was of the most reverential kind. Had she chosen that
a dog should does not resolve to "let himself go," and indulge himself of be treated as one of the Launays, the dog would have received all malice aforethought in a little bit of caricature,—the only con- the family honours. It must be acknowledged of her that in the per- dition of mind in which he paints pictures that seem to us dis- formance of her duty she had become a rural tyrant. She gave agreeable as well as extravagant. Nothing could be better away many petticoats; but they all bad to be stitched according to
her idea of stitching a petticoat. She adminibtered physic gratis to than the principal tales, "Why Fran Frohmann Raised her the entire estate; but the estate had to take the doses as she chose Prices," "The Lady of Launay," "The Telegraph Girl," and to have them mixed. It was because she had fallen something short much the greater part of " Alice Dugdale," nothing more ski'. of her acknowledged duty in regard to Bessy Pryor that the parson's ful than what we may call (to borrow a metaphor from medicine) daughters were soon even proud of an intimacy with the girl, and that the old butler, when she once went away for a week in the Mr. Trollope's diagnostic of the true significance of various winter, was so careful to wrap her feet up warm in the carriage." little nuances of social manners, and the influence which he Notice especially, too, Mr. Trollope's description of the change assigns to them in the working-out of his story. in the manner of the domestics when Bessy falls out of favour It would have been difficult, for instance, for any novelist in for a time, for falling in love with Mrs. Miles's son. Here is England except Mr. Trollope to describe the struggle in the the behaviour of the housekeeper on such an occasion, rendered Tyrolese innkeeper's (Frau Frehmann's) mind and life against as only Mr. Trollope could render it :— that necessary raising of prices which is a consequence of the
"Soon after the receipt of Mr. Gregory's letter she sent for Bossy, reduced value of gold and of the relative rise in the wages who was then brought into the room, under the guard, as it were, of of labour, with the power and the singular interesting- Mrs. Knowl. Mrs. Knowl accompanied her along the corridor, which ness which he has displayed. One would think, at first, was surely unnecessary, as Besay's door had not been locked upon that a worse subject for a story than the reasons which her. Her imprisonment had only come from obedience. But Mrs. Knowl felt that a great trust had been confided to her, and was
compelled a Tyrolese village landlady to raise her prices could anxious to omit none of her (Intim She opened the door so that the hardly be chosen. But in Mr. Trollope's hands it becomes invalid on the bed could see that this duty had been done, and then quite a delightful subject. You see the good, old Tory, priding Bessy crept into the room."
herself on her dinners, especially priding herself on her two Mrs. Knowl "accompanying Bossy along the corridor," in order puddings, priding herself on the glasses of new milk which she to show that she regarded herself as in some sense better gives her guests without charge, priding herself, most of all, trusted for the time by Mrs. Miles than the disgraced orphan, that all her poorer guests are accommodated at rates which they is just one of those happy touches which make Mr. Trollope's can afford to pay, though they pay no less than the richest for stories so vivid. In the greater things, too, he succeeds. It the same accommodation, and priding herself finally on the is impossible to imagine an old lady of Mrs. Miles's utterly generosity with which she treats her labourers and the poor despotic temper, more lovable and more disinterested than people who supply her with butter and fruit, anxious, too, to he has made Mrs. Miles, and all this he contrives to show, give her daughter a generous portion on her marriage—you while showing perfectly the despotic mind, and the curious see her becoming gradually aware that all this can go on no way in which duty identifies itself with the secret de. longer, that she must accommodate herself to the changes in the spotism of that mind in the most graphic and vivacious world, and follow in the track of the general rise of prices way. So, again, in the last story, Mr. Trollope, who, to which has taken place in the district. You see the vigorous our thinking, hardly ever succeeds in painting a really lovable struggle which her pride makes against this change, how all young lady, does fully succeed in making Alice Dugdale really the Toryism in her nature forbids the apparent exactingness of lovable and charming to us, in spite of the drudgery in which a new tariff for her hotel, and how she first attempts to return she is always engaged, the unromantic butteriness of her little to the simplicity of the old days by beating down those who brother's kisses, and the much-pricked forefinger which has gone supply her with goods, to the old rates, which she fancies that through so many trials in the mending of torn clothes. Nay, they have arbitrarily changed. And you see how disastrously she he makes, as, of course, he ought to make, the buttery kisses and is defeated ; how she gets supplied with cheaper meat, but only to the pricked forefinger essential parts of the lovableness of the find it worse; how she has to dismiss her old labourers, and to girl, who carries her dignity so well through all her trials, and break with her friends in the mountains who sent her down wins her prize at last, by virtue, almost, of her resolve to throw eggs and fruit, and all to no purpose, since, unless she chose to it away. If any one wants to have clear evidence of the micro. go on losing money, she must turn round and swim with the scopic insight which Mr. Trollope has into the manners of his
day, but few, even of his best and longest stories, will give them
• Why Frau Praha:awn Raised her Prices, and Other Stories. By Anthony Trollops. London : W. Isbister, Limited. better evidence than this most amusing volume of shorter tales.
stream, after all. And all this is made not merely iuteresting,
BOOKS. but charming, by the skill of the novelist, who describes so
admirably the embassies she receives from the chfilets, the con- MR. TROLLOPE'S SHORTER TALES.* ferences between her and her old friend the butcher, whom she MR. TROLLOPE is always amusing, but he is never more amusing leaves for a time on account of his high prices, the debates with than in his shorter tales, when he makes them turn, as he so her guests and her chosen son-in-law, and pictures it all so as to often does, on his curiously microscopic knowledge of those make the domestic politics of the little Tyrolese valley almost little social tactics and manceavres by which so many important as full of true charm and humour, on the smaller scale on which positions are gained or lost, though no one but social micro- they are described, as stories like Miss Mitford's Our Village, scopists like Mr. Trollope appreciate their significance. In or even Mrs. Gaskell's Cranford.
this new volume of tales, Mr. Trollope is at his best, Then, again, how admirable is the story of Mrs. Miles, the Lady though in one of them, the farcical story of the mustard- of Lannay, the good, despotic lady who thought of nothing but plaster applied by a lady in a Paris hotel to the wrong patient, duty, but had such an insurmountable difficulty in distinguishing —a story which is, we believe, founded upon fact,—he deserts between the things which she had taken it into her head to will the more legitimate field of his genius to enhance the screaming because they seemed to satisfy all her hereditary prejudices, farce of the situation. The only story in this volume in and duty ! How admirable, for instance, is the following little which we feel little or no interest is the very laughable one to sketch of the difference made in the position of the adopted which we have just referred. It is laughable enough, but it child, Bessy Pryor, when it is first discovered by Mrs. Miles's betrays hardly any of that tpecial knowledge of the world dependants, in the course of a severe illness which the child in which Mr. Trollope excels us all, and, apart from the goes through, that the good lady, in spite of her disciplinarian absurd incident on which it is really founded, has little habits, is at heart devoted to the child !- or no merit. But in all the other tales, Mr. Trollope " Bessy had been despised at first all round Latmay. Unattrac- shows unmistakably the master's hand, though now and then, tire children are despised, especially when, as in this case, they are especially in the last of them, he betrays a little of that de- nobodies. Bossy Pryor was quite nobody. And certainly there had
never been a child more powerless to assert herself. She was for a light in caricaturing the worse instincts of society, under the year or two inferior to the parson's children, and was not thought influence of which he has now and then spoiled a good story, much of by the farmers' wives. The servants called her Miss Bossy, and once and again, perhaps, turned out a bad one which is not of course; but it was not till after that illness that there existed worthy to be numbered in the goodly array of his voluminous among them any of that reverence which is generally felt in the ser- vants' hall for the young ladies of the house. It was then, too, that and, on the whole, sufficiently self-restrained works. Far the the parson's daughters found that Bessy was nice to walk with, and greater part of this volume, however, is marked by that absolute that the tenants began to make much of her when she called. The sobriety of judgment of which Mr. Trollope is amply pos. old lady's secret manifestations in the sick bedroom had, perhaps, sessed in criticising society and social manners, whenever he been seen. The respect paid to Mrs. Miles in that and the next pariah
was of the most reverential kind. Had she chosen that a dog should does not resolve to "let himself go," and indulge himself of be treated as one of the Launays, the dog would have received all malice aforethought in a little bit of caricature,—the only con- the family honours. It must be acknowledged of her that in the per- dition of mind in which he paints pictures that seem to us dis- formance of her duty she had become a rural tyrant. She gave agreeable as well as extravagant. Nothing could be better away many petticoats; but they all bad to be stitched according to
her idea of stitching a petticoat. She adminibtered physic gratis to than the principal tales, "Why Fran Frohmann Raised her the entire estate; but the estate had to take the doses as she chose Prices," "The Lady of Launay," "The Telegraph Girl," and to have them mixed. It was because she had fallen something short much the greater part of " Alice Dugdale," nothing more ski'. of her acknowledged duty in regard to Bessy Pryor that the parson's ful than what we may call (to borrow a metaphor from medicine) daughters were soon even proud of an intimacy with the girl, and that the old butler, when she once went away for a week in the Mr. Trollope's diagnostic of the true significance of various winter, was so careful to wrap her feet up warm in the carriage." little nuances of social manners, and the influence which he Notice especially, too, Mr. Trollope's description of the change assigns to them in the working-out of his story. in the manner of the domestics when Bessy falls out of favour It would have been difficult, for instance, for any novelist in for a time, for falling in love with Mrs. Miles's son. Here is England except Mr. Trollope to describe the struggle in the the behaviour of the housekeeper on such an occasion, rendered Tyrolese innkeeper's (Frau Frehmann's) mind and life against as only Mr. Trollope could render it :— that necessary raising of prices which is a consequence of the
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