A WEEK IN A FRENCH COUNTRY HOUSE.* THERE is more
than one reason for welcoming this new edition of a charming old friend. As a rule, the modern system of editing the books of a past generation, and writing prefaces to explain them from the point of view of some literary person whose opinion does not seem to matter much, is a cause of irritation in those who love the old books for their own sakes. To them a beloved classic without notes or introduction is a thing to be desired. And even in the interest of education, the excuse for so much fuss and pedantry, we are inclined to believe that it is better to let all this explanation alone. What is the use of teaching people to think if all the thinking is done for them ?
Mrs. Sartoris's little book, simple, fresh, fascinating, in the well-remembered binding of thirty years ago "needed no bush" to bring its merits to the notice of those worthy to appreciate them. But now it is rather a different thing. People have read a great deal about French life since those days, though they actually know very little more. They have never met with anything truer to that life, more full of its intimate charm, than Mrs. Sartoris's little pioneer volume. But they do not know this; and also the majority of the present generation have no very clear idea of Mrs. Sartoris herself as a writer and a woman. This charming character and delicate genius, in whom music might be called the out- ward expression of all the other arts, had not the kind of strong and showy literary talent which makes a mark in the world in spite of itself. The fine touches and pale, exquisite colours of her work found fit admirers at first; but to revive it in an age when fineness is at a discount is an attempt not very sure of success.
For modern readers, therefore, among the best of whom her name is so honoured and so familiar, as well as for those who recognise the right of the author of The Village on the Cliff to write of A Week in a French Country House, Mrs. Richmond Ritchie's delightful preface is a very welcome addition to the book. It may almost be called a biographical sketch, made up as it is out of the recollections of many friends, who in their different ways knew how to appreciate Mrs. Sartoris. It does not—nothing could—increase one's admiration for the story, but it will make people realise with wonder and interest how many-sided was the character to whom this book owes its unique charm of touch and atmosphere, its exquisite blending of truth and fancy.
It really was a study from life, "more than a sketch and less than a story," as its author described it in offering it to Mr. Smith for the Cornhill. To us it seems a good deal more
• .4 Week in a French Country House. By Adelaide Sartoris. Illustrated by Lord Leighton, P.R.A. New Edition. With a Portrait ; and a Preface by Richmond Ritchie. London : Smith, Elder, and Co. [7s. Gd.]
than a sketch and a story with a real and absorbing interest of its own, not from any particular plot, for there is none—and this was probably what Mrs. Sartoris meant—but from the fact that the characters are living people. The whole thing is true and real ; c'est rcu. To quote the writer again,—" the papers are descriptions of places and things which I have seen and people whom I know." Probably it was only the thin veil of a change of name which disguised Madame Olympe and M. Kiowski from their fortunate friends and acquaintances ; and probably it would even now be possible to climb from the river to Marny-les-Monts, to wake in the morning and look out in the crystal air of autumn over " the great ocean of the forest, drenched in deep dews, steeped in warm sunshine, swaying in the sweet morning freshness." All through the story one breathes the air of French woods, and among its most telling scenes is the description of the boar-bunt, in which also full justice is done to the spirit of French sport, not to be despised, as we insular people are too apt to think, because of the hundred ways in which its theory and practice differ from our own.
For those who are not yet acquainted with the book we may add a few particulars. A young Englishwoman goes to France to visit a French Comtesse whose mother was English, and paints her hostess's portrait, as well as that of her brother, the Marquis, " Monsieur Charles," and of the various guests who are staying at the chateau at the same time. Never was so much fun, romance, originality, variety of character, crowded into one house and one week. Madame de Caradec herself, " Madame Olympe," stately, simple, imperious, old- fashioned ; Monsieur Charles, the perfect French gentleman;. Monsieur Berthier and M. Kiowski, artists in painting and music ; Mademoiselle Jeanne, a pearl of young girls : then the other English visitors, Lady Blankeney and her daughter, touched in with well-deserved satire for their shallow worldli- ness and stupidity ; the girl who arrives under their wing, Ursula Hamilton, rich, handsome, extraordinary, and interest- ing, with her wonderful little musician friend, M. Jacques. Dessaix ; last not least, as he would himself think, Rene-de. Saldes, the spoilt man who does not know whether he is more furiously angry with Ursula or more desperately in love' with her. If there is a failure among Mrs. Sartoris's characters, it is Rene de Saldes : he is a little melodramatic and out of tune with the rest. She is at her best when laugh- ing gently at Lady Blankeney and Marie for their narrow selfishness and ignorance of French conventionalities, or in describing the inimitable M. Dessaix and his relations with Ursula. The talk of the book is quite as delightful as its scenery and characters. Mrs. Sartoris's people are cosmo. politan, not merely French ; though their daily life is made up of the thousand little peculiar customs which make French country life in its delightful picturesqueness so different from the English.
It may be said that the little book is old-fashioned. Certainly it was written nearly forty years ago ; but human nature has not changed much since then, except that with greater liberty there may be less originality. French people in their homes are very much what they were under the Empire. They have new troubles, and are less light-hearted. Madame Olympe would certainly have resisted the packing away of her favourite little teaching Sister, " the good angel of the village." But they have not lost that family love and talent for mutual toleration which sweetens life, nor that brilliancy which lightens every burden, nor that kindness which warms the heart of a stranger amongst them. In many a charming French house of to-day a week might be spent quite as delightfully as at Marny-les-Monts. We could promise a Monsieur Charles, a Madame Olympe, a Jeanne, gay evenings, romantic hunting parties, manners sweet as of old. But Monsieur Jacques Dessaix might be missed. " Ursula, there is danger ; I leave thee!" Whether a por- trait or a creation, he belongs for ever to Mrs. Sartoris and the French country house she made her own.
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