Oliphant at the height of her
descriptive
and dramatic power.
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Title: Library of the world's best literature, ancient and modern;
Charles Dudley Warner, editor; Hamilton Wright Mabie, Lucia
Gilbert Runkle, George H. Warner, associate editors . . .
Publisher: New York, R. S. Peale and J. A. Hill [c1896-97]
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## p. 10793 (#1) ############################################
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Lit 2050. 18
HARVARD COLLEGE
LIBRARY
ER
TAS
FROM THE FUND OF
THOMAS WREN WARD
Treasurer of Harvard College
1830-1842
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!
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1
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}
鳌
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1
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*
PETRARCH.
## p. 10803 (#11) ###########################################
LIE
VRLD'S
ILTO.
R. S
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Al
1
## p. 10805 (#13) ###########################################
LIBRARY
OF THE
WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE
Ancient and Modern
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER
8
EDITOR
HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE, LUCIA GILBERT RUNKLE,
GEORGE H. WARNER
ASSOCIATE EDITORS
THIRTY VOLUMES
19)
VOL. XIX
NEW YORK
R. S. PEALE AND J. A. HILL
PUBLISHERS
## p. 10806 (#14) ###########################################
L
T
HARVARD
UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY
H 21,
COPYRIGHT 1897
BY R. S. PEALE AND J. A. HILL
All rights reserved
RNER COMPANY
THE WERNER
PRINTERS
BINDERS
AMBONO
## p. 10807 (#15) ###########################################
THE ADVISORY COUNCIL
CRAWFORD H. TOY, A. M. , LL. D. ,
Professor of Hebrew, HARVARD UNIVERSITY, Cambridge, Mass.
THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY, LL. D. , L. H. D. ,
Professor of English in the Sheffield Scientific School of
YALE UNIVERSITY, New Haven, Conn.
WILLIAM M. SLOANE, PH. D. , L. H. D. ,
Professor of History and Political Science,
BRANDER MATTHEWS, A. M. , LL. B. ,
Professor of Literature, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, New York City.
JAMES B. ANGELL, LL. D. .
President of the
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY, Princeton, N. J.
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN, Ann Arbor, Mich.
WILLARD FISKE, A. M. , PH. D. ,
Late Professor of the Germanic and Scandinavian Languages
and Literatures,
CORNELL UNIVERSITY, Ithaca, N. Y.
EDWARD S. HOLDEN, A. M. , LL. D. ,
Director, of the Lick Observatory, and Astronomer,
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, Berkeley, Cal.
ALCÉE FORTIER, LIT. D. ,
Professor of the Romance Languages,
TULANE UNIVERSITY, New Orleans, La.
WILLIAM P. TRENT, M. A. ,
Dean of the Department of Arts and Sciences, and Professor of
English and History,
UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH, Sewanee, Tenn.
PAUL SHOREY, PH. D. ,
Prof ssor of Greek and Latin Literature,
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, Chicago, Ill.
WILLIAM T. HARRIS, LL. D. ,
United States Commissioner of Education,
BUREAU OF EDUCATION, Washington, D. C.
MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN, A. M. , LL. D. ,
Professor of Literature in the
CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA, Washington, D. C.
## p. 10808 (#16) ###########################################
1
:
## p. 10809 (#17) ###########################################
TABLE OF CONTENTS
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
VOL. XIX
BY HARRIET WATERS PRESTON
A Comfort to her Dear Papa (Miss Marjoribanks')
The Deliverance (The Ladies Lindores')
Teacher and Pupil (Life of Edward Irving')
FRANCIS SYLVESTER O'MAHONY (Father Prout ')
JOHN BOYLE O'REILLY
Father Prout (Reliques')
The Shandon Bells (same)
Don Ignacio Loyola's Vigil (same)
Malbrouck (same)
The Song of the Cossack (same)
BY JOHN MALONE
LIVED
1828-1897
Ensign Epps, the Color-Bearer
The Cry of the Dreamer
A Dead Man
My Troubles
OSSIAN AND OSSIANIC POETRY
BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN
The Fairy Host
Credhe's Lament
1804-1866
Colloquy of Ossian and St. Patrick
To the Blackbird of Derrycarn
The Fian Banners
1844-1890
The Rainbow's Treasure
Yesterday and To-morrow
A White Rose
The Infinite
BY WILLIAM SHARP AND ERNEST RHYS
PAGE
10819
10845
10857
10865
## p. 10810 (#18) ###########################################
OUIDA (LOUISE DE LA RAMÉE)
OSSIAN AND OSSIANIC POETRY - Continued:
Deirdrê's Lament for the Sons of Usnach
Colna-Dona (Macpherson's Ossian)
The Songs of Selma (same)
From a Colloquy of Oisin and St. Patrick'
The Death-Song of Ossian (Macpherson's Ossian)
OVID (PUBLIUS OVIDIUS NASO)
1840-
The Silk Stockings (Bébée, or Two Little Wooden Shoes')
How Tricotrin Found Viva (Tricotrin')
The Steeple-Chase (Under Two Flags')
The Sun-God's Palace
A Transformation
On the Death of Corinna's Parrot
From Sappho's Letter to Phaon
A Soldier's Bride (Laodamia)
The Creation
Baucis and Philemon
A Grewsome Lover
BY FRANCIS W. KELSEY
THOMAS NELSON PAGE
vi
Effect of Orpheus's Song in Hades
The Poet's Fame
The Burial of the Guns
ÉDOUARD PAILLERON
THOMAS PAINE
LI ED
43 B. C. -17 A. D.
From "The Crisis"
The Magazine in America
JOHN GORHAM PALFREY
1834-
The World of Boredom (Le Monde où l'on s'Ennuie')
A Scientist among Ladies (same)
The Story of Grigneux ('Cabotins')
1853-
1737-1809
PAGE
10885
10915
10937
10961
10975
1796-1881
Salem Witchcraft (A Compendious History of New Eng-.
land')
10988
## p. 10811 (#19) ###########################################
vii
WILLIAM GIFFORD PALGRAVE
FREDERIK PALUDAN-MÜLLER
The Night Ride in the Desert ('Hermann Agha')
The Last Meeting (same)
Hymn to the Sun (Kalanus')
Adam and his Mother ('Adam Homo')
EMILIA PARDO-BAZÁN
GIUSEPPE PARINI
1852? -
The Reign of Terror (Russia: Its People and its Litera-
ture')
GILBERT PARKER
LIVED
1826-1888
BY WILLIAM MORTON PAYNE
The Schoolmistress at Home (The Swan of Vilamorta ')
Russian Nihilism: "Going to the People" ('Russia: Its
People and its Literature')
The Toilet of an Exquisite (The Day')
The Lady's Lap-Dog (same)
The Afternoon Call (same)
THEODORE PARKER
1809-1876
FRANCIS PARKMAN
1861-
The Patrol of the Cypress Hills (Pierre and his Peo-
ple')
Valmond (When Valmond Came to Pontiac ')
1729-1799
1810-1860
BY JOHN WHITE CHADWICK
Mistakes about Jesus: His Reception and Influence ('A
Discourse of Matters pertaining to Religion')
1823-1893
BY CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS
Dominique de Gourgues (The Pioneers of France in the
New World')
Father Brébeuf and his Associates in the Huron Mission
(The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth
Century')
The Battle of the Plains of Abraham (Montcalm and
Wolfe')
PAGE
IIOOI
11017
11025
11042
11047
11073
11087
## p. 10812 (#20) ###########################################
viii
PARMENIDES
THOMAS WILLIAM PARSONS
Mary Booth
A Dirge
Epitaph on a Child
Introduction of the Poem on Nature
Thought and Existence
Kosmos
JAMES PARTON
BLAISE PASCAL
From the Life of Andrew Jackson'
From the Life of Voltaire'
From the Thoughts'
WALTER PATER
COVENTRY PATMORE
LIVED
520-450? B. C.
1819-1892
To Francesca
Pilgrim's Isle
Paradisi Gloria
Wind and Wave
The Toys
"If I Were Dead »
To the Body
BY ARTHUR G. CANFIELD
1822-1891
1623-1662
The Queen
Wisdom
Pathos (Principle in Art')
BY ANNA MCCLURE SHOLL
White Nights (Marius, the Epicurean')
The Classic and the Romantic in Literature ('Apprecia-
tions')
1839-1894
BY MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN
1823-1896
Love Serviceable (The Angel in the House')
Sahara (same)
Married Life (The Wedding Sermon' in 'The Vic-
tories of Love')
PAGE
11114
11117
11123
11143
11157
11179
## p. 10813 (#21) ###########################################
ix
JAMES KIRKE PAULDING
PAUSANIAS
Pliny the Younger (The Dutchman's Fireside')
A Woman's Privilege: And the Charms of Snuff Color
(same)
Sybrandt Receives back his Estate - with an Incum-
brance (same)
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK
The Acropolis of Athens and its Temples
The Temple of Zeus at Olympia
SILVIO PELLICO
LIVED
1779-1860
BY B. PERRIN
Second Century A. D.
1785-1866
From Maid Marian': Maid Marian; A Forest Code; Chiv-
alry; Pilgrims from Holy Land; Storming the Fortress:
Crossing the Ford
SAMUEL PEPYS
GEORGE PEELE
Old Age
David and Bethsabe
From A Farewell to Sir John Norris and Sir Francis
Drake'
Extracts from the Diary
1553? -1598?
BY J. F. BINGHAM
From 'Le Mie Prigioni': His Purpose in writing the Book;
Arrest and First Day in Prison; The Romance with
Maddalena; Two Visits from his Father; His Sufferings
from Heat and Gnats in the Piombi; The Romance
with Zanze; His Sufferings from Cold; The Reception.
of the Final Sentence; His Journey to the Final Prison
of the Spielberg; The First Day in the Prison of
Spielberg; His First Experience of the Diet of Spiel-
berg Prison; He Assumes the Prison Uniform; He
Tries to Live on the "Quarter-Portion"; The Comfort
and the Pang of Sympathy
Meeting of Francesca and Paolo (Francesca da Rimini')
1633-1703
1789-1854
BY ARTHUR GEORGE PESKETT
PAGE
11195
II2IO
11223
11258
11263
11283
## p. 10814 (#22) ###########################################
JOSÉ MARIA DE PEREDA
CHARLES PERRAULT
X
Tuerto's Family Life (La Leva')
The Candidate Visits his Voters (Los Hombres de Pro')
The Portrait of Don Gonzalo Gonzalez of Gonzalez-Town
(Don Gonzalo Gonzalez de la Gonzalera ')
Cleto's Proposal to Sotileza ('Sotileza')
Little Red Riding-Hood
The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood
Blue Beard
Toads and Diamonds
ALEXANDER PETÖFI
BY WILLIAM HENRY BISHOP
PERSIUS (AULUS PERSIUS FLACCUS)
The Author's Ambition
A Child's Trick
"We Twa"
PETRARCH
Master Paul
Song of Lament
May-Night
Dreaming
Faithfulness
LIVED
1834-
Indifference
1628-1703
34-62 A. D.
BY CHARLES HARVEY GENUNG
A Vow
Sorrow and Joy
Wife and Sword
1823-1849
Cur Country
One Only Thought
1304-1374
PAGE
11305
He Extols the Beauty and Virtue of Laura
The Death-Bed of Laura
On the Announcement of the Death of Laura
She is Ever Present to Him
11323
11343
11347
11357
BY J. F. BINGHAM
To the Princes of Italy, Exhorting Them to Set Her Free
To Rienzi, Beseeching Him to Restore to Rome her An-
cient Liberty
To the Virgin Mary
To the Fountain of Vaucluse - Contemplations of Death
He Paints the Beauties of Laura, and his Unalterable Love
## p. 10815 (#23) ###########################################
xi
PETRARCH Continued:
—
LIVED
He Thanks Her for Returning to Console Him
Vaucluse has Become to Him a Scene of Pain
His Only Desire is Again to be With Her
He Revisits Vaucluse
He Feels that the Day of their Reunion is at Hand
He Seeks Solitude, but Love Follows Him Everywhere
He Prays God to Turn Him to a Better Life
His Praises Cannot Reach Laura's Perfection
Her Counsel Alone Affords Him Relief
Sonnet Found in Laura's Tomb
PETRONIUS ARBITER First Century A. D. : Died 66
BY HARRIET WATERS PRESTON
The Adventure of the Cloak
Trimalchio's Reminiscences
Laudator Temporis Acti
The Master of the Feast
On Dreams
Epitaph on a Favorite Hunting-Dog
PHILEMON (361-263 B. C. ), MENANDER (342-291 B. C. ),
AND THE LOST ATTIC COMEDY
BY WILLIAM CRANSTON LAWTON
Susarion (Sixth Century B. C. ): Women
Teleclides (Fifth Century B. C. ): The Age of Gold
Cratinus (same): Wine versus Water
Hermippus (same): Imports of Athens; The Best Wines.
Eupolis (same): Honor to Home Talent
Phrynichus (same): Eulogy on Sophocles
Alexis (393-287 B. C. ): Vanity Fair
Amphis (Fourth Century): Life and Death
Anaxandrides (same): Health, Beauty, Wealth
Antiphanes (same): The Comic Poet's Grievances
Timocles (same): Office of Tragedy
Philemon: Peace is Happiness; Tears; Tyranny of Cus-
tom; Diversity of Character
Menander: Desert a Beggar Born; Monotony; The Claims
of Long Descent; The Poor Relation Goes a-Visiting;
The Misery of Tyranny; Knowledge; Aphorisms
PAGE
11384
11397
## p. 10816 (#24) ###########################################
## p. 10817 (#25) ###########################################
LIST OF PORTRAITS
IN VOL. XIX
Margaret Oliphant Wilson Oliphant
Francis Sylvester O'Mahony (Father Prout)
John Boyle O'Reilly
Ouida (Louise De La Ramée)
Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso)
Thomas Nelson Page
Édouard Pailleron
Thomas Paine
John Gorham Palfrey
William Gifford Palgrave
Frederik Paludan-Müller
Emilia Pardo-Bazán
Theodore Parker
Francis Parkman
James Parton
Blaise Pascal
Walter Pater
Coventry Patmore
James Kirke Paulding
Silvio Pellico
Samuel Pepys
Charles Perrault
Persius (Aulus Persius Flaccus)
Alexander Petöfi
Petrarch
Petronius Arbiter
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Full page
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Vignette
Full page
Full page
Vignette
## p. 10818 (#26) ###########################################
## p. 10819 (#27) ###########################################
10819
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
(1828-1897)
BY HARRIET WATERS PRESTON
M
ARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT was born in Midlothian,
in 1828, and published her first novel, 'Some Passages in
the Life of Mrs. Margaret Maitland of Sunnyside,' at the
early age of twenty. Since then, this prolific writer has given to the
world some seventy romances; a large number of historical and criti-
cal essays; English Literature at the End of the Eighteenth and
Beginning of the Nineteenth Century' (3
vols. ); the Victorian Age of English Lit-
erature; the Makers of Florence, Venice,
and Rome-designed as historical guide-
books for the visitor to those cities; a good
many short lives of artists and men of let-
ters for different English series; and some
half-dozen extensive and carefully studied
biographies of famous men and women,
which take rank with the best contempo-
rary work in that important line.
As a mere monument of industry, this
library of a hundred odd volumes would
command respect; still more when we con-
sider the high average level of literary ex-
cellence maintained throughout these many books. All are written
with ease and natural eloquence, and some with charming spirit;
while the truly extraordinary imaginative power displayed in a sketch
like that of 'The Beleaguered City,' the nice critical discernment of
many of the essays, and especially the keen yet sympathetic divina-
tion of human character and motive which gives their highest value
to both the novels and the biographies, constitute an assemblage of
qualities rarely associated in the same writer, and go to make up a
noteworthy and almost unique life work.
Many of Mrs. Oliphant's earlier stories and essays appeared in
Blackwood's Magazine, to which she was for years a principal con-
tributor. It was the picturesque tale of Zaidee,' published in 1856,
which first revealed her peculiar vein of arch and quietly ironical
MARGARET OLIPHANT
## p. 10820 (#28) ###########################################
10820
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
humor. Mr. Ruskin was then at the summit of his grave ascendency
over the romantic mind; but no one is more likely than himself to
have relished the detailed description of Mr. Burtonshaw's new house,
which was provided, in deference to a recent recommendation of his
own, with a species of richly sculptured spout through which articles.
of food were "shunted" to the beggars, for whom comfortable seats
had also been provided under the back porch; -a process which
went on to the satisfaction of all parties, until it was discovered that
the family plate was rapidly disappearing by the same convenient
channel.
Seven years later, in the 'Chronicles of Carlingford,' we find Mrs.
Oliphant at the height of her descriptive and dramatic power. Here,
like Mr. Trollope in the 'Chronicles of Barset,' and George Eliot in
'Middlemarch,' she annexed and made her own a small province of
English life, which she developed, thoroughly and delightfully, in all
its grades of rank and shades of opinion. Good and bad, élite and
vulgar, clergy and laity, the denizens of the ideal country town of a
generation ago live and move amid their mellow old-fashioned sur-
roundings, with all their curious and inevitable, yet often unconscious
action and reaction upon one another. Mrs. Oliphant's humor is at
its richest in depicting the career of that great altruist and gallant
social reformer, Lucilla Marjoribanks; and she has seldom struck a
deeper note of tragedy than in the histories of the proud and perse-
cuted young minister of Salem Chapel, and the Roman Catholic con-
vert Gerald Wentworth. Some of her later tales, however, as, for
example, The Story of Valentine and his Brother,' (Sir Tom,' 'In
Trust,' 'A House Divided against Itself,' and 'The Cuckoo in the
Nest,' are better constructed than the Chronicles, which are essen-
tially novels of character rather than of plot. Her greatest fault as
a story-teller has always been a tendency to over-minute analysis
of motive and mood; and to an undue repetition of her own reflec-
tions upon her people, who are after all so thoroughly alive that
they may usually be trusted to act and speak for themselves.
The admirable 'Life of Edward Irving' appeared almost simultane-
ously with the earliest Chronicle of Carlingford. Mrs. Oliphant was
now at the "half-way house," and her power of characterization was
fully ripe. She had, moreover, in this particular case, a very strong
sympathy with her subject, and unusual qualifications for dealing
with its difficulties. Herself a loyal Scot in race, and a born Presby-
terian, she knew by instinct the sources of that strange spirit, and
all the conditions of the bleak Lowland life into which it was born.
The early struggles of Edward Irving, his piety and his ambition;
the terrible test of his sudden and unparalleled London popular-
ity, and that other test, no less terrible, of its abrupt decline; the
## p. 10821 (#29) ###########################################
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
10821
grotesque fanaticism which invaded his originally healthful mind,
and disgraced him irremediably with the world polite; the tragedy of
his expulsion from the fold of his fathers, and of his early death
in uttermost humiliation and sadness; —into all these experiences his
biographer could and did enter without an effort. She perceived his
desperate sincerity, and became his impassioned apologist; and in a
narrative more thrilling than most of her fictions, she compelled the
attention of a scoffing world. She must be held completely to have
vindicated the blameless private conduct, and the perfectly disinter-
ested purpose, of the eccentric founder of the so-called Catholic Apos-
tolic Church. The life of Edward Irving was a triumphant piece of
special pleading. That of Count Charles de Montalembert, published
in 1872,-exactly a decade later,- shows abilities of a yet higher
order; for it contains an exposition both lucid and dispassionate of
an even more obscure bit of modern religious history. Mrs. Oli-
phant had become familiar with the man Montalembert while making
her excellent translation of his monumental work on the Monks of the
West; and she brought to the estimation of his fine character and
conspicuous course, a thorough knowledge of the questions and con-
troversies with which his name is identified, and an exquisite poise of
judgment. It had always been a great puzzle to the Protestant mind,
how the three famous men who led that untimely movement toward
liberalism inside the Catholic Church, and gave the proud name of
"The Future" to the short-lived journal which they edited,- how
Lamennais, Lacordaire, and Montalembert could have been all that
they were, and no more; all so revolutionary and two so reactionary.
Mrs. Oliphant has virtually solved the enigma; and her account of the
way in which Henri Lacordaire received the rebuff of the Holy See,
when the three associates in the publication of L'Avenir had gone
with so naïf a confidence to seek the papal sanction for their gener-
ous undertaking, strikingly illustrates her power of putting herself in
the place of one whose conclusions are erroneous to her, and whose
action she more than half deplores.
Mrs. Oliphant has written three more biographies of unusual in-
terest and merit: the lives of St. Francis of Assisi, of Jeanne d'Arc,
and of her own distinguished kinsman, Laurence Oliphant. They
may best be considered together, for her view of each of these curi-
ously diverse careers is modified by a marked feature of her own
mind, her tendency, namely, toward religious mysticism. She is
herself, apparently, deeply persuaded not merely of the reality of a
future life, but of the existence, all about us, of a super-sensual scheme
of things, having a perfectly definite though as yet unfathomed con-
nection with the things which we see and hear. Into this mysterious
region -so near and yet so far-our own loved ones vanish when
-
## p. 10822 (#30) ###########################################
10822
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
they depart from us. What do they there become to one another,
and what may they still be to ourselves? It is needless to say that
Mrs. Oliphant has not answered this importunate question; but she
has the air of having received light upon it, which she imparts in
what may be described, collectively, as her Studies of the Unseen.
The first, and altogether the most symmetrical and remarkable, of
this series which includes 'Old Lady Mary,' 'The Little Pilgrim,'
and some others - appeared in 1880. It was called 'A Beleaguered
City,' and purports to be the attested narrative of the maire and
sundry citizens of the town of Semur in Haute Bretagne, of a singu-
lar series of events which at one time took place in that municipal-
ity. These amounted to no less than an invasion of the town by the
innumerable souls of all its deceased citizens, and the expulsion in a
body of the living, who remained encamped without the walls while.
the supernatural visitation continued. Nothing can surpass the veri-
similitude with which this strange and powerful conception is wrought
out. The energy of its first inspiration never flags. There is not
an inconsistent occurrence, and hardly a superfluous word, in all the
thrilling narrative. The French instinct in matters religious, so ten-
der and genuine though so alien to our own, and the French turn
of thought as well as expression, are faultlessly preserved. Here, for
once, Mrs. Oliphant's very style, so apt to be redundant and dis-
cursive, is perfect in its direct simplicity. It is her highest literary
achievement; a sacred poem in prose, which shakes the soul at the
first perusal almost with the force of an actual revelation.
It is easy to see that to a mind capable of such a conception,
both the visions of St. Francis and the "voices" of Jeanne d'Arc
would possess a peculiar interest; and that Mrs. Oliphant would not
be disposed to regard either from a strictly rationalistic point of
view. She does not pretend to do so; but while clearly avowing her
own belief in the direct Divine guidance of both the saint and the
martyr, she searches the best sources of information concerning the
material and mundane side of their careers, in the most patient
and critical spirit of modern inquiry. This is especially the case in
the life of Jeanne d'Arc, where the but recently published 'Procès'
is followed step by step, and the defense of the supposed sorcer-
ess is allowed to rest almost entirely on her own artless and solemn
asseverations. Nor has Mrs. Oliphant ever shown herself more truly
judicial than in her manner of apportioning the responsibility for the
hideous and cowardly crime of Jeanne's murder, between the vin-
dictive English authorities of the day and the Maid's own faithless
countrymen.
In describing the strange career of that most modern-minded of
mystics, her own far-away cousin Laurence Oliphant, our author had
## p. 10823 (#31) ###########################################
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
10823
to deal with the problem of a soul's destiny under strikingly novel
conditions. But though she cannot repress her honorable scorn for
the element of vulgar charlatanry in the self-styled Prophet, at
whose bidding Laurence Oliphant, his mother and his wife, sacrificed
so much, her testimony is no less clear and unhesitating than in the
case of the medieval devotees, to the reality of that higher life for
which they gladly lost all that is supposed to render this life desir-
able to highly civilized creatures. This testimony is, in fact, Mrs.
Oliphant's true message to the world; and in bearing it she but
ranges herself with the chief seers of her own generation,— with
Tennyson and with Browning, both of whom departed from an un-
believing world with the word of faith upon their lips.
For the rest, the 'Life of Laurence Oliphant' is upon the whole
the ablest of the three biographies which have here been grouped
together. The author touchingly acknowledges, in her preface, the
assistance in preparing it of her gifted son, Francis Oliphant, whose
early death has been one of the heaviest sorrows of her later years.
But to dwell on the number of those years, or anticipate the hand
of time, would be both ungrateful and impertinent in the readers of
one whose power of sustained production has proved so very excep-
tional, and whose natural force is apparently quite unabated.
She died June
[This was written before Mrs. Oliphant's death.
25th, 1897, after this article was in type. ]
Harmet Mac's Preston
A COMFORT TO HER DEAR PAPA
From Miss Marjoribanks'
M
ISS MARJORIBANKS lost her mother when she was only fif-
teen, and when, to add to the misfortune, she was absent
at school, and could not have it in her power to soothe
her dear mamma's last moments, as she herself said. Words are
sometimes very poor exponents of such an event; but it hap-
pens now and then, on the other hand, that a plain intimation
expresses too much, and suggests emotion and suffering which in
reality have but little if any existence. Mrs. Marjoribanks, poor
lady, had been an invalid for many years; she had grown a lit-
tle peevish in her loneliness, not feeling herself of much account
in this world. There are some rare natures that are content
## p. 10824 (#32) ###########################################
10824
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
to acquiesce in the general neglect, and forget themselves when
they find themselves forgotten; but it is unfortunately much
more usual to take the plan adopted by Mrs. Marjoribanks, who
devoted all her powers, during the last ten years of her life, to
the solacement and care of that poor self which other people
neglected. The consequence was, that when she disappeared
from her sofa,-except from the mere physical fact that she was
no longer there, - no one except her maid, whose occupation was
gone, could have found out much difference. Her husband, it is
true, who had somewhere, hidden deep in some secret corner of
his physical organization, the remains of a heart, experienced a
certain sentiment of sadness when he re-entered the house from
which she had gone away forever. But Dr. Marjoribanks was too
busy a man to waste his feelings on a mere sentiment.
His daughter, however, was only fifteen, and had floods of
tears at her command, as was natural at that age.
All the way
home she revolved the situation in her mind, which was con-
siderably enlightened by novels and popular philosophy; for the
lady at the head of Miss Marjoribanks's school was a devoted
admirer of Friends in Council,' and was fond of bestowing
that work as a prize, with pencil-marks on the margin,- so that
Lucilla's mind had been cultivated, and was brimful of the best
of sentiments. She made up her mind on her journey to a great
many virtuous resolutions; for in such a case as hers, it was evi-
dently the duty of an only child to devote herself to her father's
comfort, and become the sunshine of his life, as so many young
persons of her age have been known to become in literature.
Miss Marjoribanks had a lively mind, and was capable of grasping
all the circumstances of the situation at a glance. Thus between
the outbreaks of her tears for her mother, it became apparent to
her that she must sacrifice her own feelings, and make a cheer-
ful home for papa, and that a great many changes would be
necessary in the household-changes which went so far as even
to extend to the furniture. Miss Marjoribanks sketched to herself,
as she lay back in the corner of the railway carriage with her
veil down, how she would wind herself up to the duty of pre-
siding at her papa's dinner parties, and charming everybody by
her good-humor and brightness, and devotion to his comfort; and
how, when it was all over, she would withdraw and cry her eyes
out in her own room, and be found in the morning languid and
worn-out, but always heroical, ready to go down-stairs and assist
## p. 10825 (#33) ###########################################
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
10825
at her dear papa's breakfast, and keep up her smiles for him till
he had gone out to his patients.
«<
Altogether the picture was a very pretty one; and consider-
ing that a great many young ladies in deep mourning put force
upon their feelings in novels, and maintain a smile for the benefit
of the observant male creatures of whom they have the charge,
the idea was not at all extravagant, considering again that Miss
Marjoribanks was but fifteen. She was not however exactly the
kind of figure for this mise en scène. When her schoolfellows
talked of her to their friends,- for Lucilla was already an im-
portant personage at Mount Pleasant,—the most common descrip-
tion they gave of her was that she was a large girl"; and there
was great truth in the adjective. She was not to be described
as a tall girl, which conveys an altogether different idea, but
she was large in all particulars,- full and well developed, with
somewhat large features; not at all pretty as yet, though it was
known in Mount Pleasant that somebody had said that such a
face might ripen into beauty, and become "grandiose," for any-
thing anybody could tell. Miss Marjoribanks was not vain: but
the word had taken possession of her imagination, as was nat-
ural, and solaced her much when she made the painful discovery
that her gloves were half a number larger, and her shoes a hair-
breadth broader, than those of any of her companions; but the
hands and the feet were both perfectly well shaped, and being
at the same time well clothed and plump, were much more pre-
sentable and pleasant to look upon than the lean rudimentary
schoolgirl hands with which they were surrounded. To add to
these excellences, Lucilla had a mass of hair, which, if it could
but have been cleared a little in its tint, would have been golden,
though at present it was nothing more than tawny, and curly
to exasperation. She wore it in large thick curls, which did not
however float or wave, or do any of the graceful things which
curls ought to do; for it had this aggravating quality, that it
would not grow long, but would grow ridiculously unmanageably
thick, to the admiration of her companions, but to her own.
despair, for there was no knowing what to do with those short
but ponderous locks.
These were the external characteristics of the girl who was
going home to be a comfort to her widowed father, and meant
to sacrifice herself to his happiness. In the course of her rapid.
journey she had already settled upon everything that had to be
## p. 10826 (#34) ###########################################
10826
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
done; or rather, to speak more truly, had rehearsed everything,
according to the habit already acquired by a quick mind a good
deal occupied with itself. First she meant to fall into her
father's arms,-forgetting, with that singular facility for over-
looking the peculiarities of others which belongs to such a char-
acter, that Dr. Marjoribanks was very little given to embracing,
and that a hasty kiss on her forehead was the warmest caress he
had ever given his daughter,- and then to rush up to the cham-
ber of death and weep over dear mamma. "And to think I was
not there to soothe her last moments! " Lucilla said to herself
with a sob, and with feelings sufficiently real in their way. After
this, the devoted daughter made up her mind to come down-
stairs again, pale as death, but self-controlled, and devote herself
to papa. Perhaps, if great emotion should make him tearless,-
as such cases had been known,- Miss Marjoribanks would steal
into his arms unawares, and so surprise him into weeping. All
this went briskly through her mind, undeterred by the reflection
that tears were as much out of the doctor's way as embraces;
and in this mood she sped swiftly along in the inspiration of her
first sorrow, as she imagined,- but in reality to suffer her first
disappointment, which was of a less soothing character than that
mild and manageable grief.
When Miss Marjoribanks reached home, her mother had been
dead for twenty-four hours; and her father was not at the door
to receive her as she had expected, but by the bedside of a
patient in extremity, who could not consent to go out of the
world without the doctor. This was a sad reversal of her inten-
tions, but Lucilla was not the woman to be disconcerted. She
carried out the second part of her programme without either
interference or sympathy, except from Mrs. Marjoribanks's maid,
who had some hopes from the moment of her arrival. "I can't
abear to think as I'm to be parted from you all, miss," sobbed
the faithful attendant. "I've lost the best missus as ever was,
and I shouldn't mind going after her. Whenever any one gets
a good friend in this world, they're the first to be took away,"
said the weeping handmaiden, who naturally saw her own loss in
the most vivid light.
"Ah, Ellis," cried Miss Marjoribanks, reposing her sorrow in
the arms of this anxious attendant, "we must try to be a com-
fort to poor papa! " With this end, Lucilla made herself very
troublesome to the sober-minded doctor during those few dim
## p. 10827 (#35) ###########################################
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
10827
days before the faint and daily lessening shadow of poor Mrs.
Marjoribanks was removed altogether from the house. When
that sad ceremony had taken place, and the doctor returned
serious enough, heaven knows-to the great house, where the
faded helpless woman, who had notwithstanding been his love.
and his bride in other days, lay no longer on the familiar sofa,
the crisis arrived which Miss Marjoribanks had rehearsed so often;
but after quite a different fashion. The widower was tearless,
indeed; but not from excess of emotion. On the contrary, a pain-
ful heaviness possessed him when he became aware how little
real sorrow was in his mind, and how small an actual loss was
this loss of his wife, which bulked before the world as an event
of just as much magnitude as the loss, for example, which poor
Mr. Lake, the drawing-master, was at the same moment suffering.
It was even sad, in another point of view, to think of a human
creature passing out of the world and leaving so little trace that
she had ever been there. As for the pretty creature whom Dr.
Marjoribanks had married, she had vanished into thin air years
and years ago.
These thoughts were heavy enough,- perhaps
even more overwhelming than that grief which develops love to
its highest point of intensity. But such were not precisely the
kind of reflections which could be solaced by paternal attendrisse-
ment over a weeping and devoted daughter.
It was May, and the weather was warm for the season: but
Lucilla had caused the fire to be lighted in the large gloomy
library where Dr. Marjoribanks always sat in the evenings, with
the idea that it would be "a comfort" to him; and for the same
reason she had ordered tea to be served there, instead of the
dinner, for which her father, as she imagined, could have little
appetite. When the doctor went into his favorite seclusion, tired
and heated and sad,- for even on the day of his wife's funeral
the favorite doctor of Carlingford had patients to think of,- the
very heaviness of his thoughts gave warmth to his indignation.
He had longed for the quiet and the coolness and the solitude
of his library, apart from everybody; and when he found it radi-
ant with firelight, tea set on the table, and Lucilla crying by
the fire in her new crape, the effect upon a temper by no means
perfect may be imagined. The unfortunate man threw both
the windows open and rang the bell violently, and gave instant.
orders for the removal of the unnecessary fire and the tea service.
## p. 10828 (#36) ###########################################
10828
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
"Let me know when dinner is ready," he said in a voice like
thunder; "and if Miss Marjoribanks wants a fire, let it be lighted
in the drawing-room. "
Lucilla was so much taken by surprise by this sudden over-
throw of her programme, that she submitted as a girl of much
less spirit might have done, and suffered herself and her fire.
and her tea things to be dismissed up-stairs; where she wept still
more at sight of dear mamma's sofa, and where Ellis came to
mingle her tears with those of her young mistress, and to beg
dear Miss Lucilla, for the sake of her precious 'ealth and her dear
papa, to be persuaded to take some tea. On the whole, master
stood lessened in the eyes of all the household by his ability to
eat his dinner, and his resentment at having his habitudes dis-
turbed. "Them men would eat and drink if we was all in our
graves," said the indignant cook, who indeed had a real griev-
ance; and the outraged sentiment of the kitchen was avenged
by a bad and hasty dinner, which the doctor, though generally
"very particular," swallowed without remark.
About an hour afterwards he went up-stairs to the drawing-
room, where Miss Marjoribanks was waiting for him, much less
at ease than she had expected to be. Though he gave a little
sigh at the sight of his wife's sofa, he did not hesitate to sit
down upon it, and even to draw it a little out of its position,
which, as Lucilla described afterwards, was like a knife going
into her heart; though indeed she had herself decided already,
in the intervals of her tears, that the drawing-room furniture had
got very faded and shabby, and that it would be very expedient
to have it renewed for the new reign of youth and energy which
was about to commence. As for the doctor, though Miss Mar-
joribanks thought him insensible, his heart was heavy enough.
His wife had gone out of the world without leaving the least
mark of her existence, except in that large girl, whose spirits
and forces were unbounded, but whose discretion at the present
moment did not seem much greater than her mother's. Instead
of thinking of her as a comfort, the doctor felt himself called
upon to face a new and unexpected embarrassment. It would
have been a satisfaction to him just then to have been left to
himself, and permitted to work on quietly at his profession, and
to write his papers for the Lancet, and to see his friends now
and then when he chose; for Dr. Marjoribanks was not a man
## p. 10829 (#37) ###########################################
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
10829
who had any great need of sympathy by nature, or who was at
all addicted to demonstrations of feeling: consequently he drew
his wife's sofa a little further from the fire, and took his seat
on it soberly, quite unaware that by so doing he was putting a
knife into his daughter's heart.
"I hope you have had something to eat, Lucilla," he said:
"don't get into that foolish habit of flying to tea as a man flies
to a dram. It's a more innocent stimulant, but it's the same
kind of intention. I am not so much against a fire: it has
always a kind of cheerful look. "
"Oh, papa,” cried his daughter, with a flood of indignant
tears, "you can't suppose I want anything to look cheerful this
dreadful day. "
"I am far from blaming you, my dear," said the doctor: "it
is natural you should cry. I am sorry I did not write for my
sister to come, who would have taken care of you; but I dislike
strangers in the house at such a time. However, I hope, Lucilla,
you will soon feel yourself able to return to school; occupation
is always the best remedy, and you will have your friends and
companions »
"Papa! " cried Miss Marjoribanks; and then she summoned
courage, and rushed up to him, and threw herself and her clouds
of crape on the carpet at his side (and it may here be mentioned
that Lucilla had seized the opportunity to have her mourning made
long, which had been the desire of her heart, baffled by mamma
and governess, for at least a year). "Papa! " she exclaimed with
fervor, raising to him her tear-stained face, and clasping her fair
plump hands, "oh, don't send me away! I was only a silly girl
the other day, but this has made me a woman. Though I can
never, never hope to take dear mamma's place, and be-all-
that she was to you, still I feel I can be a comfort to you if you
will let me. You shall not see me cry any more," cried Lucilla
with energy, rubbing away her tears. "I will never give way to
my feelings. I will ask for no companions-nor-nor anything.
As for pleasure, that is all over. O papa, you shall never see
me regret anything, or wish for anything. I will give up every-
thing in the world to be a comfort to you! "
This address, which was utterly unexpected, drove Dr. Mar-
joribanks to despair. He said, "Get up, Lucilla; " but the de-
voted daughter knew better than to get up. She hid her face
in her hands, and rested her hands upon her mother's sofa,
-
## p. 10830 (#38) ###########################################
10830
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
where the doctor was sitting; and the sobs of that emotion
which she meant to control henceforward, echoed through the
room: "It is only for this once-I can - cannot help it," she
cried.
-
When her father found that he could neither soothe her nor
succeed in raising her, he got up himself, which was the only
thing left to him, and began to walk about the room with hasty
steps. Her mother too had possessed this dangerous faculty of
tears; and it was not wonderful if the sober-minded doctor,
roused for the first time to consider his little girl as a creature
possessed of individual character, should recognize, with a thrill
of dismay, the appearance of the same qualities which had wearied.
his life out, and brought his youthful affections to an untimely
end. Lucilla was, it is true, as different from her mother as
summer from winter; but Dr. Marjoribanks had no means of
knowing that his daughter was only doing her duty by him
in his widowhood, according to a programme of filial devotion
resolved upon, in accordance with the best models, some days
before.
Accordingly, when her sobs had ceased, her father returned.
and raised her up not unkindly, and placed her in her chair.
In doing so, the doctor put his finger by instinct upon Lucilla's
pulse, which was sufficiently calm and well regulated to reassure
the most anxious parent. And then a furtive momentary smile
gleamed for a single instant round the corners of his mouth.
"It is very good of you to propose sacrificing yourself for
me," he said; "and if you would sacrifice your excitement in the
mean time, and listen to me quietly, it would really be some-
thing: but you are only fifteen, Lucilla, and I have no wish to
take you from school just now;- wait till I have done. Your
poor mother is gone, and it is very natural you should cry; but
you were a good child to her on the whole, which. will be a
comfort to you. We did everything that could be thought of to
prolong her days, and when that was impossible, to lessen what
she had to suffer; and we have every reason to hope," said the
doctor, as indeed he was accustomed to say in the exercise of
his profession to mourning relatives, "that she's far better off
now than if she had been with us. When that is said, I don't
know that there is anything more to add. I am not fond of
sacrifices, either one way or another; and I've a great objection
to any one making a sacrifice for me
>>>
-
――――
## p. 10831 (#39) ###########################################
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
10831
"But oh, papa, it would be no sacrifice," said Lucilla, "if you
would only let me be a comfort to you! "
"That is just where it is, my dear," said the steady doctor:
"I have been used to be left a great deal to myself; and I am
not prepared to say that the responsibility of having you here
without a mother to take care of you, and all your lessons inter-
rupted, would not neutralize any comfort you might be. You
see," said Dr. Marjoribanks, trying to soften matters a little,
"a man is what his habits make him; and I have been used to
be left a great deal to myself. It answers in some cases, but I
doubt if it would answer with me. "
And then there was a pause, in which Lucilla wept and stifled
her tears in her handkerchief, with a warmer flood of vexation
and disappointment than even her natural grief had produced.
"Of course, papa, if I can't be any comfort—I will go back to
school," she sobbed, with a touch of sullenness which did not
escape the doctor's ear.
"Yes, my dear, you will certainly go back to school," said the
peremptory father: "I never had any doubt on that subject.
You can stay over Sunday and rest yourself. Monday or Tues-
day will be time enough to go back to Mount Pleasant; and now
you had better ring the bell, and get somebody to bring you
something or I'll see to that when I go down-stairs.
It's get-
ting late, and this has been a fatiguing day. I'll send you up
some negus, and I think you had better go to bed. "
And with these commonplace words, Dr. Marjoribanks with-
drew in calm possession of the field. As for Lucilla, she obeyed
him, and betook herself to her own room; and swallowed her
negus with a sense not only of defeat, but of disappointment and
mortification, which was very unpleasant. To go back again
and be an ordinary schoolgirl, after the pomp of woe in which
she had come away, was naturally a painful thought;-she who
had ordered her mourning to be made long, and contemplated
new furniture in the drawing-room, and expected to be mistress
of her father's house, not to speak of the still dearer privilege
of being a comfort to him; and now, after all, her active mind
was to be condemned over again to verbs and chromatic scales,
though she felt within herself capacities so much more extended.
Miss Marjoribanks did not by any means learn by this defeat to
take the characters of the other personæ in her little drama into
consideration, when she rehearsed her pet scenes hereafter,
for
## p. 10832 (#40) ###########################################
10832
MARGARET OLIPHANT WILSON OLIPHANT
that is a knowledge slowly acquired, but she was wise enough
to know when resistance was futile; and like most people of
lively imagination, she had a power of submitting to circum-
stances when it became impossible to change them. Thus she
consented to postpone her reign, if not with a good grace, yet
still without foolish resistance, and retired with the full honors
of war.
She had already rearranged all the details, and settled
upon all the means possible of preparing herself for what she
called the charge of the establishment when her final emancipa-
tion took place, before she returned to school. "Papa thought me
too young," she said, when she reached Mount Pleasant, "though
it was dreadful to come away and leave him alone with only the
servants: but dear Miss Martha, you will let me learn all about
political economy and things, to help me manage everything; for
now that dear mamma is gone, there is nobody but me to be a
comfort to papa. "
And by this means Miss Marjoribanks managed to influence
the excellent woman who believed in 'Friends in Council,' and to
direct the future tenor of her education; while at least, in that
one moment of opportunity, she had achieved long dresses, which
was a visible mark of womanhood, and a step which could not be
retraced.
