ESTHER VANHOMRIGH.*
Mits. WOODS has done all that literary skill and the careful study of a period can do towards constructing a living picture from the bare facts of a historic episode. If she has failed to reproduce those more subtle and distinctive traits of character and individuality by which figures live before us, Esther Van homrigb still remains an interesting and elaborate study of a very dramatic and tragical story. But, judged merely as a novel, it seems to us far inferior in artistic com- pleteness, and in real power of imaginative sympathy, to the remarkable story by which Mrs. Woods first attracted attention as a novelist. Esther Vanhontrigh, it must be owned, is, at least a good deal of it, rather dull. It is too sensibly con- strained in its endeavour to preserve strict historical accuracy, too deficient in dialogue, too dependent on explanatory narra- tive, to allow of that free and spontaneous play of character, that stir of life and movement in its pages, by which interest is aroused and sustained even within the narrower limits of a historical novel. The central figure of the book, and the one on whom the course of the story must depend, is obviously that of Swift. Unless we can gain some distinct impressions of that strangely complex and formidable personality, which could exercise so enduring a spell over the affections of two women as to lead them to sacrifice reputation and happiness for the guarded friendship which was all he would give in return for their devotion, the key to the story is missing. But it is in the portrait of Swift that the absence of vivid and imaginative insight is most marked. All the care- ful work, the accurate adjustment of the character to its authentic historic outlines, even the local colour which is so conscientiously introduced—the dissertations on friendship, the use of the "little language," the employment of such characteristic endearments as " bratikin," " slutikin "—only leave us puzzled and bored, no nearer to grasping with any clearness the figure of Swift, and unconvinced of what the novel takes so much pains to display to us. A glance into the Journal to Stella does more than all Mrs. Woods's pages of analysis and narrative to interpret the re- markable power of fascination which Swift undoubtedly could exercise, and which availed to reconcile Stella to the ambiguous aspect of her position with him before the world, and which could le:td the luckless Vanessa to stake her happiness on his half-hearted response to her persistent and passionate declarations of affection.
With the character of Esther Vanhomrigh herself, or Vanessa, to give her the name by which she is more widely known, Mrs. Woods has been much more successful. In con- ception and execution it is distinct and spontaneous, suffering leas than either Swift or Stella from the hampering restraints of a too obviously respected historical accuracy. In the early scenes with which the book opens, in the gay London world of the period, there is something specially graceful in the picture we have of her, young, attractive, impulsively eager, detached from the somewhat vulgar and frivolous life round. her by her higher intellectual ambitions, and by the engrossing
interest of her intercourse with Swift. There is a touch of pathos, too, which is cleverly conveyed, in her proud enjoyment of a friendship with so brilliant and powerful a personage, a friendship that later events were to modify so profoundly, and which was finally to suffer so melancholy an eclipse. L ater, when the scene of the story is transferred to Ireland, and the ardour of Esther's attachment for Swift, now Dean of St. Patrick's, has become little short of an infatuation, it is not easy to prevent compassion for her from passing into dislike. There is some-
thing distasteful in the spectacle of a passion declared with so little reserve, and with so complete an abandonment to the
caprice of its unwilling and wearied object, that even Mrs.
Woods's apologetic skill cannot overcome. But the monotony of this changeless devotion passes as we approach the inevitable and tragic conclusion. The scene in which Stella and Vanessa meet is described with remarkable force and directness. It is the only occasion on which Stella, middle-aged now, but pre- serving a certain indolent charm, emerges from the shadowy seclusion through which we dimly discern her ; so subordinate is she kept throughout the book, to her younger and more
brilliant rival. The proud reserve with which she meets Esther's questions, and the eager intensity of the younger woman, are brought out with a genuine depth of feeling and a power of • Esther Vanhomr;gh. By M. L. Woods. London: John Murray.
imaginative insight, which scarcely show themselves elsewhere in the book. The passage is too long for quotation, but the following scene, which marks the ending of Vanessa's ill-fated experiment in friendship, will show sufficiently Mrs. Woods's skill in narrative :—
"Esther had heard the sound of hasty hoofs approaching the house along the hard road. A moment later there came a loud knock at the front gate. Francis went reluctantly, and left the door of the dining parlour ajar. He could not but guess whose was the heavy foot that immediately afterwards came striding into the house. Swift had flung his reins to the old man-servant who opened the outer gate to him, and entering the house un- announced, burst into the book-room. Essie faced him half- leaning on the table, as white as a sheet, and with terror legible
on every line of her face The awful look she had seen and dreaded before was mild compared to this, for it was not only a vision of black wrath that stood there frowning upon her, but something worse ; something that cut into her heart, cold and sharp as a knife. It was, or it seemed to be, Hate. An interminable minute the shape stood in the door- way, then making two strides forward, flung a sealed packet violently down on to the table. At the same instant Esther sank on her knees, as much because her trembling limbs refused to support her as for the purpose of supplication, and stretching out her hand, clutched him convulsively by the right arm as he turned to go. Cadenus !' she would have shrieked ; but nothing more was audible than a hoarse murmur that died in her throat. Cadenus V At the second attempt her lips framed the word ; but the voice was a mere whisper. He raised his left hand as though to loose her fingers from his sleeve, and loosening them herself, she let her arm drop to her side. In an instant he was gone. She heard the bang of the house-door and the outer gate, and then the hurrying hoofs of the big horse, just as she had heard them four minutes ago, only this time they were going instead of coming. When the last echo of the horse-hoofs had died away, Francis listening in equal bewilderment both to the sounds and to the silence of those few minutes, heard a strange cry : a long, low, moaning cry, less human than like that of some inarticulate suffering creature. Yet it seemed to proceed from the book-room. He went in. and coming hastily round the corner of the door almost trod on Essie's hand. She had fallen face forwards on the ground, and the hand stretched out above her head held a torn wrapper, which seemed to have contained a sheaf of papers, that had slipped after her from the table, and lay strewn upon her body. Francis called her name, but there was no response, and on raising her head he saw that she was perfectly unconscious."
The book contains, of course, besides its three principal figures, many incidental characters whose fortunes touch and interweave in varying degrees. But, for the most part, they are either without much significance, or are not drawn in a manner to convey any very distinct or individual impression. An excep- tion must be made in the case of charming Molly Vanhomrigh, whose gay flirtations with Lord Mordannt end so disastrously, and whose early death in her remote Irish home is so soon followed by the more melancholy end of her sister. With Esther, she remains, to our mind, the only character in whom the difficulties which necessarily beset any attempt to recall the character and life and experience belonging to a long vanished past, may be said to have been fairly overcome.
Previous page
