SOME FRENCH NOVELS.* IT is a common complaint just now
in every country that there is no man who can be reckoned exactly in the first class, as far as is shown at least by his present work. We have perhaps a right to plume ourselves upon an exception in Mr. Gladstone ; but that is not in the field of literature, where, since Carlyle is dead and Tennyson is dead, we can recognise no star of the first magnitude. In France, the last great light is supposed to have disappeared at the death of M. Renan, of whose greatness we are not so well assured. In a lighter branch of literature, the same country possesses a numerous band of very clever novelists, none of whom, however, according to their own countrymen, rise above the second rank. We are not quite so sure abciul M. Bourget, in the future at least, if not in the present. Cosmopolis is, undoubtedly, a very remarkable work, and one particularly adapted to raise the spirits of M. Bourget's admirers at a time when they had been specially cast down by the perusal of his late unsuccessful novel, Terre Promise, the tediousness of which was undeniable by the most enthusiastic. But here we have again a novel not only better than anything the author has given us since Andre Corndlis, but even superior, in our opinion, to that very powerful book. The canvas is larger, and the whole strain of the novel, if not stronger, is at any rate more sympathetic.
The plot is not what interests the reader most in the book before us. The two characters who are introduced to us as being chiefly lookers-on, though they are also at times actors of considerable importance in the incidents of the story, are of more intrinsic importance even in the eye of the author. The programme laid before us in the first chapter shows this idea clearly, the first observer com- plaining of the heterogeneous mob which fills up the Holy City—for the scene is laid in Rome, which he re- gards not as Oosmopolis, but as Metropolis, the mother- city of all Christian men—while the other expresses his • (1.) Cosmopolie Roman. Par Paul Bourget. Paris Alphonse Lomorro.— (2.) Le Secret du Prifeepteur. Par Victor Cherbaliez. Paris : Hachette et Clio. —(8.rre.) Lonoun d 13revee ; Nouvelles, Par Francois Copses, Paris : Alphonse Leino delight at having so many incongruous elements brought together to study at once. The latter, Julien Dorsenne, is a rising novelist, who goes about to study the world with a mental note-book always in his brain, and a real one frequently in his hand, in which last he records the style of the staircase in a palace he visits, and the effect it produces upon his mind We are not much impressed by Dorsenne, because we have met so many of his near kinsmen in literature ; even in M. Bourget's own books we have Claude Larches, who appears almost a twin-brother. Many novelists have attempted to make a figure of a literary man, which, we suppose, is intended to reconcile the public to the existence of so many of them, but very few have succeeded in making at all a pleasing picture. Whether this is perhaps due to the impossibility of rendering the subject attractive, it is not for us to say. Charles Reade once tried to give a full-length portrait of him- self, which was only a caricature. We do not suppose that M. Bourget has had any similar object; indeed, we hope not for it cannot be denied that Dorsenne is by no means always to our taste, though he is undoubtedly a clever sketch. The pernicious habit of talking to oneself—which is practised by some exceedingly worthy persons in private life—is usually inexcusable in a novel, but here Dorsenne has a certain posi- tion as showman which makes it almost a necessity. His part in the story does not represent him in a heroic light ; but that we could hardly expect. The scene in which he rejects the proposal made to him by Alba Steno in despair, awakens in our mind distinct memories of a similar scene in one of Mr. Henry James's books. This is, no doubt, a coincidence ; but we believe that M. Bourget does happen to be better acquainted with English, and possibly also American, litera- ture than most of his fellows.
The other observer is of a very different stamp. R has often appeared to us that when M. Bourget cast his novels in that squalid atmosphere of intrigue which is common in French novels, it might be less from his personal preference than from the necessity of pleasing his public. That he can appreciate the poorness of this class of work was clearly shown at the end of his most disagreeable novel, Mensonges, where the priest replies to Claude Larcher's philosophisings on the real character to be discovered at the bottom of the heroine's relations with divers persons, " Tout cela, voyez- vous, c'est des grandes saletes." No author ever passed a. truer criticism on his work, nor a franker,—at least, since Thackeray declared that Esmond was a prig. The Marquis. de Montfanon holds very much the same views as the Abbe in Mensonges. To him the corrupt society which affords so much entertainment to Dorsenne is an abomination of which he cannot even speak with patience, and the contrast thus established is very subtly worked out. M. de Montfanon, who, is of course a man of great family, has been in his time a Parisian viveur, whom, however, the graver thoughts suggested by a serious illness have brought back to the fold of the. Church ; be has enlisted in the Papal Zouaves, fought in the war of 1870, by the side of the heroic De Sonia, where he lost an arm, and is, at the commencement of the story, a resident in Rome as the capital of the Christian world, retired from all active life by reason of his infirmity, and spending all his time in religious exercises and good works. The old Adam, however, is still strong within him, and the strange mixture of, Christian charity and potty prejudice, of good-will to all men • and hopelessly intolerant exclusiveness, are set before us in the most striking and vivid manner. The sharp transition from the unmanageable fire-eater of one day to the humble penitent of another who accuses himself of every misfortune that may have happened, is laid before us— not in words, but in action—in a manner which not only enthrals the reader's interest, but convinces him of the necessary truth of the picture. The preliminaries of 'the duel, where Montfanon, who has consented to act as second to prevent mischief, succeeds with the best intentions in preventing all possible settlement by. rigid adherence to fantastic principles of etiquette, show the lights and shades of a really lofty character with marvellous art. This is, to our mind, the highest note M. Bourget has yet struck in any of his works that we have seen. There is a strange ending to the book, where Dorsenne and Montfanon converse in. the Pope's garden on the melancholy events that have passed, and the latter inveighs against the habit of regarding good and evil as merely traits of character interesting to observe. Dorsenne, of course, describes this as the malady of the time tor which there is no remedy, and his companion points out the remedy in religion. We do not know whether this is the author's view, but the sentiment, supported by a very pretty little episode of the Pope passing on his way to his carriage, is left practically unanswered. We have no space left to say anything of the story, which chiefly turns upon two intrigues, one of love—to use the con- ventional phrase—and one of money, and one as sordid as the other. The striking point in the treatment of these subjects is the way in which the persons principally to blame escape all evil consequences, which fall entirely upon the two innocent girls, whom the discovery of their parents' real character drives, one to suicide, and the other to a convent. The Countess Steno goes off comfortably to her country residence ; the Baron Hafner will, no doubt, pursue his financial schemes with con- tinued sauces ; and the ruined lives of poor Alba and Fanny will soon be forgotten incidents. The minor characters are admirably drawn,—the Jacobin bookseller Ribalta, Branca- deli, the host of the Marzocco,' the Parisian-Roman princes, Cibo and Pietrapertosa, being specially excellent sketches. Heredity, of course, crops up as usual, and almost everybody's action is explained thereby. We must, however, though having little sympathy with this easy escape from responsi- bility, note the skilful 'manner in which the atavism of their black blood comes out in Florent Chapron and his sister,—the latter displaying the mean and underhand qualities, deceit, envy, &c., natural to a race so long forcibly suppressed, and the other the simple, dog-like devotion to a being of a higher kind who has shown kindness to his inferior.
The reputation of M. Cherbuliez is of older date, and his career has long been one of calm, uninterrupted success. We do not know that he has added very much to his literary record by the publication of Le Secret eau Procepteur, but it is at least not unworthy of him. Yet one -would find it difficult to write at any great length upon the even tenor of a work which, however, is a pleasure to read. The calm, reflective tone of thought which is dear to M. Cherbuliez never becomes too placid to hold our interest, and we own to an old-estab- fished weakness for the discussions among his characters. Often have we wondered why La BcIte, for instance, was not dull, though it was full of philosophical symposia, appalling to behold till one began to read them ; but it was not dull. Much is due, probably, to the charm of the author's easy, -flowing style, and something, perhaps, also to the fact that he knows mankind, and can tell to an inch the point at which boredom would commence. Would it were so with some who write in English ! The narrator of the story is a man who, partly on account of his learning and partly on account of his ugliness, has been selected by an eccentric wine- grower in Champagne to be tutor to his daughters. The elder, Sidonie, is one of those sedate, impeccable figures which are rarely seen except in marble or in novels ; the younger, Niquette, a lively, frivolous girl, is the one by whom the tutor is at first repelled, then attracted, and at last absolutely enslaved. His love for her is, of course, hopeless, and always concealed, till at last, in a scene where the author is by no means at his best, it comes out, with small consequences. The tutor-Iover is naturally the guardian angel of his pupil, and watches over her in the various difficult seasons of her life, exerting his influence in turn to make her discard a well-born and agreeable but un- reliable suitor, and marry in his stead a plain and unamusing personage, who, however, is endowed in the highest degree with that first of conventional virtues, respectability,—after her marriage, to oblige her to be happy, and, finally, to prevent her from ruining the happiness which is not very solid yet, by a return towards the first ineligible suitor. With some dis- agreeable incidents, the story is charmingly told, Of the details of the work, the mind of M. Tristan and his conversa- tions with the Abbe 'Verlet, with M. Brogues, the wine-grower, and especially with Niquette, we have nothing to say but that they are genuine Cherbuliez. We do not know that any one will require more than that.
M. Francois Copp& is moat famous as a poet, but his prose works are well known to all lovers of pure French and grace- ful style. The tales in the collection before us are slight, and none of them appear to us to approach in interest the very remarkable study which opens the book, " Faute de Jeunesse." It is the story of a poor young man who, being saved from Itaonn scuni ft misery by a lucky appointment as secretary to a gentleman, somewhat of the Montfanon type, who spends his whole time and money on charity, after much consideration of himself and his employer from an agnostic and ultra-radical view—his owner being a pious Catholic—robs him to supply the expenses of his mistress. The theft being discovered, the employer obliges Henri Luc, the secretary, to sign a paper acknowledging it, which is to be used against him only in case of his committing another bad action. Years afterwards, we find Henri Luc, whose life since this one crime has been faultless and laborious, the orator par excellence of the anti-clerical party ; he is to lead the next day one of the many cruel attacks on a beneficent priesthood. His old employer visits him in the night, and swears to publish the fatal paper if the speech is made. Henri decides, like a true Frenchman, that suicide is the only course open to him, and the scene ends in tears and reconciliation. These are the dry bones of the story, but M. Coppee makes them live, and to good purpose. Of the other tales, " L'Enfaut Perdu" is a kindly, pleasant Christmas tale ; "Palotte " and " Le Louis d'Or " are both very clever ; and " Une Restitution " is a tremendously powerful satire, but deals with a matter of which the interest, thank heaven, is exhausted. We want to hear no more about Panama.
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