this time. She was busied upon a comedy on which she built great hopes; time only can inform us the probable name of it. Robinson was to pay her two hundred pounds for the Simple Story,' of which we shall speak at large in the following chapter. VOL. I. S CHAPTER XII. The Simple Story'-Sketch of it-Connexion of its two parts suggested by The Winter's Tale'-Striking passages in the novel-The character of Dorriforth-Her premonition to the second part-Rousseau's Emile ’—Establishes herself as one of the greatest ornaments of her sex. WE are now arrived at the production which bears the highest testimony to the genius of Mrs. Inchbald. There are still living men of strong minds, who speak sincerely when they affirm her 'Simple Story' to be yet unequalled. We conceive her interest, however, to be any thing but simple, in any inferential use of that word. It is a story complicated with powerful character and the strongest passions; operating with a force that becomes irresistible and destructive; such too as could be found only in the peculiar connexion imagined by the author, and the Catholic profession of the leading personage. Dorriforth," says an amiable critic, " is a Romish priest of a lofty mind, generous, and endued with strong sensibilities." When such a character gives himself up to celibacy, we are to expect that nature in him will some way suffer by the sacrifice. He becomes stern and inflexible; because, having commanded his own tendencies, he exacts from others the same performance of duty, however painful; and he literally avenges his own deprivations, when he punishes the errors or vacillations of those around him. The death of a relation opens his succession to a peerage. The continuation of a Catholic peerage in England is thought so important to the See of Rome that the Pope readily dispenses with the vows of the priest; and opens to him a field for the exercise of his sensibilities, which, did nothing occur to counteract them, would in time considerably abate his sternness and inflexibility. By the death of a beloved friend, he becomes the guardian to his daughter; and by her father's will she is to reside under the roof of her guardian. She is a Protestant and fond of pleasure; gay, volatile, and indiscreet: one who fancies beauty to be a law as well as a charm, and thus expects the readiest obedience to her will the moment it is announced. The author has inspired these two persons with a mutual passion. Perhaps they were the least suited to each other that could well be imagined. It was impossible for Dorriforth to approve the levity of Miss Milner, and she was apt to consider indulgence as the only real demon stration of love. The lover at last determines upon a foreign tour, and the destined moment of his departure is, by the most dramatic incident in the piece, rendered that of his union to the agitated ward. 66 Here again we have to notice the Catholic principle that pervades the interest. The tutor and bosom friend of Dorriforth is a Jesuit of profound discernment and rational attachment. He sees prophetically the mischiefs threatened by such an union, and systematically throws every impediment in the way of it, while there is a chance of success. But at the decisive moment, seeing his patron linger, unable to tear himself away, Sandford exclaims, Separate this moment, or resolve to be separated only by death." He then stepped aside to a book-case, and taking thence The Offices of the Church,' opened the marriage ceremonies, and they were on their knees before him. He explains himself very affectingly to them both, and joins their hands. Cold indeed must be the bosom that does not sympathise with the bride, when she sees the carriage that was to bear her lover for ever from her arms drive away empty from the door. Such is the first grand division of her story. The happiness of the lovers seems boundless; but, aware that she intended to change all "such notes for tragic," the author has borrowed a hint from superstition to prepare the minds of her readers, and concludes the volume with the following alarm of her heroine: "Looking on the ring, which Lord Elmwood had put upon her finger in haste when he married her, she perceived it to be a mourning ring." To an actress like Mrs. Inchbald, the Winter's Tale' of Shakspeare was well known she had probably acted both the Mother and the Daughter of that romantic drama, and remembered the expedient fallen upon by the poet to slide over sixteen years, till the Perdita has become nubile, whom, as an infant, we had seen cast out by its jealous and savage father. But our dexterous authoress has had the address to conceal that she follows a precedent, rather than invents an escape; and sinks the same interval in her novel that the poet had done in his play, with a graceful ease of expression quite peculiar to herself. We cannot resist the pleasure of laying it before the reader, in case he should have forgotten the language: "Not any event throughout life can arrest the TIME is here the speaker, addressing the audience : 66 Impute it not a crime To me, or my swift passage, that I slide O'er sixteen years, and leave the growth untried To o'erthrow law, and in one self-born hour |