Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/819

1868.] personages have a local color. The difference between a writer of the grand style, like George Sand, for example, and a writer like Mrs. Edwards, is that, in the first the local color or local character is subordinate, while in the last it is paramount. The observing faculty is strongest in the novelist; the reflective faculty is strongest in the writer.

Mrs. Edwards is a very perfect example of the novelist; she is that; she is not more than that, Thackeray was that; he was habitually not more than that. The novelist is always a contemporary, is esteemed for the genuineness of his relation to his time; the great writer is more than that, is not a contemporary, but what has been called an eternal man, and is well thought of for his relation to the mental qualities and emotional elements of humanity. Mrs. Edwards is a true novelist; she tells us a new story, and stamps it with the fashion of the day. She belongs to the class of contemporary observers—the class whose master is Balzac, the class in which all modern novelists may be comprised. You perhaps wish to check me, and mention Victor Hugo, George Sand, Hawthorne, even Charlotte Bronté—I should reply: They are not novelists, but writers, and illustrate more uncommon, and I think, higher faculties than the work of the novelist; they exhibit more than observation and analysis; they exhibit great power of reflection, great power of imagination, an impetial sense of the grand and the beautiful, are always what we call poetical, and are more than writers of novels; they are great writers, not great novelists: and the distinction is very important—it is just the difference between a Burke and a Fielding, between a De Quincy and a Thackeray, between a Ruskin and a Mrs. Edwards.

If once we fix in our minds this distinction between a great writer and a great novelist, we are prepared to understand Mrs. Edwards as a novelist, and pay the literary tribute due to her delightful and uncommon merits. Criticism is very unsatisfactory, and even a sterile work, when the note of appreciation is not stronger than the note of censure; and happily, "Archie Lovell" is a novel that evokes the note of sympathy, of appreciation, and, by the pleasure it gives, keeps down the note of censure. We all love Archie, and our sympathies spontaneously adapt themselves to every situation of the fresh, unconventional, venturesome, and innocent girl, whose wilfulness gives so much zest to her personality. It may be that most persons have found the charm of "Archie Lovell," and the merit of "Archie Lovell," to be just the skilful management of innocence, lawlessness, and pretty ribbons and flowers, that are associated with our thoughts of her. But these are not sufficient to separate Mrs. Edwards from many clever novelists. I think you will discover that her distinction, and the distinction of her writings, is that the artistic sentiment and the point de vue of the artist, always control her, so that she never indulges in commonplace reflections or moralities, and therefore escapes vulgarity and stupidity; for nothing is more vulgar and stupid than the insensibility which allows us to judge, by cut-and-dried maxims of conduct, the actions of living men and women.

But to return to "Archie Lovell." What grace, what playfulness, what naughtiness, what freshness in her character! What a a charming and fresh personality, what lively naturalness, what pointed protest against coarseness and awkwardness do you discover in the development of her nature! Grouped about this charming girl are several characters, closely studied from life, and showing a clean and definite touch, a skill in drawing, and a conscientious yet free execution of parts. Mr. Lovell is easily and admirably sketched, Captain Waters is faithfully studied, and also Major Seton and Robert Dennison. The analysis of motives and of conduct is quite uncommon, and shows very nice distinctions for casuists. And what shall we say of the "Vampire Brood?"—a terrible company, whose kinsmen may be found wherever human society has organized itself into villages, towns and cities. "Archie Lovell" is a faithful, a brilliant, a varied picture of English men and women, modified by Continental experience. The strongest Englishman of the group is Robert Dennison. He never ceases to be English; and to know the Englishman we must look at him when he is thirty or forty, when his character is fixed.

Every chapter of "Archie Lovell" is