MRS. TROLLOPE'S WIDOW BARNABY.
THE dreaded satirist of the Americans has made an advance upon the present occasion, much beyond her previous fictions. "Widow Barna)] is indeed remote enough from the probitbilities of daily life in the more interesting parts, and often literal and vulgar in the more exact delineations : but there is less of exaggeration than is usual in Mrs. TROLLOPE'S characters; a considerable improve- ment in taste, with less of the upstart spirit she affects to ridicule : and the story, constructed with sufficient coherence, runs well enough along when we are once fairly embarked in it. The name of the work is derived from a provincial belle, who, after various flirtations with regimental officers in country quarters, weds with Mr. Barnaby, a country apothecary, when youth is on the wane. This gentleman dying suddenly, leaves her absolute mistress of four haptra a year; with which the widow starts on a husband-hunting expedition to Clifton, Cheltenham, &c.: and the broad humour of the book. consists in the ridiculous hopes, vulgar airs, and absurd mistakes, indulged and perpetrated by a selfish, presumptuous, and inexperienced woman of middle age, trans- planted into new scenes, and forcing herself through a series of accidents into a society higher than she has ever been accustomed to. Introductory to these adventures, is a long account of Mrs. Bar- naby's ancestors, birth, parentage, education) and flirtations ; some- times truly done, and with occasional points in which the mean displays of a country town, and the shabliiness they involve, are satirized with strength but coarseness, though the introduction is tedious upon the whole, from its minuteness and commonplace vulgarity. The adventures of the Widow are accompanied by the love and distresses of her niece, in which the interest of the piece as a novel consists ; and by some really pleasant sketches of' genteel society, in the person of the Widow's sister-in-law and her family,—Mrs. Taors.ors having actually suspended all attacks upon the bourgeoisie, and only infused a prejudice in favour of good blood into the mind of a recluse old maul, who performs a promi- nent part in effecting the denouement.
There are some ludicrous incidents at Clifton, Cheltenham, and London,—such as Mrs. Barnaby's appearance at the assembly, and her fancy that a jesting Peer has fallen in love with her ; as well as some interesting ones, dashed by a melodramatic spirit. These, however, require a knowlege of the story and characters to be un- derstood. We must resort, therefore, to smaller points for ex- tracts, and those of rather a Trollopian kind. Here are some re- marks, true, but animated by a cynical spirit : how different from the tone of mind that laughed at the maternal schemes of Mrs. Primrose !
" Few subjects have furnished more various or more beautiful images for the Poet's pen than maternal fondness. From the heart-stirring fury of the daunt- less lioness when her young ones are threatened, down to the patient hen red- breast as she sits abrood, lonely, fasting, and apart from all the joys of birdhood, awaiting the coming life of her loved nestlinga . . . in short, from one ex- tremity of animal creation to the other, volumes of tender anecdotes have been collected illustrative of this charming feature of female nature; and yet much still remains to be said of it. Where is the author who has devoted his power of looking into the human heart to the task of describing the restless activity, the fond watchfulness, the unwearied industry, of a proud, poor, tender mother, when labouring to dress her daughters for a ball ? Who has told of the turn- ings, the dyings, the ironing, the darnings, that have gone to make misses of ten pounds a year pin-money look as smart AS the squanderer of five hundred? Yet such things are : the light of morning never steals into the eyes of mortals to spur them on again to deeds of greatness after nightly, rest, without awaking many hundred mothers whose pnncipal business in life is to stitch, flounce, pucker, and embroider for their daughters! . . . All this is very beautiful ! . . . I speak not of the stitching, flouncing, puckering, and embroider- ing . . . but of the devotion of the maternal hearts dedicated to it. . . . All this is very beautiful I . . . yet never has gifted hand been found to bring forth in delicate pencilling traits such as these with half the study that has been often bestowed on the painting a cobweb."
A DIALOGUE ON A BALL.
" It was so quite unlike any other party that ever was given," as Mrs. Compton well observed, in talking over the matter with her daughters, " that it was downright impossible not to make some difference in the way of pre- paring for it." " Different ! . . . I believe it is different 1" exclaimed Miss Martha (the future Airs. Barnabv); it is the first ball we ever showed ourselves at by daylight, and I should like to know how we, that always lead every thing, are to present ourselves in broad sunshine with dyed pink muslin and tarmshed silver ?"
" You can't and you shan't," replied her affectionate mother, "if I sell the silver spoons and buy plated ones instead. . . . I will not have my girls disgraced in the face of two regiments at mice. But, upon my life, girls, money is not to be had for the asking ; for truth it is, and no lie, that there is not above twenty pounds in the bank to last till Michaelmas, and the butcher has not been paid these five months. But don't look glum, Martha! . . . Shall I tell you what I have made up my mind to do?' " Carry a plate round the mess-room, mamma, when they are all assembled, perhaps," replied the lively young lady ; "amid if you asked for aid for the sake of' our bright eves, it is likely enough you might get something; but if it is oot tint, what is it, mother ?" " Why, I will walk over to Compton Bassett, Martha, and ask the ram's- horn, your aunt, for five pounds outright, and, tell her into the bargain what it is for, and, stingy and skin-flint as she is, I aint't say that I shall be much sur- prised if she gives it ; for she is as proud as she's ugly; and it won't be diffi- cult to make her see, this time, that I am asking more for credit's sake than for pleasure." "Go, mother, by all means," replied the young lady with a sneer, that seemed to indicate despair of any aid from Miss Betsy. "All I know is, that she never gave me any thing since I was born but a Bible and Prayer-book, and it don't strike me as very likely she'll begin now. Set off; however, by all manner of means; and if you come back empty-handed, I'll tell you what my scheme shall be."
vocuircr. ASSOCIATIONS: A BETTER BIT.
Elizabeth Compton did not believe in the doctrine of ghosts; her mind watt of a strong and healthy fibre, which was rarely sufficiently wrought upon by passing events to lose its power of clear perception and unimpassioned judg- ment; but the scene she bad just passed through had considerably shaken her philosophy. Five-and-thirty years had passed since Josiah and Elizabeth shared the paternal roof together. They were then very tender friends, for he was affectionate and sweet-tempered ; and she, though nearly seventeen, was as young in appearance and as much in need of his thoughtful care of her, as if she bad been mimy years younger. But this union was totally and for ever destroyed when Josiah married: from the first hour they met, the two sisters- in-law conceived an aversion for each other which every succeeding interview appeared to strengthen ; and this so effectually separated the brother from the sister, that they had never met again with that peculiar species of sympathy which can only be felt by children of the same parents, till now, that the sister came expressly to see the brother die.
This reunion had softened and bad opened both their hearts : Josiah con- fessed to his dear sister Betsy that his conscience reproached him for having made away with his patrimony . . . . a fact which he had never hinted to any other human being . . . . and she owned to him that she was secretly possessed of landed property worth above six hundred a year, and also—which was a confidence, if possible, more sacred still—that Agnes Willoughby would inherit it.
It would be hardly doing justice to the good sense of Miss Betsy to state, that this rational and proper destination of her property had never been filially decided upon by her till the moment she answered her brother's question on the subject; and still less correctly true would it be to say, that the dying man's delirious fancy respecting the presence of their father, was the reason that she answered that appeal in the manlier she did; yet still there might be some slight mixture of truth in both. Miss Compton was constantly in the habit of telling herself that she had not decided to whom she would leave her property; but it is no less true, that the only person she ever thought of as within the possibility of becoming her heir, was .Agnes. It is certain also, .as I have stated above, that Miss Compton did not believe that departed spirits ever revisited the earth; nevertheless, the dying declaration of Josiah, that he saw the figure of his father, did produce a spasm at her heart, which found great relief by her pronouncing the words "Agnes Willoughby."
Previous page
