If there be any one thing worse than French immorality, it is French morality. This is a moral book, à la Française, and weak as ditch-water. Nor is the ditch-water improved by being particularly dirty.
Edward, who is a mere boy, is in love with Fanny. This is natural enough. Fanny, who is decidedly an old girl, who has been married for fifteen years, and who has three children, is not less desperately in love with Edward, whom she regards with a most charming sentiment, in which the timid passion of the maiden blends gracefully with the maturer regard of an aunt or a grandmother. This is not quite so natural. Certainly, it can hardly be that she is fascinated by Edward, who is the most disgustingly silly young monkey to be found in the whole range of French novels. But the mystery is at once disclosed when we read the description of Fanny's husband. He is "a species of bull with a human face." "His smile was not unpleasing, and his look without any malicious expression, but clear as crystal." We begin to comprehend his inferiority to Edward,—to sympathize with the youth's horror at the sight of this obnoxious husband, "who seems to him," as M. Janin says in his preface, "a hero—what do I say?—a giant!—to the loving, timid, fragile child." "In fine, a certain air of calm rectitude pervaded his person." Execrable wretch! could anything be more repulsive to true and delicate sentiment (as before, à la Française) "I should say his age was about forty." Our wrath at this last atrocity can hardly be controlled. It seems as if M. Feydeau, by collecting in one individual all the qualities which most excite his abhorrence and contempt, had succeeded in giving us, in Fanny's husband, a very tolerable specimen of a gentleman. We pardon all to the somewhat middle-aged lady, whose "feelings are too many for her"; and we only regret that M. Feydeau did not see the eminent propriety of increasing the lady's admiration by having this brutal husband pull Edward's divine nose or kick the adored person of the pauvre enfant down stairs.
Life Without and Life Within: or, Reviews, Narratives, Essays, and
Poems. By MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI, Author of "Woman in the Nineteenth
Century," "At Home and Abroad," "Art, Literature, and the Drama," etc.
Edited by her Brother, ARTHUR B. FULLER. Boston: Brown, Taggard, &
Chase.
Of this volume little more need be said than that, had Margaret Fuller Ossoli edited it, she might have reduced its size. Yet it is not surprising that love and reverence should seek with diligence and save with care whatever had emanated from her pen; and if the matter thus laid before the world take something from her reputation, it also completes the standard by which to measure her power. She appears to have been without creative faculty, yet her perception of the gift in others was often remarkable, and it pleased her to hold the possessor of it up to admiration. Hence she devoted much time and attention to the critical examination of art, music, and literature, and succeeded in giving the works and lives which she reviewed a fresh interest and a fuller meaning. Her articles on Goethe and Beethoven, in this volume, furnish ample evidence of her capacity to appreciate the works and the men of genius, and that, if she could not give good reasons for the aberrations and eccentricities of their courses, she at least had a heart large enough to look kindly upon them. Of books she was a student and a lover; and in the short notices of new ones, which are transferred from "The Tribune" to these pages, there is hardly one that has not some thought of value to author as well as reader. Indeed, all her prose writings are suggestive, and thus are capable of opening vistas in the quickened mind which were unknown before. Authors of this class often dart a ray into the recesses of our souls, so that we see what they never saw, gain what they never gave. A book that increases mental activity is incomparably better than one that multiplies learning. The value of knowledge that lies in libraries is overestimated by all save those who read Nature's runes. The Countess Ossoli gathered from the garners, rather than from the glorious field, and therefore she does not range with the marked originals. In this rank she was not born. Her poems—which we think injudiciously published—place her far down among the multitude. From these untuneful utterances we gladly turn to her prose. There she shows strength of character and goodness of heart. One aim, never lost sight of, is perceptible through all, and gives unity to the whole; this is a fervent desire to ennoble human life; consequently her works will long have influence, and continue to call forth praise.
Lectures on the English Language. By GEORGE P. MARSH. New York: Charles Scribner, 1860. pp. vi., 697.
An American scholar of wide range, at the same time thorough and unpretentious, is a rarity; a philologist who is neither perversely wrongheaded nor the victim of a preconceived theory is a still greater one; yet we find both characters pleasantly united in the author of these Lectures. Decided in his opinions, Mr. Marsh is modest in expressing them, because they are the result of various culture and long reflection, and these have taught him that time and study often render the most positive conclusions doubtful, especially in regard to such a topic as Language. Deservedly honored with diplomatic employment in Europe, he has done credit to the choice of the Government by turning the long leisure of a foreign mission to as great profit by study and observation as if he had been a Travelling Fellow and these had been the conditions of his tenure.
Addressed to a mixed audience, to the laity rather than to students, these Lectures are more popular than scholastic in their character. Mr. Marsh alludes to this with something like regret in his Preface. We look upon this as by no means a misfortune. The book will, for this very reason, reach and interest a much larger number of readers; and while there is nothing in it to scare away those who read for mere entertainment, they whose studies have led them into the same paths with the author will continually recognize those signs, trifling, but unmistakable, which distinguish the work of a master from that of a journeyman. Scholarship is indicated not only by readiness of allusion, and variety and aptness of illustration, but by a thorough self-possession and chastened eloquence of style. A genius for language comes doubtless by nature, but Mr. Marsh is too wise a man to believe that a knowledge of it comes in the same way; his learning has that ripened clearness which tells of olden vintages and of long storing in the crypts of the brain; he has nothing in common with the easy generalizers who know as little of roots as Shelley's skylark, and who, seeking a shelter in welcome clouds, pour forth "profuse strains of unpremeditated art" upon questions which above all others are limited by exact science and unyielding fact.
We believe we are not going too far when we say that Mr. Marsh's book is the best treatise of the kind in the language. It abounds in nice criticism and elegant discussion on matters of taste, showing in the author a happy capacity for esthetic discrimination as well as for linguistic attainment. He does not profess to deal with some of the deeper problems of language, but nevertheless makes us feel that they have been subjects of thoughtful study, and, within the limits he has imposed upon himself, he is often profound without the pretence of it.
We have spoken warmly of this volume, for it has both interested and instructed us, and because we consider it one of the few thoroughly creditable productions of Cisatlantic scholarship. We hope the appreciation it meets with will be such that we shall soon have occasion to thank Mr. Marsh for another volume on some kindred theme.
The Marble Faun. A Romance of Monte Beni. By NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. 2 vols. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. 1860.