THE LAIRD OF FORLAW — MR. FAILEA.R'S ERIC. HAPPILY the author of

"Margaret Maitland" is again upon her old ground in The Laird of Arorlaw. Scottish character and Scottish manners are the topics of her theme, with a racy blending of Scottish feeling in its old and its modern forms. Mrs. Elphinstone of Norlaw, is, on her husband's death, with which incident the story opens, the mother of an extremely an- cient and extremely reduced house of three sons. She combines in herself the feudal family pride of an ancient chief, with the religions faith of a covenanter, the rusticity of a straightened Scotch farmer's wife of a generation or two ago, and owing to hot remote and isolated position, an utter ignorance of the living world ; while a national sagacity and resolution dominate over all. Her eldest son, Huntley, has at the bottom, some of his mother's pride of family and of landed substance. But that social atmosphere, which reaches almost as far as the air itself, has shown him the necessity of burying his feelings in his own breast,' so as not to interfere with the worldly struggle he sees before him. Patrick, the second son, is intuitively a "prac- tical man." Although scarcely knowing anything by experience beyond his native district near the Tweed, the newspapers he has seen and their reports of steam-boats, of the railway experi- ment just begun, and of the other wonders connected with the mighty changes steam was even then working, have given him light. He has a conviction that the family dreams are of the past, and must be thrown aside by a man who has his bread to win and his way to make. The youngest and favourite son, Casino, is a loftier likeness of his father. A poetical spirit ele- vates and refines the good-natured but weak and somewhat self- ish character of the sire—selfish that is in no coarse and vulgar way. He merely pursued his own inclinations and neglected his family interests; and the world saw him as his eldest son saw him.

"Young as Huntley was, he looked with eyes full of love and pity upon this boy, who inherited more from his father than his name. Huntley had been brought up in all the natural love and reverence of a well-ordered family ; he knew there was weakness in his father's character, beautiful, lovable, tender weakness, for which, somehow, people only seem to like him better. He had not permitted himself to see yet what harm and selfish un- consciousness of others that graceful temperament had hidden."

1. The Laird of Norlato ' - a Scottish Story. By the Author of "Margaret Mait- land," " Lilliesleaf," &c. In three volumes. Published by Hurst and Blackett. zrie, or Little by Little ; a Tale of Roslyn School. By Frederic W. Farrar, reii0W- Of Trinity College, Cambridge. Published by Black, Edinbuegb, The story isfi the, novels in if anuresis the caress of these three sons. H-nntley emigrates to .Atiatralia, determined to aNaire means to discharge the encumbrances on the land of Norlaw. po. trick, throwing aside the notions of Scotch gentility, resolves to become an engineer, and begins by studying the mechanical part as a workman. Cosmo devotes himself to discovering a first lose of his fatheeli, whose memory though she jilted him was green the last, and her name uttered in his dying momeuts. Tut do, votion does not altogether originate in romance—though there is what is tailed a romance- connected with it, and which ellased his mother's life. The validity of a will and the succession to en estate depend upon discovering " Ma.ry of Melt:oar" or proms' her death.

With the separation of the family consequent upon these re. so/vet the interest of the story will probably begin lbr- the siren. lating;library reader. In a critioal sense, the introductory nar., rative and scenery possess the most quiet attraction. They have not indeed the movement, variety of persons and incidents, or the surprises of the latter and larger section. But these things rather partake of the character of the general novel in their eonception though possessing freshness from-the style of the author. Re; original observation and minute lifelike .painting mingled with reflections appear more distinctly in the .scenes at Realitw. k part of the owner's deathbed will serve as an instance. "The three sons of the house were in the r000m watching with their ma. ther. Huntley, who could scarcely keep still even in the awe.of this shadow of death, stood by the front window, often drawing closet,* the bed, but ua, able to continue there. The second, who was his mother's son, a healthful, ruddy-, practical lad, kept on the opposite aide of the bed, ready to help his Mother m moving the patient. And at the foot, concealed by the en

a delicate boy of fifteen, with his face buried in his hands, sat. upon an o square ottoman, observing nothing. This was Cosmo, the youngest and favourite, the only one of his children who ,reallyresembled. Norlaw.

"The caprice of change was strong upon the dying man ; he wanted his position altered twenty times in half an honr. He had not anything much to say, yet he was hard to please 'for the Manner-of' saying it ; and longed, half in a human and tender yearning for remembrance, and half with the weakness of his character, that his children should naver.forget these last words of his, no the circumstances of hie, dying. He was a,good maa, but he carried the defects of his personality with him te, the very doer of heaven, When, at last, the pillows were arranged round him, so as to raise him on his bed in the attitude he wished, he called his Children, in his trembling voice. Huntley came forward from the window, witha swelling haut, scarcely able to keep down the tears of his first grief. Pktrinic stood by the bedside, holding down his head, with a stubborn composure—and Comm, stealing forward, threw himself on his knees and hid his sobbing in the coverlid. They were all on one side, and on the other stood,the mother, the care on her brow blanching into conviction, and all her tremulous anxiety Calmed" with a determination not to disturb this last scene. It was the last. Hope could not stand before the look of death upon that face. t" lify sons ' said Norlaw, I am just dying ; but I know where I ma in this strait, trusting in my Saviour. You'll remember I said this, when I'm gone.' "There was a pause. Cosmo sobbed aloud in the silence, clinging to the coverlid, and Huntley's breast heaved high with a tumultuous motion—but there was not a word said to break the monologue of the father, who was going away. "'And now you'll have no father to guide you further,' he confined, with a strange pity for them in his voice, There's your mother, at my side —as true a wife and as faithful, as ever a man had for a blessing. Boys, I leave your mother for her jointure the love you've had for me. Let her have it all—all—make amends to her. Martha, I've not been the meal might have been to you.'

"These last words were spoken in a tone of sudden compunction, strangely unlike the almost formal dignity of the first part of Ins address, and be turned his eager, dying eyes to her, with a startled apprehension of this truth, foreign to all his previous thoughts. She could not have spoken, to save his life. She took his hand between hers, with a low groan, and held it, looking at him with a pitiful appealing face. The self-accusation vet like an injury to her, and he was persuaded to feel it so, and to return to the current of his thoughts.

"Let your mother be your counseller ; she has ever been mine,' he said once more with his sad, dying dignity. I say nothing about your plans, because plans are ill adjuncts to a deathbed ; but you'll do your best, every one and keep your name without blemish, and fear God and honour your mother. If I were to speak for a twelvemonth I could not sa more to say.' "Again a pause • but this time, besides the sobs of Cosine, Patrick's taut were dropping, like heavy drops of rain, upon the side of the bed, and Huntley crushed the curtain in his hand to support himself, and only &lapel here quite against his nature by strong compulsion of his will. Whether lig deserved it or not, this man's fortune, all his life, had been to be loved."

Mr. Farrar's Erie, or Little by Little, must be considered under two aspects ; as a tale of schoolboy life, and as a species of philosophical novel. In the first Roint of view, it is a work of great power and ability. The incidents are varied and well planned to carry out the scheme of the tale ; the characters an numerous, and conceived with truth as well as embodied with great vramemblance ; the style has a nervous vigour, and runs through many varieties of feeling varying with each. There are too, real flesh-and-blood characteristics pervading the whole that are rarely met with in fiction. The exception to these remarks is the termination ; which has apparently been contrived to produce a powerful pathetic effect, rather than to harmonize with the na- ture of the elements. This exception, however, only extends to the plan. The execution is as truthfully exhibited as the pre. ceding narrative. It might probably be critically objected that the boys talk a shade too little like boys. But to us this is merit. A whole volume of namby-pamby is extremely objection- able. The philosophy of the "Tale of Roslyn School" breaks down. The object of Mr. Farrar is to illustrate by example the moral dangers attendant upon the temptations, boyish brutalities, and other evils of schools. Erie Williams, the son of a civil servant Of the East India Company is sent to England for his health, and brought up, while a little child by his aunt ; and we may say hl poyeathesio that th.e character of Eriela1utate3:Whole- familris nie,obagly As- the:boy approaches his.teens he is re:0110-..goslyn Shool,. and the seeds of his destruction sown, uiok passionate temper is not improved by the persecutpersecutionsa a tig brutal boy is ; his under-master mconceivea :him and mis- tr"usts his truth; hisreputation assailed by the artsoof an enemy though tke end without effect. These things injure his chit- rode, but they .stimulate his e!tertionst When by one means of but they pass away, Eno's, spirit, frankness, and ether goo& qualities make themselves felt, and he becomes not only egurdedrbut popular. This popularity tells upon the great de- ,( his character .vanity and weakness. His studies are first Made subordinate to regular play and pleasure parties; finally aeglected., as much as school regulations will permit for the sake of forbidden treats. Like school boys since the world began he breaks bounds; induced by the persuations or the sneers of boys

way inferior to himself, he smokes, he tipples, he gets out every

at night to frequent a public house ; he joins a party to steal an unpopular under-master's pigeons ; and in short so misconducts himself as to become a lost youth in the sense of this world. Now every advantage being given to Mr. Farrar, and the sory being taken as he tells it to us, it is not the school that produces Erie's fall; but his own weakness. Other boys with similar external temptations, either do not yield to them at all, or in ftless degree, or they do not produce the same ill effects upon their character ; while none of them have the same advantages as Me, He has been tenderly and piously brought up ; family re- miniscences recalling to virtue, haunt him he has a friend at school who persists in the right path without Erie's stimulants— for Russell is an orphan. Erie too has acquaintances who by silence or intimation condemn his backsliding& He has still more in- fluential friends. Dr. Rowlands the head master does all he can for him; his immediate master, Mr. Rose, exerts himself with what ought to be greater effect; Mr. Gordon who once doubted his truth acknowledges he was wrong in his suspicion. The stiraulus of events is not wanting to set him or keep him right. He distinguishes himself by saving a friend's life under circum- stances of great courage and self-devotion. Nay, a death bed and a dying example is set before him ; yet the only excuse that can possibly be urged for him is that the final catastrophe is partly brought about by ill-luck. It argues much for Mr. Farrar's power that spite of his heroe's persistent weakness the reader's in- terest in him is sustained to the end.

Although Mr. Farrar has wrote a long story about schools, to exemplify an exception, he has a distinct and true perception of the philosophy of the ease, and presents it in a letter from Mr. Rode, when Erie doubts whether his little brother Vernon should. accompany him to aehool.

"The postscript about Vernon suggested a thought that had been often in his [Eric s] mind. He could not but shudder in himself, when he thought of that bright little brother of his being initiated in the mysteries of evil which he himself had learnt, and sinking like himself into slow degeneracy of heart and life. It often puzzled and perplexed him and at last he deter-

mined to open h heart, Th

partially at least, in a letter to Mr. Rose. e master fully understood Ins doubts, and wrote him the following reply— 'My dear kric—I have just received your letter about your brother Vernon, and I think that it does you honour. I will briefly give you ray own opinion.

"You mean, no doubt, that, from your own experience, you fear that Vernon will hear at sehool many things which will shock his modesty, and Much language which is evil and blasphemous you fear that he will meet with many bad examples, and learn to look on 'Grod and godliness in a way far different from that to which he has been accustomed at home. You fear in short, that he must pass through the same painful temptations to which you have yourself been subjected ; to which, perhaps, you have even suc- cumbed.

" Well, Erie, this is all true. Yet, knowing this, I say, by all means let Vernon come to Roslyn. The innocence of mere ignorance s a poor thing ; it cannot, under any circumstances, be permanent, nor is it at all valuable as a foundation of character. The true preparation for life, the true basis of a manly character, is not to have been ignorant of evil, but to have knovrn it and avoided ; not to have been sheltered from temptation, but to have passed through it and overcome it by God's help. Many have drawn exaggerated pictures of the lowness of public school morality; the beat answer is to point to the good and splendid men that have been trained in public schools, and who lose no opportunity of returning to them with affection. It is quite possible to be in the little world of school-life, and yet not of it. The ruin of human souls can never be achieved by enemies from without, unless they be aided by traitors from within. Remember our lost friend; the peculiar lustre of his piety was caused by the circumstances Wider which he was placed. He often told me before his last hour, that he, rejoiced to have been at Roslyn ; that he had experienced there much real happiness, and derived in every way lasting good.'

It alight be supposed from a passage in this extract that the

Writer as aiming at the abuses of public as compared with pri- !ate schools. But such does not appear to be the case. Indeed hC attributes part of the ill effects of Roslyn school to the want of the rnonxtoraal system. It seems needless to say that Mr. Farrar diselaims a wish to identify Roslyn School with any partioular establishment.