ibe x , BLANCHE, AND V/OLET. IN spite of cons i derable knowledge of
society, some study of human na- ture, a good deal of reflection upon the consequences of particular feelings or passions, and a forcible style though with too visible an effort, the se- cond novel of Mr. G. H. Lewes would seem to intimate that the author has no true calling to fiction. Rose, Blanche, and Violet, is deficient in wholeness and in smoothness. The characters, with one or two excep- tions, have no real vitality ; they are an author's creations, not "flesh and blood." The narrative is slow; overlaid by needless description— which is a defect in the plan; or impeded by reflection and disquisition— which is only a fault of composition. A panegyrist might say that Mr. Lewes excels in dramatic power : but such is not the case—he is theatrical, not dramatic ; and of a bad style of theatre. He can work up a scene to a climax ; but the scene is not likely in itself, or is incon- sistent with the persons such as he has made them; and be relies upon physical or sensual, or even offensive circumstances, for his effects. We have frequently been called upon to mark the faileressin fiction from a want of that true moral perception which is the prineipium et fens of writing; but we never saw the deficiency so injurious as in the novel before us. The women have no delicacy either of feeling or of conduct ; the principal men are men about town disguised by melodramatic elevation. Hence, the reader has neither care nor sympathy for the persons, or for their fate. The innate power of Mr. Lewes, and a certain theatrical dex- terity, may excite a curious kind of interest for a particular scene ; but it is given to the cleverness of the author, not to any regard for the people represented.
It is possible that some persons and circumstances in Rose, Blanche, and Violet, may be natural in the sense of having actually existed : the same seems to be the case with occasional traits of character, since they have no purpose beyond the author's idea of their " naturalness" ; Mr. Lewes himself intimates that some of his sketches of society have their actual prototypes. This notion of nature is a common misconception. In the first place, it does not follow that a thing which is natural in the reality is equally natural in the copy ; a thing and its repre- sentation are by no means identical. But mere natural existence is not nature in the sense of art ; which requires a largeness and an elevation rarely found in particular events or particular persons. In point of fact, however, the natural in life is never exactly copied ; something is added, something is omitted, and possibly the circumstances are altogether altered. So far from the " founded in fact" of the play- bills being an advantage of itself, it is likely to prove a source of incon- sistency, because actions that might be natural in the living person cease to be so when any part of the character is changed. The artist, whether he works on the external form or on " the manners and the mind," de. rives his ideas and his materials from nature, but he does not take a bit here and a bit there, and put them together with a kind of laboured dexte- rity. He fuses them in his own mind, and reproduces them as a complete and consistent whole; consistent not merely as regards one part with another, but as respects structure, treatment, style, and tone, which all harmonize with the subject and its materials. This power is called by various names—genius, imagination, art : and in this creative and vivi- fying power Mr. Lewes is deficient. Independent thought, vigour of expres- sion, force and skill in exhibiting a single scene, are of no avail without this power ; and it seems that it cannot be acquired by study, or rather, that without it study cannot be properly pursued. In imaginative par. suits, and perhaps in all things, an apt nature both prompts and guides the study—there must be instinct before there can be art.
There are no fewer than five stories in Rose, Blanche, and Violet. Each of the three sister-heroines has her lover and her distress ; there is the tale of their young stepmother, Mrs. Vyner, who after flirting inconsistently and unpleasantly enough through two volumes and a half, elopes from her old husband; there is also the story of Hester Ma- son, a genius of the Eloisa school, who goes off with an old married beau, out of ambition. The exhibition of bad taste and bad principle in these parties is aggravated by a kind of double intrigue which the lover of Violet carries on with her stepmother; and what probably adds to the injurious effect of the coarseness, is the forced and inconsistent character of much of it, and the borrowed nature of the matter which is peculiar to the story. The incidental sketches of society, the descriptions, and what the painters call the manner, are the author's own ; but the elemen- tary substance of the fiction belongs to the stage and the circulating library, the apparent novelty being only produced by the author's style, or by strangeness—not freshness. Mr. Lewes states in his preface, that he set out with: the intention of evolving a moral, but abandoned it on account of the constraint it would have imposed upon the naturalness of the story. One lesson, however, he does intend to inculcate—the superiority of strength of will to talent. We do not see that this lesson is well taught. In Mrs. Vyner, Mr. Maxwell her brutal lover, and Hester Mason, there is no lack of strength of will ; it predominates over their talent; but without preserving them from vice and misery. Cecil Chamberlayne, the lover and husband of Blanche, is indeed weak enough in purpose, but his talent seems to have been equally weak. He does finish his opera, and his picture of Nero; but the squabbles of the actresses prevent the performance of his piece, and nobody will buy or even praise his painting. No doubt, he is a victim of weakness, but of a weakness beset by a conglomeration of contrived circumstances. Yet Mr. Lewes, from a mistaken love of effect, has made him needlessly selfish, coarse, and brutal. The story of Cecil is, however, the only piece of sustained narrative, mixed with dramatic conduct and discourse, in the book. Not, indeed, the earlier part of it, for that is as extreme as the rest; but from the time when Cecil takes to gaming as a hope of fortune and a means of living. This picture of a gambler's life has a closeness and consistency which are vainly sought in the other parts, with a force in the descriptions, which, if not more powerful than other scenes, is more effective from being more like life : the "hell," with its scenes and frequenters, seem sketches from the reality with very little change. Were the subject less hacknied, the narrative of the gambler's career might have modified our opinion as to the unfitness of Mr. Lewes for fiction ; but it has been a constant theme from the days of Moore and his Gamester down to " Mr. Russell from America" with his Gambler's Wife; and the influence of these examples seems to operate upon Mr. Lewes. It does not suggest the idea of Yates so strongly as some of Boa's writings, but it belongs to the Adelphi school of art, with a rather direct imitation from the " Gambler's Wife" in the scene where Blanche is awaiting her husband's return, and the clock strikes one, two, and three. An actual knowledge of the life, and the literary ability of Mr. Lewes, remove the scenes from the hacknied character which too commonly distinguishes gaming stories ; but they exhibit no originality or even novelty of idea. They form, however, a " powerful" - story. The following scene precedes Cecil's suicide. Completely infatu- ated by his vice, he has sunk through all the bitter gradations of rain, till, friendless and penniless, he commits a forgery on Captain Heath, a friend and indeed an old lover of his wife, and the model-man of the book.
"In one of the low gambling-houses in Leicester Square, Cecil aat, as in a dream, risking the fruits of his crime. His brain whirled round, and his heart beat every time the door opened; for he could not drive away the fear that his
forgery had been detected, and that they were coming to arrest him. .
"He had dishonoured himself to play this new game which Frank had ex lamed to him; and now that the crime was committed he could not profit by it ! "Such a game required, above all others, consummate coolness and self-mas- tery: Cecil was more agitated, his brain was more confused than ever it had been, and he played utterly at random. It would be difficult to conceive greater torture than that which he endured, for he won without satisfaction, and lost with agony: his brain was not so confused but that he bad a distinct perception of his situa- tion, and of the necessity for playing every coup as if for life; but at the same time his brain was so drugged with horror a'hd despair, that his will seemed paralyzed, and he was forced, as by an unseen hand, into the rain which he saw yawning before him. " While the cards were dealt with mechanical precision by the impassive dealer, and Cecil's crime-furnished gold was passint, away before his eyes, visions of his happy. youth, of his early days of niarmagei and healthy activity, floated before his mind; and he, the gambler, on the edge of that dark gulph which gaped be- fore him, turned back his thoughts to those sunny days when his soul was stain- less, and his life was fall of love and hope, of activity and happiness: it was like a small wild flower on a mass of loosening rock, which the next gust of wind will quite unloosen, and tumble thundering into the ravine.
"He thought of his mother, and of her dying; injunctions; and her words of blot-.
sing fell upon his ear just as the dealer, in his pasasionless voice, proclaimed— 'Mick wins.' "And a heap of gold was swept away before him. "For hours did this tortured gamester play; becoming gradually inured to the pain he suffered, and deadened to the whispers of his cooseience. "It was now eleven o'clock. The room was full of players. A succession of new faces replaced those who one by one fell off, contented with their winnings, or (and this was by far the moat frequent case) desperate from their losses. But Cecil never moved. He called for wine occasionally but nothing interrupted his
Oa • Ilfis last three sovereigns were staked upon the black: his life was on the hazard
of that one deal. Even the old players, accustomed to every species of intense emotion, could not keep their eyes off Cecil, as, with parted lips, straining eyes, and purple face, he watched the rapid progress of the game. Intensely they felt the moment was supreme.
"He lost!
" With a burst of uncontrollable despair, he snatched the rake from the hand of the croupier, who hadjust swept away his money, and with both hands snapped it in two: a murmur followed this act of violence, which only seemed preparatory to something worse; but he glared round upon the players with such a look of mad fury that they were awe-stricken. "Instead of any further violence, however, he broke out into a wild hysterical laugh, which made their blood run cold, and staggered out of the house. that moment which had preceded his wild laugh, a vision of his young wife and child destitute—starving—thinned with want and sickness—had appeared to him, and, as in a flash, revealed to him the hideous extent of his rain. "Beggared, dishonoured, stained with a profitless crime, nought remained for him but death; and in death he resolved to still the throbbing of his agony."
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