BOOKS.

MISS CHARLOTTE WILLIAMS-WYNN.* THE kind of pleasure which this volume of letters gives us is very

much akin to that of a fine piece of sculpture. There is no par- ticular " purpose " contained in the book. Miss Wynn had no predominant object in life. She was not a poet, nor a meta- physician, nor an artist, nor a devotee. But her character was so finely-balanced, her refinement so perfect and yet so little of an adventitious quality,—indeed, it was a mere natural exhibition of the fine grain of her womanly strength and simplicity—her insight so keen, her humour, though grave, so genuine, her interest in the higher political issues so unaffected, her courage so high, and her piety at once so deep and full of charity, that the book never palls for a moment, while there is a much greater variety of lights and shades, of course, to interest the reader than there could be in any piece of sculptured marble, however fine the hand which chiselled it.

Charlotte Williams-Wynn was the eldest daughter of the Right Hon. Watkin Williams-Wynn. She was born in 1807, and died in 1809, her mature life covering, therefore, almost all the great political events in the history of this country between the two Reform Bills of 1832 and 1867. The memorials of this volume, however, do not begin sooner than the year 1839, and touch at first rather the religious than the political interests of the day, though in later years Miss Wynn's mind was far too powerful and active not to busy itself with the larger political issues as well. Kers, though a thoroughly feminine, was not a dependent nature.

One sees in almost every letter the evidence of a calm and clear intellect, which could not surrender up its judgments to any mind, however powerful, and of a somewhat solitary though most tender nature, which almost recoiled from anything like fusion with the nature of another. In a most characteristic pas- sage written in her journal in 1846, when she was thirty-nine years old, Miss 1Vynn says :—

4. Women are born wives, just as men are born artists, musicians, ttolts. This I see, and the non-perception of this truth is the cause of half the uncomfortable marriages you moot with. But men and women will not content themselves with doing that which they can do, that for which they came into the world. Everybody is to do the same thing, or to sot up at least for doing it. All are to speak Gorman, all are to sing, all are to be wives! and it is quite as much of an accomplishment to be a wife as to be an artist. If we could but realise our individuality more distinctly, we should not commit these errors. I should like to have the capabilities of making a wife, just as I should like to have the power of singing in church, but the talent for both has been denied mo. My neighbour perhaps will possess both these talents, but have none for philosophy, and so it goes on ; and if we would satisfy ourselves with reverencing our neighbours, and not trying to imitate them, we -should all be of much more use to each other. Now I really do reverence a wife, and never am with one without shivering for her. I wonder at their high spirits and their humility combined, at the way in which they can throw off their burden of dependence and pick it up again in an instant."

That passage strikes the key-note of Miss Wynn's character, but it is the key-note of a character eminently feminine for all that, and not feminine merely in the bare sense in which one is bound to pronounce all women feminine where one does not wish to impute to them a species of incompatibility between their mind and their condition in life. You see women who are before all things mothers, women who are before all things wives, women who are before all things daughters, and women who are before all things sisters, besides the women who were apparently intended for a more enterprising lot than any of these. Miss Wynn, so far as we can describe her by a relation to others at all, belonged to the class of sisters. She was essentially sisterly in the character of her tender- ness, but her mind was so active and independent, that throughout the story of her thoughts and interests the reader gives at least as much attention to her judgment as he does to her impressions, though he never feels for a moment that she was the kind of

woman who needed a larger sphere and a more independent career to satisfy her inward cravings. Thus we learn very early how, though her very life was rooted in her Christian faith, she detested that chase of heresy into which so many religious women enter with a sort of factitious zeal. She writes as early as October, 1841 :--" I am beginning to be tired of the very name of ortho- doxy. I am convinced there are a set of men in the world who answer to that race of dogs who hunt truffles. It is quite curious to see how, in a wood, one of them will rush at once to some particular tree, and hunt out the truffles that are to be found in the ground underneath it ; and equally astonishing is it to see

Memorials of Charlotte Williams-Wynn. Edited by her Stater. With a Portrait. London Longmont,,

how these men are always sniffing and picking at some hidden heresy in a book, which common eyes and readers never discover; and like the dogs, too, they trouble themselves with nothing but the heresy, and look neither to the right nor to the left. They are made to perform that one duty, and they do it."

A certain sedate self-control and lucidity of mind were also of the essence of Miss Wynn. Thus, while still young, she writes. most characteristicall: as follows, after speaking of one who had' always desired to die suddenly, and whose death was as suddem. as she had wished :— " I am astonished that the wish to die suddenly without being aware. of it is so common a one. Surely it is a singular desire ? Mine would' be the exact contrary. I should like to die leisurely, and not to do that which can be done but once in a hurry. I would not pass away unconsciously, but rather with all my powers unquenched, to see it approaching. To he allowed to intend to die seems to me the most enviable departure, not the being struck down like a withered tree. I think it is wrong to lay too great a stress upon a longing for death being a certain proof of a good life and of a Christian state of mind. It is a pity that the tone from the pulpit is invariably that men dread' death, for I do not believe that it is true. You may have an intellectual desire to die, or rather a longing prompted by the intellect, merely the natural result of tho limits and shadows by which it is here confined. Is this meritorious ? The same spirit that makes the child, after admiring the toy, desire to pull it to bits in order to discover how it is put together, accompanies us through life; and after wondering at the machinery around one, and spending many a year in vainly trying to. find out why and how it acts, is it astonishing that we long at last to. get into the engine-room ?"

And Miss Wynn, too, had her wish, looking forward for three years, with perfect calmness to death as in the near future, and dying at last- easily and happily, without excitement, with a mind quite free to

notice all that was noticeable around her, and yet a soul hidden, if ever a human soul were, "with Christ in God." And to Ohl complete self-possession and equanimity of soul, Miss Wynn added

a fine though in no sense a buoyant humour. Take this admirable- criticism, for instance, on public funerals, written after going to-

see the Duke of Wellington lie in state :—" The curious silence and enthusiasm of the crowd interested me most, for the sight itself gave me little satisfaction. I could not help regretting

that the person to whom it would have given most pleasure could not behold it,—the poor old Duke himself I In the course of the next hundred years, if we still keep up a practice so irrationa and pagan as a public funeral of the sort, we shall at least, k think, on the greatest possible amount of happiness principle, take care it shall take place in the lifetime of the man it

is to honour. For after all, he is the only one who is flattered and pleased by such an exhibition." Or take this;

as descriptive of the manner in which the " Catholicity " of the English Church is held in reserve by Anglicans, as a kind of clew ex machinee to answer a certain class of objections, though

usually that Catholicity is so difficult to describe, and so incon- venient, that little is said about it :—" Our English Church stands.

very much in the position I see a hen does. It has two legs, but keeps one generally in reserve. The reserved leg of the English.

Church is its Catholicity ; it brings it forward as little as pos- sible. That leg is in its way, and it stands as well without it. When attacked, however, down it goes, and then half the world cannot make out the difference between Romanism and Cathol4 cism, and the other half will not ; and so, as soon as possible, up.

goes the awkward leg again, to be cherished and kept warm in, the bosom of the Church, but not to reappear till the whole body is again attacked." Again, when Miss Wynn is in Paris, with how delicate and yet gentle an irony,—an irony without a spark of malice in it,—she sketches the touch of frivolity—both temporal and spiritual—about the society in which she moved :—

"The visit I paid with Madame do Rauzan to Madame La Croix was too dull. I was really ashamed of assisting at anything so absurd. Very like the prat:ewes ridicules. Madame La Croix, who is sentimental, and talks with esprit, gave us a monologue on the way the soul reveals itself before certain natures, as certain flowers to the sun—Madame do Rauzan, of course, being the sun. The compliments between the two were incessant ; and the wholo thing reminded one of two milliners try- ing to not fine ladies on the stage ; so I wont away after an hour, with no wish to return. Lady Elgin is very good-natured to me, and hopes to convert me to the pun:fled Catholic faith ; and so sends the preachers to me. I find it much more exciting to have one's soul looked after than one's body, but it is a funny contrast, at the same time to have the Dsse. de Rauzan fidgotting about a bonnet and a cap to shorten the length of my face, and Lady Elgin that I should talk to the Abhd

Massiot, and Mr. Carre who is so clever." .

In another page she describes the society of the salons as wearying from its "heavy lightness." "They evidently feel they must not dwell on any subject, and yet being naturally engrossed by thetopica of the day, you almost see the struggle they are making to end with their little epigram, and fly off to something else. In short, it is a long persiflage, and I am not used to it, and cannot end= it."

Further, though Miss Wynn is not often a vivid describer of external nature, there comes in here and there so clear a proof of her inward delight in natural beauty and her true eye for its charms, that the narrative of thoughts is as much relieved by it as a beautiful room is by a

peep of a distant vista. For instance :—" I would that you could have seen the sun setting last night. Just before he sank behind a grove of dark pines, his beams fell on a sloping bank covered with primroses, and the poor little flowers seemed quite oppressed under the exceeding glory that had fallen upon them—they drooped their heads, and closed their leaves as if dazzled by the glow of amber light. In a few minutes their tor- mentor disappeared, and as the long dark shadows of the pines fell on them, they looked up quite refreshed and young again. I am obliged to put a restraint on myself, or I should fill my letter with histories of grass and trees, shadows and sunshine:, Miss Wynn, like many persons of strong affections, who, from natural reserve, are hardly able to pour out their feelings to even their most intimate friends, was one of the increasing number of those who have quite a special devotion to dogs, and the account of her feelings on losing Mohr ' is as touching as almost anything in the book :— " I am staying here tgie-it-tele with a dear aunt, while my sister is paying a visit in Ireland. We see no one, boar no news, so I have nothing to write about except the Welsh mountains, which I admire more than ever. The quiet lazy life is doing me good, for I was worn with the long stay in London, and just before I came away I had the sorrow of losing my poor dog. One evening he was brought home with his leg broken, and as injured by a horse having trodden on him, that, after watching him two days and two nights, I had to end his life of love to me by prussic acid. It seemed an ill return for the twelve years that he had cheered and comforted me; but they told me that he would suffer so terribly, that my selfish longings to keep him had to give way. How solitary I feel without him no one can guess, and most would laugh at the idea of so caring for what they call a brute animal. I learnt from him more practical lessons of trust, of love and obedience to my Master than I ever got from any pulpit! You will not despise me for

all this ; indeed, if you do, I can't help it I However, that

phase of my life is over [From MS. book.] I have been sorrowing sadly for Mohr ; and one may sorrow, so long as it is after a godly sort.' It is very well for people to say 'only a dog ;' but if that dog has been a comfort, and done you good, its loss is likely to ba as keenly felt as if it were your ,:great-uncle.' Mohr has made me better. How often has his love to me made me feel my own coldness and ingratitude to God ! Such was the love I ought to give—that entire dependence, that complete content, if allowed simply to be in my presence. He was an abiding sermon—a living and a breathing one. As long as an effect is produced, it matters little by what moans it takes place; and if from my dog I learned the real feeling of that passage, Though Thou smitest me, yet will I trust in Thee,' I am grateful for it."

That reminds one curiously of Cowper's lines on his dog Beau's fidelity to him, and eagerness to interpret his every wish ; and indeed it would have been well for Cowper if, on far more important matters, he had been cast with such religious teachers, and had fallen into so spiritual and yet natural a school of faith, as Miss Wynn. Shrewd as she was in politics, thoughtful in theology, keen in her social criticisms, delicate in her natural tastes, there is yet nothing in this book that will take the reader so much as its profound and perfect spiritual trul3t,—the depth of which strikes you the more that there is no strain in it, no exoite- ment, no detachment from the natural interests around her, nothing but deep and thankful spiritual rest. She does not yearn to go to "where beyond these voices there is peace," but she no sooner realises that she is really going there, than the thought fills her with serenity ; and we can almost see the full content in her face as she writes down her latest feelings, while her sister is lying dead, and she herself is still uncertain whether it may be months or even a year,—though it was but five days,— before she shall follow her. From beginning to end of this fascinating volume we see the same mind in a great variety of lights and attitudes, but all simple, all natural, and all those of a woman of no common culture of mind and no common depth of faith. Her theology was the theology of Frederick Maurice, whose pupil and intimate friend she was ; and it would be hard to find any life in which a nobler theology brought forth the fruit of a more perfect trust.

Should this book reach a second edition, which we fully expect, it would be well to rectify one or two errors of date. A letter, dated "Fast-day, Indian Mutiny," is placed amongst the letters of February, 1866, though the Indian Mutiny was not heard of in this country till July, 1857; and a letter on the funeral of Lord Palmerston is dated November 3, 1866, and placed amongst the letters of that year, instead of those of the year preceding.