ALTAIR OF BLUE EYES.* WE have on two previous occasions
noticed Mr. Hardy's stories, and we scarcely know whether we are now most impressed by our unexpected good:fortune in his valuable accession to the higher ranks of modern novel-writing authors, or by the rapid strides which he has made, each time, in the direction of improvement. We did not spare his maiden work, because we saw marked evi- dences of true feeling and real power, and felt that he was a writer worth a little honest scolding, and manly enough neither to resent it, nor to be disheartened by it. It is not for us to suppose that our criticisms were of much or any avail, but we find, at any rate, that he has discarded inexcusable sensation writing, and that, while his second work—Under the Greenwood Tree—was a most picturesque portraiture of village life embodied in a pure and simple story, and illustrating in every line its author's keen and humorous perception of the thoughts and manners of a rural popu- lation, his third has risen to the rank of those which show, not only quick observation, and sparkling humour and true moral instinct, but a delicate and subtle analysis of varieties of charac- ter and moods of feeling, a poet's sympathy with human passion when tuned to its sweetest or saddest notes, and an artist's eye for every aspect of nature,—sensitive to every puff of air, the veriest film of mist, or the merest thread of light.
Under a title—perhaps the weakest point in the book—abso- lutely injurious to its success, as carrying with it no weight, and seeming to evidence, at most mere prettiness, and probably sickly sentimentality, we have a really powerful story, well proportioned in its parts, of varied and deep interest, yet not too harrowing for pleasure, relieved by exquisite touches of word-pictures, and sup- ported by characters not too numerous to crowd the stage and divert us from an attentive study of the three central figures. We have done with any thought of antagonism when we get past the first page or two. The title is frivolous, the poetical table of contents and the dramatis person m are unusual, and therefore inspire a shrug of our conservative shoulders, and the few words of introduction are somewhat affected ; beyond this we have little complaint to make, except of, here and there, the same affectation in a word—" the affective side of his constitution," "a crescent sense of its necessity," and the like—a very occasional want of good taste, or an ungrammatical expression. We could spare indeed the chapter called "The Pennie's the Jewel that beautifies a'," which is forced and caricatured without any compensating humour. And we would willingly have compounded for a happier conclusion, by the sacrifice of some of the true artistic consistency and striking dramatic effect. Indeed it is long since we have been so troubled in laying-down a story,—it is long since we felt that desire that we had known what the author was going to do, that we might have stayed his hand while we entreated for mercy,—that sense of a sad and helpless indignation. Our interest in Elf ride arises from the subtle union in her character of the extremest purity of conduct and inten- tion, with a timidity which in her loving and ardent nature, that dares not risk its treasure and fatally exaggerates the heinous- ness of its trifling departures from the prudent and usual course, suggests prevarication and duplicity. Her intellectual acuteness, her physical courage and moral timidity, her devotedness, her utter self-surrender and trust, and yet her exquisite purity of feeling, and the entire absence of vindictiveness at injustice,—the conse- quence of misapprehension, —is all told, or rather revealed, with such a wonderful insight into a woman's nature, that we are surprised to find as perfect a comprehension of the force and straightforwardness of her lover's utterly different and strictly manly characteristics. For Knight is no carpet-knight, but quite the reverse,—a lonely, unloving man, an acute, uncompromising critic, of severe rectitude, unable to conceive of purity and faithfulness in combination with timidity and vacillation, and therefore harsh and unjust. The
*4 Pair of Blue Eyes. By Thomas Hardy. London: Tinsley Brothers.
union of this harshness and injustice with his deep and tender love, and of his fastidious and jealous exactingness—bred of sensitive refinement and an utter ignorance and seclusion from women—with his chivalrous desire to be lenient and gentle, are portrayed with admirable knowledge and art. Here is a part of a scene when he has discovered some incidents of her past which Elfride had not voluntarily confessed :—
" 'Elfride, I told you once,' he said, following out his thoughts,_ that I never kissed a woman as a sweetheart until I kissed you. A kiss is not much. I suppose, and it happens to few young people to be able to avoid all blandishment and caressing except from the one they afterwards marry. But I have peculiar weaknesses, Elfride ; and because I have led a peculiar life, I must suffer for it, I suppose. I had hoped—well, what I had no right to hope in connection with you. You naturally granted your former lover the privileges you grant me.' A 'yes' came from her like the last sad whisper of a breeze. 'And he used to kiss you—of course he did.'—' Yes' (very weakly).—' And perhaps you allowed him a more free manner in his love-making than I have shown in mine.'—' No, I did not.' This was rather more alertly spoken.—' But he adopted it without being allowed 1'—• Yes.'—' How much I have made of you, Elfrido, and how I have kept aloof!' said Knight, in deep and shaken tones. So many days and hours as I have hoped in you—I have feared to kiss you more than those two times._ And he made no scruples to . . .' She crept closer to him and trembled as if with cold. Her dread that the whole story, with random additions, would become known to him, caused her manner to be so• agitated, that Knight was alarmed and perplexed into stillness. The actual innocence which made her think so fearfully of what, as tho. world goes, was not a great matter, magnified her apparent guilt. It may have said to Knight that a woman who was so flurried in the preliminaries must have a dreadful sequel to her tale. 'I know,' con- tinned Knight, with an indescribable drag of manner and intonation,— 'I know I am absurdly scrupulous about you—that I want you too exclusively mine. In your past before you knew me—from your very cradle—I wanted to think you mine. I would make you mine by main force. Elfrfde,' he went on vehemently, I can't help this jealousy over you! It is my nature, and must be so, and I hate the fact that you have been caressed before : yes, hate it I' She drew a long deep. breath, which was half a sob. Knight's face was hard, and he never looked at her at all, still fixing his gaze far out to sea, which the sun
had now resigned to the shade 'When that lover first kissed you, Elfride, was it in such a place as this ?'—' Yes, it was.'—' Elfride, you don't tell me anything but what I wring out of you. Why is that ?. Why have you suppressed all mention of this when casual confidences
of mine should have suggested confidence in return ? Did you live at Endelstow at that time ?'—' Yes,' she said faintly.—'Where were you when he first kissed you?'—' Sitting in this seat.'—' Ah, I thought so!' said Knight, rising and facing her. And that accounts for everything—the exclamation which you explained deceitfully, and all ! Forgive the harsh word, Elfride—forgive it.' He smiled a sur- face smile as he continued : 'What a poor mortal I am, to play second- fiddle in everything and to be deluded by fibs!'—' 0, don't say it ;.
don't, Harry Where did he kiss you besides here ?'—' Sitting on—a tomb in the—churchyard—and other places,' she answered with the slow recklessness of despair.—' Never mind, never mind,' he exclaimed, on
seeing her tears and perturbation. don't want to grieve you. I don't care.' But Knight did care. How much he cared few who have failed to realise the man's nature will be able to imagine."
We have given this passage rather as one that illustrates the con- test in Knight's mind, and gives a clue to both their natures at. once, than as one of the best. The discussions on women, the contests at chess, the revelation of his love to himself after their separation, the purchase of the ear-rings, and afterwards the double presentation, and almost every other scene in which they are together, are touched with a delicacy and power fairly balanced.. Stephen, the earlier lover, is another admirably-drawn picture,— boyish, with the boyish diffidence so quickly removed, and passing into the extreme of demonstrative love, but quite under the- stronger will and control of Elfride. His worship of his teacher, Knight, his feminine faithfulness during absence to Elfride, equally feminine self - devotion when he finds she loves- another, with a mingling of the chivalry of the man, are- very perfect of their kind. The handsome, common-place vicar,. and Elf ride's hearty and very kindly step-mother—for Mr. Hardy does not go with the unjust and mistaken crowd in his picture of a step-mother—are also very good. And we might devote a second review with ease to his admirably true and humorous. description of the humble neighbours. The scenes at the mason's. where the pig is being killed, and in the church vault where they are enlarging it for the poor countess, are almost worthy of George- Eliot in their marvellous intimacy with the turn of thought, the- ceremonious and quaint courtesy exercised towards each other,. the homely illustration, and the provincial idiom of the peasantry- of the far western counties. We must content ourselves with a. small portion of the scene after the pig-killing is accomplished.. The whole passage is equal to that in the author's Under the Green- wood Tree, in which the church choir waits upon the vicar :—
"'Well, now we'll weigh,' said John.—' If so be he wore not BO fIne,_ we'd weigh en whole : but as he is, we'll take a side at a time. John,. you can mind my old joke, ey ? A good old joke, that.'—' I do so though 'twas a good few years ago I first heard Yes,' said Lick- pan, that there old familiar joke have been in our family for generations,. I may say. My father used that joke constantly at pig-killings for-
snore than five-and-forty years—the time he followed the calling. And 'a told me that 'a had it from his father when he was gaits a chiel, who made use o' en just the same at every killing more or less; and pig- killings were pig-killings in those days.'—' Trowly they were.'—' never heard the joke,' said Mrs. Smith tentatively.—'Nor I,' chimed in Mrs. Worm, who being the only other lady in the room, felt bound by the laws of courtesy to feel like Mrs. Smith in everything.—' Surely, surely Ton have,' said the killer, looking sceptically at the benighted females. However, %isn't much—I don't wish to say it is. It commences like this: "Bob will tell the weight of your pig, 'a b'lieve," says I. The congregation of neighbours think I mane my son bob, naturally ; but
the secret is that I mane the bob o' the steelyard. Ha, ha, ha Haw, law, haw laughed Martin Cannister, who had heard the explanation 'of this striking story for the hundredth time.—'Huh,huh, huh !' laughed John Smith, who had heard it for the thousandth.—' Heo, hoe, hoe!' laughed William Worm, who had never hoard it at all, but was afraid to say so.—' Thy grandfather, Robert, must have been a wide-awake chap to make that story,' said Martin Cannister, subsiding to a placid aspect of delighted criticism.—' Ho had a head, by all account. And, you see, as the first-born of the Lickpans have all been Roberts, they've all been Bobs, so the story was handed down to the present day.'— 'Poor Joseph, your second boy, will never be able to bring it out in company, which is rather unfortunate,' said Mrs. Worm thoughtfully. —"A wont. Yes grandfer was a clever chap, as ye say ; but I knowed a cleverer. 'Twas my uncle Levi. Uncle Levi made a snuff-box that should be a puzzle to his friends to open. Ho used to hand en round at wedding parties, christenings, funerals, and in other jolly company, and lot 'em try their skill. This extraordinary snuff-box had a spring behind that would push in and out—a hinge where seemed to be the cover ; a slide at the end, a screw in front, and knobs and mysterious notches everywhere. One man would try the spring, another would -try the screw, another would try the slide ; but try as they would, the box wouldn't open. And they couldn't open en, and they didn't open en. Now what might you think was the secret of that box ?'—All put on an expression that their united thoughts were inadequate to the occasion. —' Why the box wouldn't open at all. 'A were made not to open, and .ye might have tried till the end of Revelations, %would have been as naught, for the box were glued all round.'—' A very deep man to have made such a box.'—' Yes. 'Twas like uncle Levi all over.'- "Twas. I can mind the man very well. Tallest man ever I seed.'—' was so.'"
The exquisite little bits of description of natural scenery abound throughout. Light and shade, mists, and blue distances, and grey overcast skies, too, are sketched with the love of artist and poet combined. One of the grandest scenes we have left to the last to mention. It is the one in which Knight is hanging over the cliff, and waiting for death or for Elf ride and life. The manner in which the effect is enhanced by the description of Knight's strange com- parison between himself and the queer fossil, the eyes in which happen to be opposite to his and which stare at him in his peril, and by the effects on him of the passing of light, and cloud, and rain ; and the way in which the time of our suspense is lengthened, and therefore intensified, by a description of the cliff, and dreary outline of its geological formation, is painfully clever. It is one of those breathless descriptions which reminds us of Sir Walter Scott, but which shows a far subtler knowledge of the movements of the mind in such a crisis. We heartily trust we may hear of Mr. Hardy soon, but not too' soon again.
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