in so fond and so simple a shepherdess: after this, hands are joined, and all parties made happy. We have detailed the story of this romance thus fully, for the purpose of exposing the false and dangerous principles of conduct adopted even by those French writers who seem to pique themselves on decency and morality; for, by how many besides Florian, is the "legal prostitution" of a marriage, against which the heart revolts, cried up as the most heroic of sacrifices, at the same time that the first love is represented as unconquerable, and the obstinate perseverance in it, after the most sacred vows have been exchanged with another object, this adultery of the heart, is made the test of exalted sentiment, and a soul superior to the common kind! Thus, by an absurd and cruel contradiction, the most amiable characters are rendered at the same time the slaves both of duty and passion, on the success of which attempt, "to serve two masters," the manners of modern France afford an ample comment. Wiser was the attempt of Madame de Genlis utterly to expel the tender pas sion from the female bosom at least, in a state of society which afforded scarce a hope of its innocent gratification ! Wiser still, and much more consonant with the best feelings of our natures, is the system of the English law, which, by restricting the authority of parents within moderate bounds, and enabling young persons to follow, in a considerable degree, the dictates of their own hearts, spares the anguish of concealed and hopeless love, while it checks the frenzy of illicit passion. Long may the indulgence of our laws guard the strictness of our manners; and while we spurn our neighbours' fetters, on one hand, let us not adopt, on the other, that unbridled licentiousness which slavery has produced, and slavery alone can palliate. We are not displeased to conclude this article, by pronouncing, that the execution of the translation is little calculated to recommend the design of the original. The prose is very bald French English, and the verse is contemptible. ART. VIII. St. Clair of the Isles; or, the Outlaws of Barra, a Scottish Tradition. By ELIZABETH HELME. 4 vols. 12mo. AMID the masses of dulness and vulgarity intruded on the public under the title of novels and romances, it is not a little refreshing to us to meet with any thing that relieves our weariness, and interests our feelings. The demand for works of this class is much too large to be entirely supplied by first-rate artificers; when, therefore, a piece comes to hand, free from stain and mildew, and turned out in a conscientious and workman-like manner, we are eager to recommend it to our customers, even though it should be found deficient in perfect symmetry of pattern, exquisite brilliancy of colouring, and laborious accuracy of finishing. The tradition on which the romance before us is founded, possesses both interest and novelty: the characters are sketched with considerable strength, and blended and contrasted not unhappily. The scene is laid in North-Britain, during the 15th century; but the manners and language are those of an age and nation much more refined than Scotland under the two first Jameses. This is a kind of anachronism, however, which it would be idle to represent in a heinous light, when the genuine language of the country could not be understood by an Englishman, nor the unvarnished manners of the times tolerated by a modern. The style of Mrs. Helme is deficient in grace, in polish, and sometimes in grammar; but it is clear and unaffected, and displays the fluency of a practised writer, though not the accuracy of a scholar. The heroine may be thought somewhat too forward, and more eager than beseems a modest damsel to share the fortunes of "a banished man condemned in woods to roam." But on the whole, we may promise the readers of these volumes a considerable share of entertainment, enjoyed free of expense to morality, propriety, or common sense. ART. IX. Letters of Miss Riversdale, a Novel, in three Volumes, 12mo. about 370 pages each. THIS novel is not to be confounded with the vulgar trash of the day: the author is one of those who have seen the mores hominum multorum & urbes, and who has not suffered the advantages of an extensive intercourse with mankind to pass unheeded away. In a sort of prefatory advertisement some anxiety as to the success of this artless tale' is expressed, from the prevailing taste of the day for the marvellous dramatic; contrary to the usual mode of dressing fiction in the semblance of truth, we are told, that in the present instance pains have been taken to dress truth in the garb of fiction; "still it is fiction so devoid of adventure, so little deviating from the natural result of the genuine workings of a susceptible mind, that its chief claim to interest must rest upon the corresponding emotion it will excite in every unsophisticated honest heart." The mere story, indeed, is so extremely simple, that we should convey a very inadequate and injurious idea of this novel by a dry and meagre relation of it: Miss Riversdale, who addresses these letters to her absent brother, is at a very early age impressed with a deep sense of gratitude to Colonel Malcolm, for the parental guardianship which he assumes over her conduct. Young, beautiful, amiable, and accomplished, protected only by a mother, who for the advantage of conferring on her daughter an unexpensive education, had left her native country and retired to Geneva, Miss Riversdale is exposed to the flattery of fops, and the artfulness of knaves. Malcolm warns her of the danger, but his friendship is not perfectly disinterested: the charms of his protégée make an impression on his heart, and notwithstanding the very great disparity of years between them, he is induced, from the frequent and sincere expressions of esteem and gratitude which had flowed from her lips, to hope that he may have inspired her with a more tender passion. She admits his addresses; but the colonel, with an honest and an honourable heart, lousy in its commencement, Colonel Malcolm might fairly have attributed the too just grounds for it which now existed: it had so frequently hurried him into violence, and even brutality of behaviour towards Miss R. that all her friends were alarmed at the certain misery which awaited her. The attachment of Miss R. indeed had been so sensibly weakened, that she had unguardedly expressed a conviction that the fulfilment of her engagement with the Colonel would make her wretched; nevertheless, she says, "I must abide by it; from the dictates of honour there is no appeal." Under such an impression, happiness in the marriage state is not to be looked for; and Lady Riversdale, without the knowledge of her daughter, addresses a letter to Colonel Malcolm, who is at Venice, stating the situation of Louisa's feelings, and throwing her upon his honour for releasing her from an engagement which she is determined to fulfil, although it blasts every hope of happiness. The colonel, before he replies to Lady R. writes to Louisa, incredulous that her affections were so estranged: "no pen but your own shall make me believe it. I await my fate at your hands." Lady Mary Melville is a character who effectually forwards the action of the piece here: in earlier life she had been fascinated with the accomplishments of Colonel Malcolm, who was not equally sensible of her charms. The brother of Lady Mary, a Scotch gentleman of fortune, who affectionately sympathized with his sister's sufferings, had deviated from the ordinary' delicacies which prohibit the unsolicited avowal of a female passion, and had gone so far as to make overtures to the colonel in behalf of one who had cheek." "let concealment is haughty, coarse, and intemperate: his Like a worm i' the bud, feed on her damask love degenerates into jealousy, and the workings of this turbulent and detested passion are strikingly pourtrayed in the character of Malcolm. His suspicions are excited to the very highest pitch by the assiduities of Prince Polinski, a most accomplished character, into whose company Louisa Riversdale is frequently thrown, and to whose talents, virtue, and grace of body and of mind she is far from being indifferent. To the unreasonableness of his jea The colonel, however, was too much a man of honour to bestow his hand where he could not give his heart a sincere friendship had nevertheless been cultivated between them, and some recent acts of disinterestedness on the part of the lady, had given it additional force and ardor. Our readers will not fail to recognise in this story some of the features of Clementina, in Sir Charles Grandison. hands of the colonel before he had re course to so singular a corresponce as that which produced the present happy extrication. We consider this as one of the clumsiest manœuvres in the novel; it has a number of excellencies, but is not without faults, some of which we shall notice as we proceed, After a very lingering illness, Louisa at length recovers, and goes into company; this gives the author an opportunity of shewing his intimacy with Parisiau manners and characters, which indced are sketched with a very skilful hand: he is master of colloquial French, and seems to be versed in the idiomatic niceties of the language. The conver sations with which the novel abounds are extremely characteristic: as the subject of the following, which takes place at the English ambassador's hotel, is generally interesting, we shall give it as a speci men: At the time that Lady Riversdale addressed her letter to the colonel, Louisa was confined to her bed at Paris, in so dangerous a state of illness, that it was not even thought prudent to indulge her with the perusal of any letters which were sent to her; of course she was unable to answer any. Colonel Malcolm considered her silence as a confirmation of the mortifying intelligence he had received from Lady Riversdale, to which, therefore, he now returned an answer, releasing Louisa from an engagement which appeared to her so pregnant with wretchedness. At the same time he addresses a letter to Lady Mary Melville, complaining of the treatment he had received, and expressing his regret that he had not been more sensible of the honour done him by her partiality, at a time when it offered a prospect of the steady and unalloyed satisfaction for which a rational man ought alone to look in a matrimonial connection. He states that rejected, cast off, as he now is, it would be an insult to court her acceptance of his hand, intimating, however, at the same time, that the slightest encouragement would bring him to her feet. Lady Mary immediately writes to Miss Riversdale for an explanation of the mystery: the favourable impression which Colonel Malcolm had made on her heart is indelible; but she has too high a sense of honour to accept of his hand, with out previously informing herself from Louisa's pen, of the circumstances of the case. The same illness, however, which incapacitates Louisa from answer ing the colonel, incapacitates her from answering Lady Mary, who draws a similar inference from her silence; and is prompted to return a flattering answer to the long-lost object of her affections, "The conversation at one time took a telling him that if his proposal is not political turn, and Madame de Sainval havsolely dictated by anger against Missing expressed a curiosity, in regard to the Riversdale, but really arises from a wish to pass his life with a woman, whose every thought will be subservient to his pleasure, she is ready to convince him that her affection is of that generous sort which only seeks the happiness of its object, and that he may command her hand whenever he pleases to call for it. It must be acknowledged that the god of silence is not called in here to ac complish a difficulty unworthy of his interference. The author, indeed, must have been a good deal puzzled to get Louisa out of the scrape, and tie the "At dinner the conversation was uncommonly brilliant, chiefly supported between the Marchioness and Mr. Stanville; she speaking French, he English. Wit sparkled on both sides, but I thought a great deal of what Madame de Stanville said borrowed its prettiness from the language in which it was his expresions, of which I was not aware spoken; while Mr. Stanville lent a grace to the English language was susceptible. His selection of words is very striking; for, without the smallest degree of pedantry, he says the very commonest things in the very best possible manner, and seems indeed, as you say, to have a turn of thought peculiarly his own. also singularly pleasing. different merits of some of the most admired fort seemed to lie in the clearness of his speakers; Sir George said, that Lord N's financial statements, and the simplicity of his arguments, never weakening their force by superfluous declamation. "Add to this his extraordinay self-possession, and peculiar felicity in warding off the scurrilous invective with which he is frequently attacked," said Mr Stanville, "I can often fancy I see his guardian angel in his ear the best possible reply upon every perched upon his shoulder, and whispering occasion, Then, his pleasantry so conciliating; his ridicule enlivening, without irritating the house-the very objects of it join ing irresistibly in the laugh; his wit is phosphoric, brilliant, without being caustic.' "Comment!" interrupted Madame de Sainval, " on se permet dans votre grave parlement de fuire de l'esprit? j'aurois crue que ce seroit un crime de lèse-raison." "You would perhaps on the contrary, think it usurped a portion far too considerable of the debate," replied Mr. Stanville, "if you were to hear the splendid, figurative, animated imagery of B, soaring away from his subject, till it is scarce possible for the mind's eye to follow him; quoting from Lucretius, Hudibras, Cicero, Rabelais, or an old ballad, with equal readiness.” "But all this occasionally so interlarded with puerile pathos, and vulgar scurrility," said Sir George. "That arises from want of taste, not of powers," Mr. Stanville replied. Digressions without end," continued Sir George, the apparent conclusion of his speech starting into the exordium of another, like Ovid's Metamorphoses; in short, I am come to consider his rising to speak, merely as a signal to adjourn to the beef-steak room; and so, I'll be sworn, did the better half of the members, when they nicknamed him the dinner-bell." "I believe it may be fair to say of him," rejoined Mr. Stanville, "that for good, bad and indifferent he has not his equal. There is a mixture of delight and disgust in hearing him, which seems to endue the ear at once with the centripetal and centrifugal motions; at the same time, his mind is perfectly electric, for upon the slightest friction, it pours forth a stream of intellectual light." "Which so completely dazzles his devotees," interrupted Sir George, “that they are ready to subscribe even to his judgment." The ambassador thought, that, as a finished orator, Mr. P soared above competition. "Mr. Stanville admitted his talents to be refined, versatile, and polished. His flowery, harmonious periods, his nice selection of apparently unstudied phrases, his inexhaustible copiousness are very striking; and that perspicuity of diction, which seems to express his ideas with such clearness." Seems to express ?" interrupted the ambassador. "Certainly only seems, for upon a mo. ment's reflection, you will commonly find it impossible to attach any precise ineaning to it." sieur de Sainval, who from having served in America, understands English, and speaks it with tolerable fluency, observed, that he had always conceived British orators above every sort of trick themselves, while they so constantly affixed that epithet as the stigma of French politics. "We have an old adage which may ac count for it," said Sir George, " mocking is catching." "Mr. Stanville good-humouredly seem ing to wish to do away his friend's bluntness, said, "there are certain ruses de guerre admitted in all governments; and I do not mean to detract from abilities so conspicuous as Mr.'s in particular; I have always admired the never failing felicity, with which he improves to his own advantage, the slightest opening given by his antagonist." "But observe," said Sir George, "whether it be ever possible to carry away, or quote any thing from his speeches." 66 No, they certainly are characterised," Mr. Stanville replied, by a languid, glittering verbosity, which fills the ear without satisfying the mind. How strikingly contrasted with the energetic, commanding, impassioned eloquence of his rival! which at once convinces the understanding, and seizes upon the heart." Ay, there indeed," exclaimed Sir George, "are candour and acuteness, joined to sound judgment, depth of thought, and force of logic, unequalled." His elocution level to every capacity," rejoined Mr. Stanville; "never seeking for a word to embellish his period, but enlisting and disciplining the commonest in a moment, to charge in the ranks, and bear down all opposition. He proves the irresistible power of luminous common sense, leaving all the little arts of debate at a distance, and stands forth alone the Orator of Reason.” "There I recognize the true English character," said Madame de Sainval, " and I judged your whole parliament to be so composed." You did us too much honour, indeed," replied Sir George, shaking his head. "One such man in a century would be sufficient to support the diguity of the human race! You'll allow him to be phosphoric and electric too, Stanville?" "He," exclaimed Mr. Stanville, with an enthusiasm that well became himn !—“ His oratory is the effulgence of the meridian sun, darting the ray of unsophisticated reason around, and shedding intellectual day." 66 Upon my soul, you are inspired, Stanville!" cried Sir George, looking delighted with the brilliancy of his friend's observations. "Et inspiré encore par la raison, denuée des graces!" added Madame de Sainval, smiling, "cette grande triste raison—si froidesi úpre-si peu inspirante-quel miracle!" "Perhaps, upon better acquaintance with Rr her, you might think more favourably," said Monsieur de Sainval, with a degree of archness which I did not think he had possessed. Her ee struck fire as she glanced at him; and the retort' not courteous,' I believe, was rising to her lips; but Mr. Stanville averted it by observing, that Madame de Sainval would not easily find the opportunity of improving an acquaintance, which her appearance was so likely to put to flight. "Mr. Stanville's wit, like Midas's touch, has the property of converting all to gold. It would not readily have occurred to any one else, to turn the mere repetition of a reproach into a compliment," replied the farchioness smiling, who required but the moment's reflection, to curb her displeasure, for which he had given her time; she added, "I may be excused, if I fail in the accurate appreciation of un personnage de trop mauvais ton, to be admitted into French good company; but I will trust to my Louisa for put ting me in the way de lui faire réparation d honneur in England; where I expect to find her presiding at every tea table-et puis, nous irons aussi entendre ces miracles au parle ment; n' est, ce pas-mon cœur ?" "I said, I was afraid she must take them upon trust, for I had understood that women were now excluded from the gallery. ་་ "To the eternal disgrace of our gallantry, I confess it," the ambassador said. "Ah, les Ostrogots!" cried Madame de Sainval. "No wonder that reason should have power, where women are inadmissible." "Would any of us have dared to utter such an implied sarcasm on the sex?"exclaimed Mr. Stanville. 66 In virtue of my claim, as its professed champion, I beg leave in our parliamentary language, to offer an amendment, by substituting the word graces, which, however it may strike us all at this moment, to be synonimous with woman, will certainly rescue a part of the sex at least, from the severity of Madame de Sainval's remark: which will then be reduced to this political axiom, that the triumph of reason can only be secured by the exclusion of the graces. And this is undoubtedly the principle upon which those senators acted who voted the ladies out of the gallery." Mr. Stanville, whose conversational talents are here displayed with so much brilliancy, is the brother to Lady Belford: the charms of Louisa Riversdale make a deep impression on his heart, nor on the other hand is she by any means insensible to the polished manners, the cultivated understanding, and the splendid abilities of Mr. Stanville. The character of Louisa is too sus ceptible she transfers her affections from one object to another with a facility which derogates from that exalted dig. ..nity with which the author intended to endow her: She is very young, indeed; not eighteen, but the author has con ferred on this girl of eighteen all his own powers of discrimination, his own insight of character, his own accuracy of judgment, and maturity of reason. It will here be very naturally asked what became of Polinski? the ardent lover, the accomplished prince? Louisa had given him unequivocal acknowledgments of the impression which his varied accomplishments had producedin her bosom. When he quitted Geneva, where he could no longer remain the tortured witness of her impending misery as the wife of Malcolm, he was permitted to correspond with her. What becomes of Polinski? Louisa is liberated, and his own engagement is also at an end: the lady to whom he was betrothed, it seems, thought he was dilatory in coming to claim her promised hand, and therefore conferred it on another. Once more, then, what becomes of the prince? had absence cooled his ardour, or had the charms of some third beauty fascinated his affections? No: but we are incidentally informed, not from the best authority indeed, that the only impediment to offering his hand where his heart is so entirely devoted arises from the difference of religion : but for that he would immediately have flown to the feet of his charmer: In this abrupt manner is Prince Polinski driven off the stage: his character is drawn with a great deal of spirit, we are interested in his fate, and he ought not to have been dismissed with so little ceremony. The difference of his religion and Louisa's must have been perfectly well known to him at Geneva; so that our author has been as unsuccessful in extricating himself from this scrape as he was in the other. Mr. Stanville, then, is the next object of Louisa's love: but an unfortunate amour has implicated his honour, and he struggles boldly, but ineffectually to resist the impression of her charms. The story of Agathe, who has been the unhappy victim of Stanville's impetuous passion, is extremely beautiful; it is told with simplicity and feeling, and is altogether full of interest. But here again the author entangles himself in a net which he is obliged to break in order to escape from: Agathe is the mother of a babe of which Mr. Stanville is the father. Her disgrace is concealed in a convent in the south of France. Louisa Riversdale cannot accept the hand which, upon every principle of honour and duty, |