MORALS AND MYSTERIES.* THE principal " mystery " seems to
us to be how the author of Rita, with a deserved reputation, could risk it on such inferior productions as these sensational tales, only fit for Christmas num- bers of periodicals ; and we know in what very slight estimation these are held—not even critics feeling obliged to read or notice them. And the principal " moral" which we have deduced is the old one, "Let well alone."
It is perhaps only fair that the present writer should confess that he gave heed to the morals and endeavoured to penetrate the mysteries partly while in prospect of a sea passage which he dreaded, and partly—when it had been safely passed—in the bitter knowledge that he had, by his own act, placed the ocean between himself and his native land. But making generous allowance for the circumstances under which the book was studied, we do not recom- mend it, and we almost think we shall be able to show why. In the drat and much the longest story we have a mild and tepid-natured artist taking a foolish fondness for a drinking, swearing, horse-riding young fellow whom he calls "generous-hearted Harry," and in whose favour he resigns a beautiful Italian foundling—a protegee of Harry's uncle—named Assunta, with " deep eyes," occasionally "lighted up by passionate flashes." Our poor artist gains nothing by his move, and only slips between two stools—as the generous-hearted Harry's uncle won't hear of his marry- ing a foundling,—and a wealthy county gentleman, of mysteriously wicked antecedents—never revealed—steps in and carries the beauty off to place with his other rare works of art and nature in his castle. There, with cold cruelty, mentioned, but not described, he virtually imprisons her and drives her mad ; and drunken Harry, happening, during a headlong hunt, to pitch him- self off his horse at the castle steps, she rushes off to a pool in the park—and Assunta and Harry are no more. Of interest in the characters there is none.
In the next story, a rich young Ger man count has a mad mother in a deep-moated schloss, far in the forest,—she went mad when her daughter was drowned in the moat, so her son travels about till he finds a shop-girl just like his late sister ; he marries her, with the highly probable and still more highly laudable purpose of restoring his mother's reason ; Magda undertakes—by his wish and ignorant of his purpose—to separate from him, and sleep alone in the wild schloss, inhabited, as she thinks, by three weird old servants only. Her mother-in-laws frightens her out of her sleep, and at the same moment, we are glad to say, dies ; but we regret to say that the very peculiar or very selfish young count does not lose also his pretty young bride, for she recovers from her swoon. There is some picturesque description in this story, -and it may pass as a German legend,—it is certainly the only thing in the volume with any merit beyond that of being harmless ; -and the only thing with enough character to be remembered 'beyond the hour in which it is read.
Story No. 3 is of a savage Scotch lord, who gets so enraged with his silly wife for laughing at pedigrees and trying to pene- trate an ancient family mystery—not revealed again ; all the mysteries in this book are sacredly respected—that he cuts off her right hand, and cuts out her tongue, and carries her secretly to France, where she dies ; and then he sets his castle on fire, and purposely remains in it, so that he and his castle and the family mystery cease and determine with his unfortunate wife. Then follow three very weak stories indeed, and lastly comes a most extraordinary account—with a hint that it is founded on fact— of two young German women who carried on a system of decoy and murder for the sake of the hair and teeth of their victims. This story is simply horrid.
In fact, we have accorded too much space already to a volume
• Morals and Mbsteries. By Hamilton Aide. London : Smith, Elder, and Co.
of so inferior, not to say worthless, a character, and we excuse ourselves for doing so only on the ground of pleasant recollections of Rita. It is sad to see—as we have very often said before_ authors, not only of ability, but of some established and deserved reputation, lowering themselves by descending to this sort of thing, and still sadder to know that a large public encourages them by reading these unhealthy atrocities ; while they, in their turn, pander to and nourish the desire of idle inquisitiveness for such trashy and morbid productions.
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