different interests converge; and then, instead of floating down the united stream of events, we are forced separately to ascend each of its tributary branches, like Humboldt examining the bifurcations of the Oroonoko, until we forget, in exploring their sources, the manner in which they bear on one another. We regret too, that he should have violated the simplicity of his narrative by that novel-like incident, the testimonial from Butler's grandfather through which, in some degree, Jeannie obtains the assistance of Argyle. Its introduction is, if we may be allowed to revert to a distinction which we endeavored to establish in a former article, vol. xxiv. p. 355, both improbable and unnatural. Improbable, because, that Jeannie should, the instant she wanted a great protector, have found her obscure lover possessed of the strongest claims on the man best fitted for the purpose, was, to a degree almost beyond the powers of numeration, against the chances of real life. Unnatural, because it was absolutely impossible that a family, holding a document which gave them unlimited access to the patronage of the most powerful nobleman in Scotland, should have suffered it to remain unemployed, like Aladdin's rusty lamp, while they struggled through three generations in poverty and disappointment. If our author thinks even this more natural, than that Argyle should have been induced, by Jeannie's representations, to examine into her sister's case, by his doubts as to her guilt to interfere in her favour, and by his sympathy with Jeannie's heroism to bestow his benefits on her and her family, we must say that he thinks much worse, than we do, of the characters he has drawn.

We are not sure too, that it might not have been politic in the author to suppress almost all his fourth volume. We are very glad that he did not, for it is all very amusing. Knockdunder is excellent; and so is the transformation of Gentle Geordie and Effie into Sir George and Lady Staunton, particularly the latter; and we revisited with pleasure, in Sir George's company, the Tolbooth door and Saddletree's shop. A new and most entertaining light is likewise thrown upon the character of David Deans; his feelings on Dumbiedike's marriage, his reconciliation of his speculative principles with existing circumstances, and his discussion with Butler as to his acceptance of the Duke's preferment, are delightful. But all this has the effect of a farce after a tragedy. Where the ludicrous is interwoven with the pathetic or the terrible, it heightens the effect, both by contrast and by the appearance which it gives of authenticity. Saddletree's absurdities have certainly a good effect in the trial scene; but a whole train of light. amusing narrative, in which the very persons, whose previous history has harrowed the reader's mind with pity and terror, or swelled it with admiration, have nothing to do but to show foibles

H 3

and

and enjoy prosperity, lowers sadly their poetical dignity, little perhaps as they themselves would have been aware of it.

Among the exquisite scenes, on which the opinion that we have just ventured to express is founded, perhaps the most perfect is the meeting of the sisters before the trial. We will own, that on our first perusal, we trembled for the author when we found that he really meant to exhibit it. We felt that such a meeting must create emotions almost beyond the power of words; and yet that a single expression exaggerated, or constrained, or artificial, would poison the whole. The trial has not perhaps the same merit from its difficulty, but is as striking in its execution. Effie is a perfect specimen of the fit subject for fictitious misfortune. Not so good as to make her calanuities absolutely revolting; not so bad as to make them appear appropriate punishments. Her crime is precisely the anapha uyan of Aristotle. Had it been deeper, her sufferings would, of course, have excited less pity; had it been none at all, they would have raised, instead of pity, horror and indignation. As it is, our exquisite pity for her, and our pity, mingled with admiration, for her father, produce an intensity of interest, which extends itself, not only to the important incidents, but to the minute formalities, of the trial, which is even heightened, as we observed before, by the foolery of Saddletree, and the bad taste of her advocate, and is not destroyed even by our constant anticipation of the event. We wait with almost as much anxiety during Jeannie's silence after Fairbrother's question, And what was the answer she made,' and while the yet unpublished verdict is sealed and recorded, as if we did not well know what must, in each case, be the result.

We cannot bestow the same unqualified praise on another celebrated scene, Jeannie's interview with Queen Caroline. Jeannie's pleading appears to us much too rhetorical for the person and for the occasion; and the queen's answer, supposing her to have been overpowered by Jeannie's entreaties, This is eloquence,' is still worse. Had it been eloquence it must necessarily have been unperceived by the queen. If there is any art of which celare artem is the basis, it is this. The instant it peeps out, it defeats its own object, by diverting our attention from the subject to the speaker, and that, with a suspicion of his sophistry equal to our admiration of his ingenuity. A man who, in answer to an earnest address to the feelings of his hearer, is told, 'you have spoken eloquently,' feels that he has failed. Effie, when she entreats Sharpitlaw to allow her to see her sister, is eloquent, and his answer accordingly betrays perfect unconsciousness that she has been so, 'You shall see your sister,' he began, if you'll tell me;' then interrupting

himself,

bimself, he added in a more hurried tone, no, you shall see your sister whether you tell me or no.'

The duke himself is, perhaps, a little too fine spoken in his opening conversation with the queen, but his character is in general happily finished. The vanity, which covered his great qualities with a varnish, that has perhaps contributed to the permanence of his reputation, is very gracefully insinuated. Douce Davie Deans is magnanimous in his affliction, and amusing in his prosperity. We have but one fault to find with him, the laugh which is constantly raised by his religious peculiarities. It may be said, that the weight of his religion, like that of armour of proof, if it sometimes repels the impulses of nature, when they are right, always secures him from them when they are wrong; that, if it loads him with unnecessary scruples, it arms him with heroic self-devotion and constancy; and if it sometimes makes him absurd, leaves him often venerable, and always respectable, in his absurdity. But it is precisely to this union of good and evil consequences, that, as a subject of general representation, we object. When religion, or what resembles it, is represented as rendering sanguinary and merciless such a fanatic as Burley, every reader can perceive that his belief does not create his bad passions, but only decides their course. Pride, violence, and malignity, are essential parts of his character; and if he had been an Atheist instead of a Cameronian, they would have only changed their objects. But the religion of David Deans is the basis of his whole character; his faults and follies seem, no less than his virtues, to spring from it. And we can conceive a reader, without much power of discrimination, so strongly associating them together, as to believe the one as necessary a consequence of it as the other; and to congratulate himself that he is a man of the world, above all silly scruples. We refer, as an illustration of our remark, to his conversation with Saddletree and Butler, on the choice of a counsel for Effie, at the end of the first volume.

To get rid of the little we have remaining of blame, we must add, that we do not think George Robertson quite worthy of his author. He is somewhat too melo-dramatic. Men, whatever may be their remorse, do not profusely apply to themselves the terms villain, murderer and devil; or calmly affirm themselves predestined to evil here and hereafter. They have always a reserve as to the goodness of their hearts, especially where they are ready, as Robertson is described to be, to sacrifice their lives to save that of another. Saddletree is less annoying than our author's fool generally is, because there is less of him. He is not, like Fair Service, locomotive, so that when we escape from Edinburgh and its neighbourhood, we leave him. His wife is happily

contrasted to him. We thoroughly enter into her dislike of her husband's gossips, and her indignation to see sae mony o'them set up yonder in their red gowns and black gowns, and a' to take the life o' a bit senseless lassie.' What to say of Madge Wildfire we scarcely know. The outline is bold and the colouring vivid; and it is more like what we suppose maduess to be than any other representation of it that we recollect. But whether it is really like, those only can tell who have had the misfortune to see more of the insane than has fallen to our lot. Her introduction, to warn Robertson by her songs that an enemy is at hand, rather too much resembles the incident in the Lady of the Lake, where Fitz James is warned of the ambush by the song of the maniac Blanch. The novel, however, tells the story with more plausibility.

We must not close our remarks without taking a more formal leave of Jeannie. She is a perfect model of sober heroism; ot the union of good sense with strong affections, firm principles and perfect disinterestedness; and of the calm superiority to misfortune, danger and difficulty, which such an union must create. A hero so characterized generally spoils the interest of a novel, both because the reader knows him to be protected, among all his dangers, by the strong arm of poetical justice, and because his conduct, upon every occasion, is anticipated. The first of these inconveniences is skilfully obviated, by making another person the object of the dangers on which the interest of the story depends, and using Jeannie only as the means of averting them; the second, by placing her in humble life, and then exposing her to situations in which no good sense could supply the want of experience. As it is, she is a splendid exception to the insipidity of perfect characters, and excites and retains the reader's deepest interest, without possessing the advantage of a single fault.

We are almost inclined to renounce the supremacy of Waverley, and of the Heart of Mid Lothian, when we come to the BRIDE OF LAMMERMOor. It is a tragedy of the highest order, and unites excellence of plot to our author's usual merits of character and description. It may be objected, that poor Lucy Ashton's misfortunes are too much the sufferings of innocence to be the fit subjects of tragical sympathy. Her forming the engagement with Ravenswood cannot, as it is described, be considered even as an error. She adheres to it, through every persecution of violence and art, while her reason remains unimpaired; and her final breach of it is scarcely an act of the will. Perhaps the answer is, that a voluntary breach of engagement is a fault, to which so much disapprobation is attached, that some degree of disapprobation-that degree which affords a pretext for the misfortunes of tragedy-is attached

attached to one that is involuntary. No combination of circumstances will perfectly wipe off the stain of a breach of chastity, and constancy is the chastity of the affection, and is as necessary to the security of unmarried love, as that of the person is to married love. Both are, therefore, fenced with the same jealousy; and a woman who has been surprised, or seduced, or impelled into a violation of either, though under circumstances that may acquit her in foro conscientiæ, is guilty foro imaginationis. To this arbitrary tribunal the poet resorts; here Miss Ashton will be tried, and though her case is a very hard one, we fear the verdict will be against her.

Although there is no deficiency of faults in Ravenswood, it is perhaps a blemish, that his faults are so remotely connected with his misfortunes. They set in motion, it is true, the train of causes on which his misery and his death ultimately depend. If he had not been violent and revengeful, the lord keeper would not have feared him; if the lord keeper had not feared him, he would not have endeavoured to soften him by effecting an intimacy with Lucy Ashton. Without that intimacy there would have been no engagement; without the engagement he would not have received the challenge, or been lost on his way to meet it. But it is not to the remote and accidental, but to the immediate and appropriate, effects that the reader looks. Now all the immediate effects of Ravenswood's spirit of pride and vengeance are advantages; it frightens a powerful enemy into a friend, gives him the affections of a charming girl, and appears to have great influence in obtaining a valuable patron. His misfortunes spring from the enmity of Bucklaw and Lady Ashton; both arising from causes out of his own controul, and as likely to have arisen if he had been the meekest of mankind. If this is a fault, it is an unlucky one, as it might have been so easily avoided. His own temper might have been made to afford far more obvious, and more probable, causes of offence, than a gaucherie of Caleb's, or the hereditary dislike of Lady Ashton. As a character he is excellent, admirably drawn, and admirably grouped and contrasted with those around him. Indeed we recollect no work of our author's in which contrast is more skilfully used. Ravenswood is opposed to Lucy, and Sir William to his lady; and those characters, which at first appear the same, are beautifully distinguished from each other. Sir William and Lucy are flexible and timid; Ravenswood and Lady Ashton firm and decisive. But the flexibility of Sir William, arising from fear of personal consequences, and fickleness of purpose, differs as much from that of his daughter, which springs from affectionateness of disposition, anxiety not to give pain, and preference of others to herself, as the firmness of Lady Ashton does from that of Ravens