SOME FRENCH STORIES.* M. PAUL MARGUEEITTE is one of the

most rising among the younger French novelists, and Ma Grande is a very attractive specimen of his work. The number of editions that it has already gone through in France gives pleasant evidence that the French public is ready to welcome a novel which, though full of cleverness and brightness and up to the time in every way, has not a word in it which could offend the most fastidious and delicate taste. Ma Grande is the charmingly told story of a young professor at the Lycee Louis-le-Grand, who has been brought up by a sister twenty years older than himself. Marie-Anne, Noel Gnislain's " Grande," is an excellent woman of strong character, violent prejudices, and a devotion to her young brother which leads to almost tragic consequences when he very naturally falls in love, and marries a young Russian girl with whose family he and Grande have made acquaintance in the country, in his summer vacation. The terrible struggle of Grande with the jealous agony she feels at seeing her place with Noel taken by a stranger, though nothing can he better or more unselfish than the behaviour of both towards her, is described with real and pathetic power. This is the chief motive of the story ; but it is embroidered all along with clever descriptions and quaint characters charmingly touched,—such as Sonia's mother, Mme. Tratkoff, a delightful abbe, M. d'Hautpont, the 'old servant Margande, and best of all, a young poet, &nee Kastor, of the new pessimist and symbolist kind, who finds nothing in life but " le meme spectacle toujours, toujours !" While munching Mme. Tratkoff's peculiarly excellent crepes, he goes on :-

"'Mais est-ce que Is vie ne dalgoiite pas toute ileac qui so

respecte ? Oh ! Is vie, l'amour, la gloire, 6ternelle blague Devant l'impudente duperie de cotta existence, j'ostime que to suicide seul est logique, correct at distingu6 ! Pourquoi no se tue-t-il pas tout de suite, alors?' pensa Mademoiselle GI uislain."

But M. Muster, answering her unspoken question, goes on to observe that " la vie vraiment ne vaut nAme pas qu'on s'en prive." He afterwards declaims his sonnet, " Episcaphie ' by name, which is worthy of Mallarme, and of which we cannot resist quoting a few lines,-

" Flamm° veulo is poupe ni memo de barre ! Quais do l'espoir at is Dame dans son atour Et le regard de cetto foule sur la tour Extrorse vers In mar vide de Ines gabares.

II6m4rocalles ! c'est le saint du retour.

Cette lampe haute ol3 tournoyeront les pbares, Cotte flour at n6nie en buccins at fanfares Ont Bien signifi6 toute mort de l'autour."

Another excellent story recently published, which, if it does not reach the heights or depths of M. Margueritte, is full of grace, liveliness, and good feeling, and may safely be recom- mended to all readers, is La Foils du Logis, by the author of the always popular Terre de France and La Contre-allie, both formerly reviewed in the Spectator. This is a story of country life, of the loves, friendships, and troubles of several simple and straightforward young people. It bears upon it the stamp of real life, and one seems to learn from it that romance and self-will are making their way even into the close preserves of old French respectability, and that young people are no longer ready to accept without a question the husbands or wives pro- vided for them by prudent relations. There is something very pretty in the picture of young Pierre de Chaveroche and his mother, and we feel sure from the beginning that his romantic fancy for Mdlle. Alice de Toyrac will somehow arrive at a happy end. At the beginning, nothing could have looked more hopeless. The two cleverest characters in the book, perhaps, are the worthy cure, the family friend, with his "Hum! hum!" and the little folio Lucette, who takes matters into her own hands in such a very original fashion, and fits her relations into their places all round. The arrangement by which she does this is quite French enough to satisfy any one who expects to find a difference between French and English proprieties, if not human nature.

The same author's volume, called Deur Gloires, contains

(1.) Ma Grando. Par Paul Margnoritte. Paris : Ernest Ko1b,—(2.) La FoUn On Logis. Par Francois do JuLliot. Paris : 1/most Kolb.—(8,) psoac Gloiros; Ira Cas d'Hypnottems; changonent d'Eoole. Par Francois do Julliot, Paris: Ernest Kolb.

three stories. Laying down La Folio du Logis, and taking up this, we meet with another distinct side of " Francois de Julliot's" talent. In the former book, she was at play; her charming pictures were drawn with the lightest touch and in the brightest colours ; the dark realities underlying life were far away. In this book she is sadly, even cynically in earnest.

"Deux Gloires " is the story of two young men, a musician and a painter, intimate friends, struggling and failing together in the battle of life. Both had had a taste of fame, or rather of success ; the first painting by Patrice, the first composition by Verbert, had delighted the critics, and the public, as it some- times does, had followed readily in their wake. But the second attempts had met with very different fortune. If Patrice has tried to follow where the highest art leads him

" Ce n'est plus ca On vous avait assez avertis de rester dans votre genre "—while Verbert's Marche a la Gloire fell on a careless, inattentive silence, left no more impression

than the flame of a candle blown out. And as one cannot live long on a first success—never well paid for—and as immortal works cannot be produced in a day, especially under the shadow of disappointment, Verbert and Patrice find them- selves very soon in the hands of M. Solsmisch, the Jew. They had no interest to help them on, and it is difficult enough to keep on one's feet in the world of art at all. " Quelques pas on tombe ; les camarades vous passent sus le corps."

Under these circumstances there is nothing for it but to accept M. Solsmisch's offer,-3,000 francs, to be repaid by 10 per cent. on their gains for ten years ; or in case of death, all their pic- tures, sketches, and musical compositions to belong to the Jew. At present all these were worth nothing; but if the artists

were dead they might be worth a great deal. At last, with several conditions, the bargain is struck, and the next we hear of the two young artists is that they have been drowned off Dieppe. Then we find ourselves in a crowded room where Patrice's paintings are exhibited, and Verbert's piano stands veiled in crape. All Paris is there, and the talk of all Paris is most amusing, showing the liveliest side of the author's talent.

There is real fun, with a bitter taste it is true, in the chatter of this crowd of would-be critics. It has suddenly become the fashion to admire the work of the young painter who has perished so tragically :-

" Il n'y a pas It dire, c'6taient de vrais artistes Une

belle piece, ma foi Savez vous qu'au Salon de l'ann6e derniere, co jeune Patrice a exposé un tableau tres reussi P—Com- ment done ! c'est moi-m hie qui l'ai signal6 It la critique Et cette adorable romance sans paroles de Verbert, je suis une des rares personnel qui relent entendue ; vous ne is connaissez pas P —Mais si ; mon Diou si I" In the meanwhile, a grand funeral service is held for the young men, according to the conditions they had made with. M. Solsmisch, and here their relations, who concerned them- selves very little about them in life, come eagerly forward to claim the right of mourning for artists of so much distinction.

Then we have an extremely clever and satirical description of a spiritualist séance, at which the spirits of Verbert and Patrice announce themselves. Then the relations of the young men bring a law-suit against Solsmisch the Jew to deprive him of the works of art now become so valuable, which had passed into his possession at the death of the artists Then—as we certainly expected all along—claims of Jew and of relations are alike disappointed by the appearance in court of Verbert and Patrice as living men. Let us hope that " Tout Paris " forgave the disappointment, and that the cleverly earned fame did not at once disappear.

" Un Cas d'Hypnotisme" is a clever but very unpleasant little story of the uses to which that science may be put. After Francois de Julliot's fashion of laughing aside at the puppets she sets to play, it is tolerably plain that the heroine of this episode was never really hypnotised at all, and did not even imagine that she was.

" Changement " is the most attractive, if the saddest, of the three. We have here again a young man of genius, but this time his talent is literary. He is an idealist of the finest order. To his fate attach themselves a young girl called Gloire and a little dog called ' Fortunio,' and for a time all goes happily. Having triumphantly finished his idealist novel, which is to bring him the means of supporting himself and these two companions, be proceeds to offer it to editors and publishers,—alas, in vain 1 These scenes are clever and most ironical, suggesting rather too strongly and painfully that they have been studied from life. One feels glad to

think that an unfortunate young man with a manuscript would hardly be treated so by the least sentimental of London publishers :—" Votre premier ouvrage ! Et vous supposez que nous nous chargeons d'un premier ouvrage? Et qui lira un premier onvmge P Vous figurez-vous des gens venant acheter un premier ouvrage P "—" Permettez, monsieur, auoun auteur n'a commenc6 par un second ouvrage." As the poor author, whatever may happen to himself, cannot allow either Gloire or ' Fortnnio ' to die of hunger, he finds a situation as sick-nurse for Gloire with his old master, M. Raphael, the prince of idealists, who teaches that soul is everything, matter nothing, and cares for no company but that of his pictures and books. By a clever stratagem, he insinuates Fortunio ' into the house of a lady who had lost a dog very like him. Then, having found shelter for his two friends, the idealist goes on his way alone for the winter, hoping to reclaim them both in spring. And for once fate smiles upon him,—his book is published ; be buys new clothes and furnishes his empty rooms. Then be goes to M. Raphael's house in search of Gloire, and finds that the elderly and spiritual invalid is resolved not to part with her ; she is to be his ange gardien for the rest of his life. And she has no wish to leave wealth and comfort and M. Raphael to share the uncertain fortunes of the young struggling author. So Gloire forsakes him. And when he goes to reclaim Fortnnio,' frankly telling his whole story to the old lady, who believes him to be her own dog, she not only refuses to listen, but Fortunio ' himself ignores his old name, growls at his old master, treats him as an insolent Bohemian, and barks him downstairs. And this is why the young author changed his school, and from an idealist became a realist. It was bad enough to be deceived and forsaken by a woman. "Mail un chien, (fest plus fort."

It will be seen that the motive and treatment of this story are essentially French ; but in saying this we must add a remark of which no one who knows Francois de Julliot's writings will doubt the truth ; that she knows how to treat a doubtful subject with perfect delicacy. " Changement d'Iteole " in some hands might have been so worked out that one would hesitate to recommend it to the ordinary English reader. As it stands, it has the nature of a fairy-tale, pessimistic and sad, yet so lightly touched that the characters seem more iike impersonations than real people, and all passions are softened into a kind of softly mournful allegory. Yet one knows throughout that the author is deeply in earnest. Comparing these two recent books, she seems more charming, though perhaps rather less interesting, when, to use her own words at the beginning of La Folle du, Logis, she tells " des choses faBacieuses " to the young girls of France, who form, we suspect, not the least appreciative half of her public,