NOVELS •

DAPHNE.*

'Tron ethical element has always been more or less prominent ;in Mrs. Humplwy Ward's stories, but she has never so frankly or undisguisediy committed herself to the novel -with a purpose as in the pages of Daphne. Primarily it is addressed to an American audience, since the main aim of ,the book is to expose the dangers inherent in American -Feminism in general, and the American Divorce-.laws in ; particular. The author's view is clearly that put first into the mouth of an American journalist, to the effeot that the • most significant feature of modern American life is "a coin- 'plate transformation of the idea of marriage," and elaborated ; in a letter supposed to have been written by an English

• clergyman to an American officer. After noting certain formidable statistics and features of the situation—one in twelve of all marriages in the States dissolved ; the anomaly • of allowing a man or a woman to he divorced in one State and . still bound in another ; the remarkable fact that it is the • women who bring the majority of the actions, and, when *they have got rid of their husbands, only marry again in 'the minority of cases—the writer continues

"It is not passion, therefore, that dictates many of these . actions ; no serious cause or feeling, indeed, of any kind; but -rather an ever-spreading restlessness and levity, a readiness to " tamper with the very foundations of society, for a whim, a nothing !—in the interests, often, of what women call their

'individuality No foolish talk here of being members one of - another '! We have outgrown all that. The facilities are • always there, and the temptation of them. The women- • especially—who do these things,' my correspondent writes me, are moral anarchists. One can appeal to nothing; they acknowledge nothing. Transformations infinitely far-reaching - and profound are going on among us.' 'Appeal to nothing ! ' And this said of women, by a woman I It was of men that a Voice said long ago : Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, suffered you to put away your wives'—just such • grounds, apparently—trivial and cruel pretexts—as your American courts admit. But I say unto you! —I say unto you . . . . Well, I am a Christian priest, incapable, of course, • of an unbiassed opinion. My correspondent tries to explain the situation a little by pointing out that your women in America claim to be the superiors of your men, to be more intel- lectual, better-mannered, more refined. Marriage disappoints or disgusts them, and they impatiently put it aside. They break it up, and seem to pay no penalty. But you and I believe that they - will pay it !—that there are divine avenging forces in the very -law they tamper with—and that, as a nation, you must either /retrace some of the steps taken, or sink in the scale of life."

An English reviewer can only guess how this indictment will be received in America. But in view of the high motive and goodwill of the writer, her sincere admiration of a kindred race, and her strenuous efforts to hold the balance fairly ; between the representatives of the conflicting ideals, we cannot bring ourselves to believe that Mrs. Humphry Ward's novel will excite resentment or indignation. "Faithful are the

-wounds of a friend " ; and, after all, the picture she draws of '•the heartless assertion of individuality is not nearly so black

as that given by Mrs. Wharton in The House of Mirth. Of the two American "moral anarchists" who figure prominently • in Daphne, one on her deathbed makes solemn renunciation of the colt of lawlessness, and the other is quite unable to live up to her creed. We cannot help thinking that Mrs. Ward's • advocacy would have lost none of its persuasiveness if she had abstained from the conversion of her wild women.

The outlines of the story are simple enough. Roger Barnes, an extremely handsome and impecunious young Englishman, while travelling in America falls in love with Daphne Floyd, an orphan heiress steeped in advanced Feminism. On their . marriage Daphne's wealth enables them to resume life in the

family mansion in England on a lavish scale ; but her love of • self-aseertion brings her into constant collision with her mother- in-law, and estranges the neighbours. She is also furiously . jealous, and puts the worst possible construction on the efforts • of Mrs. Fairmile, a fascinating and unscrupulous grass-widow who had jilted Roger when he lost his money, to lure him ' back to his old allegiance. A lady nurse—the villain of the

• Plot—supplies false evidence of assignations, and Daphne, now

• driven almost insane by suspicion, leaves her home in her • husband's absence, carries off her child to America, and avails

* jar, Marriage d Ia Mode." By 31dre, Humphry Ward, London

'vasseil and Co. Oa.]

herself of all the resources of the American Divorce-law to dissolve her marriage. For the moment she is triumphantly successful ;. but her triumph is dearly won. She loses an excellent and adoring, if somewhat commonplace, husband ; her child dies'; and though her wealth gives her influence, her self-satisfaction is slowly undermined by the spectacle of the gradual defection of her greatest friend, from whom she had learned the gospel of self-assertion. Finally, when she is ripe for reconciliation, she finds it is too late. Though broken in health and spirit, her husband argues with fatal force against the experiment of reunion.

Daphne is not a cheerful book. It is, in fact, an extremely painful story. But it is not a case of the unnecessary manu- facture of misery. The tragedy is implicit in the promisees,— an ill-balanced temperament influenced by a vicious code of social ethics. The story, as we have said, is addressed first and foremost to America, but its theme concerns British readers only one degree leas closely. Indeed, in view of the large number of Englishmen who, like Roger Barnes in this novel, marry American wives, and the peculiarly close ties which bind the two countries, no very broad distinction can be drawn between the appeal which the book will make on the two sides of the Atlantic. The " transformation " of which Mrs. Humphry Ward speaks as an accomplished fact in America is a serious possibility with us. We cannot therefore regard the story as a gratuitous performance. On the contrary, the salutary warning which it conveys is one which is entirely justified by the tendency and teaching of advanced Feminists on this side of the Atlantic. The great difference is that the moral anarchists in America belong mainly to the idle rich. With us they are mostly to be found in the ranks of political extremists.