NEW NOVELS.* The Man of the People is a story

almost of the present age, for it relates to a period within the memory of more than one living generation, and yet it is as truly an historical novel as if its scenes were laid in the England of the Stuarts and of Cromwell. An historical novel, as we understand the term, is one in which the personal element, however important, is subsidiary to the his- torical one, the author's purpose being to illustrate the national life of a given period by a story pervaded and manifestly governed by its influences. In this sense, Mr. Thackeray's Esmond is not an historical novel, though it faithfully reflects the colouring and costume of Queen Anne's time ; it is strictly a domestic story of ancient date. Mr. Howitt, on the other hand, has made it his main purpose to exemplify the political life of England during the unhappy period which followed close upon the victory of Waterloo, and the tale he tells is that of a fictitious actor in the events of a great national crisis. His subject has been happily chosen both as regards himself and the majority of those who will be his readers ; it is remote enough from their experience to make strong demands upon their imaginations, but near enough to his own to enable him to portray it with vividness and truth.

The plot of the novel is very simple. Philip Stanton, Mr. Howitt's well-born but friendless and fortuneless hero, begins life as tutor in the family of a Tory baronet, and has a prospect, through the influence of his friend and pupil, of fair preferment in the Church of which his father was a faithful but ill-requited minister. Still brighter visions open upon him, for he wins the heart of the daughter of the house with the cordial approbation of the heir, and even with the tacit consent of her mother ; but there is a cousin, an archdeacon, whose hopes of a mitre are jeopardized as he thinks through the tutor's influence, and this man's machi- nations are successful for a while. lie causes Philip to be dis- missed with contumely, intercepts his letters, and makes himself generally useful as the prime villain of the piece. Up to this point, the story has moved on somewhat heavily, though with bursts of vigour here and there, but now the pace quickens, and the interest becomes strong and sustained. Philip's first tempo- rary occupation as a village schoolmaster in Wiltshire makes him personally cognizant of the misery of the labouring classes in those dismal times, and awakens him to a perception of the dense

• The Man of the People. By William. Hewitt. in three volumes. Published by Hurst and Blackett.

Grey more ; a Story of Country Life. In three volumes. Published by Smith, Elder, and Co.

ignorance of political science under which the Government and the ruling classes were aggravating the existing distress, and pro- voking the blind passions of starving multitudes. Me goes to London, impelled by an irresistible desire to aid, however humbly, the efforts which a more enlightened minority were making for the salvation of the country, but, all his endeavours to obtain em- ployment are fruitless, until he suddenly finds himself made fa- mous by accident. The scene in which he bursts upon the politi- cal stage is most graphically portrayed. He attends the great meeting held at the Crown and Anchor Tavern, under the aus- pices of three royal Dukes, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Castlereagh, and many other great personages. The chair was taken by the Duke of York, " a sallow-looking, middle-aged man, in blue coat with gold bottons, buckskin and top-boots."

" His royal highness addressed the meeting in a few words, expressing much sympathy with the sufferings of the people, and trusting that the dis- tinguished men that he saw around him would propose some efficient reme- dies. The Duke of Cambridge then proposed a resolution, purporting that there was great distress in the country, the cause of which was the sudden revulsion from a state of war to a state of peace. He proposed likewise sub- scriptions all over the country, and that employment of some kind should be found for those out of work. The Duke of Kent followed, and expressed much hope that the good feeling of the country would carry it through this crisis, which he imagined to be only temporary. All so far went tolerably well. Philip did not see much in the royal speakers to raise his ideas of royal capacity for oratory; but, he thought, in the good-natured gossiping manner of the Duke of Cambridge, and the earnest sympathy of Kent, there were qualities to admire and esteem.

" No sooner did the latterDuke sit down, than there stepped forward from i a remote corner of the platform to its front, a tall, thin man in naval cos- tume, having the round, fair face, the light-blue eyes and sandy hair of a Scot, who moved an amendment. At once there burst forth a tempest, as if heaven and earth were coming together. The gentlemen on the platform, and numbers of persons on the front seats, sprung up shouting, gesticu- lating, crying Order, order ! question, question !'—but, at the same mo- ment, the huge mass lower down rose too, shouting :—'Well done, Coch- rane ! stand to 'em, Cochrane ! hurrah for Cochrane !' The shouting, the stamping, the bellowing, the fierce commotion, as if the infuriated crowd would have rushed at once to mortal combat, was such as Philip had never witnessed before, and of which he had no conception. Are such then,' he said to himself, ' the furious elements of popular assemblies ? ' 'Is it amid storm and tornadoes like these that the popular speaker has to make his way, and do battle, as with the furies, for public right ? ' " It was some time before the hubbub was put an end to ; and at last, Cochrane, for he it was, could get a hearing. He denied that the cause of the distress was the change from war to peace—but the necessary conse- quence of the extravagant management of the war, of corruption in every department of government at home, which, with arbitrary measures still existing, destroyed the mercantile energies of the nation, and which must be abolished before there could be a return to prosperity. Again the uproar burst forth with redoubled violence. The whole body of the people, whether on the platform or below, was like a roaring, foaming ocean. All possi- bility of proceeding appeared at an end ; but the royal chairman, holding up a paper, and gesticulating for silence, at length procured enough to say that he proposed to leave out all mention of the causes of the reaction, and only affirm the fact of the distress. This was carried by acclamation, and the meeting then went on for some time. The Archbishop of Canterbury, and some others, suggested various remedies for the popular suffering. These, however, were but of the same stamp as the bean-shelling and nettle rope-making, and were received sometimes with shouts of laughter, and sometimes with storms of groans and hisses.

" In the midst of this scene, Philip suddenly, as if carried away by an un- controllable impulse, sprung upon the bench where he sat, and shouted, Hear me !' The act was the signal for a fresh storm. Some cried, Down with the demagogue ! Order ! order! Down with the disturber !' Others around him cried as lustily, ' Hear the gentleman ! fair play ! hear him ! ' The chaos was wild and deafening. Some attempted to drag him down by the skirts , i - others, standing on the seats around, bellowed loud above every- thing, with faces inflamed with passion Hear him ! You shall hear him or nobody !' At length the Duke of York was able to ask his name ; and he shouted Stanton ! ' At that word, there was a marvellous change of the

whole scene. Stanton ! the devil!' exclaimed the men about him, who now seemed as if they would annihilate,, instead of defending him. Stan- ton, indeed ! a traitor ! a boroughmonger ! a Castlereagh hole-digger ! Down

with him ! ' But on the platform there was a universal clapping and hur- rahing. Come up, come up !' they cried ; and the friends of that party before him making way, Philip ran rapidly from bench to bench, and sprang on the platform.—' Are you a relative of Sir Marmaduke ? ' asked the royal chairman.= His nephew,' replied Philip. The duke rapped loudly with his ivory hammer on the table, and cried :—‘Mr. Stanton, the nephew of Sir Marmaduke Stanton!' It was some time before silence could be ob- tained, but then the Duke said :—' Mr. Stanton, have you a resolution to submit to the meeting ? I have,' replied Philip ; and it is this, that the

only remedy. for the paralysis of the nation—the only means to feed the peo- ple, and revive our trade—the grand source of prosperity—is to abolish the Corn-law !' "

" It would have been almost a recompense for a ten years' imprisonment to have witnessed the effect of that last word. There was a momentary silence, as if a thunderbolt had fallen in the midst of the assembly, and struck them speechless ; but the air of astonishment flung over the whole dense mass above and below would have been a rich study for a painter. The blank consternation, the dead take-in of the gentlemen on the platform —the equally unexpected result to the crowd, was beyond all words. At once a thundering din of acclamation burst from the throng. There was

stamping, jumping, beating on the walls ; a thousand hats were whirling

violently above their heads—a thousand throats stretched to their utmost, to fling out the big exultation. Amid the rending uproar, the cries of "Re- negade ! cheat ! impostor ! down with him !" were perceptible from the dis- appointed platform. All hope of restoration of order vanished. The royal dukes quietly took their leave ; the rest followed, some of them retreating through the side door, with reverted looks of wrath and gestures of ven- geance."

Philip now becomes the intimate associate of Sir Francis Bur- dett, Lord Cochrane, Cobbett, Major Cartwright, &c., and their tinted agent in opposition to such dangerous demagogues as Hunt, Brandreth, and the members of the Spencean Club. He goes down to the north, visits every place where the distress is sorest, and meets with the usual fate of rational men in times of public infatuation, to be hated by the extreme of both parties. Oliver, the spy and agent provocateur—we have not the name in

English, but we had the thing in abundance in the good old Tory times—Oliver, denounces him, a price is set upon his head, and he is captured under circumstances that afford a rancorous Govern- ment and partisan judges pretext enough for hanging him, but he is saved by the interference of his friends, aided by his sudden ac- cession to the estate and title of his uncle, the Tory minister.

The author of Greymore is fairly entitled to our congratulations on her first appearance as a writer of fiction. Along with some serious faults, her volumes contain much that is positively good in performance and better still in promise. She writes evidently out of the fulness of her knowledge, and wisely abstains from ven- turing beyond its limits, her materials being all drawn from the lives and habits of the more affluent portion of middle class. Her style is simple and not inelegant, and her story, though thin in texture and not free from ethical blemishes, is told with sufficient distinctness ; but her prolixity is excessive. Her matter might easily be compressed into a third of the bulk of words into which it is now expanded, and this might be done not only without de- triment to its interest, but to its great improvement. Her pages are of unusual dimensions and density of letterpress, and there are nearly a thousand of them! Two of her volumes contain probably as much printed matter as Mr. Howitt's three, which are of the average form and substance. It is plain that she cannot go on thus, if she intends to write books which can be read with pleasure by busy people.