Fiction
The Gypsy. By W. B. Tritos. (Gollancz. 5s.)
Tim brief novel called The Gypsy was first issued at Nice two years ago. Critics who then read the story have expressed fervent appreciation : It is certainly a brilliant and original piece of work, though it just misses entering into the per- fection that should receive a thing of such brevity and intensity. In a fantastic Andalusia of sheer preCipices and triumphing roses, a dipsomaniac painter, a failure at fifty, lives
under the discipline of his tender and heroic wife. "The gypsy walked as if to barbarie iriusie "--into his life and art.
His weak senses so dissolve in her spell that finally he watches unprotesting when, "with a glance of no significance," she presents the little glass of poison to his wife as she rests in a moment of singular happiness. The darkening eyes 'of Wake him to horror and despair. In_a state of alcoholic
trance he marries the gypsy, and submits to the indignities of her tribe, lost all the time in a baffling agony in which his spirit pursues the wronged soul of Julia, seeking forgiveness. At last, after' he has signed a will in favour of the •girl Dolores, he accepts the glass she gives, again "-with a.glance_ok no signi- ficance," convinced that such atonement -will 'bring peace and pardon. The colour and illumnuttion of the-scene, the rose and amber images excited by the physical perfection of Dolores, the vision of a Spain all splendour and squalor, enclose the drama with a mocking beauty. But credibility should never fail, especially in a story of the " remorseless " style ; and in a conte that recalls Wrimee • nothing should- be vague. The husband has no character at all ; he is only a sullen sick consciousness, and the length of his repenting reverie destroys the incisive objective impression created by the first part of the story. It is the concluding chord of despair, struck when the dying man suddenly loses his belief in humor. tality, that alters a rococo incident into a spiritual tragedy.
The very title of The Vicar's Daughter transports us to another world, though those who have met the " .William " of E. H. Young will at once suspect it of a smiling intention. Edward, the scholarly unconventional vicar, had one daughter, Hilary : another was wrongly imputed to him, though he did not know it. Hence the subtle imbroglio created by his cousin Maurice, a different kind of vicar. The mental processes of that rubicund neurasthenic with flat feet are exposed with a really masterly precision. He loves, in his aching neurotic way, the enchanting Margaret, wife of Edward. So does Edward. So do we. She has been born under the dancing star ; and her conversation is an arrowy delight. There is creative impulse in Margaret, spent in sweet and gay intrigues for the amusement of Edward and Hilary; but her graceful figure, her ironic and acute mind, her impassioned temperament, have their touches of greatness, and, less honest or less humorous, she might have been claimed by a fiercer destiny. Her daughter Hilary is sur- prisingly effective beside such a mother. She intervenes rarely, but when she does it is clearly and softly as a matin bell ; and it is her frank simplicity. that divides the silken knot of suspicion before it strangles. With its various charm of softly lit interiors, sunny gardens, and vital dialogues, this is a captivating book. For all its low laughter, you are never unaware of the quick emotional pulse beneath it.
The Coming of the Lord takes a larger canvas for its wider issues. Like all good novelists, Mrs. Millin writes in the first instance because the queer stuff called human nature so fascinates her that she must shape it into breathing men and women. But, partly because her scene is the debatable clashing world of South Africa, her novels have a farther value of persuasion to tolerance that no direct propaganda can achieve. It would be hard to read this satirical, sombre, yet compassionate chronicle of suffering, misunderstanding. and tragic conciliation, without more intimately realizing Kaffir, Jew, disinherited German, and even the stultifying kind of Englishman. When Aaron, the Kaffir prophet. brought his Levites to the Heights above Gibeon to wait the Coming of the Lord, strictly according to Biblical injunction, he created consternation in the town below ; and - finally machine-guns taught him that no government enjoys the literal interpretation of the Scriptures. The wise Jew, Isaac Nathan ; his sensitive son Saul, who perished, binding the wounds of the ICaffirs he disliked ; Dr. Dietrich, the German ; Dr. Tetyana, the native physician ; the disastrous Arnold Duerdon, who swaggers with his Vigilants because he is good only for games and war, and his wife supports his home, are all people to be deeply considered. The author's implicit chivalry inclines her to -the weaker; but she is at home in the hearts of all her folk. Work so firmly handled, and so nobly tolerant, -shows a masculine vigour ; none the less the book has an unfaltering tenderness, from the opening scene of the two old chess-players to the last when, after long estrangement, they sit down again, equal in loss.
Perhaps it is slightly unfair-to turn from so sincere a book to C. A. Nicholson's flamboyant Hell and the Dachas. Sold as a convent bred girl to her infamous lord, the Duchesse de Trigues went -into hell when- the Duke killed her :lover in a and thereafter abdtiaiii her daughter. She -Went as a modern Ninon de l'EncloS ; and the effort to show the
lady -" magnificent in sin" in gilded Paris, though highly artificial, is distinctly picturesque. When she regains her child, Claire, from England, she proceeds to arrange a marriage between her and her stepsbn. JneqUes, who !adores herself. Her diplomacy is dramatic-melodramatic, indeed-but she succeeds, and perishes to the music of the lovers' harpsichord. The dialogue seems unnatural. Why should the Duchess speak English, with French phrases, to a lawyer of her own country ? It is a spirited incredible story in a falsetto style. The author has done much better work.
RACHEL ANNAND TAYLOR.
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