ALBERT SMITH ' S SCATTERGOOD FAMILY.
Tam is the best of Mr. Smith's fictions that we have seen • his imitation of " Boa " perhaps excelling his prototype in the delination of ex- ternal objects, and the exhibition of the extreme characteristics of low or middle-class London life. These things, as well as the occasional reflec- tions that the scenes in the Great Metropolis may naturally give rise to, are done, it strikes us, with more lightness of touch and leas of obvious effort than by Dickens. But Mr. Smith is deficient in the depth, variety, and force of his master; nor has he the largeness of Dickens in his better works, which not only present types of the Cockney species in single persons, but, by seizing upon some social evil as the object of satirical exhibition, the author warns society, if he does not improve it.
The head of the Scattergood Family is a solicitor' but one of those easy, idle, effortless kind of men, who generally end by the ruin of self and family. This result is pretty well accomplished at the opening of the tale; Mr. Scattergood with his wife and daughter having emigrated to Boulogne, whilst Vincent Scattergood, brought up to no business, and leading an idle life, has turned out what many people will think some- thing like a scamp, although he is Mr. Smith's hero. The first chapter presents this gentleman just returned from sea, "hard up," and landed in London from a waggon. Here he forms the acquaintance of Mr. Glemd- von Fogg, a dramatic author; who introduces Vincent to a minor theatre, and is the means of carrying him through various scenes of low theatrical life both in town and country; as an accidental acquaintance with a smuggler and a thief; encountered in the waggon, brings the hero into equivocal company and to the verge of burglary, Whilst Vincent is passing through this class of adventure, Mr. Scattergood returns to town, to get a situation under Government; and takes refuge on the Surrey side of the Thames. This incident not only introduces life in a lodging- house, but a variety of characters and incidents among persons of the indefinite class in middle life, with pic-nic parties, excursions to Graves- end, and other diveriisements of that sort. A presentation to Merchant Taylor's for Vincent's young brother gives occasion to satirical sketches of the bullying and other bad practices of public schools; but exaggerated, or rather perhaps onesided. Growing embarrassments induce Clara Scatter- good, the heroine—the most natural and interesting character in the book—to accept a situation as governess with the Constables, an ill- regulated, vulgar, pretending family : and this obviously furnishes a picture of the depressions and ill treatment to which the class gover- ness are subjected. When the adventures to which these fourfold states of life give rise have been continued sufficiently long, the whole is wound up in the usual happy way, or with more improbability than is usuaL It is a strange thing, but true, that the authors of this class of fiction appear to delineate naturally so long as they confine themselves to the looser kinds of life—low authors, low actors, social wags, and the doings of holyday or Sunday folks ; but they no sooner attempt to depict a more respectable class of society, or to shape a course of conduct which is to advance a person in life or lead to his permanent settlement, than they produce a series of events quite as unnatural as anything in the dramatic pieces they ridicule. Some may ascribe the origin of this difference to the simple fact that that is best delineated which is best known : we, lunvever, incline to attribute it in a great measure to the nature of the thing described: a life of irregularity and uncertainty allows greater suddenness and variety of fortunes, without appearing extravagant, than a more sober and settled career. Something perhaps is ascribable to the character of the literature. A plot or story seems about the last thing that is taken direct from life; the subject being, perhaps, too vast to allow of individual observation. No great genius has yet applied himself to trace a hero of modern society through various incidents to settled fortune; whereas Le Sage and other writers of the novel of adventure have left works which furnish a general model, though their style of incident may not be imitated.
We will take our few extracts from the better parts. Here its a good January picture, which might have been realized in February.
A WINTER MARSH SCENE ESSEX.
The greater part of the swampy moors which lie on each side of the road for some miles, is covered with bunches of rushes and rank• whilst the ground is everywhere moist and plashy, where it does not act y sink into small hollows filled with slimy and stagnant water. Long, melancholy rows of pollard willows mark the courses of the various dykes and bourns running and intercrossing each other in all directions; and here and there the roadway is obstructed by a gate or swing-bar, the use of which, beyond occasional obstruction, is unknown, since there is no one to receive tall; nor do the few half-starved animals who graze stout the waste appear desirous of straying to any, of its distant pastures. The only living things that appear to thrive and fatten in this fenny region are the frogs; and, when day goes down, they croak out their self-satisfaction at keeping their heads above waterin such numbers, and with such earnest vehemence, that their canoed travels far andwide upon the wind, and the "marsh-bells," aa their * The /Ivrea In my Journal are so obliterated, that, In enter not to make a misstate. manta am. obliged to omit them, song is termed by the natives of the adjoining places, may be heard upon set evenings at an incredible distenoe. It was a sharp winter's night, in the beginningof- January. Eery pool and t water-course of the morass was frozen over; the rushes at thew edges were powdered with frost as well ; and the cart-tracks of the road were covered with a thin coat of ice, which shattered down by the least touch with a glass-like and hollow sound into the dry ruts beneath, to the great delight of the boys who loitered along the road collecting stray cattle, and thus procured all the ex- citement- of breaking windows, without the unpleasantry of attending punishment. It was cold, bitter cold. The wind came frozen as it swept in biting gusts over the fettered marsh, or whistled among the slender branches of the pollards ; and the very stars appeared shivering as they twinkled with wintry brightness in the clear blue sky.- But in the interval of the wind's wrath all was dead and still; as if Nature, being locked up in the icy trammels of the frost until the sun chose to bail her out, was aware that at present she could not well help herself; and se maintained a dignified and impressive silence.
A " MINOR" GREEN-ROOM-
The green-room presented many tokens of that heterogeneous confusion which may be imagined to exist behind the scenes of a theatre during. the performance of a bustling pantomime. All sorts of curious " properties"—faries-wands, wicker shapes, and monstrous heads, were lying about, brought thither by the call-boy to be in readiness. Several of the characters also were sitting round, awaiting the moment of their appearance; the chief part being the lady visitors to the afore- mentioned exhibition, and promenaders, who were elegantly attired in scanty cloaks and cardinals of pink glazed calico, trimmed with white rabbit-skin dotted black, which had a. fashionable effect. And every now and then the harlequin or clown rushed in, panting and exhausted, and leaned their heads upon the mantelpiece for support, whilst torn to pieces by a hacking cough, or refreshed themselves from a jug of barley-water, common to the chief pantomimists, placed on a shelf in the corner of the room; but before they had recovered, they were always called off again. The harlequin had to take fresh leaps whether he had breath or not; and the clown's duty was to throw the house into convulsions by a moral lyric, descriptive of an unprovoked assault committed by several ill-con- ducted lads upon an ancient woman of diminutive stature, who supported herself by retailing apples, but was slightly addicted to an unmentioned liquor, only to be guessed at by its rhyme to the last verse, unless supplied by any youth of quick perception in the gallery. At the end of the room were two little children, mere infants, asleep; one a fair-haired thing of four years old, and the other somewhat its senior. They had been tied to a floating cloud as fairies in the opening scene, and now were not again wanted until the conclusion. Their little legs had trotted backwards and forwards a long distance during the day to and front the theatre; and their night's work only commenced when the night was already advanced. They were paid sixpence an evening for their attendance; and the weekly three-shillings doled from the treasury was a sum not to be despised. But the effects of this artificial existence were painfully visible; for their lips were parched and fevered, their cheeks hollow and pale, even in spite of the daub, of vermillion heathy applied by the dresser, and their limbs shrunk and wasted. To the audience, however,. they were smiling elves, who appropriately peopled the "Realms of Joy," to the centre of which blissful region their presence was confined; and, so long asthma end was answered, little else was cared for.
LODGING-HOUSE-KEEPERS' CONVERSATION.
Of course there was to be a cake. Whoever went to school without one? What balm was ever found equal to it for the home-sick yearnings of little boys? Clara undertook to make it herself; and for that purpose descended to the kitchen, on the morning antecedent to Frederick's departure. Mrs. Chicksand was there also, fully. employed, apparently conducting a small private wash, manufacturing a meat-ple, and superintending an unknown preps- paration that was simmering on the fire, all at once. But these manifold occu- pations did not prevent her from talking incessantly to Clara, as was her waist with anybody who would listen to her; the most favourite topic being the domestic' affairs of her establishment and the characteristics of her tenants. " We 've had a bad winter of it," said Mrs. Chicksand, as she screwed the fire- place together, took a glance at the contents of the saucepan, and then shook out a lot of little wet frith and cuffs, and threw them lightly upon one another to await the iron; "a very bad winter, indeed, Miss," she continued, wishing a reply- to her remark.
"Very cold, indeed," answered Clara; "but I think that is all over." And she looked towards the window in confirmation of her remark, where a smoky canary of irregular plumage was disporting in the sunbeam, and very in- dustriously trying to extract nourishment from a knot of wire in his cage, in liet • of a bit of lamp-sugar. " I was n't complaining of the weather," said Mrs. Chicksand. "I meant it' had been a bad time for my lodgings." "I am sorry to hear that, Mrs. Chicksand," observed Clara. "Were the rooms . empty, then?" Oh, my rooms are always full, thank goodness. Always," responded Mrs. Chicksand, with a firmness of asseveration calculated entirely to scare anybody, from daring to think to the contrary, and intended to assure her tenants that they/ were there located as an especial favour, by a lucky chance that did not happen often, and one which they could not possibly appreciate sufficiently. "1 never knew them empty above a week,' continued Mrs. Chicksand, as if she had been upon her oath before the Lord Mayor or any other sitting Magis- trate. And then, finding no response to her affirmation, she went on. But tke. lodgers have all been the wrong sort; they did no good for the house—too =Oh in the chop and poultry way. They harricoed all that was left the next day, .or briled the legs for breakfast. Give me a joint: that's what I say." "But it does not suit everybody to have joints always," said Clara, as she quietly continued her employment. "There it is, Miss," answered Mrs. Chicksand; "but then, how are the house- keepers to live? As I said to Mrs. Walton, next door, what a ' let ' she made, with them Pollens—five months, and they never had anything up twice."
"That was very fortunate for Mrs. Walton, of course," said Clara.
"Fortunate, indeed, bliss," replied the landlady; "a heavenly blessing I. I never get such catches. Our second floor's all very well; but Mr. Bodle a the stingiest person I ever knew, lie has a rabbit for dinner, and eats it all; and then buys baked potatoes ia the street, and brings them fiome for sapper in, bit pocket."
DEFINITION OF HUMBUG. (MR. FOGG LOQUITUIL)
"The world allows no meed to living authors. Were the Swan of Avon now' among us, his warmest admirers would become his enemies; the critics would pitch into his plays ; and he himself, if more than commonly successful, would be called a humbug." "That 's true," said the tall man, perfectly understanding the tenour of the if he was not altogether acquainted with the subject of it. "It 's a great thing to be a humbug, though: Fve been called so often. It means hitting the pubhc in reality. Anybody who can do so is sure to be called a humbug byaome- .body who can't."
The Fortunes of the Scattergood Family only enters into the third volume ; the finis being reached through a couple of tales derived'from he French dramas of La Tour de Nesle and Perinet Leekro.
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