LITERARY NOTES.

Timaru Herald, Volume XC, Issue 13295, 25 May 1907, Page 3

LITERARY NOTES.

A Notable Novel.—" Prisoners, (Fast Bound in Misery and Iron)." by Mary Cholmondelev. (London: Hut-jhinsori and Co.; Timaru: P. W. Tlutton and Co.) — In literary distinction, as in dramatic force, Miss CholinoiuLlev's new book leaches a highter level than even that new popular nevel, "lied Pottage:" It would be easy to compile from 'it an anthology of beautiful saj-ings. several of which did not appear in ferial form. Some are like the wanting, significant music that fills up the intervals of a tragedy, others are the; obiter dicta of the -v't and most sympathetic of social ciifiix, others again unveil the loveliness of the natural scenes —the pri: on swamp near Venice with the sea-lavender, the woods of Hampshire in spring and summer. .Miss Cholmond-eley is a true poetess, aiV.l lie;- slightest landscape picture is drawn with exquisite care. Even in the. crisis of the story, as we see from tlu* description, of the alder coppice at Barford, with ilia houses of the baby-pheasants, set ;>t- intervals alortg the path, she knows how to heighten effect by the most delicate word painting. We are told that five years were spent in writing "Prisoners," and it would not have surprised us to learn that ten or even twenty years had been devoted to the attainment of this polished and perfect art. There are no rough or hurried sentences, no awkward, misplaced epithets. The workmanship shows everywhere the ease of infinite effort.

Some may think that the canvas of " Prisoners" it too crowded, and the author certainly introduces a surprising number of figures who are not essential to the action. As a clerical portraitpainter she is the natural successor of Trollope. We feel the reality of her ecclesiastical personages, and would not willingly spare one of them, from thee archbishop downwards, whether they actually come upon the scene or are known to us only from the testimony of others. The bishop's son-in-law, for example, stands out- as distinctly as the bishop himself. Aunt Agg,ie's archdeacon i-~ as vivid as Archdeacon Grantlv, yet neither of thesee two is a first-hand character, or has the slightest connection with the real narravive.

The writer confessed to liavin gslcipped at a first reading the chapters occupied by the aunts. Aunt Aggie's lore-storv, delightful as it is, hardly pretends to be more than padding. Why dues Miss Cholmondeley spend so much pains in developing the character of Bessie, who is not, like Magdalen, the heroine of an under-plot? But Magdalen's gentle romance irritates the reader who has been caught with the sway and excitement of the central theme. Six or seven charac ters mf.ght be lifted out- of "Prisoneis" without the slightest disturbance to the plot. Miss Cliolmondeley, whose constructive skill is.so remarkable, must have felt that th? troubles of our liero will fiill our minds with too painful anxiety, if she did not also provide for our recreation and refrc-hmant. We hurry over some of her chapters, at first, as we hurry over the scene between Launcelot Gobbo and his father, the scene with .the porter in "Macbeth," or the brief clown scene in "Othello." Many of us, as Professor Bradley says, would be surprised to hear that there is a clown in "Othello." Such digressions, placed where they are, must inevitably provoke the reader while he remains in suspense, though afterwards he can return and enjoy the lively episade, and even recognise the poet's wisdom in providing the relief of an occasional entr'acte. If there is one circumstance which link?, together the minor personages of the novel, and welds them into the fabric, it is the bondage in which all are held. Fay's criminal selfishness would ba too shocking for belief, if we were not permitted to watch the same fault twining and growing round all the members of her family except Magdalen, holding them in chains which are light as cobwebs and strong as steel. Miss C'holmondeley's prison is not alone the fortress in the swamps—: a jn-ison which, asi we learn from a note, has no counterpart in real life. The scents in Michael's cell ai'9 wonderfully imagined, and his convict life may be added to that record of noblyborne suffering with which the poets have made holy the d'arkne-s of Venice prisons. But the author shows us also captive-souls in English country 'houses, fart- tied and bound with the chain of some petty disabling fault. The most firmly chained of all, the man whos sentence is for life and beyond life, is that irreprochabie gentleman, Wentwoi'th Maine. In. the unravelling of the knots Miss Cholmondeley displays extreme cleverness, keeping her readers in suspense until the closing chapter, and -encouraging them to hope for a happy end. Even after Went worth leaves Lostford Palace, two solutions are possible, and if suggestions oh earlier pages have prepared us for the catastrophe, it is not till the end is actually reached that we realise that such a conclusion was inevitable.

On the three principal characters, Michael, Fay and Wentwortli, all the force of the author's genius is concentrated. We follow Michael's fortunes with an almost too painful sympathy. His character is well defined at the beginning by Fay's first husband, the Duke of Colle Alto. Your young cousin is an enthusiast, a dreamer, a sensitive —what your Tennyson calls a Sir Galahad. In Italy we maka of such men a priest, a cardinal." In his boundless self-sacrifice, his patience after- every hope is frustrated, his slow sinking under the stokes of a cruel destiny, he has the grandeur and simplicity of a Greek tragic hero. As in the case of Desdemona, there is something that hurt's us pemcvnally, and almost outrages our sense of justice, in the calama ties heaped upon so innocent a victim. Pera'hps it is difficult for ordinary readers to believe in the self-immolation of Michael. His wife, we feel, would have been like that Breton girl who, as tradition tells , becomes the bride of an angel. Miss Cholmondelev probably recognised that she had made her hero almost too flawless, and the fight with Wentwortli in the "little airless room" of the Palace is a welcome proof that he is not above the temptations of humanity.

In the portraiture of Fay there 13 no charm for the reader. Except at the moment when, still from selfish motives, she pours out her confession, our sympathies hardly once go out to this spoiled and cowardly woman. Miss Cholmondeley has succeeded only too well in depicting her character. The wife who shrinks from the death-bed of her excellent husband, the temptress who consigne her lover to the slow torture of a life in death, might have won. our pardon were it not for the brutality of some of her sayings. She turns in disgust from the sight, of Michael's hands, scarred by chains and disfigured by coarse labour endured for her, but worse than that in her remark to hi-r victim, '"I would not have kept Wentworth in prison for a day," and again, "It's you I betrayed, Michael; I'm so thankful it was you and not him." half- brother. Wentworth, makes a favourable impression at the outset. ''You could not look at Wentworth without seeing that he was a man who had never even glanced at the ignoble side of life, for whose fastidious, sensitive nature sensual lures had no attraction, a man who could not lie, who could not stoop, wiwe mind was as clean as his hand." But we soon discover that Wcntworth's heart is a nest of mean, suspicions. He thinks "not even Launcelot brave, nor Galahad pure." Selfishness with him takes the form of an insane, ferocious jealousy. By his priggishness, Ills censoriousness, his lack of every generous feeling, he has alienated all his friends except the bishop, on page 120, usps an expression in private about Wontworth for which we are grateful to him. When the tragedy is rushing to its climax.

Wentwort-h behaves as miserably as the worst of men could behave, flings off Fay, flings off his brother, and when he sees Lord Lossiemouth at Barford, supposes "he should be told that Fay was making herself ill with crying." We are allowed to understand that, after Michael's death he forgives Fay and marries her. What does Miss Cholmondeley intend us to think of the future? Each is morally guilty of murder, and with ninety-nine out of a hundred human beings the torment of 'the recollectionns they share in common would ruin their happiness for ever. Not of this kind, perhaps, is the Nemesis of Fay and Wentworth. The sting of the future must be in their own characters. We have no reason to suppose that either at the last is truly repentant. Wentworth is brooding over his OAvn fancied wrongs when he- .is snmmonde to his brother's death-bed. Fay would have crept from the painful scene but for the bishop's express command. Is there any prospect of happiness in such a union as theirs? We nrss at the close of this brilliant novel that sense of calm and healing, that milifting hope for thesurvivors, which lightens so many of the great (tragedies of literature. If the curtain rose again, it would show us, we fear, the petty life of two petty souls-. Memories from the past must haunt them, for

" Neither heat, nor frost, nor thunder, Shall wholly do away, I wean, The marks of that which once hath been." But there are some who find no place for repentance, though they seek it cawfully with tears.