HEROINES OF FICTION.
[TO THE EDITOR OP THE "SPECTATOR:']
Sra,—Nothing could more clearly betray the difference between a man's woman and a woman's woman than Mr. Lionel Tollemache's admiration of Agnes Wickfield (Spectator, April 12th). To myself and every other woman I know she is a bundle of the qualities Dickens labelled womanly. Esther Summerson is another. On the other hand, I am quite ready to allow that many women's heroes are bundles of qualities the authors label manly (e.g., Mr. Rochester on one hand, and Sir Guy Morville and Donovan on the other). But are there no heroes and heroines with regard to whom both agree ? A consensus ought to be the author's highest and final praise. What do men feel about Clive and Ethel ? Do they like Laura Bell and George Warrington? (I regard Mrs. Arthur Pendennis with coolness.) Do they love Esmond, as I do, and hate Lady Castlewood ? (By the way, has any one ever• discovered, as I have, the secret of Mrs. Mackenzie's behaviour•, which Thackeray did not know ? She drank.) Shakespeare's greatness stands this test : his women are women to their own sex as well as to his. One word more,— do we always allow for the effect of our own age in judging of writers of the past and the present? Are not Thackeray and Dickens too much mixed up with the joys of our• own youth for• us to be quite dispassionate when we compare them with present-day writers F—I am, Sir, &c., AN ELDERLY WOMAN.
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