BOOK OF THE WEEK

Taranaki Daily News, 5 January 1935, Page 11 (Supplement)

BOOK OF THE WEEK

MORE ABOUT THE ALARDS

(By ÜB.) "Gallybird,” by Sheila Kaye-Smith. Cassell & Co. Ltd., Melbourne. A. J. Fyfe Ltd., New Plymouth. Chronicles of Sussex and particularly of the “Alard” family have proved sources from which Sheila Kaye-Smith has derived many good stories. “Gallybird” refers to the struggles of an Alard whose conscience would not permit him to accept William of Orange as the lawful head of the Church of England. So he leaves the pleasant though very dull living of Leason and goes to live with his brother, Sir Charles Alard, to whom the estate confiscated when his forebears clung to the Stuart cause had come back.

These stories of an England that has long since passed are always interesting and sometimes illuminate history _ that was made not so much at Westminster or Whitehall as in manor houses, quiet vicarages and even among the farmhouses of southern and western Britain. Miss Kaye-Smith knows how to mingle history and romance, and this latest “Alard” story shows that she has lost none of her skill.

It is a refreshing change in times when the proletarian and the “social” novel that demands of the reader that he shall seep himself in much that is unpleasant and worse are ever present to come across a book that deals with simpler days and simple people. Not that they were any more or any less attractive in the lump than the men and women who live to-day in mean streets, dull villages or in manor houses or a Grand Babylon Hotel. There are the same struggles between good and evil, the same beautiful—and uglyhuman relations, but one finds after reading of the Sussex Miss Kaye-Smith describes so affectionately the same impression that men are better than their institutions and that in the simplest, most limited community there can be found much to explore and to shape into an alluring narrative. Gervase Alard, vicar of Leason, who had determined to give up his living at what he thought was the demand of conscience, though flavoured with some vanity as well, is the principal character in this story. He had scarcely settled down in his brother’s home at Conster to live the life of a gentlemanscholar when an accident makes him lord of the manor and Sir Gervase Alard. Idleness and a little of the weariness it brings had turned the clergyman's thoughts back to some studies in chemistry and magic he had begun when a youth in Paris, whither the family had fled for shelter when Cromwell dominated England. He knew that there was danger to his peace of mind in pursuing those studies, he thought them, frankly, a temptation of the devil. Later days were to show that they at least sapped his intelligence and made him an easy prey to an unscrupulous employee. As vicar, and later as Squire of the Manor, Gervase Alard considered it his duty to interest himself in the lives, circumstances and conduct of the people of the district. It was a period when Roman Catholics were regarded by authority as vermin to be exterminated, by illiterate people as scheming mis-chief-makers in league with Satanic powers, and. by those of their faith as missionaries in a hostile, dangerous and stubborn community.

Lady Alard, the French wife of Sir Charles, was a Roman Catholic yet like many others could receive the ministrations of’her church only; in secret and by the bravery and skill in disguise of the priests who served their church knowing well that martyrdom might be their reward.

Among Gervase’s former parishioners was a family of well-to-do farmers. The Harmans of Newhouse had, in fact, been given portion of the Alard estate by the Protector, but with the restoration of King Charles 11. the estates, after some struggles, had been returned to the Alards.

“Exalted Harman,” head of the family, had more than his name to connect, him with Revolutionary days. Though a correct churchman he retained what were then termed “Roundhead”—and to-day would be called “wowser”—manners of speech and action that irritated mortals less assured than Exalted that his place in this world and the next had been made for him by a discerning Providence. .

In the Harman household an illegitimate daughter of Exalted was drudge and servant to all, and her relationship to the head of the house was made an additional scourge. The first individual to treat “Condemnation” Harman with respect and kindness was Parson Alard, although he only regarded her as an overworked child.

Later, when the Harmans proposed to marry Condemnation to one of the farmhands she appealed to Sir Gervase for help. The shelter she craved, was given her at Conster and it was then that the girl’s beauty was evident and her appeal to Sir Gervase became stronger than that of childhood oppressed, or innocence to be sacrificed. Meanwhile the cares of the estate and especially the conduct of the iron smelting, then an important industry in Sussex, had led Sir Gervase to seek the assistance of a locally-bred youth who had studied that trade in France and Belgium. William Douce had studied other matters besides the smelting of iron. He, like Sir Gervase, had dipped into the mixture of superstition, science, spiritualism and chemistry that had been woven into a kind of philosophy for the study of which there had been “lodges” formed that were proscribed by law.

Sir Gervase wanted William Douce to marry Condemnation, but the younger man had more ambitious plans. He hoped to obtain for himself the ownership of the furnace he managed and the land from which the ore and the charcoal for smelting it were obtained. For awhile it seemed as though the schemes of Douce would be successful. At a so-called experiment Sir Gervase was allowed to receive what he believed was a message from his dead brother, Sir Charles, and this of course stimulated his desire for more.

In the end Douce failed, but the story of his defeat and of Condemnation Harman’s share in his discomfiture make a thoroughly interesting narrative. If it is hard to think oneself back into the fear of those who dabbled in’what they called “the occult sciences,” the descriptions of English country life are as real and as charming as readers have learned to expect in any of this author's books.