vividly set in a perfect whole. -There is no twist or turning here, and as we<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[28]</span> -see the red harvest-moon and the dark -water and trees, so we seem to touch the -hand of suffering youth:</p> - -<p>‘Over a length of the stream the red, -round harvest-moon was rising, and the -weakened youth was this evening at the -mercy of the charm that encircled him. The -water curved, and dimpled, and flowed flat, -and the whole body of it rushed into the -spaces of sad splendour. The clustered trees -stood like temples of darkness; their shadows -lengthened supernaturally; and a pale gloom -crept between them on the sward. He had -been thinking some time that Rose would -knock at his door and give him her voice, at -least; but she did not come; and when he -had gazed out on the stream until his eyes -ached, he felt that he must go and walk by it. -Those little flashes of the hurrying tide spoke -to him of a secret rapture and of a joy-seeking -impulse—the pouring onward of all the blood -of life into one illumined heart, mournful from -excess of love.’</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[29]</span>In none of his books do such passages -abound as in ‘Richard Feverel,’ unless, perhaps, -in ‘Harry Richmond.’ These two -books, and in a lesser degree ‘Sandra Belloni,’ -may best be described as picturesque -and melodious. The writer is less a thinker -than a poet, and sometimes he sings with a -sweetness that troubles our vision and catches -us queerly about the throat.</p> - -<p>But viewing him upon the ground of the -simple story-teller, we must admit that this -is a ground either foreign to Mr. Meredith’s -original genius, or deliberately shunned by -him. The good old fashion, so dear to Scott -and Thackeray, of bringing everything to a -definite conclusion, either for better or worse, -and clearing up all doubts as to the ultimate -career of even their minor characters, is a -fashion that he, with some cruelty and much -contempt for the ordinary reader, utterly discards. -He cares not a jot for our sympathy, -still less for our judgment. He notes that -life is chiefly interrogatory and unsatisfactory—an<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[30]</span> -unfinished drama rarely terminating with -the rightful wedding-bells or the merited -reward; that choice is rarely justified by -results, and that good and evil still remain -vexed questions to be decided, as far as -definite decision is possible, except upon their -broadest issues, by temperament and individuality, -by race and sex and training, as -faith and love are decided. Look at the -end of all his stories, and you will find yourself -confronted with the unanswerable question -which is sure to fix us in the examination -of the lives of each one of us. There is the -fatal tide, we know, but can we dare to say -at what precise turning of the road of life -we missed it?</p> - -<p>This is the philosophy that ‘Richard -Feverel’ exposes—conjectural, questioning; -a drawn game between reason and impulse, -between nature and intellect, between a -philosopher’s system and a young man’s first -love. Neither win, because, though a mighty -fighter and a Homeric wrestler with words,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[31]</span> -Meredith is not of the definite school, and -will not pander to his readers’ tastes either -way. Are you for the mismanaged poor -hero, or for the disappointed philosopher, -gazing in the last page upon the system -fondly built upon sand, and laid in ruins by the -first breath of purely human disaster? Mr. -Meredith resolves that your sympathies shall -be balanced, as his own are soundly balanced. -He leaves you with a question upon your -lips, and your childish reproach is chidden by -his silence.</p> - -<p>Richard is the strongest and best hero the -writer has drawn, before he fell in love with -the more intricate complexities of woman, -and delighted in her intellectual surprises, her -social difficulties and struggles with iron fate -and masculinity. We part with him as he -rises from a sick-bed, widowed and broken -upon the outset of brilliant manhood, enshadowed -in a tragic gloom, and who is to -explain to us the evolution of middle-age in -this youth of burning hope and rash promise?<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[32]</span> -Not the creator, certainly. The throes of -commonplace speculation into which he may -thrust the ordinary reader trouble him not, -and he is less merciful to him even than -Tolstoi. He takes us from that strong -Shakespearean scene, in which Richard reads -the diary of Clare Doria Forey, unveiling -her unconscious and reticent love, only fully -measured by her on the threshold of a loveless -marriage, while overhead the candles are -burning in her mortuary chamber, and flickering -lugubriously upon the lips that have -spoken to him from ‘behind the hills of -death’; and without giving us time to clear -our throats of the gathered sensations of pity -and pain, he hurls us into fresh emotions, -equally painful, by the death of Lucy, -Richard’s young wife. And after that we -learn nothing more of Richard, and are at -liberty to decide for ourselves whether Sir -Austin, the broker system-creator, and Lady -Blandish married, like any other pair of -middle-aged lovers, or preferred to continue<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[33]</span> -in the less definite and secure path of platonic -sentimentalities—the one studying the pilgrim’s -scrip, the other adding to its wisdom.</p> - -<p>The fault is perhaps to be laid to our -complex, inquiring, and unrobust age, that -men like Tolstoi and Meredith should both -be incomplete as artists and as thinkers. -Completeness in art belongs to simplicity of -thought and directness of vision, and these -are the attributes of the real story-teller, who -is never diverted from his task by philosophic -conjecture or by psychological problems. -Mr. Meredith’s incompleteness is -shown in an affectation of oddness and an -artificial glamour that leave the reader with -senses and wits perturbed, anxiously questioning -the gravity of the writer, apprehensive of -being laughed at, and not altogether sure -that he has not been assisting at the marvellous -performance of a juggling metaphorist, -instead of the discoveries and exposition of a -serious philosopher. This artificial glamour -is more sparingly used in ‘Richard Feverel’;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[34]</span> -hence, perhaps, its larger popularity than any -of his other works. But it is hardly, as a -whole, so great as ‘The Egoist,’ ‘Rhoda -Fleming,’ or ‘Diana of the Crossways.’ In -it the quality of tenderness, noticeably absent -in the rest, abounds, and also a lovely freshness -and a visible delight in youth and in -youthful joys. It is a work pre-eminently -human, with all the defects and qualities of -humanity strongly marked. Had it been -written in blood, it could not be redder with -life. Vitality is its captivating charm and -melody its voice. As a work of art, it may -be far from perfect, and we recognise that it -is marred by many impossible situations, -errors of taste and judgment, and a tendency, -in the portrayal of the famous Mrs. Berry, to -gross caricature. Nevertheless, we love it, -faults and all, with that strong personal love -and a wish for frequent dipping at its sources -that it is the unshared privilege of truly great -and original productions to inspire. How -many are the writers we turn to in all moods,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[35]</span> -knowing we shall ever find something new, -something helpful in their familiar pages! -Shakespeare for the English mind and for a -very few foreigners; Montaigne, and perhaps -Molière, for others. Others, again, decide -between Scott, Thackeray, and George Eliot. -Add to this limited sphere a half-dozen of -the world’s best poets, and the circle of comforters -and permanent friends is formed. In -such choice company may Meredith present -himself with ‘Richard Feverel’ in his hand, -and his place will be no mean one in their -midst. Shakespeare himself might offer him -the cordial hand-clasp of brotherhood, and -assure him that since the appearance of -Beatrice and Portia, no such women as -Diana, Emilia, and his German princess had -ever shot upon the dull world from masculine -brains.</p> - -<p>In Meredith’s very faults there is an excess -of strength. It is this superabundance -and an impatience of drivelling sentiment -that lead him so frequently to shock our<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[36]</span> -nineteenth-century taste. I think he shocks -us with deliberate aim, deeming our taste -questionable and unrobust, and our fastidiousness -unhealthy. These blows directed against -our temple of false modesty are in no book -fiercer and more astounding than in ‘Richard -Feverel,’ and in no other book has he risen -to such supreme heights. Here you have at -its best the matchless splendour and majesty -of his prose, and pages of prolonged beauty. -You have ample scope to realize the vividness -of his interpretation of nature, and the -delight of young love so magically unveiled -by him in those three beautiful chapters on -the opening romance of Richard and Lucy—‘Ferdinand -and Miranda,’ ‘Diversions -played on a Penny Whistle,’ and ‘Time-honoured -Treatment of a Dragon by a -Hero.’ Which of these three chapters to -choose it would be difficult to say, for there -is nothing like them in all English literature -for sweetness, melody, and pulse-moving -charm. If I had to pronounce, I should be<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[37]</span> -disposed to give the preference to the ‘Penny -Whistle’ chapter, though, from the fact that -the first meeting between Richard and Lucy -is oftenest quoted, I judge it to be the most -popular.</p> - -<p>Match me this exquisite picture in prose -or poetry: ‘The sun is coming down to -earth, and the fields and the waters shout to -him golden shouts. He comes, and his -heralds run before him, and touch the leaves -of oaks and planes and beeches lucid green, -and the pine-stems redder gold; leaving -brightest footprints upon thickly-weeded -banks, where the foxgloves’ last upper-bells -incline, and bramble shoots wander amid -moist rich herbage. The plumes of the -woodland are alight; and beyond them, over -the open, ’tis a race with the long-thrown -shadows; a race across the heaths and up -the hills, till, at the farthest bourne of -mounted eastern cloud, the heralds of the -sun lay rosy figures and rest.’</p> - -<p>Or yet again, this other: ‘The tide of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[38]</span> -colour has ebbed from the upper sky. In -the west the sea of sunken fire draws back, -and the stars leap forth and tremble, and -retire before the advancing moon, who slips -the silver train of cloud from her shoulders, -and, with her foot upon the pine-tops, surveys -heaven.’</p> - -<p>In these three chapters we have Mr. -Meredith not only at his best, but better than -many of the best poets upon their own -ground. He sings rather than speaks. He -neither wants to astonish nor affright us, but -solely to enchant us. And who can read -him and remain unmoved—withstand the -spell he casts upon us? Shelley was never -more musical, more thrilling, and never so -strong.</p> - -<p>But there is much else in the novels of -this remarkable writer besides music and -poetry, and the soft showery joys and sorrows -of young love. There are the qualities and -deficiencies of his tragic and his mighty side -as a pendant for the grace and charm of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[39]</span> -mood we have seen. Everything in him is -pronounced. He has a taste for strong -lights and shadows, for grotesque asides and -interruptions; is sometimes crude, always -complex, and often incomplete. His coarseness -is akin to the coarseness that shakes us -to amazement in the tragedies and comedies -of Shakespeare, where ribaldry and lovely -delicacy go hand-in-hand; where, swift upon -the most fanciful play of thought and scenes -of pathetic beauty, and images as exquisite as -a Theocritan idyl, come a burst of clownish -mirth and hideous joking.</p> - -<p>Shakespearean is the word to describe -Meredith, both in his defects and in his -qualities. In each is he great, with something -of the unapproachable greatness, the -originality, the blood and brains and nerve, of -the Stratford poet, towering over his fellows -to-day as Shakespeare, alive, towered over -his. Human to the heels, a seer and a -psychologist in one, no word is lightly written, -no character lightly drawn. He delights in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[40]</span> -humanity, and almost wickedly revels in its -eccentricities. Hence his tendency to exaggeration. -He seizes a queer character, -such as old Tom Cogglesby, John Raikes, or -Mrs. Berry, and, not content with their -natural oddities, like Dickens, he must steep -them in the colours of his own imagination; -with the result that they come out of the -process caricatures, and we find it exceedingly -hard to divest them of their comic garb, and -trace them back to the elemental, whence -they started on their devious wanderings -through their creator’s mind. This characteristic, -as M. Taine observes, is peculiarly -English. Since Rabelais’ days the French -writers are too hampered by laws and rules -in art, inalterable, like those of the Medes -and Persians, to dare play such tricks with -reality and human nature as Dickens, Thackeray, -and Meredith, in their jesting moods, -permit themselves. Scott’s moods had no -such promptings, perhaps because he was a -better story-teller than any of the three, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[41]</span> -found the humour of life quite sufficient without -the aid of exaggeration. But then there -was no satire or hardness in all Scott’s -nature, and manly tenderness and sympathy -were his predominant traits. He wrote -stories for the pleasure of writing them, not -to belabour or ridicule poor worn humanity, -in which he kept his faith green and unquestioning -as a child’s.</p> - -<p>But, like Dickens, Meredith is a poet, and, -like him, has all a poet’s extravagances and -excesses. Scott, as a poet, is never excessive, -never exuberant, and always exact. -His strength is employed with a Scotch -perception of its just value, whereas his -Saxon brothers waste theirs with an endless -profusion. Not that I would compare Meredith -with Dickens, except in his tendency to -caricature, which in Dickens is a vice, and in -his poetical excesses. He tortures metaphor -at times, and lacks measure. This is the -complaint French artists bring against their -English brethren. Perhaps their greater<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[42]</span> -physical strength, added to the Teutonic -strain that flows through their blood from -the early ages, runs to excess in imagination, -and produces a conception of the grotesque -unapprehended by the French. -Certain it is that the latter escape our -violent emotions in literature, and cannot -arrive at an understanding of them. Our -sensibilities, strung to common themes, and -unexcited by lawless love and cerebral complications, -rouse their wonder; and the -mixture of buffoonery and satire in our -great writers incurs their indignation. For -this they say we are not artists, and -ignore the classical limitations of art. And -doubtless they are right. Upon the whole, -our works of art are less artistic than theirs, -and are produced in a lesser quantity, while -our greatest works sin frequently against -every known canon of art.</p> - -<p>In shedding a double ray of ridicule upon -his comic characters, Mr. Meredith so envelops -and twists them in metaphor, now<span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[43]</span> -mildly sarcastic, now a joyous shout of -laughter, we cannot tell with or at us, for -we are not in the secret of his comic moods; -and at times so bitingly ironical that we are -puzzled and astray. Fain would we know -whether he feels tenderly towards us at our -worst, or cherishes an inalterable contempt -for us at our best. For, unlike Thackeray, -he is no moralist. Here, at least, is an -English novelist whom M. Taine cannot -accuse of laying down hard and fast rules -for our moral benefit. His two most cynical -characters attract some of our sympathy. -Whereas we are ordered to loathe and condemn -Becky Sharpe, and feel how much her -railing creator despised her, Meredith allows -us to be glad of his Countess’s acquaintance, -and shows us that a cynical, intriguing -woman, full of vulgar pride and not illegitimate -ambition, may be interesting, and not -unloved by her creator. He invites us to -wonder at her, and not condemn, and though -he may laugh at her weaknesses, and take<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[44]</span> -a wicked pleasure in exposing them, he -cannot be said, on the whole, to show her -any harshness. As an adventuress, she is -unsurpassed, and, unlike poor Becky, lives -and dies, we imagine, a fine lady, driven by -ambition to duplicities, but not consciously -mean or dishonest. Though a virtuous -woman, her morals are crooked, and her -sense of honour is the reverse of keen. We -have seen how such a character in Thackeray’s -hands would develop, and to what -lengths in heartlessness his satire carried -him. Meredith’s Countess is possible; but -Becky Sharpe is impossible.</p> - -<p>The same may be said of his male villains. -Indeed, he has none. There is something -eminently human in the egoism of the wise -youth Adrian Harley. We greet him ever -with a cheerful smile, and for one of his -witty remarks would have no, or only a very -slight, objection to part with our last five-pound -note. Contrast him with Barnes -Newcome, and you have all the difference<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[45]</span> -between black and gray. All Thackeray’s -bad people are irredeemably bad, and all his -good people hardly want wings to fit them -for the angelic sphere. It is true, his female -angels do not inspire us with a very ardent -yearning for the joys of Paradise, if they -are to be shared in such extremely insipid -and melancholy society. Eternity with -Amelia and Laura Pendennis and Lady -Castlewood could not be described as a -captivating perspective.</p> - -<p>But Mr. Meredith must not be acquitted -of any pronounced sins against reality. -English taste is such, and its restrictions -and exuberances are so little in accordance -with life as it is lived by even those who -paint it falsely, that it is impossible for -the English novelist to escape sins of the -sort. In general, Meredith is sufficiently -just to humanity in its faults and in its -virtues; it is only when its oddities catch -hold of his fancy that he runs riot, and -surpasses nature; only then is he apt to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[46]</span> -overdraw his account upon the bank of -credulity.</p> - -<p>Take, for example, Mrs. Berry, whom -Mr. Le Gallienne, in a recent interesting -study of Mr. Meredith, describes as a character -that would have been a feather in -Dickens’ cap. Doubtless, but that is not a -compliment to Mr. Meredith, for what might -do honour to Dickens cannot be said to be -worthy of him. Mrs. Berry is witty and -original to an alarming degree. She is a sort -of compromise between Mrs. Quickly and -Juliet’s nurse; not quite so coarse as either, -perhaps, but more exhaustively garrulous and -obtrusive. In the fifteenth century she might -have been possible and pleasant, but not so -in ours. She is an anachronism that we -resent. The fault may be with us, but the -fact remains, that we could not tolerate a -Mrs. Berry in the flesh. Of such a servant -a man of genius, or one of a humorous turn, -might be glad as a study; but can we -imagine lending a patient ear to her free<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[47]</span> -speech, a stately and solemn old English -gentleman, if capable of understanding what -we call humour, only in its highly starched -and faultlessly correct form? A student of -mankind, certainly, after a certain prejudiced -fashion, especially convinced of the inferiority -of woman, as it behoves a poor gentleman -who has suffered grievous wrong at the hands -of a daughter of Eve; but one whose collar -laughter is never likely to wrinkle or crush, -and whose features under no temptation can -relax into anything broader than a grim -stiff smile. Picture this paternal prig and -polished library philosopher being entertained -by Juliet’s nurse and Falstaff’s landlady, and -pronouncing both to be excellent women!</p> - -<p>A gentleman who loved his Lamb and -relished his Dickens would put up with her -for the sake of her wit and originality, accepting -her as a possible character, which I am -not disposed to do. But no young girl, with -even less of Lucy’s refinement, could submit -to her gross indelicacy in that scene between<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[48]</span> -them in the Isle of Wight. We know how -reticent and shy young girls have become -since Juliet’s day; still more so young brides -with the most intimate of their sex—their -mothers and their sisters; how easily affronted -are their susceptibilities by the slightest -trending towards ground that they so -savagely regard as sacred. It is as much as -one’s life is worth almost to speak to a very -young bride about her married life; above all, -if she be deeply enamoured of her husband, -and for her mother to seek to unveil it would -be a sacrilege. Mr. Meredith, who makes -straight for nature divested of the swaddling -clothes of sentimentality, and prefers her -mud to the sentimentalist’s spangles and -pink clouds, will perhaps say that the excess -of delicacy to which naturally sensitive and -fastidious womanhood has let itself be trained -is artificial, unhealthy, and absurd. I do not -dispute that a little more of savage candour -would be an improvement to women, and -that excessive delicacy leads them by a very<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[49]</span> -apparent slope into pruriency. But honesty -and candour, with modesty, are surely better -than either without it, and if, for the sake of -honesty and candour, we show ourselves -willing to dispense with an excessive modesty -for that of naturalness, surely we must lose -one of the nameless, and not the least, charms -of maidenliness! This reproach I make to -Lucy is not only in the case of her tolerance -of Mrs. Berry’s coarse talk, but in the occupation -it enters her mind to allot her undeclared -lover, Lord Montfalcon. I reproach, -in fact, Mr. Meredith, with the entire creation, -all the more so as she is the only girl -he has drawn upon the old wearisome lines of -masculine taste, of the eternal old-fashioned -ivy-type, commonplace, loving and pretty, -without character or interest apart from her -second in the immortal duet with his breathless -hero. She is charming, as all creatures -lovely to look upon and purely natural must be -charming; but the freshness of youth and the -pleasant daisy-and-buttercup flavour vanished<span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">[50]</span> -with the years and increasing domestic cares, -what would there have remained in her to -interest us and satisfy a soaring nature like -Richard’s? The affair of the cookery-book -irritates and displeases us as much as it did -her husband in the period of the moon of -bliss, and the only satisfaction we extract -from it is the inimitable wise youth’s witty -description of it in his letter to Lady Blandish. -Bret Harte’s speculative vision embraced -a disastrous sequel to the union of -the Judge and Maud Muller of Whittier’s -poem, and we may be permitted to picture -Lucy twenty years after, with a bunch of -keys at her waist, still studying the cookery-book, -strong in the fabrication of preserves -and home-made medicines, superintending her -children’s studies, and arching mournful and -uncomprehending brows at the moral and intellectual -vagaries a man like Richard would -be certain to develop. An admirable wife -and mother, but an inadequate study.</p> - -<p>It has been remarked that for Mr. Meredith’s<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[51]</span> -readers there is no half-way house -between uncompromising hostility and discipleship. -You either bend before him as -your master—imperfect at times, genius -having its limitations as all things else that -are human, but great in his very imperfections—or -you reject him utterly. How -those who reject him can manage to -reconcile it to their conscience, I am at a loss -to understand. But this proves the texture -and quality of his influence. It is immense or -it is nought. And by this pronounced feeling -he evokes may he be classed as the founder -of a school. He has introduced a new -element into English literature—a healthy -and purely philosophic realism, which differs -as widely from the realism of Fielding as it -does from that of Zola. To French wit he -brings German profundity of thought, the -whole wrought into a thoroughly Saxon -setting. Vividness of conception, intensity -of vision, and strength of diction—combine -these qualities, and you have English such as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">[52]</span> -no other writer has given us. It is beautiful, -with a beauty all its own, and there seems to -be no feat of which it is not capable. He -has ransacked our language until he has -wrought it, through a process of bewildering -originality, into a flexibility, a forcible -simplicity, a majesty and rhythm that, in his -prose, surpass poetry. Never before have -we received such a lesson in the unimagined -resources of language. Never before did we -so understand how written words may be -made to seize us, fell us, captivate us, make -vivid and tangible to our mind every image, -every trick of person, every hue and aspect -of nature. He does not describe or paint: -he simply vitalizes inanimate objects. And -if he had not made us his debtor in any -other way, we must thank him for his great -and perfect disciple, Mr. Robert Louis -Stevenson.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[53]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER III.<br /> - - -<small>THE NOVELS OF GEORGE MEREDITH: ‘RICHARD -FEVEREL’ AND ‘RHODA FLEMING.’</small></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="smcap">As</span> this little book is written for those who -have the misfortune not to be acquainted -with the novels of Mr. Meredith, I do not -think it will be inadvisable to add to my -essay a slight sketch of each one, hoping -thereby to send readers to the head source. -Those who allow themselves to be persuaded -thereto will have reason to thank me, even -should they be among the common majority, -unable to appreciate to its full value the new -chapter in English literature offered them.</p> - -<p>Much mention has been made of ‘Richard -Feverel,’ the novel of Mr. Meredith’s youth, -and, we are told, his own special favourite.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[54]</span> -The plot of this powerful story turns from a -mixture of graceful mirth, delicious wit, and -profound reflection, to tragedy, upon what I -humbly conceive to be an impossible situation. -And this is the sudden separation of -Richard from his young bride. But after -noting the crudities and errors of taste and -judgment, which are frequent enough in the -book, and which never once hide from us -the lambent flame of genius that steadily -burns through the whole, our fear is lest our -desire to praise adequately should drop us -into hyperbole. It is so much easier to -blame than to praise with taste—above all, to -praise judiciously. Our wits will always -devise fresh methods for a successful use of -the whip of censure, but in admiration it is -less easy to get beyond the exclamatory -period, and the end of simple epithets is soon -reached.</p> - -<p>The stamp of a breathless originality lies -upon each character, however minor, and -commingled in their creation is an indescribable<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">[55]</span> -mixture of weight and delicacy, of solid, -massive strength and finish to a hair’s -breadth—the finish of a purely-cut cameo. -Of the wise youth, that delightful cynic, -turning to obesity, and devoted to his -stomach, it would be impossible to say -enough. Every sentence, long and short, -that he utters is a gem of matchless and -irresistible wit. Adrian Harley’s wit is -unique, and beside him Sheridan himself -must be content with a lower place. If he -breeds a sceptical thought in our breast, it is -the doubt that any man in real life could be -so continuously and unpremeditatedly witty -throughout a reasonably long record of -utterances. Though not purposely a leading -character, he becomes so by force of his own -individuality, and the pronounced part he -plays in the development of Richard’s career.</p> - -<p>The story opens with a description of the -inmates of Raynham Abbey, the seat of Sir -Austin Feverel, the hero’s father. This -quaint individual is introduced to us as the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[56]</span> -anonymous author of a notable book, ‘The -Pilgrim’s Scrip,’ with one aphorism of which -we are startled on the first page: ‘I expect -that woman will be the last thing civilized by -man.’ We see at once that we have to deal -with a gentleman who, like Plato and -Schopenhauer, and a long list of intervening -philosophers, holds the amiable sex in scorn. -Here we have ‘the imperfect animal’ of the -one and ‘the ugly sex’ of the other more -courteously, but not less contemptuously, defined. -There is no pretension to novelty, for -he admits that ‘our new thoughts have -thrilled dead bosoms.’</p> - -<p>Reading further, we discover the clue to -his scorn of woman. The poor gentleman -has been wronged upon his hearth, and is a -widower while yet his wife lives. He once -had a wife he loved devotedly, and a friend, -a poet, whom he trusted. The one betrayed -his love and the other his confidence. The -story is not new, but novel indeed is its effect -upon Sir Austin Feverel. Bankrupt in love<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[57]</span> -and friendship, he fell upon bitterness. To -keep his heart alive, while presenting a mask -of indifference to intimates and relatives, he -concentrated all his hopes upon his baby boy, -and, for the child’s ultimate misfortune, resolved -to found a system for his benefit. But -he wishes his paternal tenderness to remain -unsuspected by others, and dismisses the -nurse who caught him sobbing over his son’s -cradle.</p> - -<p>The inmates of Raynham are certainly a -queer collection of specimens: Hippias, once -thought to be the genius of the family, but a -premature victim to strong appetites and a weak -stomach, living in the embraces of dyspepsia, -and engaged in a perpetual contention with -his dinner. Algernon Feverel, whose career -as a gentleman of the Guards lay in his legs, -until it was irrevocably cut short by the loss -of one on a cricket-ground, when he devoted -himself to the direction of his nephew’s -animal vigour ‘with a melancholy vivacity.’ -A venerable lady, known as Great-Aunt<span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">[58]</span> -Grantley, who spent the day preparing for -dinner and the night in remembering it. -Mrs. Doria Forey, the baronet’s eldest sister, -who fixed herself at the Abbey with the -intention of marrying her only daughter, -Clare, to the Hope of Raynham. There are -two other Feverel ladies, known as the -mothers of two remarkable sons, one our -delightful wise youth, Adrian Harley, and -the other, Austin Wentworth, a noble youth, -who had nobly redeemed a common fault in -the lives of young men, by marriage, and -‘was condemned to undergo the world’s harsh -judgment, not for the fault—for its atonement.’ -‘Adrian was noted for his sagacity, -which carried the world, but brought him no -friends. His problem for life was to satisfy his -appetites without rashly staking his character.’ -He was polished, luxurious, and happy at the -cost of others, and, while pursuing the maids -of earth, enjoyed a reputation for virtue. -The world declared him moral and wise, -‘and the pleasing converse every way of his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[59]</span> -disgraced cousin Austin.’ And we ever greet -him cordially, for all his vices, and the -‘edge to his smile, which cuts much like a -sneer.’</p> - -<p>In this varied domestic circle Richard is -brought up, the victim of a system. He was -carefully kept from the corruption of public -schools, and destined to enter upon manhood -immaculate and perfect. On his fourteenth -birthday we meet him in revolt against the -system, and flying with his serf, Ripton, from -a medical examination proposed by his father, -who understands physical perfection to be -wedded to moral perfection. Ripton tells -him that his sentiments are those of a girl, -whereupon the lads quarrel, as only boys and -other barbarians quarrel, and make it up in -gallant fashion when they hear voices coming -in their search. Their running leads them to -trespass, and brings them into ugly collision -with one Farmer Blaize, who gives them a -taste of the whip, and thus rouses a passion -of indignation in Richard’s breast. He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[60]</span> -threatens to shoot the farmer, and instead -conspires for revenge by arson. Here we -are introduced to a silent and unobtrusive -little maid, Richard’s cousin Clare, who -passes through the book a maidenly phantom, -only tragically revealed to Richard and to us -by her death and sorrowful little diary. Her -offence with Richard on his birthday for his -neglect of her, and her penetration at night -into his chamber, is the second occasion in -her short life for departing from the curious -negation and reserve of her character. She -drifts with circumstances, guided by her -mother, and holds her tongue. Of her feelings -and sentiments we are in the dark, until -the despair of silence stretches her upon her -deathbed in search of rest. Silent, white, -not understood, she remains for us the most -pathetic figure in the book. Neither she nor -the author choose to court our sympathies -by any of the ordinary sensational methods, -and her cold pride and his reserve are equally -powerful in securing them.</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[61]</span>Meanwhile, the conspiring Richard, unmindful -of Clare, is exciting profound reflection -in the bosom of the wise youth. ‘My -respected chief,’ the latter apostrophizes Sir -Austin, ‘combustibles are only the more dangerous -for compression. This boy will be -ravenous for earth when he is let loose, and -very soon make his share of it look as foolish -as yonder game-pie!’ Hearing Sir Austin -make the round of the house at night, he remarks: -‘A monomaniac at large, watching -over sane people in slumber.’</p> - -<p>Sir Austin, marching onward, hears strange -talk, between his son and Master Ripton, of -fire and delay, and violence and vengeance, -when Sir Austin condescends to play the -spy. He discovers that the Hope of -Raynham has embarked in his own vessel -upon the waters of life. A sensation of -infinite pity overcomes the poor baronet, -asking himself what the years will do when -one day has done so much; but he is -consoled by the consciousness of his own<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[62]</span> -part of Providence to his son. Baited and -worried by his sagacious cousin, who -shrewdly suspects his guilt, Richard takes -refuge in lies. He lies upon a gigantic scale, -to the horror of his father and the amusement -of his cousin. But there is a fine and captivating -manliness in his lies. He is a -perfect boy in all his moods—an English boy, -barbaric, brave, and pure. Observing him, -Adrian says: ‘Boys are like monkeys, the -gravest actors of farcical nonsense that the -world possesses’—which philosophizing leads -him to Hamlet and Ophelia. ‘She, poor -maid! asks for marriage and smiling babes, -while my lord lover stands questioning the -Infinite and rants to the Impalpable.’ And -when reminded of his responsibilities as -Richard’s tutor, he replies: ‘I take my young -prince as I find him: a Julian or a Caracalla, -a Constantine or a Nero. Then if he will -play the fiddle to a conflagration, he shall -play it well; if he must be a disputatious -apostate, at any rate he shall understand logic<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[63]</span> -and men, and have the habit of saying his -prayers.’</p> - -<p>After the arson adventure, the shifts and -lies, the failure of a scheme to help Tom -Bakewell out of prison for his own crime, -confession, and the bitter cup of an apology -to Farmer Blaize, forced upon him by his -father, Richard comes through the first stage -of his ordeal a wiser and a better youth. -There is a solemn reconciliation between him -and the ruffled system-creator; tears, embraces, -and a new aphorism on the part of -Sir Austin: ‘Expediency is man’s wisdom; -doing right is God’s.’ Reviewing affairs in -an ingenuous letter to his fellow-conspirator, -Richard says of his future divinity: -‘Wherever there’s mischief, there are girls, -I think. She had the insolence to notice -my face, and ask me not to be unhappy. -I was polite, of course (British-boy fashion), -but I would not look at her.’</p> - -<p>This brings us to the blossoming and -critical season of the system. Behold him<span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[64]</span> -on the edge of youth, beautiful and strong -in body, guileless and pure. He takes to -blushing, long vigils, and consumes paper—all -dangerous signs. The father is distressed, -and orders him to burn his poetic -effusions, deciding, since the mention of love -is dangerous at this age, to put everyone -at Raynham on their guard. Servants in -love are dismissed, the others are ordered to -be discreet and avoid kissing. The visits of -a hopeless curate, in love with Mrs. Doria, -are interdicted, and this excellent lady is -ordered to remove her daughter from the -Abbey. In this virtuous solitude Richard -becomes wayward and miserable, rides like -fire about the country, and has discovered the -nothingness of all things. Adrian reports -him as extraordinarily cynical. He startles -Sir Austin in sentimental fooling with Lady -Blandish’s hand, and finds he has discovered -the secret of life. He discourses pensively -with other stricken males about women’s -names, and here we come upon the beautiful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">[65]</span> -introduction of Lucy, the second of the immortal -duet of Meredith. Who does not -remember that lovely passage beginning?—</p> - -<p>‘Above green, flashing plunges of a weir, -and shaken by the thunder below, lilies, -golden and white, were swaying at anchor -among the reeds.’ This preludes the divine -love-scenes, the sweet romance of boy and -maid, in a setting of fair landscape, described -as no other pen can describe English scenery. -To analyze these chapters, or select any -passages by preference, were as idle as to -attempt to catch a sunray or sketch a flying -cloud. They are written in sunlight to the -music of love. To quote from them would -be to spoil their beauty. As we read, it is -not only on Richard that the gracious glory -of heaven has fallen. We, too, are under -the spell, and, while we read on, remember -all we had thought forgotten and dead in the -fold of forgotten years.</p> - -<p>But Lucy is Farmer Blaize’s niece, and -consequently no match for a baronet’s son.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">[66]</span> -Sir Austin has gone up to London in search -of a bride worthy the high gift of his -son’s untainted youth. His adventures are -inimitably recorded. We delight in his interviews -with Lawyer Thompson, in his unmasking -of that harmless young scamp -Master Ripton, and, above all, in his discovery -of a suitable bride, when a few years -have been added, in the daughter of one -Mrs. Caroline Grandison, a female system-creator, -whom the author presents as less -amiable than her brother-perfecter of -humanity. ‘A perfect woman mirrored in -her progeny,’ Adrian describes her, and -admits that he would prefer her to her -progeny. The fates and his father conspire -awhile against Richard, and after separation, -illness and other discomposing events, he -outwits his enemies and runs off with a -bride of his own choice—Lucy, the rustic -maid.</p> - -<p>Up to this point the book is perfect. But -here comes the stumbling-block. Would a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">[67]</span> -youth, whose purity and innocence would be -sure to give added strength to his first -sweeping passion, in the middle of an ideal -honeymoon, still bewildered by his bliss, -allow himself, upon such a flimsy pretext as -his father’s indirectly-conveyed wish, to be -separated from his bride? To be kept for -months in London through the shallowest -subterfuges? Would either of this passionate -pair, seeing with the eyes of instinct that -never errs, submit to this absurd and unreasonable -separation? The Richard we -know would have found a way to balk his -elders and keep his bride by his side, or -he would have seen through the plot, and -would have flown back to her after a week’s -fretting and fuming in town. This would -mean the loss of a great and tragic scene—his -last parting with Lucy—though the probabilities -would not have been outraged. But -Shakespeare himself may incur such a reproach -and be not less great, and a poignant -situation may be reached by the road of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">[68]</span> -gross inconsistency and thrill us not the -less.</p> - -<p>Having so far assisted at the launching of -youth upon the waters of happiness, we are -invited to assist at something still more -interesting—Richard’s undertaking in the -reform of spotted woman, his fall, his repentance, -and his expiation. We are introduced -to many new characters who do not -edify us, but only one of whom is nearly -irredeemably bad—one satellite of a worthless -but not inhuman peer, the Hon. Peter -Brayder. We have met the famous Berry, -anciently the dismissed nurse, who caught -Sir Austin sobbing, and own to finding her -Dickensonian volubility and humour depressing -in the extreme. We greet her with a -grimace that does duty for a smile, which -broadens into cheerfulness upon her exit. -Much of the society of Mrs. Berry would, -we own, fit us for Bedlam. The book is so -living that it breeds the strong aversions -and preferences of actual existence. The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">[69]</span> -very air of reality about the woman provokes -an added weariness. We endure her -and listen to her as a living bore, wondering -when and where she will stop, without the -least inclination to skip a line devoted to -her prolonged and disconnected utterances. -The humour of her matrimonial differences -and of the final <i>dénouement</i> escapes us, but -we tolerate it as we tolerate the rest of the -infinite trials of life. In feeling that the -book would be better without her, we feel -it just as we feel that our sojourn in a -certain place, where we spent the summer or -winter, would have been the better for the -absence of some other tiresome sojourner, -that is all. We cannot remember the place -without remembering the obnoxious visitor. -So we cannot remember ‘Richard Feverel’ -without recalling Mrs. Berry—an excellent -woman, in the main, and an instrument of -reconciliation between Sir Austin and his -daughter-in-law; devoted, as bores usually -are, and full of all the virtues. Mr. Meredith<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">[70]</span> -loves her, and for that reason we make shift -to put up with her. But we could wish her -less obtrusive, and, above all, less garrulous -and gross.</p> - -<p>Richard’s experiences in town, illuminated -by the mild lamp of Adrian’s wit, carry us -along with him. He claims our undivided -sympathies whenever he appears, and we are -not sorry to have him to ourselves without -his bride. Lucy may conquer the wise -youth by the cookery-book, but as we are -not invited to eat of her dinners, we prefer -the unedifying sight of Richard upon the -Thames and dining with guardsmen and -light ladies at Richmond, or escorting his -Sir Julian by way of conversion of that -indecorous lady to the path of virtue. We -like less Lady Judith, the ardent female -Radical who married a decrepit lord to carry -out her principles, and took Richard in hand, -until he succumbed, upon champagne and -song, into the arms of the siren. The -father who had given him to the world an<span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">[71]</span> -immaculate youth was the first instrument of -his fall. He desired him to see what Adrian -calls the ‘demi, or damned monde,’ before -entering upon housekeeping—an amiable -desire on the part of a virtuous old gentleman.</p> - -<p>After his fall, Richard awakes to a state of -desperate remorse, and disappears to a -remote part of Germany. He has found his -mother, as well as perversion where he had -intended to convert, had discovered the sad -little secret of his cousin Clare in her death, -and now ‘he is trying the German waters, -preparatory to his undertaking the release of -Italy from the subjugation of the Teuton,’ -in company with the sentimental politician, -Lady Judith Felle. When questioned about -him, Adrian says ‘he was going to reform -the world—unfortunately he began with the -feminine side of it. Cupid, proud of Phœbus -newly slain, or Pluto, wishing to people his -kingdom, put it into the soft head of one of -the guileless, grateful creatures to kiss him<span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">[72]</span> -for his good work. Oh horror! he never -expected that. Conceive the system in the -flesh, and you have our Richard. The -consequence is that this male Peri refuses to -enter his paradise, though the gates are -open for him, the trumpets blow, and the -fair unspotted one awaits him fruitful within.’ -He views his fault as a pure woman would, -and though knowing of Sir Austin’s reconcilement -to his marriage and his bride, -learning, too, of his paternity, he shrinks -from returning to her as unworthy. The -scene in the German forest, after he learns -the news, is most beautiful, and a worthy -prelude to that grandly tragic last scene -between Richard and Lucy, when, upon -his return, he discovers the plot to ruin his -wife, in which the baleful enchantress proves -the most respectable and honest of the -actors. Richard has challenged her husband, -Lord Montfalcon, and hurries down -to Raynham, where the fatted calf is ready, -as well as numerous open arms, the kisses of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">[73]</span> -wife and child. The strength of this parting -scene is awful. We feel the wrench of it, -and the horror, and sorrow itself seems too -full for tears. After it the catastrophe of the -last chapter is smoothly bridged, and the -sadness of Lucy’s death and Richard’s rise -from a sick-bed, numbed with grief, is but a -softly-appropriate drop-scene.</p> - -<p>As a story, ‘Rhoda Fleming’ is, perhaps, -the simplest and strongest work of Mr. -Meredith. Certainly it is the best-told story -from the artistic point of view. Like -‘Richard Feverel,’ it ends tragically, only -here the tragic effects are not concentrated -upon the end. They pervade the entire -book, and the termination is led up to consistently -almost from the beginning, where -we meet the two sisters, with minds and -beauty above their sphere, and see them -silently watched by two young gentlemen. -The foreboding is unanalyzable, but it is a -foreboding, and we apprehend storm and -contention and sombre lights.</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">[74]</span>Sombre the book is throughout, and we -regard it as almost impertinent to yield to -the occasional pricks of humour that tickle -us into quiet laughter. How can we bear to -laugh at the oddities of mankind, even at the -bidding of such a master, when we see a -sweet and pure girl’s life going to ruin, and -understand that the very nature of her is -such that there is no return from the wreck, -no after-sunshine to restore the ravages of -storm? Here is no picturesque mingling of -lights and shadows, no lyrical romance, no -melodies of the upper spheres, to imperil the -dark remembrance of the <i>dénouement</i>.</p> - -<p>The very opening is shadowed. At a -village feast, when children danced upon a -mirthful May Day on a green, lapped in the -soft beauty of Kentish landscape, appeared a -young woman, who had left her home with a -spotted name, and who was left in silence -humbly apart. Dahlia Fleming, pitying her, -expresses to her father a wish to speak to -her. The father stoutly forbade her, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">[75]</span> -when Rhoda, the stronger, defied him, and -went and stood by the poor girl, he punished -her by not speaking to her for a week. And -the girls, reflecting on this, marvelled at the -cruelty of even the kindest men to offending -or repentant women. This is where Mr. -Meredith is so original and so just. It is -impossible to go far on the road of life without -being frequently confronted with the -unrecognised fact that it is men, and not -women, who are hardest and most cruel to -fallen women. It is they in their capacity -of householder who pronounce the verdict -of damnation, as this Kentish farmer did, and -it is soft and innocent women who, like these -country maidens, would fain offer them the -hand of sympathy and sisterhood. Mr. -Meredith never follows the beaten track of -generalities. When he gives us a generality, -it is one of his own discovery, and you may -depend upon finding a very sound truth at -the bottom of it.</p> - -<p>One of the drollest and completest of Mr.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">[76]</span> -Meredith’s odd characters is the uncle of -these girls, Anthony Hackbut, a mythical -millionaire, understood by the rustic mind to -be vaguely residing in London, and amassing -quantities of gold and genial banknotes. -The family look to him for elevation and -fortune. He passes for a miser because he -refused to advance the farmer one hundred -pounds in times of difficulties, and sowed -ill-will upon the death of the girl’s mother by -urging as plea his position of great trust in a -wealthy bank that prevented him from assisting -at his sister’s funeral; nobly offering, in -his opinion, to defray half the funeral expenses. -He referred to funds as worldly -things, and hoped to meet his family in -heaven, ‘where brotherly love, as well as -money, was ready made, and not always in -the next street.’ He ended by a hint of -susceptibility to the friendliness of an invitation -to spend a vacation in Kent, and -offered one of his nieces the post of housekeeper, -should she wish to see London, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">[77]</span> -make acquaintance with the world. The -seductions were fruit at stalls, oysters and -whelks and winkles, pictures in shops, sights -of muslin and silks, and rides on omnibuses, -with an occasional glimpse of the military -on horseback.</p> - -<p>Dahlia is surpassingly fair, and the -question of her departure is submitted to -grave deliberation in an assembly composed -of Farmer Fleming, held between a desire -to secure the miser’s money and a dread of -London for his daughter; Robert, the sedate -and handsome assistant, in love with the -dark Rhoda; Mrs. Sumfit, the cook, a very -fat and loving woman; and Master Gammon, -an aged foreman, with the cast of eye -of an antediluvian lizard, who remarked -‘that he never had much opinion of London.’ -Policy and Dahlia’s entreaties prevail, and -the fair girl goes up to the great city forebodingly, -we believe. It is like a division -of souls for the two sisters so devotedly -attached. A lovely miniature is sent down<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">[78]</span> -to Rhoda in secret, who marvels at its beauty -and at the secrecy. And the next paragraph -brings down to Kent old Anthony -Hackbut. The scene is inimitable. The -queer old fellow, with a disconcerting reserve, -tosses Dahlia off upon a charge of giddiness, -drinks his beer, because he has not paid for -it, propounds an arithmetical problem to -Master Gammon, who retorts ‘that he is -paid to work, and not to think,’ and continues -to eat his dumplings to the fret of nerves -of the watchers impatiently waiting for news -of Dahlia. We learn of vestiary elegances -and temper, and of an old man left to take -his tea alone; and, like Rhoda, we understand -the sadness of it and, unlike her, -suspect its meaning. It is the sadder because -of the farmer’s pride in his handsome -daughters, so greatly superior to their station, -and of a conviction that he will prove a -cruel judge when the hour for mercy comes. -Rhoda goes to London to rejoin her darling, -her one fear lest this sumptuously-attired<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">[79]</span> -young woman should be ashamed of her -rustic garb. Robert, a very masterful and -extraordinary young farmer, the intimate -friend of a major and a polished English -gentleman, the prize drinker in his own -village and a water-drinker here, a man of -double life and double character, and at the -same time single and truthful in both, has -already sharpened her acute sensibilities for -the penetration of doubt of Dahlia. She is -dropped into a bitter depth of brooding by -the fact that Dahlia is not there to meet her -when she arrives. It is late at night when -Dahlia comes to fetch away her mother’s -Bible, and finds her sister. The surprise -decides her destiny for that night. She stays -with her sister, and sends away the young -man waiting for her on the pavement -below.</p> - -<p>This young man is the son of Sir William -Blancove, in whose bank Anthony is employed -as a clerk. Thus had he met Dahlia, -to her cost. He and his cousin Algernon,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">[80]</span> -son of the neighbouring squire at Wrexham, -were the youths who stood watching the -girls one May Day feast. Algernon is a -flippant sinner of the well-known school, -generally beset with debts, and not much -troubled with morals. Edward, Dahlia’s -lover, is of other texture—of a perilous -superiority, cold-brained, legal, sharp, and -unyouthfully serious. They have a cousin, -Mrs. Margaret Lovell, whose part in the -story it is difficult to define. She does harm, -and sometimes appears to wish to do well. -Fabulously fair, brilliant and proud, she plays -with both young men, and seems to play the -mischief all round. In the first scene between -the youths we are dashed from a -conviction of Edward’s cynicism by a very -human and sincere cry: ‘Virtue, by heaven! -I wish I were entitled to preach it to any -man on earth.’ And yet this cry and the -flush are contradicted by his cold perusal of -Dahlia’s heart-broken letter explaining why -she sent him away alone. ‘The poor child<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">[81]</span> -threatens to eat no dinner if I don’t write,’ -he says, and we pity the girl doubly.</p> - -<p>After this it is no surprise to find Dahlia -abroad, and writing home letters breathing -frantic worship of the husband she does not -name. Rhoda’s trusting joy in the news is -pitiful—more pitiful still her loyal endeavour -to shield her beloved sister when the farmer’s -wrath explodes over an unsigned announcement -of the marriage. In reply to his cry, -‘Dahlia Blank! Who’s her husband? Has -he got a name?’ she protests: ‘She was -very hurried, father. I have a letter from -her, and I have only “Dahlia” written at -the end—no other name.’ ‘And you suspect -no harm of your sister?’ ‘Father, how can -I imagine any harm?’ And then the man -in his wretched perplexity appeals to Robert, -to whom he had hoped to marry Dahlia: -‘I’m shut in a dark room with the candle -blown out. I’ve a sort of fear you have in -that dilemma, lest you should lay your finger -on edges of sharp knives; and if I think a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">[82]</span> -step, if I go thinking a step, and feel my way, -I do cut myself, and I bleed, I do. Robert, -does this look like the letter of a married -woman? I can’t think for myself. She -ties my hands.’ To please Rhoda Robert -would have lied, and said it did. ‘Her -face was like an eager flower straining for -life,’ but all he could reply was, ‘She says -she’s married, and we’re bound to accept -what she says.’ His answer is remembered -wrathfully by Rhoda.</p> - -<p>Hearing that Edward is married to Dahlia, -Mrs. Lovell exclaims, ‘Impossible! Edward -has more heart than brains.’ She resolves -not to forsake him in his folly, which means -disaster for Dahlia, and ultimately for him. -A letter from Dahlia in London brings up -Rhoda to her, accompanied by this uncompromising -father. Lugubrious portent, Dahlia -is not visible to them when they call at her -lodgings. Her letter shows that she saw -them from the window. The next chapter -unfolds the mystery. Dahlia is weeping and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">[83]</span> -miserable, Edward uncomfortable and protesting. -Like young men who embark -lightly upon such perilous waters, he is irritated -by the discovery that women are -‘pieces of machinery that, for want of proper -oiling, creak, stick, threaten convulsions, and -are tragic and stir us the wrong way.’ By -way of medicine he suggests champagne and -the theatre. To the same theatre Algernon -and Dahlia’s family have gone, and we may -imagine the sensation of their recognition of -Dahlia in a box where Algernon has joined -his cousin to help the fainting girl. Algernon -only is seen, and is believed to be Dahlia’s -seducer. There is sorrow and the face of -stricken and humbled pride in the Kentish -farm upon their return. The farmer’s sole -aim now is to marry his remaining daughter -respectably and forget the sinner. The scene -between Rhoda and Robert, in which she -still implores him to say that he thinks Dahlia -innocent, is unforgettable—sharp, strong, and -conflicting. He is sorry for Dahlia, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">[84]</span> -ready to marry the woman he loves if she -will have him. Rhoda heard him not, ‘her -brain was beating at the mystery and misery -wherein Dahlia lay engulphed.’ She will -not marry a man who fancies he has anything -to pardon, and when he lamely protests -that Dahlia has nothing to do with her, -she bursts out: ‘We are one, and will be till -we die. I feel my sister’s hand in mine, -though she’s away and lost. She’s my darling -forever and ever. We’re one.’</p> - -<p>Pushed by admiration and love, Robert -unmasks himself. Some of his phrases have -a Shakesperean ring. He half conquers -the fierce, proud girl by a promise to help -Dahlia. He shows himself still stronger -in his interview with Squire Blancove, when -the farmer calls to accuse Algernon and beg -to have his daughter found; and still more -startlingly when he returns to his birth-place, -and dodges the young men, flinging -written and public insolences at them. Edward, -returned to his natural element, shows a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">[85]</span> -mixture of cynicism and lingering conscience -that he only loses in the fiery ordeal awaiting -him, when to his and our surprise he -finds himself in possession of a passionately-stirred -heart. In Robert’s native village, -where Edward is staying, we meet one -slimy wretch called Sedgett, who is destined -to be the hero of a horrid conspiracy against -Dahlia. Everyone seems to be more or less -mixed up in it—Robert, Rhoda, and Farmer -Fleming with a sense of duty, Algernon in -idle villainy, Mrs. Lovett through intrigue, -and Edward as a door of escape from his -own responsibilities. Was ever one poor -unhappy girl so beset by friends and foes and -cruel circumstances to drive her to madness? -On the part of her family, strength and -stern tenderness resolve for her greater -misery; on that of Edward, vanity and -cowardice. Abandoned, she falls ill, goes -to a hospital, and comes out a broken flower, -permanently bent by the storm. What -refuge in the eyes of those who unkindly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">[86]</span> -desire her good is there for her but marriage—with -any man whose name she may bear? -As for Edward, in his profound remorse and -repentance, all Kentish faces are turned ruthlessly -against him, against his offer of atonement, -and poor Dahlia’s cry for his tenderness. -Rhoda is his fiercest and most pitiless -enemy. Dahlia’s letters to him have been -suppressed by Algernon, who himself has -pleasurable visions of marriage with the -victim’s sister, and the wild ramping life of -the colonies. The general decision is that -Dahlia shall marry the loathsome yokel -Sedgett, without any thought of the barbarous -sacrifice, worse than death for her. -And the ruffian is to get a thousand pounds -for taking this tarnished jewel—such is the -morality of the majority. Pass a woman -straight from illegal arms into those of a -husband, and you wash her white. The legal -repetition transforms the position into virtue.</p> - -<p>Edward himself, though desirous of the -conclusion, is wounded and astonished by it.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">[87]</span> -Dahlia’s silence startles him, and he continually -asks for her letters. He cannot help thinking -of her while seeking the distractions of -Paris to forget her. Never for one moment -does he alienate our sympathies completely, -and we understand from the beginning that -he is neither a vulgar sinner nor cynic. -Indeed, it is with a sense of personal satisfaction -that we greet his return to England, -resolved upon a courageous and manly -atonement—a changed man, unable to get -the thought of his unfortunate victim out of -his head. In that fine interview with his -father we are proud that he has surpassed -our predictions of him, and we wish he -would be left to warm the poor heart he -has chilled to stone.</p> - -<p>But Rhoda is there to shield her sister -from what she regards as perfidious tenderness. -Nothing will induce her to believe in -the sincerity of Edward’s repentance, nor -accept his atonement. The unhappy girl, -between all these ill-advised friends and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">[88]</span> -protectors, is forced to an abhorred ceremony, -where at the church door she is submitted -to the indignity of being flung off by the -ruffian who has married her for money. Is -this human retribution? for it is worse even -than God’s! When later Sedgett comes -down to Kent to claim his scorned wife, -Dahlia, to escape him, drinks poison, and -when Edward comes, showing upon his pallid -face the touch of wasting grief for all the -wringing sorrows brought about by his own -temporary baseness, and Rhoda, melted to -him, calls her sister down to happiness, -Dahlia is found by the side of the bed, -‘inanimate and pale as a sister of death.’ -She is brought back to life, but not to happiness. -Wasted and weak, passion in her was -extinguished, and neither the touch of her -lover’s hand nor his voice could ever again -thrill her. Robert and Rhoda marry, but -neither Edward nor Dahlia marry. Her -heart was among the ashes, and her last -words to Robert are, ‘Help poor girls!’</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">[89]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER IV.<br /> - - - - -<small>‘EVAN HARRINGTON,’ ‘THE ADVENTURES OF -HARRY RICHMOND,’ ‘SANDRA BELLONI,’ -AND ‘BEAUCHAMP’S CAREER.’</small></h2> -</div> - - -<p><span class="smcap">The</span> atmosphere of ‘Evan Harrington’ is -neither that of sombre passion nor poignant -pain. It has none of the lyrical outbursts -that thrill us in ‘Richard Feverel,’ and we -are spared in it any violent shaking of the -soul. We are allowed to view life more -temperately, and follow the fortunes of the -characters with an undisturbed exercise of -philosophic calm and judgment. A delicious -humour colours it throughout, and we are -back upon the old sea of metaphors that the -writer had nearly drifted from in the simple, -undecorated strength of ‘Rhoda Fleming.’<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">[90]</span> -We are tossed about upon its topmost -sprays, that sometimes drench us and leave -us in wonder whether the author will -suddenly get serious and, to use one of his -own figures, announce that the curtain has -fallen upon this particular part of his performance, -and expect us to cry, ‘What an -exciting game it has been!’ Could anything -be more boisterous than the description of -the great Mel, the tailor of Lymport? -There is a Homeric exaggeration about him -that fascinates while it bewilders. Was ever -such a man drawn since the days of mythological -heroes? Great ladies loved him; he -dressed himself up as a footman, and thought -nothing of setting a house on fire for the -privilege of carrying in his arms a titled -beauty. He was the guest and boon fellow -of lords, and he measured them; he was a -tailor, and he kept horses; he had gallant -adventures, was preposterously handsome -and big and glorious; he shook hands with -his customers, and was never known to have<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">[91]</span> -sent in a bill. The writer remarks: -‘Such a personage comes but once in a -generation, and when he goes, men miss the -man as well as their money.’</p> - -<p>We do not make the acquaintance of the -great Mel, but his spirit haunts the scenes of -his turbulent career, and we learn of him -through fabulous reports and a family of -handsome and distinguished daughters, and -one son, Evan. All inherit their father’s -physical and natural superiority. They pass, -as to the manner born, into the upper sphere, -and comport themselves in that select circle -with dignity and ease. Behind them in the -town of Lymport the tailor’s shop, with the -name of Harrington upon the door, exists, -carried on by the great man’s widow as a means -of liquidating his debts. It is the successes -and disturbances, the intrigues and exposure -of this superior family—born for greatness but -not to it—that the book records; and never -was genius more untiringly and extravagantly -used than in the combined efforts of these<span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">[92]</span> -three lovely ladies and their brother to conceal -the family origin and pass for people of -blood. The partial success that crowns their -efforts is but an inadequate return for such -an expenditure of brain in well-conceived -and audacious contrivances. People born -with a soul above buttons cannot be blamed -for every laudable effort to find their way -into their natural element! Imagine a -single rose-bush bearing flowers of exceptional -beauty in a cabbage-garden, and you -will have the incongruous effect of the -tailor’s daughter, the Countess de Saldar, in -a middle-class drawing-room. Grand manners -and aristocratic habits were hers, not by -right of breeding or blood, but simply by -right of nature. So we sympathize with her -in all her graceful and unapproachable intriguing -to maintain herself in a society to -which she had won entrance by her own unaided -genius.</p> - -<p>Contrast the genial spirit in which the -writer records the adventures and difficulties<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">[93]</span> -of this splendid charlatan with the spirit in -which Thackeray has painted us his wonderful -Becky Sharpe—the broad, half-smiling -approval of the more modern satirist, with -the ferocity of hate of his great predecessor. -Not only does Mr. Meredith admire the -woman’s genius for intrigue, but he brings -sympathy and affection to the task of making -her intelligible to us. So far from seeking -to make her odious to us, as Thackeray deliberately -does in the portrayal of Rebecca, -he leaves it impossible for us to judge her -more harshly than he himself does. Wherever -she is, we know that we cannot be dull, -and we are amused and captivated enough to -be willing to dispense with the chill atmosphere -of perfect morality and candour. He -does not pursue her with a relentless exposure -of her inmost vices. He preaches no -moral after the fashion of the English -novelist, and he takes his intriguing heroine -as he finds her—an excellent study in which -he delights. She is no vulgar hypocrite, like<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">[94]</span> -Becky, under the mask of a fine lady. Born -in the sphere to which she feels she justly -belongs, she would simply have been a great -lady with uncommon diplomatic abilities and -with a genius in the shading and splitting of -social niceties. Forced to play the part of -adventuress, she plays it grandly, and never -shabbily. All her marvellous capacities are -directed to the concealment of the family -shame and to the maintaining of her sisters -and brother in the eminence to which they -have risen. She is a generous schemer, for -her family are included in her enormous ambition. -It is not for herself individually, but -for the family of the Harringtons, for their -united glory and stable position that she so -unweariedly plots and intrigues and lies. The -three daughters of the great tailor have respectively -married a major, a wealthy brewer, -and a Portuguese count. Caroline, the -beauty, is unhappy as the major’s wife, and -finally reaches the climax in exaltation by -making the conquest of a duke. Evan now<span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">[95]</span> -becomes the hope of the family, and it is on -his fortunes, his efforts to appear a gentleman, -seconded by his sister’s (the countess’s) -efforts to penetrate into English aristocratic -society, and secure an heiress for her brother, -that the story runs.</p> - -<p>The heiress in whose pursuit Evan is -carried off to Portugal to learn the management -of his mouth, how to dress his shoulders -and to direct his eyes, is Miss Rose Jocelyn, -one of Mr. Meredith’s brave and loyal girls, -with a sweet spice of naturalness in her -virtues and in her defects, if she can honestly -be said to possess any. In her train we find -Evan returning to England, clad like a -wandering don in sombrero and cloak. -Rose’s expressed dislike of tradespeople -gives him a hankering to announce himself -as such, which honest intention the countess -resolves to thwart, and is herself thwarted by -Providence in the shape of a brother tailor, -who comes aboard the <i>Jocasta</i> to announce -the great Mel’s death, and both ruins and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">[96]</span> -saves the situation by mention of a shop and -a uniform. Evan’s experiences on the road -and in the shop are drawn in Mr. Meredith’s -best style, and we are introduced to one of -his oddities, Tom Cogglesby, and also to the -suffering countess in low society. On his -way up to London Evan is engaged in an -ugly fight in an inn, where he comports himself -as the only gentleman, and those born to -the title as cads—not an uncommon exchange -of <i>rôles</i>. He meets Rose, and instead of -London he, with his guide and protectress, -the incomparable countess, turns to Beckley -Court, the home of Rose’s parents. Here -the countess has a field worthy her great -talents. To keep her footing firm, to guide -Evan through the briars of a false position, -and help him to win Rose, whom he honestly -loves—this is no small undertaking with such -combined forces against her. Lady Jocelyn -calls her ‘a female euphuist, euphuism in -woman being the popular ideal of a duchess.’</p> - -<p>The pronounced comedian in a book where<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">[97]</span> -all the characters pertain more or less to -comedy, is Mr. John Raikes. The tricks -that are played on this young man by fortune -and by men are innumerable, and there is -perhaps a flavour of Dickens about him in -the prolonged burlesque he plays. His -burlesque lovers’ quarrels and the countess’s -intrigues fill the middle of the book, -until Evan breaks his neck in a breakneck -leap.</p> - -<p>Here is an opportunity for the countess, -which she uses to some purpose. Unfortunately, -she is felled by a stroke of fate, and -her origin is exposed at a dinner-table with -the duke. The little shadow of tragedy -peeps here in the married misery of Caroline, -the most beautiful of the sisters, and beloved -of the duke. The fortunes of hero and -heroine are fluctuating, and on the whole -better for Evan than might have been expected. -He is known to be a tailor, and -yet the half-engaged lover of a beautiful -heiress, and the guest of her parents. It is<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">[98]</span> -true, the widow of the great Mel, bent upon -honesty, imperils the situation, and Evan -completes the work by taking upon himself -one of the countess’s crimes, is rejected by -Lady Jocelyn, and leaves Beckley Court -under a cloud, only believed in by Juliana, -Rose’s rival. The fifth act finds him in -London studying tailordom, offered the protection -of Caroline’s duke. Juliana, the -heiress of Beckley, desperately and vainly in -love with him, dies leaving him Beckley -Court and all her possessions. Here is a -comical reversal of things, and an opportunity -for clearing away all doubts of him by one -sweeping act of generosity. Rose is engaged -to his rival, Laxley, and when her father -hears that Evan renounces the estate, and -exclaims, ‘He must have the soul of a -gentleman! There’s nothing he can expect -in return, you know,’ cuttingly retorts, ‘One -would think, papa, you had always been -dealing with tradesmen.’ The end may be -anticipated: marriage for Rose and Evan,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">[99]</span> -and the consolations of the Church of Rome -for the dear countess.</p> - -<p>‘Sandra Belloni’ and ‘Harry Richmond’ -are two of Mr. Meredith’s pictorial and melodious -novels. Pictures and song abound in -them, and breathless vivifying races with -passion. Writers are not uncommonly -enamoured of their heroines, and while none -of his can claim a lack of sympathy and admiration -on Mr. Meredith’s part, there are -three that stand out as rivals for the post of -his heart’s beloved. In different ways, all -leading to the one source, like the various -roads to Rome, is he equally the recording -lover of Emilia or Sandra, Clara Middleton -and Diana. These are his trio of perfect -and bewitching women—not perfect in the -wooden or puppet sense, but perfect with -the lovely perfection of nature steeped, in the -case of two, in the unanalyzable social charm -which he so well knows how to make us feel -and thrill to. Clara is the exquisite maiden -of upper England, who could never be imaged<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">[100]</span> -out of her social surroundings; Diana brings -to breeding an exhilarating dash of rebellious -Irish blood and a purity of body and mind no -less superlative than her younger sister’s; -and Emilia, unlike both, is all passion and -flame mounting on the swell of song.</p> - -<p>It is a long time since I read this entrancing -novel, and here in Paris, where I -write, it is not attainable for reperusal. -Hence many of the names of the characters -have escaped my memory, though I can -recall their personalities and actions vividly. -I am still impressed with the acquaintance -of a wonderful Greek—a Mr. Pericles, a -wandering millionaire, ready upon hearsay to -traverse Europe in the trail of undiscovered -musical genius. Staying at the country -house of one vulgar wealthy merchant, Mr. -Pole, he unearths something like it in the -voice of Emilia. The Pole family consists -of three of those inimitable, ambitious, and -diplomatic ladies that only Mr. Meredith -hitherto has drawn us. I forget their names.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">[101]</span> -There is a brother, Wilfred Pole, a cornet, -one of those limp and flaccid <i>jeunes premiers</i> -novelists and opera-composers are fond of -selecting to sing the sweetest tenor in duet -with the heroines. The hero of the novel, -as of the opera, is usually the heroine’s foil, -his unworthiness the shade against which -her splendour and strength shine. There -is a dreadful Irish widow, whose name I -certainly remember—Mrs. Chumps. This -awful creature is, like the Irishman of -English comedy, purely the result of Saxon -imagination dwelling upon our island without -the illumination of personal knowledge of the -race or the country. I have here in Paris -met a Scotchwoman who gravely informed -me that she was gathering materials for an -Irish novel, though she admitted she had -never been in Ireland, and her acquaintance -of Irish people is exclusively confined to -the few specimens of the race she had had -the misfortune to meet with abroad. I shall -be curious to see that novel when it appears,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">[102]</span> -and fancy she is not the first Britisher to -represent us to posterity upon materials for -observation so slight and so misguiding. -The only sympathy the lady mentioned -appears to bring to her gigantic task is a -partiality for a liquid as peculiar to the lowlands -and highlands of Scotland as to the -mountains and bogs of Ireland. May unlimited -quantities of whisky enlighten her -and enliven us! for she is bitten by a mighty -hatred of the nameless Celt. Under such -circumstances, barring the stimulus of mountain -distillery, the widow Chumps seems to -have been drawn. Her brogue savours more -of the Thames than of the banks of the Suir. -Such an Irish brogue is nowhere to be heard -in Ireland. And there is something curiously -alien to that country in her denseness and -want of sensitiveness, for we know that pride -and sensitiveness are the curses of the race. -She is an old flame of Pole’s—‘me Pole’ she -perpetually calls him, to the horror of the -refined daughters and the elegant cornet;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">[103]</span> -and as Mr. Pole has squandered her money -entrusted to him, he is obliged to endure her -overt tendernesses and force his children to -bow to her. This contest produces several -lively scenes, including the sequel when the -widow finds she is betrayed and cheated and -her Pole a bankrupt. Mr. Pericles adds to -the liveliness, and also one Lady Something, -who is almost in love with Wilfred, and plays -an ugly trick on him and on Emilia by -getting him to declare his passion for her -and his indifference to Emilia within the -latter’s hearing. The curtain drops on the -degradation of the gallant cornet and the -sorrowful enlightenment of Emilia. There is -also a tragic figure of an organist and impoverished -baronet, who loves one of the -ladies of the Pole establishment, and commits -suicide because she, loving him, must marry -for her family, and several lively social youths -and maidens and matrons, who act chorus, -wittily, epigrammatically, and sprightlily, as -Mr. Meredith’s chorus ever does. Then<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">[104]</span> -there are Italian politics—a favourite theme -with the writer—an attractive Welsh brother -and sister, and several unforgettable love-scenes; -notably, one great passionate love-scene -at Wilming Weir by moonlight, worthy -to rank with those matchless chapters in -‘Richard Feverel.’ The lover himself is -weaker and more pitiable than the average -young gentleman elected by the novelist to -pipe fluted sentimentalities to the sweet -thrilling note of the heroine; a man—or a -make-believe of man, which is by far the -commoner article, for true and real men are -rarer than true and real women, rare as these -be—who could doubt the delicacy of Sandra’s -passionate cry, ‘My lover!’ and who ‘could -pledge himself to eternity, but shrank from -being bound to eleven o’clock on the morrow -morning.’ Writers are sometimes compunctious -for the abasement to which they -have submitted their heroines, and spare -them the wedding-ring. Sandra does not -marry Wilfred, and we hear of ‘the mellowed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">[105]</span> -depth, the soft human warmth, which marriage -had lent to her voice,’ afterwards in Italy. -I forget whom she married, but I daresay -it was her Welsh lover, the noble Italian -enthusiast, blessed with a noble sister.</p> - -<p>‘Harry Richmond’ is truly a delightful -novel, and, next to ‘Richard Feverel,’ ought -to be the most popular of George Meredith’s -books. It is all wild adventure, bubbling, -bursting fun and lyrical outbursts. Impossible -to catch and analyse its charm. It is a -book written to weave a spell about youth -and sober age. Its exuberance is unparalleled; -not the exuberance of Dickens -or Lever, but a quaint and original exuberance -of the metaphysician and the poet taken -suddenly to football and nonsense verses. -He brings a relish quite other than that -of the habitual jester, fetches from his chest -wilder shouts of laughter, flings his ball, and -tosses off his verses with a sincerity and -ardour not known to those to whom such -things are in the ordinary way of life. Or,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">[106]</span> -at least, we are at liberty to imagine he -would, for few of us have had the privilege -of observing such a mixture as metaphysician -and poet at play. Who can ever forget the -inimitable and arch-impostor, Harry’s father, -Richmond Roy—his captivating personality, -his eccentricities, his feats, and his comet-like -passage across the sky of our imagination? -His life is a splendid comedy, though -occasionally the comic muse drops us into -farce as broad as any to be found in the -early English dramatists. We are not even -allowed to preserve a decorous gravity at the -recital and exposure of his woes and misfortunes. -Molière himself never devised a -broader farce than his <i>rôle</i> in the German -prince’s court and his expulsion therefrom. -And Shakespeare himself, had he written -nineteenth-century prose, could never have -given us a lovelier picture of a little German -princess and her English boy-lover, with all -the proper scenic effects and landscape -beauty. And what, pray, are the rough,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">[107]</span> -swearing old grandfather and Julia’s husband -if they be not English to the backbone, -brutally, faithfully English, like Squire -Western and a host of that school? They -are imaged to us pure eighteenth-century—barbaric, -powerful, big drinkers, and men of -mighty physique, with whom there is no -temporizing upon the domestic hearth nor -elsewhere. This is not comedy, but life. -English, too, are the scenes of Harry’s boyhood, -his life in the farm and in school, -where he makes the acquaintance of Walter -Heriot, in love with Julia, the schoolmaster’s -daughter, and his life-long boy-friend; and -afterwards the little wild gipsy girl, whom -Heriot betrays. All these pictures, vivid -and humorous, carry us irresistibly.</p> - -<p>Afterwards we touch a new chord when -the religious sea-captain carries off the lads -for the good of their souls, and one fine -morning we find them straying through a -lovely German forest, where they meet the -little German princess—divinest and most<span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">[108]</span> -witching of serious little maids—and Harry’s -father. The story is like real life, too complicated, -varying, and plotless for a brief -summary. Light and air and warm life-blood -quiver and flow through the chapters. -With the writer, we are mounted upon a winged -steed, and carried breathlessly through space. -The characters are too numerous for naming, -and yet all have their distinct and special -parts. If they are minor at all, it is simply as -the constant succession of faces through our -personal experiences are minor—that is, to us—but -not, we feel, in the part they individually -play. We understand acutely that -they are not there solely to please their -creator, and do his bidding like puppets. -They are not introduced to teach a moral or -propound a theory, or even consciously to -act as chorus. They are men and women, -rustics, clowns, and society men and women, -who have their distinct tastes, their distinct -utterances, and their distinct capacities. The -epigrammatist is never absent, and we are<span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">[109]</span> -always delighted to meet him or her. Of -course, an English commoner, however -wealthy, cannot marry the daughter of an -hereditary prince of Germany, and after many -adventures, heart-sorrows, and joys, the -countless intrigues of his father, a duel with an -Austrian prince (his rival), and the single kiss -of blessedness bestowed on him as upon Herr -Teufelsdroch, poor Harry returns to England -in the pursuance of an equally breezy career, -made up of wind and wave, of storm and -soft English sunshine. His father’s personality -tops him, and lends the element -of the grotesque to the gravity of his adventures. -We cannot take him seriously -with such a background.</p> - -<p>But Mr. Meredith does not wish us to -laugh unrestrainedly, and so he presents us -with a figure of exquisite unblemished pathos -in Harry’s sweet Aunt Dorothy, a lady we -can never remember without an odd sensation -about the throat. The glamour of -purity that makes no parade of coldness, of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">[110]</span> -divine unselfishness, of uncomplaining, scarcely-felt -suffering envelopes her like a veil of glory, -through which we rather define than perfectly -see her. She passes through the book -a beautiful ghost of pale womanhood, shedding -beneficent rays upon her path. As -a girl, finding her lover beloved of a weaker -sister, she pleads with him for her, and makes -an altar of her happiness for the younger -one. When the sister dies, after unhappy -wedded experiences, leaving a little boy, -Dorothy is the boy’s mother and the father’s -secret benefactor. She never marries, and -all her money is devoted to the anonymous -discharge of the arch-impostor’s debts, which, -in this spurious offshoot of royalty, we may -imagine were royal enough. The scene in -which this fact is revealed is, for fiction, of -superhuman strength—not the restrained -sense of modern art, but the battle-axe -strength of mediæval times. Harry marries -the squire’s heiress, his cousin Janet, and -deserves repose for the rest of his days.</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">[111]</span>Mr. Meredith has written one dull book. -‘Beauchamp’s Career’ would be almost unreadable, -other than patiently read as an -exhaustive political treatise, if it were not for -Mr. Romfrey and the face of Renée, that -brings the soft radiancy of a dream to bear -upon its intolerable dulness. Would not this -charming description make amends for much?</p> - -<p>‘A brunette of the fine lineaments of -the good blood of France. She chattered -snatches of Venetian caught from the gondoliers; -she was like a delicate cup of crystal -brimming with the beauty of the place.... -Her features had the soft irregularities which -run to rarities of beauty, as the ripple rocks -the light; mouth, eyes, brows, nostrils, and -bloomy cheeks played into one another -liquidly; thought flew, tongue followed, and -the flash of meaning quivered over them like -night-lightning. Or oftener, to speak truth, -tongue flew, thought followed: her age was -but newly seventeen, and she was French.’</p> - -<p>Beauchamp himself is an impossible fellow,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">[112]</span> -too wearisomely in earnest, of a single note, -which he twangs in a monotonous variety of -tones from morning until night. We fancy -at the start, after the ominous prologue, that -we are fronting a humorous adventure when -we find him a sailor lad, addressing his -challenge to the gentlemen of the French -guard. But unhappily we are not shown the -French guardsmen reading his missive, and -the episode falls flat. We feel we have been -deceived, and resent the deception. To -make up for it, we give our sympathies, such -as they are, to the uncle, a mixture of twelfth-century -baron and unintelligible Whig. He -relieves us of the monotony of Beauchamp’s -lance-breaking with society, and his extraordinary -conduct in his heart affairs. No -sympathy is due to a man who could go -prating politics through drawing-rooms and -missing two such women as Renée and -Cecilia Halkett to fall upon Jenny Denham. -Indeed, there are some chapters in the book -that provoke a sigh in the bosom of the conscientious<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">[113]</span> -readers for the useful art of skipping. -Noticeably those dealing with that -unmitigated old bore, Dr. Shrapnel, and his -everlasting letters. Mr. Romfrey suggested -that his speechifying nephew should be sent -into his element over in Ireland. But no Irish -speech-maker of the most pronounced stage -in the disease could ever match Beauchamp -by reason of the latter’s want of humour. -Irish orators off the Parliamentary stage and -the public platform are ready to laugh at -themselves and at each other, whereas -Beauchamp is in deadly earnest from six -o’clock in the morning until twelve o’clock -at night. Surely it can have been nothing -else but sheer weariness that forced the -writer to pitch his hero unexpectedly into -the Channel, and bring his career to an -untimely end. Never was catastrophe more -inexplicable, and from the artistic point of -view less justifiable, than Beauchamp’s death. -We wake as from a prolonged nightmare -with a gasp. Having failed to understand<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">[114]</span> -why he was there at all, we fail still less -to comprehend why he is knocked into -eternity in a single last page, and instead -of being touched, we are simply astounded. -Of a truth, the drawback to the book is its -politics incessantly harped upon. The -subject, treated in the high colours of -Dumas, of the plumed and sabred days, -carries a scent of intrigue and romance to -interest us; or the song and chapters of -revolt, conspiracy and revolution have our -hearts for a nod. What should we have -done had we waded through all this truly -English stuff of Whiggery, Toryism and -Radicalism, without the sweet refreshment -of those Venetian days—the night on the -Adriatic, and the lovely morning at sea -under the Alps? Or canvassing with this -tiresome hero without the society of that -amiable and amusing idiot, Lord Palmet, -whose mind runs to women, and who -murmurs before a virtuous voter in a local -institute, ‘Capital place for an appointment<span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">[115]</span> -with a woman’? This is the key of his mind -and his moods, but it is refreshing after the -dance young Mr. Beauchamp has led us, -and promises to lead us, to the end sans -intermission.</p> - -<p>He is not returned for Parliament, happily -for the country, and again we are rewarded -for our trials and patient endurance of them -by another glimpse, all too brief, of Renée -in her Norman home at Tourdestelle. This -is a delightful break, but the inconsequence -of Mr. Meredith’s characters! None of them -seem to know their own mind, neither the -men nor the women. At one moment we -find Beauchamp wanting to run away with -Renée, and Renée holding back. At another -Renée running off to Beauchamp, and Beauchamp -virtuously holding back. Again, -Cecilia awaits his proposal, and he is inexplicably -silent, though pushed to claim -her by inclination, interest and friends; when -he makes up his mind to propose, she is -off to Italy, engaged to a man she does not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">[116]</span> -love, knowing the man she loves was to -arrive the day of her departure to claim -her. Do some people act in this way out -of such a novel? We are constantly expecting -Beauchamp to wreck society and -create a revolution. Yet at the end his -uncle, the quaint, twelfth-century baron, -says: ‘He hasn’t marched to London with -a couple of hundred thousand men, and he -escapes what Stukely calls his nation’s scourge, -in the shape of a statue turned out by an -English chisel. No, we haven’t had much -public excitement out of him. But one thing -he did do: he <i>got me down on my knees</i>.’ -He married Jenny Denham and left a son -behind him. This is all he did besides.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">[117]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER V.<br /> - - - - -<small>‘THE EGOIST,’ ‘DIANA OF THE CROSSWAYS,’ -‘TRAGIC COMEDIANS,’ AND ‘SHAVING OF -SHAGPAT.’</small></h2> -</div> - - -<p><span class="smcap">But</span> however great and individual ‘Richard -Feverel’ and the other novels of George -Meredith may be, and however high a place -some of us may accord them in the collection -of books that, once read, become our daily -companions—a sort of mental sustenance -upon which we speedily learn to fall back -from sheer force of habit—not even ‘Richard’ -can be described as the most individual of -Meredith’s works. In it is no hint given -of the peculiar stand this new genius was -to take among modern writers. In it we -were not led to scent the great champion,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">[118]</span> -the mighty swordsman of woman, by his -commonplace Lucy and his silent Clare. -‘Richard Feverel’ was like a sun-burst, -broken with storm and strife, flashed upon -the insipidity of latter-day fiction and exposing -its perishableness. Of such a writer -anything and everything might justly be -expected, but even from him was ‘The -Egoist’ a surprise from which we have not -yet had time to recover.</p> - -<p>Here this subtle psychologist concerns -himself neither with plot nor passion; neither -with tragedy nor romance, nor with any of -what may be called the passional springs -of action and will. If ‘Richard Feverel’ -was an original and bewildering canter along -the highway of fiction, ‘The Egoist’ may be -described as a breathless charge into the -unknown, a direct and forcible challenge of -the unsuspected. Here we see mercilessly -unveiled civilized man, as he thinks and -feels, in the person of a handsome young -squire enjoying every advantage of nature,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">[119]</span> -fortune and birth. Nothing in him courts -rejection of our sympathies. He is not a -villain, and he is a polished, perfect gentleman, -well informed, well mannered, well -groomed, and exceedingly well mounted for -a more than spirited ride through the plains -and over the hills of experience. Such a -man as Sir Willoughby Patterne, of Patterne -Hall, in command of a rent-roll of £20,000, -the ordinary novelist, or even our old friends, -the great Immortals, could only conceive as -playing a successful and a triumphant part -through life. Why, in fact, should punishment -and humiliation of the lightest nature -pursue a youth in whom no vicious taste, -no fixed vice, is pronounced? And who but -a dissector so utterly merciless as Mr. Meredith -could find courage to drive his dissecting-knife -straight to the heart of the -conventional system, and qualify the unrevealed -disease of this graceful ornament of -county society by the ugly name of egoism? -the malady of the Ego? Who else but this<span class="pagenum" id="Page_120">[120]</span> -captain of woman could draw us maidens -bold enough to read the man and reject him, -in spite of the big social bribes he carries in -his hand? Ah, this is Mr. Meredith’s great -and original note, once he has relieved his -youthful soul of the romance of ‘Richard -Feverel.’ Woman is his study, especially -young militant womanhood, and what a -study he has made of her! Upon this -theme not a single male writer, living or -dead, since Shakespeare, can approach him, -and to it he brings modern subtle penetration -added to Shakespeare’s purely natural instinct. -Not only has he caught the bloom and poetry -of womanhood, and made her visible to us -to the soul—this were the achievement of the -poet and the artist of very exquisite perceptions; -but he has got at the very root -of her nature—quite another thing. Women -reading him gasp at his revelations, such as -they would never dare to make or dream, -so completely hedged round are they by the -conventionalities of fiction. When they take<span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">[121]</span> -to writing stories, they either set themselves -limitations in the portrayal of their female -characters stricter than their brothers, or to -hide their own ignorance of themselves (a -mystery for us as much as for men) set off -at a galloping pace into the realms of -improbability.</p> - -<p>In all fiction there is not another girl so -enchanting and healthily intelligent as Clara -Middleton—none described like her. In -addition to the attractions of birth, breeding, -and beauty which the writer thoroughly -relishes, are those of sensibilities that can -be delicate without affectation, a delightful -wit untainted by smartness, singular good -taste and tact, and honesty of soul. Here -is a sparkling young woman as clear as -daylight, as fresh as the morning dew, -beautiful to look upon, as Meredith’s women -always are, sweet and bewitching without -any shabby tricks of mind or habit, who at -the same time thinks for herself, a rare virtue -in the male novelist’s heroine. She is all<span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">[122]</span> -warm blood and variable moods, as befits -her age and sex, but never once untrue to -the finest instincts of maidenhood, and unerring -in her judgment. She is not perfect, -her accomplishments are not enumerated, we -never find her playing Beethoven or reading -the stars, and somehow, without one word -having been said upon the subject, we get -the impression that she is a young woman of -intellectual resources, and qualified to pronounce -upon subjects that engage the minds -of sages and artists, while the music of -youth runs blithely through her veins, and -her feet are nimble in a race with a school-boy. -It is her struggle with her lover, the -Egoist, that completes the interest of the -book.</p> - -<p>Here we have Mr. Meredith purified, -polished, complete, without any break in the -unity of his work, or any awkward twist in -the even flow of narrative, based solely upon -subtle and most delicate analysis. The -durability of such work is quite as obvious as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">[123]</span> -that of the best that has already withstood -the test of centuries, and when to-day’s -literature comes to be old-fashioned, ‘The -Egoist’ will still hold its place as a lasting -monument of psychological diagnosis.</p> - -<p>Of the story itself little need be said, as -it hangs upon a single situation unfolded in -one act after a short prologue introducing us -to the chief <i>dramatis personæ</i>. And can one -possibly hope to explain how this situation -is worked and twisted and unfolded—how -illuminated and ransacked to its most hidden -depths for the undiscovered clue of self, for -the unrevealed spring which prompts even -our everyday ‘yea’ or ‘nay’? To endeavour -to do so would be to undertake a -task only second to that of the writing of -‘The Egoist.’ Meredith, I should imagine, -would shrink from it. It is simply an -analysis of the Ego. The universal Ego -takes the polished and affable form of a -young English squire, the pink of perfection, -and highly commendable to ladies of fastidious<span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">[124]</span> -tastes, the eye of whose soul is turned ceaselessly -upon self. There he walks and sits -and talks before our newly-illuminated vision, -naked to the soul, each beat of the heart -discovered without its protection of flesh or -garment; not one single young man whom -we meet and part with in fiction, but the -large pervading personality of human existence -crystallized to one permanent shape—not -Sir Willoughby Patterne, of Patterne -Hall, but the soul of selfishness endowed -with a form that might just as well have been -yours or mine or our next-door neighbour’s. -This is Meredith’s most absolute triumph of -art, to which he brought all the resources -of his scientific knowledge of humanity—his -powerful phraseology and marvellous -metaphor.</p> - -<p>Other writers have drawn us pictures -enough of selfish men and selfish women. -They abound in the literature of all races, -selfishness being one of our commonest -defects. But Meredith has given a heart and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">[125]</span> -soul and mind to the vice; in fine raiment -and graceful proportions, smiled upon by the -undiscerning, he makes it tread the boards of -our common experience, with the blood and -nerves and muscles of manhood. This is an -achievement of which even a man of such -singular genius as his may be proud. Other -writers are happy when they succeed in -drawing a type—in immortalizing a single -character; but this one has done something -greater, more unique and more imperishable -still. Into space he enables us to stare, -marvelling, at something hitherto barely -suspected, now a tangible form with familiar -lineaments and unforgettable tones of voice, -a something that we dimly understand -rises up with us and lies down with us, gives -the stamp of meanness to our best endeavours, -and misleads us in our noblest aspirations. -Sir Willoughby is the personality of self that -floats subtly round us and centres all our -thoughts. It takes a masculine shape because -the course of the world, both civilized and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">[126]</span> -barbaric, is directed by the wheels of male -selfishness. Feminine selfishness has quite -another direction. It affects the domestic -circle, the persons and interests immediately -within its scope. It may bring added discomfort -to the immediate victims, but it -leaves the world without merrily indifferent, -conscious of superior strength that can always -laugh it down, with a vitality that cannot be -sapped and a confidence in laws that form a -barrier against its encroachments. Not so -male egoism. This makes straight for the -whole race of women, mercilessly potent by -reason of physical force, and backed by all -the laws, written and unwritten, of its own -making.</p> - -<p>It is this crushing exposure of the wide-spread -plague, the extension and mingling -of its fibres, the crudity and coarseness of -its very refinement and super-fastidiousness, -that gives ‘The Egoist’ a scientific as well -as an artistic value, and commands for it in -English literature a place apart.</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">[127]</span>As a work of art, it is, indeed, the most -complete and perfect thing that Meredith has -done—a flawless masterpiece without any -of the writer’s eccentric deviations and -mannerisms. Perhaps oppressively witty, -though much less so than ‘Diana,’ striking -none but the delicately comic chord, and -turning to pathos upon the point of a -smiling curl of the lip, it carries us through -a few weeks’ comedy at a pleasant canter to -the accompaniment of fanciful humour and -polished irony. If we come upon an occasional -odd effect—a queer simile, a bit of -isolated poetry lapsed into prose, a bar of -pure melody dropped into speech—we recognise -with pleasure and delight the author -of ‘Richard Feverel,’ and we greet him with a -cordial smile. This other writer is new to us, -but not the less welcome—less serious, more -polished and more fanciful; and while less of -a poet, he is more of an artist—less philosophic, -he is much more scientific. The play -of wit is less sparkling and more penetrative.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">[128]</span> -It shines, a soft luminous light, with undiminished -radiance throughout the book, -lending itself less easily to quotation, baffling -even the memory by the quality of the flying -phrases. Upon all subjects of daily life has -he something original to say, and he can -even be poetical and fresh, and compel our -senses to delighted thrills upon the worn-out -theme of woman’s dress—a theme that -wrecks other writers and leaves them dismayed -by the dulness and insipidity of their -own description. Read those lines in ‘The -Egoist,’ upon Clara’s dress in a breeze.</p> - -<p>The characters, as I have said, are few. -Clara, the heroine, described by Vernon -Whitford, that scholar and student of equable -temper, as ‘a mountain echo’—an idea that -still lingers with us when we have closed the -book as the sum of her sweetness, wholesomeness -and natural charm—and by Mrs. -Mountstuart less felicitously as ‘a dainty -rogue in porcelain.’ Here we gather an -added something of her exterior, and <i>look</i> at<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">[129]</span> -a mountain echo with the eyes of fashion, -just as we see through the same sharp and -unimaginative eyes ‘the sunken brilliancy -of the lean long-walker and scholar in a -Phœbus-Apollo turned fasting friar,’ and the -poetess, Lætitia Dale, upon her vivid stroke, -‘coming with a romantic tale upon her eyelashes.’ -This is one of Meredith’s tricks—the -uttering of pointed phrases by the tongues -of sharp, clever women. Sometimes they are -far-fetched; always are they too carefully -trimmed and edged, as hasty phrases have -not often the felicity of being edged. In -general it is the fault of his characters to talk -too brilliantly, and he forgets that men and -women in their commonplace moods are not -habitually metaphorical and literary.</p> - -<p>As the essence of self-made man, it may -be thought that Sir Willoughby is meant to -represent an unpleasant and an unusual type. -Not so at all. If it had not been for Meredith, -he might have gone tranquilly down to -the grave, and not even his worst enemy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">[130]</span> -would have had very obvious cause to scent -the wolf within him. We meet him first upon -his majority—a very fascinating and fastidious -young Englishman whom we gradually understand -is the letter ‘I’ vivified and made -human, mentally as well as physically -straightened to its erectness, and as uncompromisingly -personal. We heedlessly learn -of his dallying with Lætitia Dale, of the -silent and unexacting worship of this soft -rhyming representative of ‘starving women’ -who endure their hunger uncomplainingly, -and are too proud to offer themselves for the -sensational pity of a world ever in demand of -dramatic situations. We enjoy a secret satisfaction -in his discomfiture when Constantia -Durham leaves him in the lurch and runs off -with the more cheerful military figure, and -yet we still hardly realize what manner of -man he is when he in turn plants Lætitia -and seeks distraction in three years’ travel. -Meredith makes us understand that he is a -youth of spurious niceness, who objected to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">[131]</span> -his betrothed talking freely about male -cousins and friends, and considered the pursuit -of competing admirers a stain upon her. -Cloistral purity was his demand in the -market; woman emerging from an eggshell, -‘somewhat more astonished at things than a -chicken ... and seeing him, with her sex’s -eyes, first of all men.’</p> - -<p>How much we thank Meredith for showing -us the ‘infinite grossness’ of this demand! -And how we relish his quiet laughter at Sir -Willoughby’s loathing of the ‘dust of the -world’ touching the privileged object of his -choice. We conclude that Miss Durham -was a young person of spirit and sense when -she ran off with Captain Oxford, and heartily -wish her good luck upon her wedding-tour, -while Sir Willoughby abroad is holding an -‘English review of his Maker’s grotesques.’ -What a delightful stroke that is against the -British tourist! Thackeray never matched -it. If you would measure it fully, you have -but to stand apart and watch the faces and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">[132]</span> -listen to the criticisms of our fellow-countrymen -abroad. Everything that is not British -is grotesque.</p> - -<p>As the Creator is just as responsible for -foreign countries and foreign races as for -Great Britain, these criticisms, as Meredith -wittily points out, comprise a review of His -grotesques. It is in such light and inimitable -pen-strokes, to be found on every page, that -he shows us the man made bare to the very -heart. All his social virtues are ruthlessly -traced to the meanest source: his wish for -cloistral purity in woman, his regarding the -presence of competing admiration as a soil, -to its true Oriental origin, the monster -egoism of his prayer that even beyond -death his bride should be his alone, and -of his desire to shape her character to -the feminine of his own, without any -consideration for her natural and healthy -preference to be herself. All young men -who think it part of the poetry of love -to wish to see the unhappy maiden of their<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">[133]</span> -choice reduced to ashes or incense, and -transmuted by love until they literally become -‘the man they are to marry,’ cannot -do better than study the Egoist, and see -for themselves the manner of man they are. -The study will fill them with a sense of -horror of themselves and of the accepted -notion of the infinity of love which Clara, -listening gravely, conceived as ‘a narrow -dwelling where a voice droned and ceased -not.’ In her sharp apprenticeship as the -betrothed of this amiable young squire she -learned to become an attentive listener. -Little else was expected of her. But it was -the destiny of this intelligent and impulsive -girl to give Sir Willoughby many a rude -lesson in the sex she represented, that left -Constantia’s elopement and free talk of male -cousins and friends in the shade as minor -offences against taste and cloistral reserve. -After the preliminary descriptive pages, the -book is completely given up to Clara’s -struggle for freedom and her lover’s desperate<span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">[134]</span> -efforts to retain her, fearful of ridicule -and the ignominy of a second jilting. She -rashly compromises herself with a brilliant -Irishman, while unconsciously her heart is -given to the Phœbus-Apollo turned fasting -friar to whom Sir Willoughby, meditating -revenge, intends to hand her over upon -granting her the freedom she claims, rejoicing -privately in the fact that his own -choice had irredeemably spotted her for -another. There is something pathetic in -the poor Egoist’s delusion, and while we -heartily despise him, we are against our -judgment forced to pity him when in the -strife his true character is exposed even to -his life-long silent worshipper, Lætitia, and -we see the unhappy gentleman upon his -knees to that discarded devotee imploring -her to marry him, so that the county -should not say that he had been despised -and rejected by three women, one of them -poor and his inferior. His misfortune and -abasement are contemptible in their cause,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">[135]</span> -and contemptibly borne, nevertheless the -something in us which responds to this -terrible monster within him begets the -pity of brotherhood. Degraded, shrunken, -stripped of the glory of success, we see in -him a monstrous image of ourselves, of all -mankind, so that we are afraid to turn from -him and wring hands with the wretch in -a kind of shamed sympathy. We readily -admit the pure comedy of this sublime -absurdity in human form reduced to such -shabby dimensions and exposed for the -ridicule of posterity, but we cannot laugh -very joyously at the exposure. There is -too much truth in it for the comic muse, -and the pathos is too apparent.</p> - -<p>As Sir Willoughby is Meredith’s typical -analysis of the male’s character, so is Diana -Warwick his chief type of woman, and just -so ruthlessly as he is drawn is she drawn -mercifully—too mercifully, perhaps, for she -is painted in all the glowing colours of -love. Mr. Meredith is not the analyzer of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">[136]</span> -Diana; he is her ardent lover. He adores -her unscrutinizingly, as it behoves the true -lover to adore his lady. He paints her -very faults upon worshipping knees, and -does not think it necessary to apologize -for her or urge one word of excuse or deprecation -when, following fact, she stoops to -a shabby breach of confidence worthy the -lowest new journalist. She is Diana to -him in all her moods, a bewildering and -adorable creature, and as such he expects -the reader to swallow her thankfully, rejoicing -in her as he does, wondering at -the stupidity and evilness of the world -that condemns her, censuring the meanness -of the recreant lover who deserts her upon -discovery of her unexplainable betrayal of -his confidences. If his lady chooses to start -out at midnight, fresh from a love-scene in -which she has learnt from her lover a great -political secret, to sell it for a very substantial -sum to a London editor, Mr. Meredith -simply follows her as an admiring<span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">[137]</span> -recorder, and finds it sufficient explanation -to tell us pityingly that she was a child in -this world’s affairs, that she was as ignorant -as a child in business matters, and had no -idea of the gravity of her action. This last -plea we accept willingly, for impulsive women -like Diana rarely have any notion of the -weight of actions, and never can measure -their consequences; but for a simpleton in -worldly affairs she showed a pretty accurate -knowledge of the value of her secret and -of its market price, and for a lady to sell -secret information learnt in a love-scene -seems to us an unmistakable fall which, -however much we may deplore, we hold -ourselves exempt from admiring, or even -condoning, as Diana’s apologist desires us -to do.</p> - -<p>As an Irishwoman I cannot but be -grateful to this big Saxon giant for his -generous advocacy of a famous country-woman -whom posterity persists in holding -spotted. He has taken her up in the teeth<span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">[138]</span> -of British opinion, and being deeply enamoured -of the splendid creature, he is not -satisfied in proceeding to whitewash her, -which would have been a simple enough -task, but he has clothed her in soft cloud -and fine radiance, he has all but sketched -her wings, and shown her standing tip-toe -on hard, solid earth with glance strained -ethereally upward. Not by any means an -angel, but a young goddess, half woman, -a creature of exquisite freshness, originality, -bewildering wit and soaring intellect, as -lovely as Aurora, and as cold, purer still, -and more remote from the contamination -of gross masculine admiration, than Diana. -Her mind flies upon barbed phrases. Her -commonest words take the shape of pointed, -illuminated arrows. She is the beautiful -Egeria of a young minister of state, the -immaterial soul of a polished old statesman, -by whom she almost loses her social head, -and is only saved from the block by the -stout defence of her devoted friends. She<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">[139]</span> -is sunshine in a delicate and not happy -lady’s life, carrying a whiff of Irish mirth -and wit with her delightful presence into -the stately and decorous gloom of English -town and country existence, a mental draught -of champagne wherever she goes, all impulse -and brightness and warmth of heart. And -how this masterful knight of hers, turned -biographer, lashes those who were stupid -and wicked enough to misjudge her! For -every tear, every painful contraction of brow, -they forced her to in life, are they punished -by his unsparing pen. He uses it in her -defence like a true crusader’s sword. He -reviews her enemies in an almost passionate -anger, names them, notes every conventional -trick and fault, lays bare the tiniest spot -upon which to point his dreadful lamp of -ridicule, and then proceeds to shiver their -self-respect to atoms, to disperse their -highly-prized, respectable prejudices, and -leaves them divested of all but heavy -British stupidity, that prevents them from<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">[140]</span> -seizing the charm and comprehending the -personality of this brilliant young star shot -from the Sister Isle into their astonished -midst. Her freshness is the eternally vernal -freshness of the shamrock, her faults and -impulses the voice of a generous race seeking -expression through her ardent soul. He -makes her enemies his enemies. He wears -her colours nobly, gallantly, as behoves a -gentleman in whom the mediæval strain -still runs. He carries her gloriously through -the divorce courts, leaving her wooden Saxon -husband, of narrow, official soul, utterly -abased and shrunken, instead of triumphant -in her fall. We behold her after this crucial -ordeal clearer, whiter, more radiant than -ever; nearer to the immortal Diana she -images by reason of her new freedom; -clear-eyed as a maiden returned to the -forest-mists of unsullied imagination; and behind -her in the mire lies the crushed marital -form, unutterably mean and shabby and foolish -with his absurd ‘Yah, yah,’ on his lips.</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_141">[141]</span>In the case of her English husband and -her recreant English lover, her defender has -no worse fault to urge against them than the -stiff-necked prejudices of race. Both we see -like respectable carriage-horses in harnessed -strife with a young war-steed ready for -dangerous speed and nerve-upsetting tricks—a -potent, self-willed young creature, -sniffing menacingly at conventionality, audacious -from excess of purity, perilously poised -upon every incalculable impulse, and in spite -of a powerful intellect, scatter-brained upon -all the ugly brinks in her career. No -wonder the unhappy Saxon gentlemen allied -to this wild and too lovely Hibernian lost -their heads and turned tail when it came to a -choice of swallowing her whole and entire -and following meekly in her wake, the -obedient satellites Mr. Meredith thinks they -ought to have been, with heart filled with -gratitude, and eyes full of love and -admiration.</p> - -<p>That they did not do so is their lasting<span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">[142]</span> -shame and reproach, and he reviles them -as starched officials and stiff-necked Britons. -Whereas another and a less partial biographer -would mildly commend them to -our pity, because of their undeniable sufferings -at the expense of a female engine -that ran them down and left them in -fragments upon her path, he is only content -in piecing the fragments in order the more -powerfully to hold the feeble creatures up to -our ridicule. If it had not been for that fatal -newspaper episode, we should have been -more than disposed to share his ardent -sympathy, and range ourselves as warmly as -he upon his heroine’s side. But the newspaper -episode is an exceedingly big camel to -be asked to swallow without as much as a -wry face, above all to swallow and preserve -intact our ideal of a persecuted, disinterested, -and very noble woman. Though not the -most artificial of his books, the atmosphere -of ‘Diana’ carries a heavier scent of the -midnight oil than even that garishly brilliant<span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">[143]</span> -study of a pair of tragic comedians. There -are dialogues in ‘Diana’ that only stop -short of requiring a key—noticeably one -after-supper scene when the air is charged -with electricity, and wit oppressively polished -flies hither and thither, broken confusedly -upon rainbow sparkles of thought. Though -we are sick of commonplace chatter, the -intensity of self-consciousness and prolonged -mental effort involved in such a game of -battledore and shuttlecock, such a desperate -intellectual race for the prize for barbed -phrases and skilfully-managed metaphor, are -surely exhausting. Diana and her numerous -satellites seem never in the course of their -lives to have enjoyed five minutes’ naturalness, -and never to have known the luxury of -mental dressing-gown and night-cap. Like -the sun, their intellects never sleep, know -not even the charm of drowsiness; and it is -frequently a strain upon lazy, easy-going -readers, used to Thackeray and Dickens, to -follow the unceasing play of intellectual<span class="pagenum" id="Page_144">[144]</span> -pyrotechnics. The most beautiful thing in -this remarkable book—next to Meredith’s -generous defence of his heroine,—the tenderest, -most naturally, humanly painted, -is the sweet and faithful friendship between -two intellectual women, one a soft-hearted, -delicate Englishwoman with the milder and -more clinging sentiments of her race, and the -other our vivid Diana, made up of Irish -cloud and Irish laughter, with her robuster -and more ardent temperament. This is a -fresh debt that women owe their mighty -champion—the recognition of their capabilities -for mutual friendship, faithful love -and generous admiration, which the cynical -male habitually denies them. Emma -Dunstane married, loves her bright Tony, as -she fondly calls Diana, above all the world; -and Tony, tossed upon a sea of amatory -difficulties, in turn beloved, rejected, and -divorced, faithfully loves her friend Emma -above even her faithless and her faithful -lovers, of which Heaven knows she has<span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">[145]</span> -choice enough. One of them, Mr. Sullivan -Smith, is a sensational and finely-natured -Irishman, too apparently created after Lever -to be of value as a serious study.</p> - -<p>The story is well known. A beautiful, -witty, young Irishwoman marries a wooden -English official of docketed opinions well -phrased. She is loved by many, notably -one other Englishman, Redworth, a fine -contrast with her husband, and Lord -Dannisburgh, whose admiration excites her -husband’s jealousy and leads to divorce. -Her faithful friends throughout are Lady -Dunstane and Redworth; afterwards Percy -Dacier, at first suspecting and coldly -scrutinizing, goes over to her and finally -succumbs. He is a stiff and starched young -Englishman, faultlessly correct and attractive -after his fashion, which is the reverse of a -warm one. Diana loves him, but there is -a sort of Diana mist thrown over her love, -which shows it as burning a cold clear light -like ineffectual sunbeams upon a glacier.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_146">[146]</span> -The young minister of state and she are -engaged, and he returns late one night to -breathe a state secret into her ears. This -is the blot upon her character, the irretrievable -blot upon her life. When he has -kissed her for the first time—though no -word so barbaric and indelicate as ‘kiss’ -has been written in the record by the writer, -fastidiously sensitive in preserving the snowy -plumage of his paragon—explaining that he -is but a mortal lover after all, she says the -fault was hers that she was degraded. -This is straining at gnats to swallow an -enormous camel. She goes forth from this -first embrace to sell his political news to a -leading editor. Fact or fiction, we cannot -get the unutterable ugliness of it out of our -minds. But whether Dacier was justified -in throwing her over for the action is for -male judges to say. Great and passionate -love, the sort of love such a woman should -excite, would, I imagine, have found a ready -road to pardon. Dacier is a cold-blooded<span class="pagenum" id="Page_147">[147]</span> -politician, with whom we have not much -sympathy, and are not sorry to see him -degraded in his creator’s eyes, and, beside -his brilliant betrayer, shrunken to shabby -dimensions. He goes straight off—marries -a pious and virtuous young heiress, and -drops out of view. The stricken lady, -reduced to a state of suicidal prostration, -about whom the voices of rumour are for -a second time busily and unkindly engaged, -is not without her champions. Mr. Sullivan -Smith and Arthur Rhodes meet on their -way to propose for her, and eventually -her faithful lover, Redworth, wins what he -gallantly and manfully regards as a prize, -and thus the end is saved from tragedy. -We leave Tony too dazzled to know if her -views of life are brighter, and bearing love -for a dower to her husband. Only we continue -to wish she had not visited that -newspaper office.</p> - -<p>Equally artificial and brilliant, and of a -fascinating brevity, is ‘Tragic Comedians.’<span class="pagenum" id="Page_148">[148]</span> -Limelight plays blindingly upon the characters, -and Clotilda and Alvan seem to -flash before us like a couple of splendid -meteors, to faint and fade in their -own exhausted light. We blink and gaze -after them, thrilled, startled, and subdued -by their resplendency, with a keen sense of -the theatrical in their portraits and in their -actions. Garish the book is, but most vivid, -of a fascination not to be coldly analyzed, -of a charm indescribable. It is simply the -short story of the wooing of a royal lover, -of his lady’s betrayal of his love, and of her -marriage with his rival. Never was a wooing -like Alvan’s, never such a lover. That is -why we doubt the reality, and dream of the -footlights. We listen to him and read his -telegrams, and in spite of the Alpine sunlight -and the cool mountain air, we think of fireworks. -We read of Clotilda’s golden hair, -and we picture her flying through the clouds, -chased by her fellow-meteor and fronted by -the black night of marriage that extinguishes<span class="pagenum" id="Page_149">[149]</span> -her after his decent burial. Some of their -sayings seem written across the memory in -letters of dancing light, and we dream of the -scenes enacted by this pair of tragic comedians -long after we have left them. Of all -Mr. Meredith’s lovers, Alvan is the one who -fascinates and thrills us most.</p> - -<p>Taking a general survey of his qualities, -we may note that Meredith the writer and -man is always more interesting than even -his best characters. It is how he develops -them, what he thinks of them, his inimitable -asides and epigrams, that we look for most. -In this he is not Shakespearian, for whereas -we get nothing of Shakespeare in any of his -plays, in all of his books do we get much -of Mr. Meredith. And in none of them too -much. The one in which he sinks himself -completely is, to my thinking, except as a -remarkable <i>tour de force</i>, the least interesting. -This is the ‘Shaving of Shagpat.’ -George Eliot described it as pleasant light -reading. This reads like a joke, if so<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">[150]</span> -illustrious and serious a personage as George -Eliot could be deemed guilty of perpetrating -a joke so mild. The story and its abounding -verses are more Eastern than probably anything -in Oriental literature, and if we had -not ‘Vathek’ as a precedent, we should be -disposed to regard the feat as an incredible -one. For after ‘The Shaving of Shagpat,’ -‘The Arabian Nights’ reads as a model of -sober commonplace and the epitome of -everyday experience. Not only is the style -Oriental, but facts and colouring and atmosphere -are fabulously so. The impression -left upon the bewildered reader is that of a -kind of dazed passage beaten through a mass -of broken jewels in a soft artificial light, -richly perfumed with the heavy odours of -Eastern flowers and scents. Houris and -genii; roses, lilies, nightingales; diamonds, -opals, rubies, and sapphires; jets of flame -starting into illuminated fountains from the -heart of lilies set in opal lakes; winged -voyages through the pure Eastern air, over<span class="pagenum" id="Page_151">[151]</span> -cities and plains and sunlit and moonlit landscape; -impassioned Oriental songs, gorgeous -metaphor richly massed through a wearisome -brilliance of colours and imagery; wild -amorous speech and tales, and descriptions -of feminine beauty to turn the head of a sage -and awaken a throb of envy in the breast of -Théophile Gautier. Conceive, in fact, every -strong imaginative effect heaped in reckless -profusion, till, from sheer fatigue of overwrought -senses, we hail with delight and -relief the seizure of the Identical, the final -triumph of the barber, and the shaving of -Shagpat. There are many beautiful passages -in it, and the humour of the parody is both -subtle and exquisite, but it is too luscious for -a single reading, though we may agree with -the poet:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="first">‘Ripe with oft telling, and old is the tale,</div> -<div class="verse">But ’tis of the sort that can never grow stale.’</div> -</div></div> - -<p>This is Mr. Meredith, un-English and -impersonal, and he pleases us less. We<span class="pagenum" id="Page_152">[152]</span> -prefer his human comedy and his home -comic muse to this parody of distant literature. -We like best to feel his Saxon iron -grasp and his deep glance ransacking -humanity, as it lives and breathes, to its -uttermost depth, and twisting it to every -unimaginable revelation. We feel then in -the presence of our prose Browning, earnest -even in his laughter; Titanic, with an unsuspected -softness of heart beneath a rugged -and untender manner, and upon a homely -shaft of mother-wit ready to shade from us -the scientific penetration of his inward vision -of us. His wit is like a rainbow lighting up -a stormy sky, and his mocking carries no -baleful suggestion of a sneer.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_153">[153]</span> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CHAPTER VI.<br /> - - -<small>GEORGE MEREDITH’S MEN AND WOMEN.</small></h2> -</div> - -<p><span class="smcap">Like</span> Shakespeare and Scott, Mr. Meredith -is uniformly gallant in his romances. With -the exception of Richard, his young heroes -are generally feeble youths; sometimes -pleasant and good-natured, like Harry Richmond -and Evan Harrington, and at others -bloodless, make-believe men like Wilfred -Pole and Percy Dacier. But all, as in the -case of Scott’s amiable young men and -Shakespeare’s lovers, are merely foils for -the greater worth of the heroines. Imogen, -Juliet, Beatrice, Miranda, the ladies of the -gentlemen of Verona, Portia, and Lady -Macbeth are all unworthily mated, and as -Mr. Ruskin has said of Scott’s heroes, we<span class="pagenum" id="Page_154">[154]</span> -are left wondering at the extreme and unmerited -good fortune of these various young -men who have drawn prizes, apparently as -rewards for their amiable and pleasing manners. -The fluted tenor of romance is on -the whole an ill-treated personage. We -invent him to do the love-making instead -of ourselves with the different ideals of -feminine perfection we imagine. But with -his qualifications, his serious merits, we are -not concerned. So long as he is handsome, -has the art of using his voice, his mouth, -and his eyes, carries his doublet and hose -gracefully, twangs the guitar of loverhood -musically, and recites his sonnets to advantage—behold -the virtues we demand of -him. He must be picturesque, above all, -and the bloom of youth must lie upon his -cheek, else as a sonneteer and troubadour is -he pronounced unserviceable by the orchestra.</p> - -<p>Now, the heroine is quite another matter, -as Mr. Meredith, following great examples, -shows us. She must claim our sympathy,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_155">[155]</span> -our love, and our admiration. She must -be surpassingly fair, and no less lovely of -mind and soul. We are to quit her -enamoured and regretful, vividly aware of -her attractions, both mental and physical. -And this has Mr. Meredith achieved in the -case of all his heroines—maidens and -widows. They are beautiful, witty, pure, -womanly, and most captivating. Each one -holds us enslaved as we follow her -fortunes. She has but to open her lips, -and we are at her feet. In spite of -his harshnesses, Mr. Meredith remains -great by his generous sympathy with the -weak. In the strife between men and -women, a strife he never blinks away, or -feigns to discredit because his men choose -to fall in love with his women, he ranges -himself upon the side of women always and -inevitably—and what a defence in the ranks -of the enemy! He brings no drivelling, -one-sided sympathy to bear upon the subject, -but clear, logical sense and a keen eye for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_156">[156]</span> -the weaknesses of the sex he defends. He -laughs at woman sometimes, and enjoys a -witticism and a taste of cruelty at her -expense. But he makes it understood that -his laughter is not scoffing and his cruelty -is not bitter. On the contrary, they but -add flavour to his championship, and make -us the prouder of the big blows he directs -against her tyrant. The tyranny of his own -sex he doubts as little as its selfishness, -which he has immortalized past cool endurance -for man in the person of Sir -Willoughby Patterne. The conventional -woman, all horrors and shivers at the aspect -of the natural and undecorated, made up -of drawing-room theories and lap-dog sentiments, -he rejects as unworthy of that which -he conceives woman might be, if relieved -from the sentimental trammels and restrictions -that the selfish grossness of man has -imposed upon her. He believes that women -would be all the better for living more as -men do, and men for meeting them half-way—one<span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">[157]</span> -sex modified by the other, and -mutually ennobled; eating healthily in acknowledgment -of all healthy appetites, as -opposed to the coarse Byronic view that -condemns them to live upon air and the -sentiments. Sandra talks freely of potatoes, -fine ones too, while her sentimental lover -writhes and shivers, feeling pelted by those -potatoes, and the founts of love are nearly -dried at the root of his heart. Can a young -gentleman with a proper respect for himself -feel romantically disposed towards a young -woman, even if she be divinely beautiful, -when she owns to a capacity to dine off -potatoes? or ascend to heaven on an aria -when the prima-donna refreshes herself with -bottled stout? For such types, frequent -enough, he suggests that sunlight must be too -strong and gross, and wonders why they have -not set their wits to invent some soft extract -of a shadowy illumination wherewith to -diminish the terrors and uglinesses of mere -nature.</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">[158]</span>He acknowledges the influence of woman -in no false, Frenchified way, but accepts it -as the strong ordeal and revelation of man. -‘Women have us back to the conditions -of primitive man, or they shoot us higher -than the topmost star.... By their state -is our civilization judged; and if it is hugely -animal still, that is because primitive men -abound and will have their pasture.’</p> - -<p>Of his men, it is the old and oldish -young that he draws best. His social -epigrammatists and his grave, elderly gentlemen, -or his caustic, elderly humorists, like -Sir Austin Feverel, the immortal wise youth -whose wit never goes to sleep, the gigantic -fraud, Richmond Roy, and his <i>fidus Achates</i>; -Tracy Runningbrook, Stukely Culbrett, Seymour -Austen, and a host of such others. We -must not forget Clara Middleton’s Irish -colonel, a very pleasant figure in ‘The -Egoist,’ the German princess’s father and -Everard Romfrey. All these men have a -point in common. Their wits are keenly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_159">[159]</span> -alert, and they know not how to be dull. -They are also gentlemen. Not that all, or -many of Mr. Meredith’s male characters of -high social standing, can lay claim to this -qualification. There is in him, as in Thackeray, -a singularly strong flavour of democracy, -and a tendency to reveal us the snob concealed -by the varnish of breeding. The -young gentlemen in ‘Evan Harrington’ are -the exact reverse of our ideal of the article. -Harry Jocelyn borrows money from the -tradesman he insults before repaying it; -gets money from him to give to a wretched -girl betrayed by him, and does not apply -it to the purpose for which it has been -given; conducts himself in all circumstances -as an offensive boor and an abject cur. The -young lords and squires around him do likewise. -Some of the gentlemen and peers -in ‘Richard Feverel’ are very unpleasant -and shady company, and in ‘Rhoda Fleming,’ -Mr. Algernon Blancove would find the -average clerk in the back streets of a manufacturing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">[160]</span> -town his superior in manners and -morals. We get some queer specimens of -upper-class snobocracy in ‘Harry Richmond,’ -and what, pray, is Sir Willoughby -Patterne if he is not a wondrously decorative -and polished snob, contemplating complacently -his own superiority in the mirror of -his mind’s eye?</p> - -<p>On the whole, Mr. Meredith is hard on -his own sex. Sometimes he draws a young -fool like Lord Palmet in ‘Beauchamp’s -Career,’ who can be a lord, a fool, and a -gentleman at the same time; who makes us -laugh and holds our sympathies, there is something -so extremely natural in his idiocy and -something so very engaging in his candour; -and then we feel that the author is not hard -on him, and has no desire to excite our contempt. -But this tenderness to young men -of gentle birth is rare in Mr. Meredith’s -volumes. His laughter at them is not -usually soft-hearted, but grim, as in the case -of the youth who bought cigars to save<span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">[161]</span> -himself from excesses in charity, and who, -after an ill-digested dinner and wine, sat so -long without moving a leg that he indulged -in the belief that he had reflected profoundly, -and woke up with the philosophic intent to -forget himself; being under some doom, -nobody caring for him, happiness unknown -to him, born under a bad star, and ‘following -his youthful wisdom, the wounded hart -dragged his slow limbs toward the halls of -brandy and song.’</p> - -<p>As an apology for his somewhat merciless -dissection of fools like these young men, -Mr. Meredith adds:</p> - -<p>‘One learns to have compassion for fools, -by studying them; and the fool, though -nature is wise, is next door to nature. He -is naked in his simplicity; he can tell us -much, and suggest more. My excuse for -dwelling on him is that he holds the link -of my story. Where fools are numerous, -one of them must be prominent, now and -then, in a veracious narration. There<span class="pagenum" id="Page_162">[162]</span> -comes an hour when the veil drops on him, -he not being always clean to the discreeter -touch.’</p> - -<p>And so he diligently leads us through the -unshadowy mental recesses of the fool in -question, as a sample of others abounding, -not compassionately by any means, with -perhaps too pointed a suggestion of sneer on -the tip of his caustic pen. He shows him -awaking to the conviction that England is no -place for him to dwell in—a conviction we -cordially share, with the consciousness that -England alone could have produced him—with -visions of himself married to a wife who -in the colonies would make butter or -cheese while he rode on horseback through -space; saw himself rejoicing her with a -declaration of love, astounding her with a -proposition of marriage, and in little more -than a week sailing on the high seas, newborn; -‘nothing of civilization about him, -save a few last very first-rate cigars, which -he projected to smoke on the poop of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_163">[163]</span> -vessel, and so dream of the world he left -behind.’</p> - -<p>If this is compassionate treatment of the -fools, we wonder what Mr. Meredith would -be likely to regard as severe handling of the -genus. Indeed, Algernon Blancove, as the -typical brainless young English gentleman, -of no morals and less manners, runs in -several varied editions throughout the -author’s works. We come upon him under -different names, sometimes more of a boor, -as in the case of Harry Jocelyn; sometimes -more of a gentleman, as in the person of -Ferdinand Laxley, but ever drawn from the -same persistently objectionable type.</p> - -<p>His older men, like Major Waring and -Seymour Austen, he touches with a truly -remarkable kindliness; a gentle sadness and -reasonableness pervade the atmosphere in -which he steeps their picture, and such is -their humane influence upon him, that he -drops, or nearly drops, metaphor, and adopts -the language of commonplace but cultivated<span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">[164]</span> -humanity. If, as has been said by M. -Taine, George Sand makes us wish to be in -love and the English novelists aim to make -us wish to be married, Mr. Meredith may -be accused of a desire to prove to us that in -men middle-age is more attractive and lovable -than youth, and that the sedate sadness that -accompanies it but adds to the dignity of life, -its thoughtful measure never exceeding a -refined and placid geniality, and knowing no -other discord than a very mild sense of -disapprobation. In his men of this period, -and even beyond it, he indeed portrays us -thorough gentlemen, patient and honourable -men of dignified habits of life and of keenly -alert wits. Sometimes they have just a -flavour of fire and brimstone unconsumed in -an anterior stage, as in the case of -Beauchamp’s delightful uncle. He is a sort -of twelfth-century baron pleasantly masquerading -as a nineteenth-century country -gentleman, and more than one romantic -young person would be indisposed to hesitate<span class="pagenum" id="Page_165">[165]</span> -upon the side of youth, if ordered to make her -choice between this elderly gentleman and -his fiery nephew. Nearly on the first page -he enchants us with the honest wholesomeness -and vigour of his talk, when, in reply to -something Beauchamp has said, he exclaims:</p> - -<p>‘Damned fine speech! Now you get out -of that trick of prize-orationing. I call it -snuffery, sir, it’s all to your own nose! -You’re talking to me, not to a gallery. -Cæsar wraps his head in his robe; he gets -his dig in the ribs for all his attitudinizing. -It’s very well for a man to talk like that who -owns no more than his bare bodkin life. -Tall talk’s his jewellery; he must have his -dandification in bunkum. You ought to -know better. Property and titles are worth -having, whether you are worthy of them or a -disgrace to your class. The best way of -defending them is to keep a strong fist, and -take care you don’t draw your fore-foot back -more than enough.’</p> - -<p>Such he walks the book, a stout and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">[166]</span> -resolute old gentleman, with words of sense -upon his lips, capable of manly tenderness -and dignified concessions, and the embodiment -of all virile virtues as well as those -belonging to his class. While the charming -French girl and the sweet English maiden -hold our senses thrilled, it is this mediæval -baron that soundly raps our nodding judgment, -and keeps our wits awake.</p> - -<p>Sometimes, as in the case of Edward -Blancove, Mr. Meredith wheels us round -from cold dislike into sympathy and -admiration. But not often. His unpleasant -young men are not more susceptible of -conversion than they are usually to be found -in real life, and he is not fond of playing such -tricks as this one, wherein we get from the -lips of a coldly argumentative and sharply -legal young gentleman, who has, hitherto, -conducted himself as something of a well-bred -knave, such honest words as these:</p> - -<p>‘Plainly, sir, in God’s name, hear me out. -She’s—what shall I call her? my mistress,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_167">[167]</span> -my sweetheart, if you like—let the name be -anything—“wife” it should have been and -shall be—I left her, and have left her, and -have not looked on her for many months. I -thought I was tired of her—I was under odd -influences—witchcraft, it seems. I could -believe in witchcraft now. Brutal selfishness -is the phrase for my conduct. I have found -out my villainy. I have not done a day’s sensible -work, nor had a single clear thought, since -I parted from her. She has had brain-fever. -She has been in the hospital. She is now -prostrate with misery. While she suffered, -I—I can’t look back on myself. If I had -to plead before you for more than manly -consideration, I could touch you. I am my -own master, and am ready to subsist by my -own efforts; there is no necessity for me to -do more than say I abide by the choice I -make, and my own actions. In deciding to -marry her, I do a good thing, I do a just -thing. I will prove to you that I have done -a wise thing.’</p> - - - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">[168]</span>Such words as these would redeem a -stormier and a shabbier youth than Edward -Blancove’s; they toss him up from the brink -of common rascality upon the verge of quiet -heroism. We are forced by them, not into -condonation only, but into respect and -admiring amazement, and we are almost -glad of a fault that has been so nobly -redeemed.</p> - -<p>Apart from any other claim he may have -upon his generation, Mr. Meredith’s greatest -and most original will ever remain his marvellous -knowledge of woman. All young girls -upon the verge of womanhood should be -recommended an exhaustive study of him -upon this subject, as a healthy antidote against -the nauseous and abominable travesties of -themselves and their species circulated by -the libraries, in which volumes, however bad -the men may be drawn, the women are ten -times worse, fifty times more unnatural, and at -least a hundred times more corrupting to the -sane judgment. From him, instead of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">[169]</span> -current inanities in which the typical heroine -of the circulating libraries is enveloped past -recognition of human sisterhood (thank -Heaven! for a fraternity with the monstrous -doll would be a greater grievance than any -we owe unkind nature), will they learn much -upon their sex that will give them material -for long and profound reflection. They will -learn that the eggshell appearance of woman -upon the boards of experience is a gross -exaction, the remnant of a grosser stage in -man—that the demand is the reverse of a -compliment to her. Instead of that ragged -aphorism (clothing of a lie), ‘that the hardest -on women are women themselves,’ they -will be offered a higher and juster estimate -of their own natural mercy, and will hear -‘that a woman in the pillory restores the -original bark of brotherhood to mankind,’ a -remark to give them pause and set their -brains in another direction. They will also -learn, what they can never sufficiently appreciate, -that ‘what a woman thinks of women<span class="pagenum" id="Page_170">[170]</span> -is the test of her nature;’ that ‘in their -judgments upon women, men are females, -voices of the present sexual dilemma,’ and -that in their desire to have a ‘a still woman -who can make a constant society of her pins -and needles,’ ‘they create by stoppage a -volcano, and are amazed at its eruptiveness,’ -and a word upon which we cannot too -insistently weigh, a gallant word from a male -pen, ‘that the motive life with women must -be in the head, equally with men.’</p> - - -<p class="center">THE END.</p> - - -<p class="center">BILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD</p> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<div class="transnote"> -<p class="ph1">TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:</p> - - - -<p>Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.</p> - -<p>Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.</p> - -<p>The cover image for this eBook was created by the transcriber using the original cover as the background and is entered into the public domain.</p> -</div></div> - - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GEORGE MEREDITH ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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