'O that I knew where I might find him,
Where but on yonder tree?
Or if too rich thou art,
Sink into poverty,
And find him in thine heart.'
A Syren. By J. Adolphus Trollope. Three vols. Smith, Elder and Co.
Mr. J. A. Trollope has returned to the scenes of his first love—to Italian skies, artists, maidens, marchesi, and friars. We are plunged at once into the hot sunshine and tropical excitements of a Ravennese Carnival. The author gives us exuberant descriptions of female beauty, of fastidious adornment, dexterous deshabille motivée, and of fierce sexual passion met by cold calculating resolve to play a high stake without love, or faithfulness, or even wisdom. Mr. Trollope is matchless in his portraiture of Italian artistes, and of the simple contadina of refined and delicate taste, and pure seraphic devotion to the one over-mastering affection. He has, in this story, contrasted the natures of two beautiful portionless girls, who by strange fortune are thrown, during the same carnival, into the way of the two Marchesi Castelmare. The one is an opera singer, the other a painter. The former resolves on making a conquest of the elder nobleman, and the latter does win the affections of the younger. The uncle is described as the pattern of the highest virtue, of stone-cold passions, of infinite proprieties; and La Lalli, the syren, succeeds during the carnival in bewitching, maddening, and befooling him into promise of marriage, and inspiring the most deadly jealousy of any interference with his claim. A noble nature is ruined by the fierce fires of a foolish attachment, and most tragic are the issues. We will not diminish the fascination of the story by revealing its secret. La diva Lalli is actually murdered on the very day when the old marchese has publicly admitted his intention to marry her, and everybody but the murderer seems to have run the risk of having to bear the brunt of the charge. More than a volume is occupied with an endeavour to answer the question, 'Who has done the deed?' There is more delicacy, and subtlety, and meaning in the inquiry, than in the inquiry, 'Who killed Tulkinghorn?' and the reader is reminded of the heart-searching of Mr. Browning's 'Ring and Book,' rather than of Mr. Dickens's popular story. The story cannot be called pleasing or profitable. It is a wonderful drawing, full of brilliant effects, and crowded with narrative and suggestion. The style is clear, and the Italian expletives and appellatives give it an operatic grace and sweetness that are very attractive. If 'tesoro mio' had been translated 'duck of diamonds,' and the rest of the prettiness turned into plain English, perhaps the blue sky and the circolo and the carnival would have had to vanish likewise.
Against Time. By Alexander Innes Shand. Two vols. Smith, Elder and Co. 1870.
The machinery that Mr. Shand has contrived is clumsy, and looks like a violent effort to be original. The hero of the story is put into circumstances of maddening temptation to make money by unfair means. He is exasperated by discovering that a relative has made him sole heir to her vast estates, on the proviso that in the course of three years he developes out of the few thousands that are left to him, a fortune equal to that which he may then receive. On his failing to fulfil this condition, the designation of the property is concealed from all except a pair of contemptible villains, who endeavour to play a series of underhand tricks to secure it ultimately for their own uses. The hero came from the Kursaals of Germany to hear of this race that he had to run 'against time,' and he is determined, by huge speculation, to win the prize. The monetary scheme, the Credit Foncier and Mobilier of Turkey, is described by one who has seen the eggs of many of these vipers hatched in the sun of England's prosperity. There is a grandeur about the conception, and a rapidity in the inflation of this great balloon, that is enough to take away the breath of ordinary financiers. The young aristocrat is the Ulysses in council, the Achilles in strife, the Bayard sans peur, sans reproche; and though he makes, in the course of three years, some quarter of a million sterling, and might claim the possession of family estates, he has positively contrived to withdraw the greater part of it from the 'concern,' and to have done it without dishonour. He has been dabbling up to the elbows in boiling pitch, and is neither scorched, nor blistered, nor defiled. Most surprising is his nobility. When the bubble bursts, he has the magnanimity and magnificence voluntarily to sacrifice his splendid fortune, and more splendid prospects, at the shrine of the honour which seems for a moment in the dust. Finally, of course it all turns out for the best, and the young lady who has won the heart of the great financier is prepared to second his sublime sacrifice, and as the two are starting for Australia in beautiful poverty, it turns out that on the bridegroom's failing to fulfil the conditions of the will, the penniless bride has herself become the heiress of the immense estates, and so the pair are happy ever after. There is much brilliant writing in the story, some caustic satire, and a great deal of clever and pleasant characterization.
Diary of a Novelist. By the Author of 'Rachel's Secret,' 'Nature's Nobleman,' &c. Hurst and Blackett. 1871.