That the authoress has a quick and appreciative eye for the picturesque, her most bitter detractor will not care to deny; she loves to write of birds and flowers, field and forest, golden sunshine and blue waters. She exhibits a passion for the bygone—in architecture and in man. In her interesting miscellany, “A Christmas Greeting,” she reproves those who would take from the charming old-worldliness of Shakespeare’s birthplace by erecting in Stratford-on-Avon ugly villas and shops suggestive of Clapham or Peckham Rye. She would—as we all would—have Stratford kept as much as possible like Stratford was when Shakespeare wandered by Avon’s banks or brooded over the fire in his home near to the old Guild Church.
“Ardath” was written in a hot glow of inspiration. Its theme is drawn from the Book of Esdras, one of the apocryphal Jewish writings which, while not used for “establishment of doctrine,” are held to be of value for historical purposes and for “instruction of manners.” Like a constantly recurring refrain in a musical composition, the passage in Esdras chosen by the authoress for her text greets the reader ever and anon as he turns the pages: “So I went my way into the Field which is called ‘Ardath,’ and sat among the flowers.”
On this passage Miss Corelli built her romance, and so successfully did she work out her ideas that “Ardath” drew letters from all sorts and conditions of men—letters discussing the theories propounded in her writings, and asking for information and advice of encyclopædic character. Amongst the
A Boating Place on the Avon
A Favorite Reach on the Avon
correspondence were many flattering letters from men and women of light and leading, not only in England, but abroad. The novel under notice, which was issued in 1889, brought Miss Corelli a letter of praise from Lord Tennyson. The work was indeed so remarkable a piece of imaginative conception and picturesque writing that it appealed peculiarly to the Laureate’s sense of the poetic and artistic.
Of the mission of the book, which was of serious character, we shall speak anon. “Ardath” is one of the author’s finest efforts to further the cause of true religion. A strange outcome of the book was the proposed building, by some enthusiastic Americans, of a Corelli city in Fremont County, Colorado, U. S. A., on the Arkansas River, and a prospectus was actually issued explaining the project.