12 NOVEMBER 1842, Page 16

SELF-DEVOTION.

THIS fiction appears under melancholy circumstances : the author- ess, HattatEirrs CAMPBELL, died in "the very spring-time of youth

and beauty"; and Mr. GLEIG, as a family friend, has undertaken the editorship of Self-Devotion, or the History of Katherine Ran- dolph, in almost the only case where such editorship is justified to a publication by a native. Although a posthumous work, Self-Devotion is not Miss CAMP- BELL'S latest fiction, but, as we learn from Mr. Gi.sio's preface, was composed before her Only Daughter; a book we have never seen, but which her editor appears to think displayed an advance upon the present effort. Be this as it may, Self-Devotion possesses all the merits which could fairly be expected from a very young lady, and only exhibits those defects which unless by miracle were inseparable from her years and inexperience. The sentiments are amiable, with a tinge of unworldly generosity and romance ; the style has an easy elegance with an under-current of animation ; the descriptions are true, though rather too literal, from the natu- ral overdoing of a young author, anxious to be exact ; traits in the persons and manners of her characters are often delicately caught and vividly presented ; and some of her scenes, considered by themselves, are strikiog and effective. The failing of Self- Devotion is in the conduct of the actors, and in the story, or at least in its management. The persons sometimes act with a weakness which scarcely induces sympathy ; the distresses are of a kind which only seem very deep distresses to a girl, for they could scarcely have occurred, at least in the manner represented in the fiction ; and either the subject in itself is too slender for a full-sized novel or the narrative is too attenuated in its treatment.

The heroine of Self-Devotion is Katherine Randolph ; the hero her brother Julian ; and the story is constructed to exhibit Kathe- rine's disregard of self. Besides giving way to what many readers may fancy rather a selfish want of consideration in her twin-brother, and acting generally as a peace-bringer in her family, she sacrifices an immense fortune, and with it the prospects of her marriage, in order to bestow that fortune on her brother; her reason for this generosity being, that her nabob relation had once determined on making Julian Randolph his heir, but, not approving the young gentleman's conduct, had bequeathed his property to Katherine. By this time the reader is well through the second volume ; when Julian is engaged in a duel, and involved in the danger of convid- don, under circumstances scarcely likely, and extricated from it by a trial which never could have taken place in the way described.

Among the various difficulties of the Art of Poetry, the following passage must have been a stumblingblock to many-

" Scribendi recte, sapere est et princip!um et fons Item tibi Socratic& poterunt ostendere &arta ; Verbaque provisam rem non invite sequentur. Qui didicit patriie quid debeat, et quid amicis ; Quo sit amore pareus, quo frater amandus et hospes, Quad sit conscripti, quod judicis officium, qua Partes in helium missy dude, ills profecto Reddere persona scit convenientia coigne." " The mob of gentlemen who write with ease," and think, with RALPH of the Dunciad, that as " Shakspere writ without rules" they have no occasion for them either, must wonder why HoitAcE, in addition to matters directly connected with poetry, should re- quire the aspirant of genius to study the depths of moral philo- sophy, and master the duties which are due from mankind in all the relations of life, since they feel themselves competent by the inner light " reddere personm convenientia cuique." Had Holiaez lived in an age of printing by steam, he probably would have added, that this knowledge was necessary to comply with the requisition of ARISTOTLE, and involve the hero in difficulty through an error which excites pity, but not a weakness or something worse, since we are so constituted as to have little sympathy for the distresses of folly or vice. A want of this knowledge militates against the effect of some of the earlier and quieter scenes in Self-Devotion. Katherine is per- haps a shade too much of a manager ; and when Julian indulges in fashionable extravagances, and contracts debts on the credit of being his uncle's heir, knowing in his own mind that the stiff old

nabob is offended and the heirship very doubtful, he approaches the debateable ground of credit under false pretences. There are other inconsistencies, traceable to a similar source, or to a want of extended knowledge of life : for instance, the foolish marriage of such a wise and excellent person as Randolph's father, or the ob- scure and improbable tale of the bond, by which Katherine's lover Chisholm loses his estate.

These failings are only visible where Miss CAMPBELL has at-

tempted a literary impossibility—to invent (as it is called) without a sufficient store of materials. In the delicate and difficult task of developing character and sustaining characteristic dialogue, she succeeds completely, where she has known the nature and is con- tent with imitating it. Here is an example, in her picture of a discontented

SCOTCH CRONE.

The next moment, they stood within a house which borrowed something like an air of superiority over the other shealiugs of the glen, from the whitewash- ing of the window-sill and hearthstone, and the circumstance of an old rug being stretched by the bedside. Moreover, a cheerful fire of pests burnt upon the hearth, and a large black cat was coiled up beside it, with an air of snug- ness which was quite enlivening. In a three-cornered arm-chair, on one side of the chimney, there was an old woman knitting busily, whose person was a sort of living illustration of three separate peculiarities; a wonderful erectness of carriage, a scrupulous clean- liness ofperson, and an expression of face which, without being exclusively Indicative of sickness, discontent, or mental affliction, was cross enough to have sat fur the combination of all three.

" Well, Elspet," said Katherine in a cheerful tone, " how's the cough to- day? I could not come to seeyou yesterday, but 1 hope you got the nice mixture 1 eent you over by Jeannie." " Ou, I neer expeckit ye to come," said the old dame in reply, when her

guests had seated themselves on two stools beside her: " I'm an auld withered stock noo, no able to serve anybody mysel, so I canna expeck service freer ither folk. he warrant ye'll has brewer friends to look after than puir Elspet." And she eyed Marion sourly, as if she suspected her of intruding on her own. privileges.

" Well, but you got the mixture; and it brought you a good night's rest, did it not ?" pursued Katherine, without noticing the insinuation. " Rest!" was the indignant reply ; " awed I wot, it was a windlestrae't rest on a windy nicht then. I ne'er had sic a nicht sin ever I took it ; I just hostit and hostit even on, and never devalved. Na, na, it's none o' yore drags. that's to cure a host like mine—naething 'II e'er cure it but the spade an' the shool. Gin ye had sent me a drap not o' the grand bottle ye promised to Peggy neast-by there, I micht hae pitten it intil my bowl o'gruel, and been mair the better o't. But I dinna ken sac weel how to fleech ye as she does, or I micht bee gotten it too."

" You 're tired of the raspberry vinegar, then ?" said Katherine. " Why, Elspet, you had only to send Ivan to the manse, and you should have had your glass of sherry in five minutes, you stupid body."

" Na, Miss Randolph," answered Elspet in a tone of triumph ; " na, ns, I'm no just come the length o' a beggar yet ; though I dinna refuse the bits an' bats ye send me at your pleasure. I'm sodger-bred, Miss Katherine, but I'm major-minded, an' I'll ne'er ask anybody for what I may jalouse they're no willing to gic me."

" Now, Elspet, hold your tongue," replied Katherine, with invincible good- humour : "you know very well that you would apply to me with all your heart if you had a desire for any thing I could give you, if it were only for the sake of gratifying me; and you shall have the wine for to-night's gruel when- ever 1 go home. How does the new toy I sent you yesterday please you ? You are looking quite handsome in it, I think."

" Ou, it 's no that ill," answered Elspet reluctantly, and as if at a loss for something to grumble at. " But wow! how the bus comes aff on my clean mutches"!—and she pushed back the hood ofcoloured flannel as she spoke. "It baud me ay daicherin' an' washin' them, and ruin me for sape forbye." " Never mind that, Elspet, it will only give you an excuse for putting on a clean one every day ; and that 's what delights you," answered Katherine- " Has papa been seeing you lately ?"

" Ou ay, honest man," replied the dame, with a wonderful accession of respect in her tone : " he was here this morning, and gied me a tang discourse on the cheerfulness o' Christian hope. Hech me! boo folk will cumber them- selves wi' the mony things o' this sinfu', unsubstantial world : 'gin a' body had as little wand's gear as I bee, there wad be the less to fash them."

This scene is inimitable in its way. The following sketches are i favourable examples of quickness in seizing and nicety in deli- neating external characteristics.

AN OLD ANGLO-INDIAN.

The other end of the sofa was occupied by a little wrinkled old man, in a shining suit of snuff-brown, a magnificent diamond ring, a gold chain, studs, breast-pin, and spectacles. His hair was frizzled up to that dry wiry fineness of texture which indicates long residence in a warm climate, and his com- plexion resembled that which majesty wears on a new-struck farthing. He was reading a red book wonderfully resembling the almanack, with all the in- tensity of attention which generally characterizes people engaged in any em-. ployment to which they are totally unaccustomed ; and his small sparkling gray eyes wore, even when fixed upon the page, an expression of such intense acuteness, that you might have thought them capable of searching for gold is the very bowels of the earth.

AN ARISTOCRATIC BEAUTY.

Lady Ida was very young, not more than sixteen ; and certainly, whatever it was which disappointed Mr. Randolph, it could not be either the mould of her features or the tint of her complexion. She was a dazzling specimen of the true style of Saxon beauty. Nothing could be more refinedly indicative of high birth,. than the cast of her small head, the chiselling of her proud delicate features, and. the alabaster curve of her stately throat. There was something in her bear- ing which told you that pride was more to her than an inheritance; yet it might be after all but the pride of beauty, for there was nothing imperious in the carriage of that little head, which turned from side to side like a bird's,. while she made her observations on those around her with such a mute, yet eloquent glitter of her clear bright eye, as we have seen a Virginian nightingale flash upon us from its gilded cage. Ida's mouth was the tiniest of human mouths; it looked, even when open, no bigger than the bud of a dog-rose ; and her smile was that beautiful, little, curling, polished smile, which expresses just what the smiler pleases, and no more. The creature, even at her delicate and tender age, looked as if her nursery had been a court, and that dignity and stateliness of bearing were hers by nature and right ; for there was nothing tutored or forced in her deport- ment, not a taint of artifice, not a shade of affectation; you read her history and her position at a glance; she was the only child of a rich earl, and had, besides, an independent fortune at her own disposal.

A SAXON AND A CELTIC NOBLE.

Lord de Mar was a man in the prime and flower of manhood ; distinguished. by that nobility of person, and patrician grace of manhood, which, when they are the fruits of high birth and the accompaniments of large fortune, form the beau-ideal of an English aristocrat in his most indescribable perfection. A finer contrast could not be imagined than Lord de Mar presented to his guest, as General Forbes sat at breakfast with him in the library of his mag- nificent house at Brighton. The one slightly below the standard of middle height, cast in the mould of the most consummate elegance, and with every movement of his frame subdued and harmonized into grace ; while his features wore the bland and exquisite polish of ar:ificial refinement, and the very tones of his voice were rendered musical by the absolute control in which every accent was held by the high-bred speaker. The Highland chieftain was conspicuous in General Forbes. His mould was the mould of a giant, and, with a symmetry of proportion in no respect inferior, he united a degree of physical power which seemed to mark him of a different species ; while the open and kindly intelligence of his face, with its long curb of silvery hair, and the military precision of his bearing, were in strong opposi- tion to the lordly and fashionable grace of Lord do Mar.