THE SCOTTISH HEIRESS.

COMPARED with the generality of novels, The Scottish Heiress is a powerfully written and interesting work. The author possesses some acquaintance with life ; he has a quick eye to seize the salient points of what he observes, as well as considerable powers of reflection ; his characters are conceived and developed with metaphysical accuracy, and sometimes with lifelike nicety ; the structure of his story is coherent, the narrative in the main is carried on with rapidity, and the incidents are well-contrived to dis- play the feelings of youthful romance its conjunction with modern manners ; whilst the style of the book is forcible, without any ap- proach to inflation., phases of life which are presented to the reader do not, indee, possess much of novelty, having been used so frequently as almost to have become the commonplaces of novelists; but many of them are depicted with tnore of truth and effect in ;he work before us than in the usual run of fictions.

Although Helen Ruthven, " the Scottish heiress," is the prin- cipal character at the opening of the book, and is sufficiently conspicuous as the heroine till its close, the hero is the main interest of the novel. Kenneth Clyne is a young Highlander of a good but reduced family. At the opening of the story, he is study- ing for the law in Edinburgh ; a suit, instituted by an unprin- cipled uncle against Helen Ruthven to deprive her of her for- tune and stigmatize her with illegitimacy, is defeated by his energy ; a mutual passion springs up in the breasts of the young heiress and the aspiring lawyer; when the death of an uncle, on whom he had depended, turns Kenneth Clyne adrift upon the world, and he comes to London as an adventurer. Here he is exhibited in various circumstances, common in novels, because

they are common- in life,—an applicant to a Minister, a hopeless seeker after situations with his means daily failing him' a writer for the periodicals; an under-secretary to a joint-stock bubble company ; and a dramatist. A report of Helen's marriage leads him into a connexion with the tragic heroine of the day, from which he is eventually rescued by her death; and after various collateral incidents, in which his sister is dishonourably pursued by Sir Edgar Ruthven, the accomplished villain of the piece, a fortune turns up for Kenneth Clyne, and the denouement ends happily for all parties.

Considered as a circulating-library novel, The Scottish Heiress is entitled to high praise for the interest of its story and the power of its composition ; in many of the scenes, which are rather incidental to the progress of the narrative than strictly neces-

sary to the production of the denouement, there is much of natu- ral and truthful description—as passages during the lawsuit, Mrs. Micklejolm's preparation for her party, the character and death of Kenneth's youngest sister, and the steam-boat voyage to London.

But if a novel be regarded as a picture of life, The Scottish Heiress fails in its deeper and more romantic passages. Part of this failure is traceable to want of courage in the author to treat his subject ac- cording to its own nature and not according to established recipes. The elements of the story, if not tragic, were not likely to produce the " usual happy ending." A youth with feelings mo-bidly high, nourishing an unequal passion, and thrown upon the world to have his genius developed by necessity and suffering, would have another career and termination before hint than mar- rying an heiress with twelve thousand a year and becoming a country gentleman. It may be a difficult task, and one above the author's powers, to trace the course either for good or evil of a fiery and energetic genius, baffled in its worldly hopes and nourish- ing corroding passion, when thrown into the vortex of London life and attaining sudden distinction : but this fact does not alter the nature of our objection.

Another cause of failure is one we have had to notice before—an insufficient knowledge of moral philosophy, or a dis- regard of its precepts. When Helen Ruthven goes alone to Kenneth, about to embark for India, to beg him to marry her, he never having declared his passion, our sense of feminine delicacy is lowered ; and, poor as this is, it has been forestalled by a less forced scene in Self-Devotion. When Sir Grenville Rollo is duped by Sir Edgar Ruthven into writing a coarse letter disciaiming his passion for Emily Clyne, his character is somewhat degraded, both as regards sense and feeling ; whilst Kenneth, haughty enough as he often is, displays in parts, and those the most delicate, something of the self-seeker or fortune-hunter—he is scarcely a hero. But brought to the touchstone by which we are now testing the work, the principal failure is the villain, Sir Edgar Ruthven. Metaphysically, no doubt, he is consistently created and sus- tained; though it may be questioned whether he is not painted as too intellectually powerful to be natural. This, however, might be passed. But, there is muds inconsistency in the conduct of others towards him : a libertine and a swindler, he could hardly have held his ground as described its the volumes; his last effort at abduction and violence was of so gross a kind, that, bold as he is painted, he would hardly have dared it ; and its punishment was for the law rather than the duel. Besides which, false mar- riages and violence belong to another age ; and whatever they are, like Helen's solicitings, they are stale and borrowed. The same sort of thing, but under much more likely circumstances, is exhi- bited in the Morley Ernstein of Mr. JAMES, and in a late novel called The Herberts. Sir Edgar's final escape from punishment is also a violation of poetical justice. The system of scrupulously weighing out reward or punishment to the characters in exact pro- portion to their deeds mil be carried to a ridiculous extreme, but some sense of it should pervade a fiction, because, as a general rule, it obtains in life. External prosperity may indeed often attend on not legal guilt, and the vulgar are dazzled by the noon-tide splen- dour without looking to the evening's declination; • but conse- quences attend on conduct in life, and it is the business of an artist so to construct his story that poetical justice shall be exhibited in agreement with the nature of his materials. And the writer of The Scottish Heiress had excellent means of doing this, had he used them.

With all its defects, this work is a very good novel, and far bey ond the common tribe of fictions; as limy be gathered even from a few extracts which can of course exhibit little more than the author's manner of writing.

A GENTLEMAN.

Sir Grenville was certainly what is usually called a very fine young man. He was versed in all the accomplishments of a gentleman, had respectable ta- lents, and a good heart. He bad led a gay life, but it had rather given a polish to his manners than a depravity to his character: he was one of those men who

• "Alas! not dazzled with their noontide ray, Compute the morn and ev'ning to the day."

sin and are sorry for it, and whose very excesses are guarded by certain checks, which always prevent them from becoming great. His character was peculiar— to hazard a seeming paradox—from its very absence of distinctive marks. He bad no besetting vice, and he had no particular excellence ; he was cool and clear-headed, yet did not want spirit; he had fallen in love with Helen Ruth- ven, and yet he could consider the rental of her estate. He did not want wit, yet never said any thing out of place; he did not want animation, yet never was exceedingly animated; was ready in an apt reply, yet seldom said any thing striking ; could talk fitly on all subjects, well on most, but on none with enthusiasm. He was never out of countenance, and seldom out of his depth; could speak with equal correctness of an opera or a view-hollo, of a Latin au- thor or a game at chess. He rode, shot, and bunted well; yet the country gen- tlemen, when they spoke of a field, always mentioned his name in conjunction with others—it was Sir Grenville Rollo and somebody else, or somebody else and Sir:Grenville Rollo. He was well liked in his own county; could nominate a candidate in a good speech, or, if need were, reply to one with effect ; was a general favourite with the ladies, for he was handsome, graceful, and polite, could converse to please them, knew the sex, and never gave offence.

MRS. MICKLEJOHN'S PARTY, EDINBURGH.

But Mrs. Micklejohn's rout was now fast approaching, and Miss Matilda and the whole household were busy with the thought and preparations of that great event. Never before had there been such a trimming of lamps, such a dusting of carpets, practice of music, and preparation of meats; such a display of plate, arrangement of bijouterie, variety of wines and liqueurs, diversity of jellies, and congregation of comfits, within the walls of that peaceful abode. Mr. Mickle- john for some days walked about his own house with the subdued look of a conscious intruder; the clerks, who knew nothing of what was about to take place beyond the bustle of preparation, began to think the end of all things was at hand; the cook had suddenly become a person of great importance, and the footman, who boasted of having once served a Peer of the realm, was daily an important member of the domestic cabinet council. Mr. Benjamin Blinker, after much persuasion, bad consented to allow his hair to be powdered, and to go into livery—. for that night only ; " a boy, who held the double office of scullion and shoe-black, and whom it took two days to wash and purify, was to appear in the dress of a page ; a brother of one of the housemaids, (a pawn- broker's apprentice,) was to attend to the hats and cloaks, and deliver the tickets therefor; and a sheriff's officer and a twopenny-postman were to ap- pear on the occasion as " servants out of livery." * • • And now the eventful evening arrived. Mr. Benjamin Blinker, arrayed in his suit of livery, with his hair and whiskers extravagantly powdered, after exe- cuting several pas-seuls in the kitchen, to the great delight and admiration of the maid-servants, was stationed with the footman at the door ; the page and the twopenny-postman placed a little in the distance; the sheriff's officer, who spoke a fine deep bass, gave the announcements with due formality ; and the young man who had the charge of the robing-chamber attended to his depart- ment with professional regularity. Every window in the house was lighted up, not even excepting those of the nursery and bedrooms on the garret-story, which had each two candles stuck in them ; a part of the arrangements by no means to Mr. Micklejohn's taste, and which induced him to send privately for a fireman to have an engine in readiness in case of accidents. Carriage after carriage drove up to the door, cloak-wrapped ladies and gentlemen with opera- hate tripped hurriedly into the house; and Miss Matilda, as she sat in the drawingroom in the flutter of great hopes and fears, with a wonderful exotic in her hand, had at length the unspeakable delight to hear the sheriff's-officer announce, with all the precision of a legal warrant, the titled names of many of the arriving guests.

MAGAZINE

Writing for magazines may be a profitable thing for established authors, it may be gratifying to young ladies and gentlemen who have no other way of distinguishing themselves; but to those who look to it for their daily bread, there is no labour more heart-sickening and depressing. It cuts the mind up into shreds and patches; gives a superficial turn to thought, by a constant fear of appearing heavy ; cramps wit and humour, or confines them to that school which is most likely to find favour in the sight of some particular coterie or editor ; forms a style which if good for magazines is seldom good for anything else; destroys that enthusiasm of genius wherein lies the secret of its power, and reduces writing, even in an author's eyes, to a hireling art—a mere me- chanical manufacture of commodities for a market. The writer, indeed, whose reputation is established, and whose aspirations lead him to higher walks than the few days' flash of a cleverly-written article, may employ the pages of a periodical advantageously to himself, and generally agreeably to those who peruse them : he writes at his ease, he knows his power, and gives his pen the rein ; his paper is read with pleasure, for the same cause that the slightest stroke of wit from him who is careless or confident of its effect is often better- received than the most sparkling thought of him who was diffident as he uttered it : but to those whose names and talents are unknown, whose papers are perhaps not examined at all by the busy editor, or if they should, are perused by him with a predisposition to consider them but as a portion of the piles of anonymous dulness with which he is harassed and overwhelmed—or even when the young author is fortunate enough, by a catching title or striking introduction, to remove this feeling, and get his contribution perused and in- setted—the crowd of authors, known and approved, who surround every periodical, the favouritism, (for in all clashing interests there ever has and ever will be favouritism,) the keeping back of accepted articles, the long "con- sideration " of others, and a whole host of similar obstacles, delays, and annoy- ances, make such a life to all men a profitless and jaded one, but to the man of genius not only one of penury but of prostitution.