New Publications [pp. 139-144]

142 ArEW PUBLICATlOArS. [Oct.,
It is a love-story full of the real "sweetness and light" that accompany, without any affectation or any straining after effects, a life of sound
Catholic piety when adorned by cultivated manners. The heroine is in a
certain sense an old acquaintance with novel-readers. She is a poor relative whose heart is made to suffer in order that the matrimonial interests
of her more fortunate relatives may not be damaged, and especially that the
strong and rather tyrannical will of the otherwise kind old lady who is her
guardian may not be thwarted. Though there is not much of what is called
plot, the story runs on in a very lifelike way, and, fortunately for the reader as well as the heroine, turns out as it should, in every one being made
happy without any resort to theatrical expedients. It is easy, though, for
the reader to see how it might quite naturally have turned out otherwise.
Indeed one of the author's motives obviously was to point to the dangers
that lie in the French fashion by which parents arbitrarily make matches
for their children without regard to their personal choice or f~elings.
Having said so much for this beautiful story, it must in fairness be added that the translation is not always idiomatic, and that sometimes it is
singularly unhappy. For instance, a "pretty French romqnce" is spoken
of, when it is no doubt that a pretty French ballad is meant. Again (p. i5):
"`Yes, indeed,' Blanche answered; and throwing her hat on the canopy,"
etc.-a strange place to throw a hat. The sofa was meant (in French
canap6), no doubt.
Oswi~ THE SAXON; OR, BAPTIZED nv ST. AUGUSTINE. London: D.
Stewart, 49 Essex Street, Strand. 1882.
In the introduction we read that "this little work was designed by the
late Miss Elizabeth Stewart, authoress of several medi~val works, and its
two opening chapters were written a few days before her almost sudden
death." The book, it appears, was developed from the MS. notes left by Miss
Stewart. The intention of the romance-for it is an historical romanceis to show how Christianity tamed and civilized the Anglo-Saxons: how
from ferocious, almost savage, barbarians it made them mild-mannered,
charitable-minded men and women. Historical fiction which professes to
be fiction, as Oswin the Sazon does, is in a sense above cnticism from the
historical point of view; otherwise an objection might be made to the
manifest unfairness in which the famous Conference or Council of Whitby
is described. Miss Stewart, or her editor, had apparently no fondness for
the missionaries who had worked their way down through Saxon England
from Lindisfarne in the north and from Bangor-Beann-chor, i.e., blessed
choir, for Celtic religious life without music was something unheard of-in
the west. The book shows, however, that its author, or editor, had made
considerable research among the authorities on the history of the AngloSaxon Church.
U~c~~ PAT'S CABIN; OR, LIFE AMONG THE AG~~c~~~~~~~ LABORERS OF
IRELAND. By W. C. Upton. Dublin: M. H. Gill & Son. 1882.
Many years ago. when her romance of life "among the lowly" slaves in
the South had made her name famous and she was setting out on a journey to Europe, it was said that Mrs. Stowe was going to visit Ireland with
the intention of writing up "Uncle Pat." But Mrs. Stowe's supposed in