THE BUCKLYN SHAIG.*
TIIEItE is a refreshing feeling in getting back from the complicated sensationalism of the present day to the more simple and natural
horrors of Mrs. Radcliffe. We have no objection to the last century being given up to crimes and deeds of darkness. If we are to have villains, we prefer having the old school of villains, whom it is proper to suspect and difficult to admire, instead of the lovely girls whose white curving shoulders are made to bear all the atrocities of our own times. Old castles in England and Italy, haunted lakes and legends surviving among the peasantry, smugglers' cottages and craft which are "not very respectable," are the fit atmosphere for deeds of blood. But while we congratu- late Mrs. Alfred Montgomery on the wisdom of her choice, we regret that she has made little use of her opportunities. All her elaborate machinery is contrive I without much object, and has not much effect on the story. The legend of the Bucklyn Shaig, which gives its name to the book, and is told with real power, vanishes after the first telling, and only re-appears as a faint copy at a later period. Perhaps the fault lies in the execution. The conception appears to have been good, though for from novel, and the first idea of many of the characters is promising. But in telling the story Mrs. Alfred Montgomery seems to have let the web slip out of her hands, and when she brings her characters into action she forgets the leading traits on which she had insisted in the description. The character of Roger Clifford is held up to us as that of a dangerous villain. His sister-in-law breathes mysterious whispers about her detestation of him, her fear that he may be made guardian of her child, her certainty that he has a dark, sinister nature, and "in his heart has renounced the Faith." But when Roger Clifford comes before us we find that he has no vice except gambling. He is appointed guardian to his niece, and behaves to her like the best of uncles. His only crime is that he submits passively to his Italian valet, and allows himself to be made accomplice in a murder. He is far from renouncing "the Faith" in his heart (it must be premised that all the characters in the book are Roman Catholics), but merely neglects his religious duties.
Altogether he is a vague and shadowy personage, having credit sometimes for wit and intellect, sometimes for villany, sometimes for the deep-brooding terror of one who has shared in a crime, but never drawing on this credit, or justifying any of our suspicions.
The intention of the book seems to have been that Roger Clifford and his son Robert should apostatize, and that as guardian to his niece Roger should influence her conduct, endeavour to get her fortune into his son's hands, and found a new family of Protestant Cliffords. But the frightful guilt of such a step has been too much for Mrs. Alfred Montgomery. She has shrunk from scenes which would have entailed so many difficulties, and condemned her villains either to unprofitable crime or premature repentance.
Her waste of good material is never shown more strikingly than in the murder of Roger Clifford's playmate. Mr. Henry Bethune comes to Roger's lonely castle in order to win all his money, wins it by foul play, and is then suddenly led to suspect some foul play of another kind. To have some safeguard against his host, he writes to a friend in Paris, telling him where he is and what he has been doing, adding that he is afraid to drink Roger Clifford's coffee, an I will be glad when the sea rolls be- tween him and his ruined victim. The letter turns up in the second volume, but only to reach the brother of Roger Clifford, who is too chivalrous to suspect anything, and burns the letter. Even then there was an opportunity for a good scene between the brothers, but it has been neglected. The only situation which is really used is Rose's flight through the snow at the end of the book, when she shelters herself on the little island in the haunted lake, and hears the tramp of a horse, which she imagines to be the Bucldyn Shaig. But two volumes are more than should be ex- pended in leading up to one good situation. We could have wished Mrs. Alfred Montgomery to make more use of the scene with the smugglers, and of the fisherman's pretty daughter, a much brighter sketch than many of the principal characters. As it is there seems no reason for her introduction, and the scene has no connection with the rest of the story, except that its vividness throws out the vagueness of the rest in still stronger relief. But description of this kind is the strong point of the book. While the authoress looks on and gives her impressions, she often causes us unmixed pleasure. The pictures of the oratory at Raymond Castle, of the scenery around the two castles, of Roman and Neapolitan life are the work of a good observer and accurate transcriber.
• The Badly& Meaty, a Tale of the Last Century. By the Bon. Mrs. Alfred Mont- gout, ry. 2 vols. Loadou: Beetlry.
It is not .so clear why Mrs. Alfred Montgomery should have laid the scene of her novel in the last century. Nothing material in it need not have occurred in the present day, for the smugglers and the last of the Stuarts are unnecessary episodes, and there are many small details which show that the authoress has not thrown herself back into the time she has chosen. Occasional reminders about the absence of gas and railroads and register grates might seem to careless readers a sufficient indication of the date, even if they were not told that "those were the days when Foote and Garrick acted, when Oliver Goldsmith dressed in a canary- coloured coat, and the ponderous Johnson perversely Latinized the English language." But if these details are to be introduced at all, they ought to be accurate. If the date of the story is fixed, the date ought to be preserved. We doubt if the word " locate " was introduced into the English language when Johnson per- versely Latinized it, or if the cafés on the Boulevard des Italiens existed in the last century. Still greater mistakes attend the career of Robert Clifford. He is made to perish by a shot on the barricades of '89, which was perhaps the only revolution when no barricades were used in Paris. But the turning-point of his life is his education at a German university, "a Protestant univer- sity," where "he can declare himself either Protestant or Catholic, or neither." The place selected for this university is Bonn. Now a reference to the first book on the subject would have informed Mrs. Alfred Montgomery that the present University of Bonn did not exist till 1818, when the University of Munster was removed to Bonn by Frederick William III. The University of Bonn, which was founded in 1786, and suppressed by the French in 1802, was no doubt purely Catholic, for during that time Bonn belonged to the Prince-Bishopric of Cologne, and did not pass into the hands of Prussia till 1814. Moreover, even now five- sixths of the inhabitants of Bonn are Roman Catholics, and till 1794 Bonn was the residence of the Prince-Bishops of Cologne. Hardly the place to choose for the modern type of a German university.
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