GOOD-BYE, SWEETHEART.*
THIS is a cleverly written, but singularly repulsive tale. Miss, Broughton possesses in a large degree the power, so invaluable to the novelist, of enchaining the attention of her readers. From page to page her narrative glides along without a single obstruction. There is nothing to perplex us, either in the incidents or the char- acters. It is never necessary to refer to what has gone before in, order to understand the progress of the plot, and it speaks much for the skill of the writer, that with very few characters and the slenderest materials she can maintain the interest of the tale. At the most, there are not more than four or five persons who play a prominent part in Good-bye, Sweetheart. Besides these, a few figures are seen upon the boards, but they only serve to fill up a space, like the walking gentlemen and ladies employed in the• theatre.
The plot, or so much of it as is needful for our purpose, can be re- lated in a few words. Two sisters, aged twenty-eight and seventeen, are to be found at the opening of the tale at a French boarding- house in Dinan. Jemitna, the eldest, demure, sarcastic, and with- out personal attractions, relates the misdoings of her beautiful and wilful sister Lenore, who has been accustomed to her own way from a child, and upon ripening into womanhood, takes it with a vengeance. A young clergyman of the silliest type is making love to Lenore in the first chapter ; he excites her curiosity about an ugly friend of his, Paul Le blesurier, "a man of anything but a good character," who " is always bored by the society of respect- • Good-bye. Sweetheart : a Tate. By Rhoda Broughton. 3 yolu. London: Bentley and Son. 1872.
able women, and never makes any secret of it." She makes a bet that she will see him, dresses up as a Breton girl, and carries a glass of wine to Paul in such confusion as to betray herself. The man who is not a good character is disgusted at this improper conduct on the part of a lady who has a character to lose, but by degrees, and through this strange introduction, an intimacy springs up between the two. Lenore is impertinent, unconventional, swears in a mild French fashion, has not a thought of propriety, and is continually shocking Paul ; but she attracts him towards her notwithstanding, "makes him love her," as he afterwards declares, and after a few private interviews, which no woman who was not immodest or fast would have permitted, the ugly man makes an offer to the beautiful spoilt girl and is instantly accepted. Paul has a devil of a temper and is very jealous; Lenore is bent upon doing what she likes at any cost, and when Le Mesurier is forced to return to England, it is not without misgivings that he leaves his handsome friend Scrope behind him, who professes to have a fancy for the elder sister. Lenore remains faithful to Paul, but she flirts a little with Scrope, calls him " Charlie," and makes the young fellow passionately in love with her ; and when Le Mesurier, after a long absence, pays a Christmas visit to Lenore at the house of Mrs. Prodgers, a widowed sister, he is disgusted to find Scrope there, and living apparently on terms of the most friendly intimacy with his betrothed. Paul is terribly jealous, Lenore rash and foolish, and devoted as she is to her ugly lover, when he lays his commands upon her she defies him. The tragedy commences at this point in the narrative, and in the third volume the warmly affectionate but wilful girl passes through a sea of troubles, under which at last she sinks. The representation of Lenore clinging to life when it is slipping from her is painful in the extreme. An infinite horror of death lays hold of her. There is no hope, nor even the resignation to what is inevitable, which gives to some dying persons the aspect of serenity.
If Miss Broughton's object has been to supply the eager crav- ings of novel-readers for mental food of a highly-seasoned kind ; to excite a morbid curiosity, and to administer to an unhealthy condition of mind by highly-coloured pictures, which, if not exactly immoral, are unrefined and suggestive of what is improper, it must be allowed that she has succeeded in her purpose. No mother would place Cometh up as a Flower or Red as a Rose is She in a daughter's hand without a caution, and the tone of Good-bye, Sweetheart, if lees objectionable, is far from healthy.
Miss Broughton may reply that she writes for men and women who know the world, not for girls in their teens ; but she is mis- taken if she thinks that men who affect to know life prefer the novel that is tainted with a knowledge of Bohemianism, or that women whose good opinion is of value will give honest praise to tales of the type selected by this writer. That her books are eagerly read we have no doubt whatever, and we have as little doubt that the readers who turn to them with the greatest curiosity are just those upon whom they are likely to exercise an unwholesome influence. The author belongs to what in Mr. Buchanan's language may be termed the "fleshly school" of novelists. The animal life in her pages stands out far more prominently than the spiritual. Lenore is praised again and again for her rippling hair and burn- ing blushes and wonderful eyes, for her long white throat and pretty pink nostrils and blood-red lips, and for the milk-white beauty of her arm. She has strong passions under little control, and although she blushes continually (the men grow red too on the slightest provocation), she does not shrink from doing anything to which she is incited by the whim of the moment, never pretends to good manners, and acknowledges that she is not ladylike. Paul is a rough-looking, ugly man, with a large red beard, in which Lenore's face is occasionally hidden ; while Scrope is distractingly handsome, with his blue eyes, his straight nose, and his soft gold moustache. "An innocent, cherubic, yet stalwart beauty, such as some men manage to preserve through half-a-dozen seasons, Scrope looks as if he had said his prayers and gone to bed at eight o'clock every night of his life." In the development of these three characters in which the interest of the story centres Miss Broughton is only partially successful. Scrope acts a part against his friend which is out of keeping with his character, and Paul's conduct in commanding Lenore not to dance with Scrope, in renouncing her because she disobeyed him, and in making love afterwards to a common-place cousin, is scarcely in harmony with what we read of him in the earlier part of the tale. The character of Lenore appears to us better conceived than that of either of her lovers. There are some graphic sketches in the novel which bring the situation vividly before the eye, and scenes upon which the writer has evidently expended all her strength. There are smart sayings too, a few of which are clever enough, while the
greater number strike us as pert and vulgar. But Lenore, with all her defects, disgusting us in one scene, and attracting us by her sincerity and passionate warmth in the next, keeps her hold upon the reader until the last. Undisciplined, headstrong, un- educated, and unladylike, she is not heartless, and when she has found her beau ideal in Paul, her whole soul goes out towards him with an impetuous rush, like a strong mountain stream, which seems to gather force from the obstacles that impede its course. It is this that accounts for her abominable and unfeminine conduct to Scrope, and it is this vehement passion that de- stroys her at last. There are some scenes in the tale which even the habitual novel - reader is not likely soon to forget. One is an interview—a fatal interview, as it proved— between Lenore and Scrope, in which she requests him to leave the house, and he promises to do so the next day, on condition that she will waltz with him four times that evening ; another is the rupture that occurs between the girl and Paul in consequence ; a third relates the preparations for the mad wedding between Lenore and Scrope, which is never destined to be consummated ; and a fourth is a moonlight interview between Paul and Lenore, on a narrow bridge which crosses a torrent in the Engadine. From each of these it would be possible to select a striking passage for quotation, but it must suffice to give a single specimen of Miss Broughton's style. Here is a part of the conversatton on the bridge to which we have alluded :- "' Lenore,' he says, after another silence, in a tone of stronger excite- ment than any that he has yet used, 'I am going to tell you something. Often and often I have wondered whether I should ever have the chance of telling you. Sometimes I have wished that I should, and sometimes I have hoped that I should not. It does not much matter what you think of me now, one way or another, but I do not think that it will im- prove your opinion of either my wisdom or my humility. Do you re- member that last letter you sent me ?' She is not pale now ; he cannot accuse her of it. No rose in any midsummer garden was ever so red; and her streaming eyes flash in the mild moonlight with the old angry spirit. Is he going to twit her with that poor little overture that mis- carried so piteously ? did not believe in it,' he goes on, still in hot excitement. ' I was sore and mad from your galling, bitter words. Lenore' (almost entreatingly), why do you let your tongue cut like a knife ? I thought it was only a flirting manceuvre to get me back and make a fool of me a second time. I hate being made a fool of ! Nobody had ever taken the trouble to do it before. I hate being trodden upon. I like to walk upright and go my own way.'—' Well ?'—' You remember the answer I sent—I hope you burnt it—I am not proud of it,' redden- ing through all his sun-tan. Well, when it was gone I read your letter over again, and by dint of poring over it line by line I grew to think that there was a true ring in it. Lenore, it was very clever of you! I do not know how you managed to get that true ring. I began to think of—of—the dear old time' (his voice, though he is a man, shakes a little). '1 began—you will laugh at me for thinking of such a trifle at such a moment—to remember the old blue gown and Huelgoat.' She turns away, and leans over the bridge ; and, unseen by him, unseen by anyone, her tears hotly drop into the cold river and are swallowed by it. ' I recollected things you used to say,' he continues, with a pensive smile, given rather to the past than the present. You had such a pretty fond way of saying things—well' (dashing his hand across his forehead, and abruptly changing his tone) the upshot of it was that I resolved to ask you to—to—to—kiss and make friends in short—I suppose one may as well word it in that childish way as any other. I had even' (beginning to laugh harshly, for one's laughs at one's own expense are rarely melo- dious) got a new pen, squared my elbows, and sat down to write to you.' She is trembling all over, and panting, as one breathless from a long race. ' Why did not you ?—why did not you?' she cries, with almost a wail. Why did not I?' he repeats, looking at her with un- feigned astonishment. wonder at your asking that. Why? Because at that very moment, not a week after you had composed that triumph of pathos' (with a bitter sneer), ' I heard of your engagement to Scrope. I saw how much the true ring was worth then ; I believe I laughed. There is always something to be thankful for, and I was heartily thank- ful that I had not written. There is no use in eating more dirt than one can help in this world, is there ?'—' But I am not engaged now!' she cries, passionately. 'I can hardly believe that I ever was really ; people exaggerate things so in the telling. I think it was always more play than earnest.'—' Afore play than earnest !' he repeats, in utter and blank astonishment. ' Why, I understood that the wedding day had come— that you were all dressed—and that it was only put off on account of your having been taken suddenly ill Yes,' she answers, incoherently ; thank God, I was ill, very ill ; that was what saved me ; Thank God ! thank God!'—' Saved you ;' he repeats, looking at her with unlimited wonder. ' how do you mean ? Surely it was your own doing? It was only put off, was not it ?—it is still to be ?'—' Never ! never!' she cries, wildly. ' Who can have told you such things? It was all a farce from beginning to end; it never was anything serious. I—I—think I must have been a little off my head.'—' And you are not engaged to Scrope (with an accent of extreme surprise).—' Not I,' she answers, vehemently ; 'do not suggest anything so dreadful.'—' Nor to any one else ?'—' Any one else !' she echoes, scornfully. 'To whom else should I be ? Must I always be engaged to some one ?'" Miss Broughton in the course of her tale alludes more than once to the novels of Miss Austen. She might learn much from a writer so self-restrained, so admirably accomplished, so truly artistic, whose works give a fresh pleasure as often as they are read, and must ever form a portion of English literature. But what reader, although he may read Good-bye, Sweetheart with avidity, will care to open its pages a second time ?
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