THE DEWY 3110BN.* THE author of The Gamekeeper at Home
and The Life of the Fields, knows nature with the intimate knowledge that springs from love. Like the heroine of this tale, he is familiar with the
simplest objects of English rural life and finds a beauty in them all. What Mr. Jefferies has said of Felise's delight in the freedom of the fields may be said with equal truth of this faith- ful observer and true worshipper of natural beauty :—
" Every day the year round, Felise went forth with the same joy. She trod the paths to their utmost ending, through meads and wheat- fields, round the skirt of copses, where pheasants feeding hurried in The Dewy Morn. A Novel. By Richard Jefferies. 2 vols. Bentley and Bon. at her coming, or wood-pigeons rose with a clatter from the firs. There was not a spot made beautiful by trees and hedges, by grass and flowers, and sun and shade, that she had not visited and lingered in. She knew when each would look at its loveliest—the corner of maple-bushes, when the first frosts had yellowed the spray and strewn the sward with colour of leaves; the row of oaks when the acorns were ripe, and the rooks above and the pheasants beneath were feasting ; the meadow where the purple orchis grew in the first days of May ; the osier-beds where the marsh marigolds flowered ; and again in the time of the yellow iris ; the sound of the wind in the oaks and in the pines ; the rush it came with across the grass; the rustle of the dry corn swinging ; the coming of the redwings and the field.fares ; the thrushes singing again in the mild autumn days; the last harebell from the hill ; swallows building under the eaves ; swallows building in the chimneys; thrashes in the hawthorn-bushes ; great missel-thrushes in the apple-trees of the orchard ; the blue sparrow's egg in the hedge; the chaffinch's moss.and-lichen nest against the elm ; the dove's nest up in the copse, fearlessly building because no rude hand disturbed them; the pheasant's eggs carelessly left on the ground by the bramble-bush, the corncrake's found by the mower ; the moor- hen's nest by the trout-pool. She knew and loved them all, the colour and sound and light, the changing days, the creatures of the wood and of the field."
Passages similar to the one we have quoted frequently occur in these volumes, and are eminently characteristic of Mr. Jefferies. On this ground, if sometimes a little monotonous, as description is apt to become, he is always true to nature. The Dewy Morn is, we believe, the author's first novel; and we therefore look in it with curiosity to see bow far he is true also to human life.
It must be confessed one is a little startled at the outset of the story. The heroine, Felise Goring, a child of Nature like Wordsworth's Lucy, starts at dawn of light on a summer morn- ing to watch the sunrise from the summit of a steep hill. Her soul is filled with love and her body with vigour. She is beautiful, and knows it ; she is strong, and joys in her strength ; she has loved at first sight, and in her youthful ardour resolves, come what may, to win the man she loves,—" The strong limbs, the deep chest, the intense sense of life within her urged her to the effort and promised suc- cess." She must, she could not live without his society. The reader, therefore, may judge that when Felise mounts the hill, it is not wholly with the desire to "meet the sun." Martial Barnard, a gentleman-farmer in the neighbourhood, is imagina- tive, and, of course, handsome. He reads poets and dreams dreams, and had been engaged before this tale begins to a pretty girl in the neighbourhood, the daughter of a wealthy wine-merchant. Rosa Wood is good and kind, but has no aspirations, and Martial, after a time, finds his courting weari- some. He is not, therefore, grieved when her father places restrictions upon it. He has ceased to care for Rosa, but still feels bound to her in honour. When in this state of mind be sees Felise for the first time following the harriers and keeping pace with the horsemen. They meet, and Martial admires the girl's splendid physique. The grace of her form, we are told, took a deep hold of his artistic nature, but her influence was negative. She did not inspire him with passion, but only made him conscious of Rosa's defects. -"Her shape looked flat to him now ; her walk was clumsy ; and he observed that she brought down the toe of her boot after the heel, making a second stump distinctly." Poor Rosa how could a young man, blessed with an artistic nature, admire a girl whose "figure was not full," whose conversation was insipid, and who irritated him when she walked by "two clumping noises." Barnard felt, therefore, that he had been a fool ; but he will not be a fool again, and so he reasoned that his admiration of Felise was purely artistic. "Any other woman, if as beautiful, would have suited him as well to look at." These are his feelings, when on that morning of which we have spoken he meets Felise Goring, quite accidentally, of course, on the hill. She, we are told, is a natural woman, and this is how a natural woman, with a "depth of chest," is repre- sented as acting towards a man who does not even offer his hand, so slight is the acquaintance between them :—" She looked straight in his face. She did not disguise her wishful glance. If he could only have let himself gaze into her eyes ! But he would not. Her right hand moved restlessly ; she almost put it on his shoulder." The girl admires his horse, and asks to stroke it. "There was an emphasis in her manner as if she would rather have stroked certain brown-gold locks near her." He appears indifferent, but she continues asking him a number of questions :— "Anything to make him stay, to make him speak that she might see him and hear his voice. 'You have not called for a very long time.' As if he was on visiting terms. lie had called once on mere formal business.—' How is Mr. Goring ?' he was obliged to ask. Then followed three or four sentences—three or four moments more —about her uncle's health, and his fondness for planting trees.— ' Why does he not look at me ?' she thought. l Can I not make him look at me ?' Then aloud, sharply : Mr. Barnard !' He could not help but look, at the sound of his name. He saw a face full of wist- ful meaning upturned to him. Some depth in her rapt gaze fasci- nated him. Her eyebrows arched—not too much arched—the curve of the cheek, roseate, almost hut not quite smiling, carried his thought downwards to her breathing lips. Her lips were apart, rich, dewy, curved ; they kissed him by their expression, if not in deed. For that moment he had no consciousness except of her, such was the power of her passion glowing in her face. Even Felise, eager to retain him with her, and unhesitatingly employing every means, could not maintain that gaze. Unabashed and bold with love, she was too true, too wholly his, to descend to any art. Her gaze, passionate as it was, was natural and unstudied ; therefore it could not continue. Her eyes drooped, and he was released. Immediately, as if stung to a sense of his honour, he placed his hands on the horse, sprang up, and seated himself.—'I---I have much to do,' he said, embarrassed to the last degree, and holding out his hand. She would not see it. She took the bridle, and stroked Ruy's neck, placing her cheek almost against the glossy skin. Obeying the pressure of his knee, Buy began to move slowly. She walked beside him, holding the bridle ; but Ray's long stride soon threatened to leave her behind. For very shame, he could not but stay. At a touch Buy halted. She looked up at him ; he carefully avoided her glance. The horse, growing restless, began to move again ; again, for Courtesy's sake, he was compelled to check him. Not a word had been spoken while this show was proceeding. Barnard's face grew hot with impatience, or embarrassment, or a sense that he was doing wrong in some manner not at the moment apparent. Sideways, she saw his glowing cheek. It only inflamed her heart the more; the bright colour, like the scarlet tints in a picture, lit up his face. Next he controlled himself, and forced his features and attitude to an im- passive indifference. He would sit like a statue till it pleased her to let him go. Buy pulled hard to get his neck free that he might feed again. She stooped and gathered him some grass and gave it to him. Twice she fed him. Barnard remained silent and impassive. Still not a word between them. The third time she gathered a handful of grass, as she rose her shoulder brushed his knee. She stood there, and did not move. Her warm shoulder just touched him, no more ; her golden hair was very near. She drew over a tuft of Buy's mane, and began to deftly plait it. Barnard's face, in defiance of himself, flushed scarlet ; his very ears fawned. He stole half a glance side- ways ; how lovely her roseate cheek, the threads of her golden hair, against the bay's neck ! Buy was turning his nostrils round to touch her, and ask for more grass. She swiftly plaited his mane. At that moment another horse neighed over the hill ; they both looked round—no one was in sight. Bat Roy answered with a neigh, and in the same instant stepped forward. Barnard pressed his knee ; Buy began to move faster. Barnard bowed ; his voice was tempo- rarily inarticulate, and he was gone."
Mr. Jefferies' ideal of what he calls a "natural woman" is not attractive, and from "the vehement passion" of a Felise in real life every man of refined feeling would pray to be delivered.
She is a beautiful animal, and nothing more ; and her whole charm consists in a lovely face and in a healthy, well-formed body. The novelist dwells on the indications of his heroine's bodily charms with a fervour that amounts to rhapsody. The beauty of a perfect skin, we are told, is so great to gaze at, it is happiness ; and "to express beauty you must delineate the adipose tissue," but the knee is the exception, for the knees are the centres from which all beauty rises. "Human life is centred in the knee, it is so very human, so nearly sorrowful in its humanity. Beautiful knees, the poise and centre of the form ! Were I rich how gladly I would give a thousand pounds for a true picture of the knee !" But we shall spare the reader any further illustration of the writer's admiration of knees generally, and of his heroine's knees in particular. Enough that "in the knee we recognise all that the heart has experienced."
The plot of the tale is slight, and almost wholly lacking in verisimilitude. Felise, unknown to herself, has another lover in the neighbourhood, in the person of a harsh land-agent, who has reached the ripe age of fifty, while the girl is not out of her teens. Godwin is, in one respect, like Peter Bell. Nature has no voices for him ; he never felt the witchery of the soft, blue sky ; he is hard, merciless, eminently practical, and accumulates money. In some respects, his character is well and sharply defined ; in others, the part he plays in the tale far exceeds the bounds of probability. He has, indeed, a madman's privileges at last ; but the unnaturalness of the situations in which he acts a part are none the less obvious. Mr. Jefferies is a clever and observant writer, with some rhetorical power; but, like many such writers, has little skill as a novelist. He seems to have expended all his artistic affection upon Felise, and the result is a girl perfect in form, in physical strength, in womanly beauty, who loves herself for being beautiful, and loves Barnard with a passion which is pure, no doubt, but scorns all restrictions and maidenly reserve. We read often of the inexpressible aspirations of her noble nature ; we
see only the passionate resolution to secure the man she loves. From first to last in this tale the heroine does the courting.
We may add that The .Dewy Morn, is not wholly without a moral purpose, and that on the condition of our rural poor Mr.
Jefferies writes with authority and feeling. The recent attempt to give a taste for art by hanging the walls of cottages with coloured prints he treats with scorn, observing that for the en- joyment of art it is first of all necessary to have a full belly :—
"Insult it is of the cruellest and harshest kind. The wretched beings require food, and you give them a picture. Good beef and beer are what the poor want, and you would find it difficult to supply too much of it. But somehow or other your modern philanthropist cannot endure the idea of beef and beer. He organises societies to teach the poor how to cook (ye gods, how to cook ! with nothing in the frying-pan nor any lard to grease it) and offers them a cold drink from the pump. In the midst of squalling children over the deal table scarce supplied with bread, he hangs up a picture."
Mr. Jefferies has a turn for exaggeration, and does not dis- tinguish between destitution and decent poverty. There is no doubt that a knowledge of economical cookery is one of the most useful gifts a cottager's wife can have, and we may add one of the rarest. Pictures are not necessaries; but it does not follow they are not welcome, and give a pleasure liko that which a labouring man feels in his tiny strip of garden. We agree with Mr. Jefferies that one of the first necessities for the farm labourer is that he should have security of tenure, and not be liable to be turned out of a cottage while able to pay the rent ; and it does not speak well for the construction of our social fabric that he should be expected to spend his last days in the workhouse.
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