Talented as she is, Miss Edgeworth is far from reaching the same level as either of the foregoing, though in variety she certainly sur

Miss Edgeworth.

passes Miss Austen, and perhaps Miss Burney also. There are, in fact, three distinct veins. which she worked with unquestioned success: that of edification, in the Moral and Popular Tales; romance, as in Ormond; and the vivid portraiture of Irish life, of which Ormond (1817) is one example, and Castle Rackrent (1800) and The Absentee (1812) are, rather strangely, instances more familiar. The Moral and Popular Tales are wonderful achievements in a field which was diligently tilled during this period, and where a harvest is singularly hard to reap. In the more ambitious ones, doubtless,-in the Rosamond and Laura of our youth,-the claims of the humdrum virtues are driven home with too little of remorse; and the child-reader begins to hate the very sound of prudence, thrift, and foresight, to think much less of the wise virgin than the foolish. But in the shorter tales-Simple Susan, for instance, or Lazy Lawrence-the moral agriculture is less obtrusive, and the stories are told with unfailing zest and much dramatic power. In romance-or, more accurately, in the tales of "fashionable" life and sentiment-she is less at home, and her work less distinctive; though, even here, she is by no means to be despised. Belinda, for instance (1801), has curious anticipations of some of the most recent developments of the novel. It is, however, by her pictures of Irish life-the lighthearted peasant and the rollicking squireen, whom

she had known from childhood-that her fame is kept alive. Here her work is admirable in itself King Corny, for instance, in Ormond is a masterpiece; and it is yet more important, as the first thing of the kind in the history of the novel. Before Miss Edgeworth, no novelist had taken the humours of the soil for the main theme-nor even, if we consider the matter strictly, as a subordinate theme-of his story. The nearest approach to anything of the kind is to be found. in the "picaresque" romances, of which Gil Blas and Tom Jones are the standing examples. But there, adventure is the real object; and, so long as plenty of that be provided, the peasant's hut counts for less than the band of strolling players, or the den of thieves, or the old man of the hill. With Miss Edgeworth, the conditions are exactly reversed. Adventure falls into the background. The whole interest gathers round the peat-bog, the peasant's hovel, the ramshackle castle of the village "king." That she gained a hearing for things so "low," as fifty years earlier Fielding's readers had reckoned them to be, is, no doubt, partly due to her own talent. But it is due still more to a change in the reading public, a change ultimately bound up with the French Revolution and the influence of Rousseau. It is due most of all to the picturesque charm of the particular soil on which it was her fortune to be born. Had she painted the peasants of Devon or Yorkshire, it is more than doubtful whether her portraits would have been hung. However that may be, her "Irishry" prepared the way for the lairds, peasants, gaberlunzies, and gipsies of Scott; just as, at a later time, they gave the hint for the moujiks of Tur

genjev and Tolstoi.

And by two of these the instruc

tion, though by Scott at any rate it was immeasurably bettered, is admitted to have come, in the first instance, from the authoress of Ormond.

Few words will suffice for the novel of edification, a species which, like the romantic novel, first took distinct shape during this period. The

Didactic novel.

chief difficulty in dealing with it comes from the faintness of the line which separates it from more legitimate forms of the novel, particularly from the novel of sentiment. Thus, by some qualities of his work, Mackenzie might well be reckoned among the prophets of the pulpit. So also might Miss Edgeworth. On the other hand, Mrs Inchbald's right to a place in the catalogue might not unreasonably be disputed. The first of her two novels, A Simple Story, manifestly as it is planned to show "the pernicious effects of an improper education," is still of intrinsic interest from the vividness of its characters. It is only by her later venture, Nature and Art, that she definitely-and, it must be added, with brilliant effect-crosses the border into the romance of edification. The same doubt arises with Bage. In such cases as Hannah More, however, there is no possibility of question. She is a preacher of pure blood. So is Day, the author of Sandford and Merton.

During her long and active life, Hannah More won fame in many directions. Drama, sacred and profane, social and sentimental poetry, Mrs More. political and religious tracts, had all brought her distinction, the two former a full

generation before she tried her fortune with the novel. It is, however, her one novel, Calebs in search of a Wife (1809), which alone survives to the present day. And, from beginning to end, it is avowedly the work of a moralist: a moralist who had been honoured with the affection of Johnson, and carried on his tradition. The characters of the story, it must be confessed, are little more than the mouthpiece of the author's religious and social opinions, or beacons of warning against those who rejected them. But the opinions themselves, which are those of moderate evangelicalism, are sound and healthy; and the book is interspersed with lively as well as sensible satire upon the social and educational follies of the time. In spite of the continual sermons, the story has undeniable interest; and the style, obviously flavoured with reminiscences of Johnson, is as sound as the matter. That the authoress had Rasselas more or less present to her mind, is not impossible. But it is Rasselas without the romantic setting, and without the plangent note of melancholy which gives it pathos and distinction. The finest work of Mrs More lay in her self-denying labours for the miners and peasantry of Somerset; and her Memoirs, embodying excellent letters by herself and her sisters, will long serve to keep her strong and kindly character in remembrance. Mrs Inchbald was one of the most quick-witted as well as one of the most attractive women of her day; and, though writing seems to have been against the grain with her, she left. her mark both on the theatre and the novel. She

Mrs Inchbald,

produced a variety of lively farces and other dramatic pieces, besides a valuable collection of stock plays, The British Theatre. And her two novels, A Simple Story (1791) and Nature and Art (1796), are both works of marked individuality. The character of the heroine in the former is drawn with singular dramatic skill; though, with a view to pointing the moral, the frivolity of a not ill-meaning coquette is handled far too vindictively by the authoress. Nature and Art is a still more distinctive tale; and, as has been said, the didactic purpose is still more clearly marked. A lad, who has been bred among savages, is suddenly pitchforked into an intensely respectable circle of deans, bishops, and predestined judges. The thread of the story is spun round the contrast between his "nature and the artificiality of his surroundings. The situations are both conceived and worked out with charming vivacity; and the amount of direct preaching is surprisingly small. It has a further interest from the sources of its inspiration. If Mrs More represents the tradition of Johnson, Mrs Inchbald stands for that of Voltaire and Rousseau. There is a touch of L'Ingénu in Nature and Art, there is more than a touch of the Discours sur la Civilisation and of Émile.

A word may be said of a novel which appeared in the same year as Nature and Art, and which has some points in common with it; Hermsprong or Man as he is not, by Bage. It has the misfortune to be one of the worst- told

Bage.

H