he literary success of Blackmore came late in life. He was born in Longworth, Berkshire, England, in 1825, was graduated at Exeter College, Oxford, and afterwards studied law in the Middle Temple, practicing his profession as a conveyancer.
But his heart was in an outdoor life. Like his own John Ridd, the hero of 'Lorna Doone,' he is a man of the moors and fields, with a fresh breeze blowing over him and a farmer's cares in his mind. In 1854-5 he published several volumes of poems under the pen-name of "Melanter." 'The Bugle of the Black Sea' and a complete translation of Virgil's 'Georgics' appeared in 1871.
Other volumes of verse followed, of which it may be said that he is a poet more sensitive to influence than fertile in original impulse; although some of his prose, in which even rhythm is observed in what seems to be an unconscious manner, displays high original quality. It is therefore fair to say of him as a poet that while his works did not gain him the reputation that has placed him among the foremost literary men of the day, the subtle influence rural nature exerts on man, and the part it bears in the sweet harmonies of life, are told in passages that are resonant with melody.
The poet's delight is in the prosperity of the fields, as if they were his friends, and in the dumb loving motherhood with which all nature seems, to his eyes, to surround him.
As the precursor of a summer that yielded such a mellow harvest, the spring of Mr. Blackmore's fiction was slow and intermittent. The plot of his stories is never probable, but in his first novel, 'Clara Vaughan,' published in 1864, it impairs belief in the general reality of the book; and though there is hint of the power to excite sympathy of which his latter novels prove him so great a master, the intelligence refuses such shrieking melodrama. 'Lorna Doone' therefore came unheralded. It was published in London in 1869 and slowly grew in favor, then leaped into popularity. In 1878 twenty-two editions had been printed.
Other novels followed. 'The Maid of Sker,' 'Alice Lorraine,' 'Cripps the Carrier,' 'Erema,' 'Mary Anerley,' 'Christowell,' 'Sir Thomas Upton,' came in rapid succession. The paternity of no novel of Mr. Blackmore's is doubtful. All have marked characteristics. They are long and exceedingly minute in detail. With all his finish, he tells his story almost with a child's elaborateness of incident. Every change of the seasons, the history of every walk is set down. He is in love with every feature of the landscape, be it the wild doons of Exmoor or the wilder Yorkshire coast, or, across the seas, the plains of the Sierras. He is a story-teller of the days in which it was quite unimportant whether tales should come to an end or not. He would have saved Scheherazade all her trouble and enjoyed the task. He cannot pass carelessly by the slightest incident; it is his nature to approfondir all his surroundings: if the hero breaks his stirrup and stops at the blacksmith's to have it mended, the blacksmith will appear at the end of the story united to the rider, from the third and fourth generation, by a subtle thread of connection. But all these details, while they encumber the tale, contribute to a harmonious whole; for he has in a peculiar degree an instinct for the judicious introduction of telling human characters that are as much a part of the detail of the scene as the trees and stones. Upon these characters he expends a wealth of humor, and his humor is characteristic of Blackmore alone. It is full of unexpected turns and twists of fancy, quiet fun when we expect grave comment. Friendly old people appear, full of innumerable quips of individuality, and breezy fields and wealthy orchards and a general mellow fruitfulness form the background of the play.
Especially in his prodigality is Blackmore characteristic of Blackmore. Other writers keep their quaint reflections for their dialogue, and confer immortality on their principal characters. But Blackmore has no sense of economy. As Mr. Saintsbury says of Thackeray, he could not introduce a personage, however subordinate, without making him a living creature. He does little with a character he has described in such powerful lines as Stephen Anerley. The fisher village folks, wild and hardy, with their slow speech and sly sagacity, the men at sea and the women at home; the maimed and broken-down yet jolly old tars; the anxious little merchants, and the heavy coast-guardsmen, we learn to know as we know the rocks and caves, the fishing cobbles in their bright colors, the slow-tongued gossips pouring out their long-voweled speech. All these characters, although they have a general resemblance to each other, have also a peculiar, quaint simplicity and wisdom that is Blackmoreish, as Thackeray's characters are Thackeraian. The author steps in and gives his puppets his little twist, the characteristic obliquity each possesses, his quips and cranks. If he would but confine the abundant tide of his flowing and leisurely utterances, he would have more time to bestow on really exciting and dramatic episodes, instead of going off into a little corner and carefully embellishing it, while the denouement waits and the interest grows cold. Neither can he write a page without sending a sly bolt of amused perception through it, in which he discovers some foible or pricks some bubble of pretension, but always tenderly, as if he loved his victim. To the fact that Mr. Blackmore's success came late in life, we have perhaps to be thankful for the softened and indulgent maturity which finds a hundred excuses, and knows that nothing is as good or as bad as it seems.
