should become a midnight assassin when an hon- and accompanied us back to Valladolid. The cavalcade ourable revenge was in his power. Mr Godwin that attended the king broke into two files, and received might have defended himself by citing the illustri- us in the midst of them. The whole city seemed to ous critic's own example: the forgery by Marmion empty itself on this memorable occasion, and the multiis less consistent with the manners of chivalry tudes that crowded along the road, and were scattered than the assassination by Falkland. Without the in the neighbouring fields, were innumerable. The day latter, the novel could have had little interest-it the light of a thousand torches. We, the condemned of was now closed, and the procession went forward amidst is the key-stone of the arch. Nor does it appear the Inquisition, had been conducted from the metropolis so unsuited to the character of the hero, who, upon tumbrils; but as we arrived at the gates of though smitten with a romantic love of fame and Valladolid, we were commanded, for the greater humilihonour, is supposed to have lived in modernation, to alight and proceed on foot to the place of our times, and has been wound up to a pitch of frenzy confinement, as many as could not walk without assistby the public brutality of Tyrrel. The deed was ance being supported by the attendants. We were instantaneous-the knife, he says, fell in his way. neither chained nor bound; the practice of the InquisiThere was no time for reflection, nor was Tyrrel tion being to deliver the condemned upon such occasions a person whom he could think of meeting on into the hands of two sureties each, who placed their equal terms in open combat. He was a noisome charge in the middle between them; and men of the pest and nuisance, despatched in a moment of most respectable characters were accustomed, from fury by one whom he had injured, insulted, and religious motives, to sue for this melancholy office. trampled upon, solely because of his worth and city, no object present to the eyes of my mind but that Dejected and despairing, I entered the streets of the his intellectual superiority. of my approaching execution. The crowd was vast, the confusion inexpressible. As we passed by the end of a narrow lane, the horse of one of the guards, who rode exactly in a line with me, plunged and reared in a violent manner, and at length threw his rider upon the pavement. Others of the horse-guards attempted to catch the bridle of the enraged animal; they rushed against each other; several of the crowd were thrown down, and trampled under the horses' feet. The shrieks of these, and the loud cries and exclamations of the by-standers, mingled in confused and discordant chorus ; no sound, no object could be distinguished. From the excess of the tumult, a sudden thought darted into my mind, where all, an instant before, had been relaxation and despair. Two or three of the horses pushed forward in a particular direction; a moment after, they re-filed with equal violence, and left a wide but transitory gap. My project was no sooner conceived than executed. Weak as I had just now felt myself, a supernatural tide of strength seemed to come over me; I sprung away with all imaginable impetuosity, and rushed down the lane I have just mentioned. Every one amidst the confusion was attentive to his personal safety, and several minutes elapsed before I was missed.

We have incidentally alluded to the other novels of Godwin. St Leon will probably descend to posterity in company with Caleb Williams, but we cannot conceive that a torso of any of the others will be preserved. They have all a strong family likeness. What Dugald Stewart supposed of human invention generally, that it was limited, like a barrel-organ, to a specific number of tunes, is strictly true of Mr Godwin's fictions. In St Leon, however, we have a romantic story with much fine writing. Setting aside the 'incredible' conception on which it proceeds, we find the subordinate incidents natural and justly proportioned. The possessor of the philosopher's stone is an interesting visionary-a French Falkland of the sixteenth century, and as unfortunate, for his miraculous gifts entail but misery on himself, and bring ruin to his family. Even exhaustless wealth is in itself no blessing; and this is the moral of the story. The adventures of the hero, both warlike and domestic, are related with much gorgeousness and amplitude. The character of the heroic Marguerite, the wife of Leon, is one of the author's finest delineations. Bethlem Gabor is also a vigorous and striking sketch, though introduced too late in the novel to relieve the flagging interest after the death of Marguerite. The thunder-storm which destroys the property of Leon is described with great power and vividness; and his early distresses and losses at the gaming-table are also in the author's best manner. The scene may be said to shift too often, and the want of fortitude and energy in the character of the hero lessens our sympathy for his reverses. At the same time his tenderness and affection as a husband and father are inexpressibly touching, when we see them, in consequence of his strange destiny, lead to the ruin of those for whom alone he wishes to live.

St Leon's Escape from the Auto da Fé.

St Leon is imprisoned by the Inquisition on suspicion of exercising the powers of necromancy, and is carried with other prisoners to feed the flames at an auto da fé at Valladolid.

Our progress to Valladolid was slow and solemn, and occupied a space of no less than four days. On the evening of the fourth day we approached that city. The king and his court came out to meet us; he saluted the inquisitor-general with all the demonstrations of the deepest submission and humility; and then, having yielded him the place of honour, turned round his horse,

In the lane everything was silent, and the darkness was extreme. Man, woman, and child, were gone out to view the procession. For some time I could scarcely distinguish a single object; the doors and windows were all closed. I now chanced to come to an open door; within I saw no one but an old man, who was busy over some metallic work at a chafing dish of fire. I had no room for choice; I expected every moment to hear the myrmidons of the Inquisition at my heels. I rushed in; I impetuously closed the door, and bolted it; I then seized the old man by the collar of his shirt with a determined grasp, annihilate him that instant if he did not consent to and swore vehemently that I would afford me assistance. Though for some time I had perhaps been feebler than he, the terror that now drove me on rendered me comparatively a giant. He entreated me to permit him to breathe, and promised to do whatever I should desire. I looked round the apartment, and saw a rapier hanging against the wall, of which I instantly proceeded to make myself master. While I was doing this, my involuntary host, who was extremely terrified at my procedure, nimbly attempted to slip by me and rush into the street. With difficulty I caught hold of his arm, and pulling him back, put the point of my rapier to his breast, solemnly assuring him that no consideration on earth should save him from my fury if he attempted to escape a second time. He immediately dropped on his knees, and with the most piteous accents entreated me to spare his life. I told him that I was no robber, that I did not intend him the slightest harm; and that, if he would implicitly yield to my direction,

he might assure himself he never should have reason to repent his compliance. By this declaration the terrors of the old man were somewhat appeased. I took the opportunity of this calm to go to the street door, which I instantly locked, and put the key in my bosom.

treachery to fear on his part. Thus circumstanced, the exertion and activity with which I had lately been imbued left me, and I insensibly sunk into a sort of slumber.

Now for the first time I was at leisure to attend to the state of my strength and my health. My confineWe were still engaged in discussing the topics I have ment in the Inquisition, and the treatment I had mentioned, when I was suddenly alarmed by the noise experienced, had before rendered me feeble and almost of some one stirring in the inner apartment. I had helpless; but these appeared to be circumstances looked into this room, and had perceived nothing but scarcely worthy of attention in the situation in which the bed upon which the old man nightly reposed himself. I was then placed. The impulse I felt in the midst I sprung up, however, at the sound, and perceiving that of the confusion in the grand street of Valladolid, prothe door had a bolt on the outside, I eagerly fastened it. duced in me an energy and power of exertion which I then turned to Mordecai-that was the name of my nothing but the actual experience of the fact could have host: 'Wretch,' said I, 'did not you assure me that persuaded me was possible. This energy, once begun, there was no one but yourself in the house?' 'Oh,' appeared to have the faculty of prolonging itself, and cried Mordecai, it is my child! it is my child! she went I did not relapse into imbecility till the occasion seemed into the inner apartment, and has fallen asleep on the to be exhausted which called for my exertion. I bed.' 'Beware, I answered; the slightest falsehood examined myself by a mirror with which Mordecai more shall instantly be expiated in your blood.' 'I call furnished me; I found my hair as white as snow, and Abraham to witness,' rejoined the once more terrified my face ploughed with a thousand furrows. I was now Jew, it is my child! only my child!' 'Tell me,' cried fifty-four, an age which, with moderate exercise and a I, with severity of accent, 'how old is this child?' 'Only vigorous constitution, often appears like the prime of five years," said Mordecai: 'my dear Leah died when she human existence; but whoever had looked upon me in was a year old, and though we had several children, this my present condition, would not have doubted to affirm single one has survived her.' 'Speak to your child let that I had reached the eightieth year of my age. I me hear her voice!' He spoke to her; and she examined with dispassionate remark the state of my answered: 'Father, I want to come out.' I was satisfied intellect: I was persuaded that it had subsided into it was the voice of a little girl. I turned to the Jew: childishness. My mind had been as much cribbed and 'Take care,' said I, 'how you deceive me now; is there immured as my body. I was the mere shadow of a man, no other person in that room?' He imprecated a curse of no more power and worth than that which a magic on himself if there were. I opened the door with lantern produces upon a wall. Let the reader judge of caution, and the little girl came forward. As soon as what I had passed through and known within those I saw her, I seized her with a rapid motion, and cursed walls by the effects; I have already refused, I returned to my chair. 'Man,' said I, you have trifled continue to refuse, to tell how those effects were produced. with me too rashly; you have not considered what I am Enough of compassion; enough of complaint; I will escaped from, and what I have to fear; from this confine myself, as far as I am able, to simple history. . . . moment this child shall be the pledge of my safety; I I was now once again alone. The little girl, who had will not part with her an instant as long as I remain in been unusually disturbed and roused at an unseasonable your house; and with this rapier in my hand, I will hour, sunk into a profound sleep. I heard the noise pierce her to the heart the moment I am led to imagine which Mordecai made in undressing himself, and comthat I am no longer in safety.' The Jew trembled at posing his limbs upon a mattress which he had dragged my resolution; the emotions of a father worked in for the present occasion into the front room, and spread his features and glistened in his eye. At least let before the hearth. I soon found by the hardness of his me kiss her,' said he. Be it so,' replied I; 'one breathing that he also was asleep. I unfolded the embrace, and then, till the dawn of the coming day, she papers he had brought me; they consisted of various remains with me.' I released my hold; the child medical ingredients I had directed him to procure; there rushed to her father, and he caught her in his arms. were also two or three phials containing sirups and 'My dear Leah,' cried Mordecai, 'now a sainted spirit essences. I had near me a pair of scales with which in the bosom of our father Abraham! I call God to to weigh my ingredients, a vessel of water, the chafingwitness between us, that, if all my caution and vigil- dish of my host, in which the fire was nearly extinguished, ance can prevent it, not a hair of this child shall be and a small taper, with some charcoal to re-light the fire injured Stranger, you little know by how strong a in case of necessity. While I was occupied in surveying motive you have now engaged me to your cause. We these articles and arranging my materials, a sort of poor Jews, hunted on the face of the earth, the abhor- torpor came suddenly over me, so as to allow me no time rence and execration of mankind, have nothing but for resistance. I sunk upon the bed. I remained thus family affections to support us under our multiplied for about half-an-hour, seemingly without the power of disgraces; and family affections are entwined with our collecting my thoughts. At length I started, felt alarmed, existence, the fondest and best loved part of ourselves. and applied my utmost force of mind to rouse my -The God of Abraham bless you, my child!-Now, sir, exertions. While I drove, or attempted to drive, my speak! what is it you require of me?' animal spirits from limb to limb, and from part to part, as if to inquire into the general condition of my frame, I became convinced that I was dying. Let not the reader be surprised at this; twelve years' imprisonment in a narrow and unwholesome cell may well account for so sudden a catastrophe. Strange and paradoxical as it may seem, I believe it will be found in the experiment, that the calm and security which succeed to great internal injuries are more dangerous than the pangs and hardships that went before. I was now thoroughly alarmed; I applied myself with all vigilance and expedition to the compounding my materials. The fire was gone out; the taper was glimmering in the socket: to swallow the julep, when I had prepared it, seemed to be the last effort of which my organs and muscles were capable. It was the elixir of immortality, exactly made up according to the prescription of the stranger.

I told the Jew that I must have a suit of clothes conformable to the appearance of a Spanish cavalier, and certain medical ingredients that I named to him, together with his chafing-dish of coals to prepare them; and that done, I would then impose on him no further trouble. Having received his instructions, he immediately set out to procure what I demanded. He took with him the key of the house; and as soon as he was gone, I retired with the child into the inner apartment, and fastened the door. At first I applied myself to tranquillise the child, who had been somewhat alarmed at what she had heard and seen; this was no very difficult task. She presently left me, to amuse herself with some playthings that lay scattered in a corner of the apartment. My heart was now comparatively at ease; I saw the powerful hold I had on the fidelity of the Jew, and firmly persuaded myself that I had no

Whether from the potency of the medicine or the effect of imagination, I felt revived the moment I had swallowed it. I placed myself deliberately in Mordecai's bed, and drew over me the bed-clothes. I fell asleep almost instantly.

MRS OPIE.

MRS AMELIA OPIE (1769-1853) (Miss Alderson of Norwich) commenced her literary career in 1801, My sleep was not long in a few hours I awaked. when she published her domestic and pathetic With difficulty I recognised the objects about me, and tale of The Father and Daughter. Without venrecollected where I had been. It seemed to me that my heart had never beat so vigorously, nor my spirits flowed turing out of ordinary life, Mrs Opie invested her so gay. I was all elasticity and life; I could scarcely narrative with deep interest, by her genuine painthold myself quiet; I felt impelled to bound and leaping of nature and passion, her animated dialogue, like a kid upon the mountains. I perceived that my and feminine delicacy of feeling. Her first novel little Jewess was still asleep; she had been unusually went through eight editions, and is still popular. fatigued the night before. I know not whether Mor- A long series of works of fiction proceeded from decai's hour of rising were come; if it were, he was the pen of this lady. Her Simple Tales, in four careful not to disturb his guest. I put on the garments volumes, 1806; New Tales, four volumes, 1818; he had prepared; I gazed upon the mirror he had left Temper, or Domestic Scenes, a tale, in three in my apartment. I can recollect no sensation in the volumes; Tales of Real Life, three volumes; Tales course of my life so unexpected and surprising as what of the Heart, four volumes; Madeline (1822), are I felt at that moment. The evening before, I had seen all marked by the same characteristics-the pormy hair white, and my face ploughed with furrows; I looked fourscore. What I beheld now was totally traiture of domestic life, drawn with a view to different, yet altogether familiar; it was myself-myself regulate the heart and affections. In 1828 Mrs as I had appeared on the day of my marriage with Opie published a moral treatise, entitled DetracMarguerite de Damville; the eyes, the mouth, the hair, tion Displayed, in order to expose that most the complexion, every circumstance, point by point, the common of all vices,' which, she says justly, is same. I leaped a gulf of thirty-two years. I waked found 'in every class or rank in society, from the from a dream, troublesome and distressful beyond all peer to the peasant, from the master to the valet, description; but it vanished like the shades of night from the mistress to the maid, from the most upon the burst of a glorious morning in July, and left learned to the most ignorant, from the man of not a trace behind. I knew not how to take away my genius to the meanest capacity.' The tales of eyes from the mirror before me. the brilliant fictions of Scott, the stronger moral this lady have been thrown into the shade by delineations of Miss Edgeworth, and the generally masculine character of our more modern literature. She is, like Mackenzie, too uniformly pathetic and tender. She can do nothing well,' says Jeffrey, 'that requires to be done with formality, and therefore has not succeeded in copying either the concentrated force of weighty and deliberate reason, or the severe and solemn dignity of majestic virtue. To make amends, however, she represents admirably everything that is amiable, generous, and gentle.' Perhaps we should add to this the power of exciting and harrowing the feelings in no ordinary degree. Some of her short tales are full of gloomy and terrific painting, alternately resembling those of Godwin and Mrs Radcliffe.

I soon began to consider that, if it were astonishing to me that, through all the regions of my countenance, I could discover no trace of what I had been the night before, it would be still more astonishing to my host. This sort of sensation I had not the smallest ambition to produce one of the advantages of the metamorphosis I had sustained consisted in its tendency, in the eyes of all that saw me, to cut off every species of connection between my present and my former self. It fortunately happened that the room in which I slept, being constructed upon the model of many others in Spain, had a stair at the further end, with a trap-door in the ceiling, for the purpose of enabling the inhabitant to ascend on the roof in the cool of the day. The roofs were flat, and so constructed that there was little difficulty in passing along them from house to house, from one end of the street to the other. I availed myself of the opportunity, and took leave of the residence of my kind host in a way perfectly unceremonious, determined, however, speedily to transmit to him the reward I had promised. It may easily be believed that Mordecai was not less rejoiced at the absence of a guest whom the vigilance of the Inquisition rendered an uncommonly dangerous one, than I was to quit his habitation. I closed the trap after me, and clambered from roof to roof to a considerable distance. At length I encountered the occasion of an open window, and fortunately descended, unseen by any human being, into the street.

CHARLES BROCKDEN BROWN.

A successful imitator of the style of Godwin appeared in America. CHARLES BROCKDEN BROWN (1771-1810), a native of Philadelphia, was author of several novels, which were collected and republished in 1828 in seven volumes. He was also an extensive contributor to the periodical literature of America, and author of a number of political pamphlets. His best novels are Wieland (1798), Arthur Mervyn (1800), Edgar Huntly, Clara Howard, and Jane Talbot (all in 1801). In romantic narrative, Brown was often successful, but he failed in the delineation of character.

In Miss Sedgwick's Letters from Abroad (1841), we find the following notice of the then venerable novelist: 'I owed Mrs Opie a grudge for having made me in my youth cry my eyes out over her stories; but her fair cheerful face forced me to forget it. She long ago forswore the world and its vanities, and adopted the Quaker faith and costume; but I fancied that her elaborate simplicity, and the fashionable little train to her pretty satin gown, indicated how much easier it is to adopt a theory than to change one's habits.'

Mrs Opie survived till 1853, and was in her eighty-fourth year at the time of her death. An interesting volume of Memorials of the accomplished authoress, selected from her letters, diaries, and other manuscripts, by Miss Brightwell, was published in 1854. After the death of her husband in 1807, Mrs Opie resided chiefly in her native town of Norwich, but often visited London, where her company was courted by the literary and fashionable circles. In 1825 she was formally admitted into the Society of Friends or Quakers, but her liveliness of character and goodness of heart were never diminished. Her old age was eminently cheerful and happy.

vivid colours, and contrasted with the cheerfulness, the buoyancy of spirits, and the manly virtues arising from honest and independent exertion. In 1817 our authoress supplied the public with two other tales, Harrington and Ormond. The first was written to counteract the illiberal prejudice entertained by many against the Jews: the second is an Irish tale, equal to any of the former. The death of Mr Edgeworth in 1817 made a break in the literary exertion of his accomplished daughter, but she completed a Memoir which that gentleman had begun of himself, and which was published in two volumes in 1820. In 1822 she returned to her course of moral instruction, and published in that year, Rosamond, a Sequel to Early Lessons, a work for juvenile readers, of which an earlier specimen had been published. A further continuation appeared in 1825, under the title of Harriet and Lucy, four volumes. These tales had been begun fifty years before by Mr Edgeworth, at a time when no one of any literary character, excepting Dr Watts and Mrs Barbauld, condescended to write for children.'

me from the vacillation and anxiety to which I was so much subject, that I am sure I should not have written or finished anything without his support. He inspired in my mind a degree of hope and confidence, essential, in the first instance, to the full exertion of the mental powers, and necessary to insure perseverance in any Occupation. A work on Practical Education (1798) was a joint production of Mr and Miss Edgeworth. In 1800 the latter published anonymously Castle Rackrent, an admirable Irish story; and in 1801, Belinda, a novel, and Moral Tales. Another joint production of father and daughter appeared in 1802, an Essay on Irish Bulls, in which the authors did justice to the better traits of the Irish character, and illustrated them by some interesting and pathetic stories. In 1803, Miss Edgeworth came forward with three volumes of Popular Tales, characterised by the features of her genius-'a genuine display of nature, and a certain tone of rationality and good sense, which was the more pleasing, because in a novel it was then new.' The practical cast of her father's mind probably assisted in directing Miss Edgeworth's talents into this useful and unro- It is worthy of mention, that, in the autumn mantic channel. It appeared strange at first, and of 1823, Miss Edgeworth, accompanied by two of one of the best of the authoress's critics, Francis her sisters, made a visit to Sir Walter Scott at Jeffrey, said at the time, ‘that it required almost Abbotsford. She not only, he said, completely the same courage to get rid of the jargon of answered, but exceeded the expectations which he fashionable life, and the swarms of peers, found- had formed, and he was particularly pleased with lings, and seducers, as it did to sweep away the the naïveté and good-humoured ardour of mind mythological persons of antiquity, and to intro- which she united with such formidable powers of duce characters who spoke and acted like those acute observation. 'Never,' says Mr Lockhart, who were to peruse their adventures.' In 1806 'did I see a brighter day at Abbotsford than that appeared Leonora, a novel, in two volumes. A on which Miss Edgeworth first arrived there; moral purpose is here aimed at, and the same skill never can I forget her look and accent when she is displayed in working up ordinary incidents into was received by him at his archway, and exthe materials of powerful fiction; but the plot is claimed, "Everything about you is exactly what painful and disagreeable. The seduction of an one ought to have had wit enough to dream." exemplary husband by an abandoned female, and The weather was beautiful, and the edifice and its his subsequent return to his injured but forgiving appurtenances were all but complete; and day wife, is the groundwork of the story. Irish charac- after day, so long as she could remain, her host ters figure off in Leonora as in the Popular Tales. had always some new plan of gaiety.' Miss EdgeIn 1809 Miss Edgeworth issued three volumes of worth remained a fortnight at Abbotsford. Two Tales of Fashionable Life, more powerful and years afterwards, she had an opportunity of repayvarious than any of her previous productions. ing the hospitalities of her entertainer, by receivThe history of Lord Glenthorn affords a striking ing him at Edgeworthstown, where Sir Walter met picture of ennui, and contains some excellent de- with as cordial a welcome, and where he found lineation of character; while the story of Almerianeither mud hovels nor naked peasantry, but represents the misery and heartlessness of a life of mere fashion. Three other volumes of Fashionable Tales were issued in 1812, and fully supported the authoress's reputation. The number of tales in this series was three-Vivian, illustrating the evils and perplexities arising from vacillation and infirmity of purpose; Emilie de Coulanges, depicting the life and manners of a fashionable French lady; and The Absentee-by far the best of the three stories-written to expose the evils and mortifications of the system which the authoress saw too many instances of in Ireland, of persons of fortune forsaking their country-seats and native vales for the frivolity, scorn, and expense of fashionable London society. In 1814, Miss Edgeworth entered still more extensively and sarcastically into the manners and characters in high-life, by her novel of Patronage, in four volumes. The miseries resulting from a dependence on the patronage of the great-a system which, she says, is 'twice accursed-once in giving, and once in receiving'-are drawn in

snug cottages and smiling faces all about.' Literary fame had spoiled neither of these eminent persons, nor unfitted them for the common business and enjoyment of life. We shall never,' said Scott, learn to feel and respect our real calling and destiny, unless we have taught ourselves to consider everything as moonshine compared with the education of the heart.' 'Maria did not listen to this without some water; in her eyes; her tears are always ready when any generous string is touched (for, as Pope says, "the finest minds, like the finest metals, dissolve the easiest "); but she brushed them gaily aside, and said: "You see how it is; Dean Swift said he had written his books in order that people might learn to treat him like a great lord. Sir Walter writes his in order that he may be able to treat his people as a great lord ought to do."'*

In 1834 Miss Edgeworth reappeared as a novelist: her Helen, in three volumes, is fully equal to

* Lockhart's Life of Scott.

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