A CHAT ON BOOKS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2690, 4 October 1905, Page 73

A CHAT ON BOOKS.

"The Celestial Surgeon," by F. F. Montresor, the book I have chosen for my talk this week, has already reached what is, for a modern novel, a trying age, — that of its first anniversary. Few, indeed, live so long. So at the risk of chatting to-day about what is to some of you comparatively old, I am going to ask permission to introduce to the others two of the most absolutely unspoilt and natural people that I have met in modern fiction — Jeronime Joy and her friend Mr Knight A lonely man of 45 is not a very promising beginning for a romance, is he? Yet that is the age of Mr Knight when the curtain rises, and at that time Jeronime is a child of four; he, a lonely wealthy man, with no kith or kin, and more money than he has* any desire to spend, — she, practically an orphan, since she has no legal right to Uier father's name, and her mother is at this very time entering- into arrangements to aive up all .claim to her in favour of Miss Lucilla Merridan, a wealthy woman who wishes to adopt her. It happens that Miss Merridan* is Mr Knight's nearest neighbour -when he becomes the owner of the Yellow House; and thus this strangely assorted heroine of four and "hero of forty-five come to their meeting ground. Till now,. Jeronime's world has been " Maman, Mother Maria, and the sea " : the first, a beautiful wonian witji a beautiful voice who came sometimes to see her; Mother Martha, the faithful old nurse whose scolding need not be much heeded, and the sea, the child's only and constant playmate. I wish I could give you in full the page on which Jeronime is introduced to you, building her sand-castles on the beach at St. Malo ; it is a picture of a real child, sturdily indifferent to being placed in a book and submitted to the criticism of readers. Here, however, is a portion of it: —

All the other babies had gone home, she was the only one who had not yet been fetched in. She had an oystershell in one chubby hand, and she was now scooping out a moat round her castle. When the scooping business was done, she meant to fill her moat with water. It is a comfort that the sea is so inexhaustible. Jeronime looked at the waves and nodded confidentially. " You wait, sea. I've nearly done digging. I am coming to you in a minute," said she. The ripple of the waves sounded inviting and friendly, but one must finish one thing at a time, and Jeronime played seriously. She and the sea talked to each other a great deal. The sea had thousands of small playfellows, but there is, always room for one more, and it is never tired. . , . Jeronime was plump and sturdy. She wore a scarlet - flannel cap, and her much-scratched legs and arms were bare. She 'possessed boots and socks, but she always took them off directly she got to the beach, and they were buried in a grave with a bit of seaweed stuck in to mark the place till she had to go home. . . . She built and dug with an intensely purposeful and industrious air. She had never been amused, and consequently knew very well how to- amuse herself. . . . , Jeronime was patient, as people are who live constantly with tmburrying Mother Nature. She trotted backwards and forwards, filling her shell carefully, and conveying the ocean to her private pond hi driblets of about five drops a journey, . . . Is that not exactly the untiring, profoundly serious way that children, when left to themselves, take their self -devised amusements? And is she not a vivid picture, this indefatigable, absorbed little personage, trotting, m the sunset glow, across the wet sand?

The next thirteen years of Jeronime's life were spent away from all these early French associations, under the care of Miss Merridan. Now, I fear that in devoting so much* space to Jeronime, I have somewhat neglected the nmturer heroine of the book. As a characterstudy, she is much more complex than her honest, uncompromising little ward ; at forty-three she is still a creature of sentiment ' and emotion, all to easily flattered, and therefore unconsciously weak- willed. Jeronime, at seventeen, is already a much stronger character than her guardian, and the two are wide as the poles apart. The child's direct fearless truthfulness and her loyal devotion to the memory of "Maman, Mother Martha, and the sea," are not soothing to Miss Merridan's vanity ; and iM lattej: turn^ for tlie a-ppreciatioji and

sympathy that her somewhat silly and excitable nature demands, to the companionship of Dr Wallace MacllverL He is the " surgeon " of the title ; the explanation of the '' celestial " is given in the preface. For the doctor of the story has certainly no claim to such an epithet ; he is a man against whom all Lucilla's friends warn her, and whom her neighbours even refuse to meet, because of certain smudges on his reputation. Jeronime, too, conceives an invincible repugnance to him during his stay in their house. The man is iav from being all bad. Sinre the time when, in a certain famous case, public opinion had damned him in spite of the legal verdict absolving him, all his energy and ambition had not sufficed to raise him, with that clogging weight upon him. " Over and over again had that miserable scandal raised its head and hissed and stung him just when he was beginning to remount the ladder." He comes back, almost as a last resource, to his old friend Lucilla Merridan ; he understands her weak character perfectly, and it is as no suppliant he comes. He claims the right simply to reinstate himself iv her estimation by teliing his own story. She yields and listens to lum, and from that moment he is master of the game. She grows to find hir. sympathy indispensable to her. and she really loves the man ; he, for his pfart, is fully purposed to make her a loyal and faithful husband in return for the advantages he would gain in marrying her. - It sounds very bald, in this brief resume ; yet the working out of this point in the book itself is full of interest, and shows a very masterly understanding of character. For Lucilla is no uncommon tpye ; such women as she are to be met in all walks in life, and the effect of this marriage on. her character is therefore all the more interesting. Curiously enough, its residt is to make a much finer women of her ; her love for Dr Macllvert is the only really unselfish thing she has ever experienced, and - through ite influence there ripen in "her fine fruits of courage, endurance, and greatness of heart. This, is the surgeon's work ; the piercing pain that "stabbed the spirit broad- awake." When it is accomplished, Lucilla's spirit leaves the weary body. When her guardian's marriage takes place, Jeronime," with characteristic honesty, refuses- -to live under the new regime with the man she ,sc heartily detested at its head, and goes off in the hope of recovering at last those cherished dreams, " Maman, Mother JMartha, artd the sea." She is only in tinie to liold' Mother Martha's dying head, and she has no clue with which to find her mother. But at this point the great friend of her life steps in, — her dear Mr Knight. The gentle, chivalrous, great-hearted old man. who has watched the growth of the child's beautiful soul, has given her t;--i one true love of his life ; and when he asks her to marry -him she consents with a certain quaint, simple innocence and confidence in him that disarms criticism.

You will say that such a marriage is altogether unnatural and wrong ; and it is unrntural that a girl of nineteen should marry a. jnan of sixty. Also, it is a very daring thing for an author to do. Yet I think that, if you read this book you will put it down, as I have done, with the feeling that this strange union was hallowed and beautiful. I have not the space to set before you the simple nobility of Thomas Knight's character, and his reverent admiration for his girl- wife ; nor have I been able to reproduce the contentment of perfect companionship that existed between them for the few short months of their wedded life. For the kindly, knightly old man dies — almost, it might be said, "from excessive happiness; and Jeronime is left a child-widow, with a heart not really yet awakened to the meaning of one sorfof love." True, there was someone ready and willing to. teach her, but his hour "had not come yet. Till it came, Jeronime's heart was engrossed with what she called Mr Knight's last and best present to her. To use her « own quaint words, "It is a very high calling to be Thornasina's mother. You sec, I cannot help knowing that she is so wonderful."