FAUST'S MARGUERITE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 280, 19 August 1908, Page 5

FAUST'S MARGUERITE.

; I neper had any time for Marguerite/' said the; Bookish Girl, as the others paused in their; discussion of the concert, "and all tho. lino, about her, all the exquisite music' cannot' hide the fact that she- was a ■selfish little cat, by far tho least attractivo of heroines. When wo meet her nowadays/ we do .what we can for her, and we are sorry for'her,but,,we do not exalt .her as a type of womanly loveliness. I never can under-stand-why she has such a.vogue." I • "I don't much admire her myself," said the I Mother, • "but. I think , you are a little hard oXL thr T ' was just a silly, ignorant child." Not-ignorant!"' cried the College Girl. • I have;just r been reading Goethe's 'Faust,' and you . cannot say she was ignorant. She had mixed with the life ,of her town, and sho herself says she used to be very hard on other girls who did wrong. I began the play with the usual idea, of Marguerite's cliarac- • £? r >' but. before 1 liad finished I wondered how ever that idea had got abroad, why an.vono: should liavo admired her. The vanity . and tho deceitfulncss of her! Lood at the silly , fuss sho makes about the casket of jewels anil her pretended surprise, just as if any , girl could 'believe, that .caskets of costly jewels were scattered about indiscriminately like that. She must hare seen tho snako in the casket. . And then how deceitful she was about the sleeping-draught she gave her tho' one that killed-the poor old Jady. 'There was enough tragedy in that to have made a wholo, modern drama, but it. only seems to have a casual effect on Marguerite's mind. Sho is sorry about it, of course, but not half as sorry as the ideal Marguerito •#uld' v haVo%Beeii. I '' % - "It is-,the men who have idealised her," said tho Bachelor Girl. "Men are such sentimentalists ."you-'VL-now, • and they-think- sho was" like'a white rose", a"dropping'lily,' a 'little, bird with broken wing, don't .you know, soriiething that was very- lovely and exquisite'and', white, and : her sad end' fills • them with gentle sorrow, whereas it was'only in her weakness that she resembled -these-af-fecting objects. She was neither'white, nor gentle,, nor devoted. No 0110; is so sorry for. Hetty Sorel in 'Adam Bede,' and-simply because George Eliot' pointed out-'heriheart-lessness. People do require to be told things explicitly." ° "No, it isn't that," said the .Bookish Girl. I take back some of what I said.-1 do know why Marguerite is so admired.--She has been given what Hetty'Sorel'never had, the most exquisite expressiveness,' and it is because the-greatest singers have put all. their soul into her pitiful little framo that wo feel today she really had a great soul herself. It is their sweet-voiced, impassioned Marguerito gay and loving and heart-broken, the Marguerite of the music, not tho-Marguerite of the .words, that tho '.world has idealised, cut all the same, sho was a littlo cat."'