RECENT NOVELS.* DESPITE certain recent assaults, the three-volume novel—so far
at any rate as quantity is concerned—seems to be holding its own. The trios of smartly attired tomes come in with the familiar regularity, and the pile on the reviewer's table is as imposing as ever : it is the material, not the bulk, that seems to have suffered temporary impoverishment. Not that the latest additions to contemporary fiction are conspicuously poor ; they are simply wanting in character, in distinction, in the qualities which arrest and strongly interest. Here, for example, is A Vagabond in Arts, by Mr. Algernon Gissing, which we cannot but regard as a very dis- appointing book, for Mr. Gissing is a man from whom some- thing is to be expected. His stories are all gloomy, some of them are intensely depressing ; but, in their dismal way, they are wont to be interesting, and the new novel is decidedly dull, .--so dull as to make the reading of it very hard work. We think that the dullness arises from the fact that for once Mr. Gissing has attempted a task which is beyond him, which is, perhaps, beyond any one, for even a great creative artist cannot give lifelikeness to conceptions which lack the unity and the harmony which belong to all real life. We know quite well that sane, intelligent, and clever young men who have enjoyed the advantages—and dis- advantages—of a university education, are liable to pos- session by all sorts of absurd notions, just as perfectly healthy children are liable to measles and whooping-cough, and it would be indiscreet to say that domination by this or that craze is inherently incredible. But one may say, without any indiscretion at all, that Shiel Wanless is incredible, because, even supposing that Mr. Gissing's own conception of the character had original vitality, he has failed to make that vitality visible to his readers. He is represented as a young man who, so far from being a selfish or lazy person, is inspired by the noblest instincts, but who, nevertheless, has • (1.) A Vagabond in Arte. By Algernon Gissing. 8 vols. London: Hurst and Blaokett.--i2.1 Ths Game of Ws. By Barley Dale. vols. London : lintahinBan and (3) The Merchant of Kiitopue: a Munster Tale. By Edmund Downey F. M. Allen). 8. vols. London : William Heinomann.—(4.) In a Dingus Poe : a Story Winch:34os. By E. M. Hewitt. vols. London: R. Bentley and Son.--1.5.} A &Melte Heart. 2 vols. London: Ward, Look, and Bowden.—(6.) Miss Precocity. By Charles T. 0. James. 2 vols. London Bliss, Bands, and Foster.---(7,) A Modern Amason. By George Paston. 2 vols. London: Osgood, MeIlvaine, and 0o. arrived at the conviction that having been brought into the world without his own consent, he is devoid of all responsi- bilities save such as he may bring upon himself by his own act. It need hardly be said that the conduct in which this con- viction embodies itself is externally indistinguishable from the grossest selfishness and the most callous ingratitude, and the young man's priggish and pedantic exposition of his views does nothing to make him or them in any way real. Then there are three women with whom the irresponsible young man enters into more or less intimate relations ; but though they all talk a great deal in a very " viewy" fashion, we never seem to come into vital touch with them. Ebba's restoration of the library which her father has sacrificed is, indeed, a pathetically conceived and admirably told story; but we have seldom read an equally able novel that is so irritatingly indistinct. The Game of Life is an absurdly ambitious title for a novel of mild, hackneyed, and very unexciting melodrama. The lady or gentleman who calls herself or himself Darley Dale provides us with the usual villain whose action keeps the story going, and without whom indeed there would be no story to tell ; but his villainy is such an inexplicable and purposeless sort of thing, that it is really impossible to feel any in- terest either in it or in him. He is, like so many of the villains of melodrama, an Italian, who, for no discernible reason, follows the heroine about, opens a chemist's shop, be- comes the local postmaster, tampers with the letters of the heroine and her lover, and makes things uncomfortable all round, with no purpose that is at all commensurate with the amount of energy brought to bear upon his nefarious designs. Like most of his tribe, he has some one in his power, but we are altogether in the dark concerning the secret of his hold upon his victim, and though the first volume excites a certain amount of languid curiosity, it soon dies away ; and by the time we are within sight of the denouement we have a dismal consciousness of having been excited on false pretences. Nor, apart from the absurd plot, is there anything in the book to interest or satisfy. There is some sort of an attempt at character-drawing in the portrait of a young lady named Sybil, but we have found her a very unconvincing person; and The Game of Life is not a specially interesting contribution to circulating-library fiction.
If we are not mistaken, Mr. Edmund Downey's previous books have been for the most part contributions to what has been called the " new humour," though he began to write before that term had been invented. The Merchant of Killogue is however a serious study of life in a small and evidently typical town in the province of Munster, and so far from being a conspicuously humorous novel, there is less of the humorous element than we expect—and almost that we have a right to expect—in an Irish story. Still, though it lacks what we on this side of the water have come to regard as characteristic Hibernian piquancy, Mr. Downey has written a very bright, vivacious book, which is by no means wanting in narrative interest, and which is strengthened by sketches of character which testify to the author's knowledge of the life with which he deals. The " merchant" himself is a very carefully painted portrait, and he is really made to live. He trades in the national beverage, and as his business is very largely that of a retailer, he is hardly a mer- chant in the English acceptation of the word; but com- mand of capital, and the knowledge of his neighbours' affairs which such command gives, make him a man of power among his fellow-townspeople of Killogue. O'Reilly's ambitions and schemes provide the novel with a good avail- able framework, and some of the separate episodes are admirably handled. There is nothing remarkable in The Merchant of Killogue, but it is a very pleasant and readable story. We are disposed to think that In a Cinque Port is a novel which has been written for the sake of its background, and certainly the passages which charmed us most when we read it, and which we believe will linger longest in our memory, are those in which our view of this background is unobstructed by any figures in front of it. The fantastic theory that the subject counts for nothing in art, has never been extended beyond a small circle of paradox-mongers, and even they are now abandoning it. It has always been obvious to the simple-minded world that there are some themes which easily lend themselves to imaginative treatment, and others which obviously resist it, and among the former are all objects associated with a past romance. Upon any man with an imaginative historical instinct, such a town as Win- chelsea, where the dullness and decay quicken the memory of the busy prosperity of long ago, makes an impression similar to the impression made by the face of an aged woman in which the beauty of youth remains only in hints and relics; and of either the one or the other he who writes with sympathy can hardly fail to write with charm. The topographical chapters and pages are indeed charming, and the whole story has a certain attractiveness in spite of a rather aggressive sentimentality and more than a touch of melodrama. It is a somewhat thin novel, and there is not a single character in it—with the possible exception of the good-natured fortuneteller, Mrs. Petipher—who possesses tangible flesh-and-blood reality; but it has the pleasantness of a quiet October day, and this really counts for a good deal.
The author of A Sunless Heart is dertainly a woman, and probably a young woman. It is clear that she lacks literary experience, which, however, may be acquired ; and on the evidence provided by this book, we should say that she also lacks the feeling for literary form, which perhaps cannot be acquired, or which at any rate can be acquired but partially. The book is shapeless in outline and often crude in workman- ship; it is more or less painful from first to last ; and it is probable that many readers will find certain portions of it not merely painful, but repellent. It is nevertheless, in its uncomfortable way, an exceptionally strong book ; and the newspaper critics who have compared it to The Story of an African Farm, would not have been guilty of any great ineptitude had they been careful to distinguish between the purely emotional appeal which is the only appeal made by A Sunless Heart, and the combination of intel- lectual with emotional interest which gives so much more of specific gravity to Miss Schreiner's gloomy romance. The Story of an African Farm, is undoubtedly a harrowing book, but it would be unjust to say that its harrowing quality con- stitutes its raison d'itre, Whether we sympathise with its purpose or not, we feel that it has a purpose, whereas no such feeling compensates us for the miserable emotions with which we close the new story. The author may have thought that she was making an addition to the numerous feminine im- peachments of the cruelty and tyranny of man ; but such an impeachment is only effective when the instance chosen is really typical,—when we can at once recognise the fidelity of the representation to the observed facts of life, as we certainly do not recognise it in the terrible story of Lotus. Lotus her- self is hardly a character; she is more like one of Shelley's personified abstractions ; she represents the writer's attempt at an embodiment of wronged and suffering womanhood. And if success is to be gauged by mere sharpness of impression, Lotus is certainly successful, though we think that the success might have been greater had more of reticence and restraint gone to the portrayal of her. Mr, Oscar Wilde has cleverly said that a popular novelist " writes at the top of his voice," and the author of A Sunless Heart makes the same mistake. Still, when one has noted everything in the book that calls for animadversion—its strain, its morbidness, its feverishness, its lack of proportion—one has to admit that it has genuine imagination and power, and that in the opening story of the brother and sister there are passages of fine pathos and beauty. With all its faults the book is not to be ignored ; and we are inclined to think that the faults may be partly due to its being written in an alien language. The dedicatory poem, which, imperfect as it is, has something of Rossetti's passion and glamour, suggests the inference that verse rather than prose is the author's natural vehicle of expression.
If any reader of this column wants a novel which provides unadulterated entertainment and nothing more, Miss Precocity ought to be the book to suit him ; and we say "ought to be," rather than "will be," because individual taste is a hazardous thing to count upon. When the present writer had himself extracted a good deal of amusement from the book, a benefi- cent impulse prompted him to pass it on to a friend, who, however, speedily returned it, on the ground that it was "too absurd." The criticism was, in a way, perfectly just, and at the same time perfectly irrelevant. That a little girl of eight should be left absolute and uncontrolled mistress of a large estate and fortune is, of course, incredible ; but credibility is not essential either to fantasy or farce, and in Miss Precocity the fantastic and farcical elements are of necessity prominent. But what we demand of a writer is, not that he shall choose this or that artistic form or method, but that, whatever form or method he does choose, his work shall be consistent and harmonious ; and with this demand Mr. James's book com- plies. The little heroine, who is always called " Miss Marston," is obviously impossible ; and the Jellicos, and the other adults who surround her, are hardly less so, but, assuming their possibility for an artistic purpose, Mr. James is very happy in his treatment in the mingled humour and pathos of the inevitable situations. The child's first interview with the foppish prig, Elias Jellico, is deliciously funny; and her relations with that mischievous imp, Harry Shorthouse, give the needed touch of simple human interest. It is some time since we have read anything so pretty of its kind as the chapter entitled "Love Birds ; " and, indeed, we think any one who is unsophisticated enough will find in Miss Precocity some very pleasant reading.
The title, A Modern Amazon, seems to promise a new con- tribution to the fiction of the great "woman question,' and the promise is fulfilled by the story itself. Mr. Past= is, however, more conservative than the majority of his competitors. Without setting himself doggedly against the new movements which have for their end the inde- pendence of women, he is evidently under the fascina- tion of the old ideals ; and his book is one that is hardly likely to be received with favour at the Pioneer Club and other revolutionary centres. Still, it would be unfair to write of A Modern Amazon as a book entirely or even mainly domi- nated by a propagandist or other purpose. Careless Gallios who care nothing for the feminine controversies with which the penny morning journals fill their columns during the dull season will find the story, as a mere story, satisfactorily enter- taining. It provides a quick succession of quiet yet interesting incident, and Mr. Fasten is very successful in his grouping of a number of characters who represent various contemporary types in a quite recognisable fashion, and who are at the same time vividly conceived studies of individual character. Such are Stephen Faulkner, the fashionable editor who has sown. his wild oats in youth, and finds the harvest waiting for him in middle age ; Lady Sarah Linkwater, the gentle, old- fashioned woman ; Humphrey Kenyon, who with his alert intellect is utterly unable to understand the nature and aims of the woman whom he loves; and Regina Haughton, the feminine journalist whose imposing programme of life was so eminently satisfactory until it was subjected to the test of practice, when it shared the fate of so many other programmes which have preceded it and will follow it. All these are most life- like and skilful portraits ; and the book which contains them is a clever, wholesome, and interesting novel.
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