A RARE NOVELIST.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIIC, Issue 14325, 15 October 1910, Page 1 (Supplement)

A RARE NOVELIST.

MRS. GASKELL'S CENTENARY. A charming article on Mrs Gaskell, the authoress of "Craniord", and "-Uary .barton," the centenary of wnose birth was observed on September 19, appears in the "ifcrtmgntly Keview." The writer tells us that her lather, Mr. William Stevenson, a Unitarian minister, was a man "remarkable for the stores of knowledge which lie possessed, and for the simplicity and modesty by which his rare attainments were concealed." The marriage of the future novelist with the husband but live years older than herself was the union of two rare personalities. '•-Mr Gaskelr,"' wrote Mrs Ritchie, "was one of those ministers whose congregations are outside as well as inside chapel walls"; and a fellow, cleric recalls a saying that his appearance_ in the pulpit was a sermon in itself, as it certainly was a benediction. A PLEASING PORTRAIT. Mrs Gaskell herself was described by Mrs Cowden Clarke as "a charming, brilliant-complexioned, but quietmannered woman, . thoroughly unaftected, thoroughly attractive—so modest that she blushed like a girl when we hazarded some expression of our admiration of "Mary Uarton;" so full enthusiasm on genera l subjects of of humanity or beujirolenca that she talked freely and vivim-j- at once upon them, and so young in -iook and demeanour that we could hardly believe her to be the mother of two daughters she mentioned in terms that snowed them to be no longer children."

To the fact that, like Samuel Richardson, Mrs Gaskell's genius • "flowered late"" have been ascribed both her strength and weakness as a novelist; from the appearance of Mary Barton it became evident that this new writer iomed to a woman's insight into detail a, masculine tolerance and. the philosopher's faculty of seeing both bidei or" the shield. To these attribute-; perhaps, is due her peculiar skill in character drawing. Any one ot the population of "OraTiford" would lieKnown by those who had once made their bow to them: Mr Gibson, Minister Holmau, Bridget Fitzgerald are unmistakable personalities: Lady Ludlow is distinct in her hnes as oiie of the was miniature reliefs dressed iu tiny actual brocades or uniforms in the possession to-day of Miss H , the oldest inhabitant of Kaulsi'crd. HER HUMOUR. Mrs Gaskell's humour is that of an observer rather than a comedian, fcwinietiraes tho utetest sentence: the old country lady's wonder how it- was that sours kinds or pain were more genteel than others, and her decision that complaints as high up the body as possible naturally belong to the aristocracy. Sometimes- it lurks in a word: the "amphibious" position which Miss Browning held the apprentices occupied in Mrs Gibsons household. At others it is a s!y medium of portraiture, as when Mrs Gibson (who surely belonged to the Veneering family) represents Miss Browning owning that she (Mrs Gibson) tried to do her duty: "I've that deep feeling about dtity tltat I think it ought only to be talked about in church and such sacred places as that; not to have a common caller startling one with it!" Mrs Rose hesitating to contemplate a second marriage because "the turtle-dove lias always been her ideal," is another delicious touch.; while far'pure comicality Sally's account of her offer of "holy matrimony" where the pig soraied the temptation (too long for quotation here) is bad to beat. Some of the highest humour is to be found in "Craniord" and the less well known "Ladv Ludlow." the former of which es pecialiy having been described as '-the purest piece of humanistic literature added to British literature since Charles Lamb." "A CHIEL TAKING NOTES." The point of how far the authrr was a "chiel takhi' notes" his been hotly discussed. Miss Betty Harker selling •ea and glass without deviation from the bye-laws of gentility in Knutsford. for instance, undoubtedly suggested Miss Matty, sweetest old maid (at fifty-one) in fiction: Tom Holbrcok owed traits to a certain Knutsford squire, famous for a weather almanac, inaccuracies of which were condoned bs iis compiler as this tq a hitherto

undiscovered planet. Some dainty malice is to be suspected in another figure; the Honourable Mrs Jamiesau was but repeating an actual request nmde in cold blood, when she desind her circle act to rail upon the titkd visitor; the same prototype was out? heard calling over the stairs to "Tell cook to cut tlie bread-and-butter thicker lor the Knutsi'ord ladies!" Tiie keen observation was Mrs Oas-kc-H's doubtless sensitised imagination, hut tho composition of the picture, its lights and shadows, remained all her own.