3 APRIL 1909, Page 23

NOVELS.

SARAH TULDON'S LOVERS.*

IT was not in human nature for a reader of Sarah Tuldon to refrain from hoping that " Orme Agnus " would tell us more of that Dorsetshire peasant's daughter who, in her parents' lifetime, had already made herself famous through- out the countryside for her character and beauty. That being 50, we may dispense with the usual truisms about the dangers of sequels, and say at once that the issue of this further instalment of the life-history of the redoubtable and inimitable Sarah is fully justified on its merits and has sensibly increased oUr indebtedness to the author.

We resume acquaintance with the heroine about a year after the death of her elderly husband, David Mockell. Sarah is still a girl in years, radiantly handsome and vigorous, and represents the most attractive typo of maftresse femme in Whom practical ability is combined with wealth and good looks. Small wonder, then, was it that this was the period at Which her farm suffered most, "for she was so busy listening tO suitors in the parlour and showing them to the door that there was no opportunity to superintend her people as she would have liked." The name of these suitors was legion, but only three made any impression on Sarah : Paul Ostramore, the painter ; Squire Deverill ; and Alec Stutchley, the young minister. At the first blush there is something repellent in the notion that Sarah should have seriously con- Ilidered the proposal of old Deverill, a vicious old reprobate who had bullied his first wife into her grave, and brutally tyrannised Over servants, retainers, and tenants. But Sarah's motives, though mixed, are not altogether ignoble. As the

dare-devilest young woman the Almighty ever made," she had no fear of the old squire, and fully meant to rule him

• ---" I like trying to tame beasts," was her own comment—and redeem his estate from tyranny by her benevolent despotism. .LOVe of power was perhaps the ruling passion of Sarah's life. " As mistress of Hill Farm she was queen over ten, as 'Mistress of the Hall she would reign over a thousand." rortunately Sarah's ambition and her courage were equalled II her shrewdness, and when she reflected that the property was entailed, that nothing would come to her own child, and that her reign would depend on the precarious life of a broken man of seventy, she had no hesitation in dismissing the wickedest though socially the most eligible of her suitors. The episode does not tend to exalt Sarah on a pinnacle of womanliness, but it fits in Perfectly with her ambitious nature, her intrepidity, and her man-taming instincts. In her relations with Ostramore :arali shows herself in a much more human light. Ostramore le an artist of talent and a man of good birth and culture,

ith a martial presence and a flattering tongue. But he so

v4" cc6.8a.ii Tuition's Lovers. By Ormo Agana. London : Ward, Look, and

far presumes on his fascination as to volunteer to Sarah the

information that he has a wife and children living not far off I But for this fatal, or, we should rather say, fortunate, indis- cretion, Sarah might have made shipwreck of her life. As it was, Sarah's passionate sense of justice brought her up with a round turn, and there is something quite heroics in her confession to the injured wife and her efforts to induce that neglected lady to assert herself. But while we can readily understand Sarah's infatuation and her disillusionment, we find it harder to accept the subsequent conduct of Ostramore. So thoroughly selfish an adventurer would have acquiesced in his dismissal and gone back to his Alsatian haunts. One cannot help suspecting that his sullen pertinacity has been utilised by the author to bring about the tragic conclusion of Sarah's third and most serious love affair. That a woman who had in her not a little of the virago should feel the deepest affection for the gentlest and least robust of her suitors is true enough to the facts of life. Besides, we are made to feel that, with all her bluntness of speech and passion for manual labour, Sarah has an innate aspiration after refinement. She loves fine clothes on occa- sions, she has taught herself to speak like a lady, and never neglected any educational opportunities that have come her way. It is natural enough that Sarah should admire Alec Stutehloy, the young minister who abandoned his calling to cultivate his musical gift, and one feels that the consciousness of her stronger nature lends a protective and maternal quality to her affection. The tragedy in which the narrative closes strikes us as rather artificial, but as it does not eliminate Sarah, and leaves her still a young widow, we may perhaps look forward to a further chronicle of the fortunes of this engaging Amazon. The book lends itself freely to quotation, but wo must confine ourselves to the passage which describes with homely pathos the burial of good Dr. Brim :— "There have been many funerals in Suckton since then that the descriptive reporter would style a melancholy pageant or imposing obsequies. There was a vast array of coaches at Squire Westham's, Admiral Delapore's brought many naval men to Suckton Church, and some years since Sir Frederick Wigston was buried with elaborate Masonic ceremonial, but old people will assort almost with passion there was no funeral like that of John Robert Brim. 'We was all there, zur,' said Ezra Goding. 4".1`waddn' hardly a soul there under wire-and-twenty as John Robert hadif brought into the world. He badn' no near rela- tion 'copt a brother from npalong near Bristol, and he came, and Zally Tuldon, her as was Mrs. Mookoll, walked with en next to the bearers. We carried on, zur ; I was woono o' the bearers. You could ha' watered my garden with the tears shed thik day, I d'low. We loved he just about, look zoo. Not a chick nor a child did lie leave behind, and there haven' been nobody of tho name of Brim in thease parts since, but tiddn' a name for- gotten.' And then Ezra ran over a dozen names of people to whom I could appeal for confirmation. We loved he just about.' On his tombstone in Suckton Churchyard, engraved at Mrs. Mockell's expense and at Alec Stutchley's suggostiou, who was at tho funeral, were put the words The Beloved Physician. But I love to think of Mrs. Loggatt's remark: "Pwouldn' be thought vitty in God's holy ground, but I do wish Polly could ha' boon put somewhere close to they two.' " 'Polly' was the Doctor's famous mare of whom Dick Tuldon said: "She be a Christian out and out." It is characteristic of " Orme Agnus" that, while Sarah queens it throughout his pages, she does not eclipse the minor personages of the story. Even when they shine with a reflected lustre, as in the case of her sister and brother, they have a quaint individuality of their own.