THE USURER'S DA.UGHTER.

Tins is a work of fiction of a peculiar kind—at least at the pre- sent day : they who remember the novels of HoLcRoFr, and others of his time, will not be at a loss for a resemblance. The peculiarity consists in the curious elaboration of the story ;. which, composed as it is of circumstances of the utmost improbability, is still woven together by the author with an apparent good faith and sincerity, which impress the reader with an idea of his belief in his own fic- tion. In most modern novels, the writer himself does not know what the next chapter will contain, or where it will throw the hero : the author of the Usurer's Daughter, on the contrary, has laid down a regular plot,—and a very black plot it is,—and has worked it through three volumes of close, country type, with the regularity of an historian ; and by means of every variety of agent, principal or subordinate, that seemed necessary for the perfection of his cobweb tissue of incidents.

The Usurer's Daughter is a lady of great beauty and high more worth. Her father's avarice has cured her of all tendency to the love of money. She resolves upon never appropriating any part of his gains to her own use ; and disdaining the splendid alliances, the object of which is the wealth to which she is the supposed heiress, she marries a worthy but comparatively humble lover. Mr. Worth- ington is a clerk in the Secretary of State's Office, and conceives that his place is a permanency. Soon after he is married, he is dis- missed!—an unseen enemy is at work; his character is blasted, without his having been guilty of offence ; and he is enveloped in a cloud, of which he neither knows the extent nor understands the source. Reduced to poverty and distress, he is at length separated from his wife, and conjured away on a mysterious commission to Italy. At Naples, he is watched, entrapped, imprisoned. His wife goes after him : a similar fortune attends her : and it is only after various mischances that the constant pair encounter each otherand only to be separated again. Virtue, however, ul- timately triumphs, and confusion and dismay seize their persecu- tors, on a discovery being made which settles all the perplexities of the story. We shall not enter into an explanation of the objects and motives of the persons who pursued this meritorious couple it will be sufficient to say, that they succeeded in maintaining a moral torture for years, and that the author has succeeded in spreading over his book that mysterious and oppressive spirit of - power, which, like the fascination of the serpent, deprives its victim of all ability to resist or to escape. The characters of the novel are strikingly drawn, Init they are scarcely individual ; they are moral or immoral qualities, dressed up in human attributes. Nevertheless, they are undoubtedly well worked up, and made efficient agents in the story. The Miser is certainly the chef dwuvre—he is well conceived and ably de- veloped ; still he is scarcely flesh and blood, he is an allegorical being, and means simply a personificaticri of the Law. The following dialogue between him and his Lighter, will unfold Mr. Erpingham's character. The time is V.at of the riots of Lord George Gordon's mob : the mob had aVacked the Miser's house- " The tumults and disturbances which bar' for three or four days seemed to threaten the destruction of the city, subsided at length, and the silly rioters one after another were taken up, and must ea'Ily convicted. Then when law and order were restored, the terrified citizens grew hold again, and most untrem- blingly and magmulimouslv swore to the persons of their assailants, while those who had kept the whole city in awe stood at the tribunals of justice in little trembling groups, helpless and confounded. "'Margaret,' said the usurer to his daughter, ' you must accompany me to the Mausionhouse, and see whether you can, among the prisoners, identify any that attacked this house.'

" ' I am doubtful whether I can,' replied the young lady, 'but I am certain that I will not. When they attacked the house I defended it. The law gave me no defence, and I will not ask it for revenge. The poor people were inflamed to madness, they have now returned to their senses.' " child,' answered Mr. Erpingham, ' you do not understand these mat- ters. Time law knows nothing of revenge. The law is made for our safety ; it is wisdom and virtue to use it for that purpose. We expose others as well as ourselves to Hanger by this false notion of forbearance.' " My dear father,' replied Margaret, know nothing of sophistry. I met the rioters as enemies. I would have tired upon them had they not retreated.. There was then no possibility that I could have killed or wounded an innocent person; their very presence there was guilt; but I cannot, I dare not, I will not expose myself to the possibility of error, in attempting to swear to a person. I may be wrong ; and there will then be a stain of blood upon me, that will never be worn out by time, nor washed out by remorse. I pray you to urge me no more. The law will not lack victims.'

" Margaret,' continued the father, 'you must know that the writer of the letter, which I received on Wednesday night, was among the crowd. You can swear to his person. When the law loses a victim, it loses part of its value, and so far fails of the object for which it was made - and when law fails of its object, it is a nonentity, a dead letter, a thing of no value; it might as well not have been made at all as made in vain ; and when there is no law at all, or, what is the same thing, when laws are made in vain, there comes a disruption of the bonds of societv,—all is confusion and disorder, plunder and murder. Margaret, would you wish to see society in sad disorder, so that there be no safety for life or property ? ' " Certainly not, my father,' answered Margaret ; 'but I am of opinion that there is no danger of such result from my abstaining to give positively a doubt- ful testimony against accused men.'

" ' If all thought as you do, my child, there would be no justice.' " And if all thought as you do, any dear father, there would be no mercy.'

" Such a reply to any other father than Mr. Erpingham would have brought a rebuke down upon the child that should have uttered it, but he heeded it not; on the contrary, without any abatement of his usual placid smile, without the slightest wrinkle on his brow, or cloud of anger on his countenance, he con- tinued— " Mercy, my child ! what is the use of mercy ? Justice holds society to- gether, but mercy relaxes those bonds, and leaves us in a sad disunion. Mercy as a word of wide, weak, and foolish meaning.. It is the insinuating craftiness whereby men plunder the honest and industrious. Margaret, nay child, I did not gain my wealth by mercy, and I will not lose it by mercy. They who came to me for gold to supply their wanton cravings, and pledged to me their title- deeds, and gave me large premiums, measured not those premiums by any mercy towards me. If I had had no money at command, they would not have putt

themselves and their reversions into my power. Had I been utterly poor and pennyless, I might, for aught that mercy would have done for me, have sat down in the dust of humility and have bowed my neck to the foot of the proud man, and have eaten the thankless bread of poverty, and have sunk clown into an un- marked grave. Justice is intelligible, definite, written, and marked down. We know where to have it. But melee is of indefinite and rambling meaning.'

" ' Oh, my dear father,' replied the daughter, it grieves me, indeed, to hear you talk thus ; contradicting all the pleasant and sweet lessons of benevolence, which I heard flan' my dear departed mother; it pains me to the heart to hear the people almme‘t curse you.,

" ' They are foolish to curse me, Margaret ; it does them no good and me no harm.'

"_Margaret turned away her face and wept ; and while her tears continued to flow and her sobs to be beard, her &tiler was silent, hot when the passion of her sorrow was abated, he renewed the cmwersation precisely in the same time and with the same purpose ; saying, My child, I would fain have you go with me to the ilIansionlumuse, where the Aldermen are examining- prisoners. You must give your testimony asserting to the best of your ability.'

"The tears which Margaret bad shell, while they relieved her grief, abated the firmness of her resistaeee to her father's will, and she replied, 'If it be your pleasure, Sir, that i should accompany. pot, my duty as a daughter compels my obedience; but I must say that uo coasideration shall make me give testimony in a doubtful matter.'

"' The testimony required of you will be according to the conviction of your own mind. Besides in time present case you will not be upon your oath.' "c My dear father,' replied Margaret, always speak as though I were upon oath.'

"'In so doing,' replied her father, 'you do wrong.' "The daughter echoed the usurer's words with astonishment, and the callous man coldly proceeded: 'Yes, my child, you do wrong; you diminish, you destroy the peculiar sanctity of an oath by such a procreding. Only imagine for a moment how inefficacious the law would be, if every one acted upon the principle of being no more bound by an oath than. without one.'

"'But think again, Fir, how much better fleut umaey laws, would be the universal prevalence if the love of truth.'

"' You are supposiog. my child, what can never take place. Besides, it would be ineonvenient, very inconvenient. It is enough that a man can be be- lieved on his oath—that is all the law requires,—all that can be expected of us in this imperfect ,date. You will go with me, .Margaret.'

"' I will go with you, Sir ; but the conscientiousness that makes me obey you in this instance, will make me disobey you if you request of me any testimony which may destroy a life which the -withholding of that testimony may save.' " Child, you have strange notions.' "

We may add the Miser's opinion of the knowledge gained by books, in comparison with the sterling information learned from the world itself- ", Oh, cried Margaret, 'how long will you persist in thinking that there can he nothing desirable in life but riches and titles?' " ' As long- as I live, Margaret, and possess a sound understanding, and the exercise of my faeul ties. If you wish to know what is desirable and good, you should look abroad among mankind, and see what it is that they desire aud pur- sue after. You must ;;;a read books, my child; beoks deceive you; your ex- cellent mother read many books, and was misled by them, and talked to me about that which I could not understand. There is a race after honours and riches— all men rim that race except the indolent, who are beggars, and the conceited ones misled by books, who generally become begg:us in the end. Books and line talk are the dust whieli the crafty ones throw into the eyes of their competitors in time race after riches and Limnos. Look at this great and mighty city wherein we live; and mark tan: how .4msy it is from morning till night. And for what is all that bneiness? host vou -Ted hooks to know? No, no, books tell nothing that is true ; they mielead, the; 'Atteeive. When a man has toiled all day long and has gained money, is he 1101' II:LT:ell with his gains? Dues lie not count them over carefully and triumphantly ? !le will not throw his gold into the street, though books may y talk much of the ploasures of generosity. Generosity, may child, is a long word. by means of which cr:ry people attack our pockets through our pride or superstition; and when they have done so, they laugh at us.'

"'But, my dear father,' said Margaree. 'is there no pleasure in relieving the distresses of our fellow-creatures? Is there no pleasure in the music of a grate- ful acknowledgment, and in the recollection of tears wiped away and broken hearts bound up?' "'I don't kmov, my child, I don't know; books talk about such things; but I will not pretend to set myself up against the wisdom of mankind. The world has existed long enough to know what is good, and the conduct of the world tells me that riches and honours are good. If there were any thing better, the world would have foiled it out by this time, and would have pursued it.' "

This is certainly not the writing of' a vulgar mind; although the novel as a whole is not of commanding excellence. We alternately wonder at the shrewdness and the simplicity of the author : we opine that he is a man of very original powers and very primitive experience.