BEATING THE AIR.* MR. Buala's novel is more cheerful than
one expects from its title, which is not attractive. There are several sad episodes in the story, and the life of the hero is, for a groat part of it, passed in vain endeavour, but the reader feels thoroughly con- fident from the first that the ex-Guardsman will come all right in the end. His troubles are rather cleverly-contrived methods for bringing out other people's characters, than solemn sorrows with which one is bound to sympathise ; and his imprudent but generous marriage is accepted by the reader—no doubt, it is so meant by the author—as a guarantee of the ultimate good in-
t5 e Air. By Click Ralph Burke. London : Chapman and Hall.
tentions of destiny. For this is a story of destiny. Hum- phrey Perceval is pulled out of his troubles, just as the reader anticipates, for Mr. Burke takes little pains with his plot, deals in no subtleties, and displays no great originality ; but all through he achieves no success,—his active career is nothing but a beating of the air. Neither is he a striking or singular person, but a very good fellow, manly, gentlemanly, and real ; living, though not especially vivid, and with nothing ideal about him. Everybody knows somebody like Humphrey Perceval, and feels it pleasant to know that somebody. This is not intended to convey that Mr. Burke's hero is a common- place person, but only that he has looked for and found him on the level, not on the heights ; and that there is no romance in the story, which has plenty of practical human interest. The writer displays his ability conspicuously in the character of Sybil Mainwaring, the young lady whom Perceval marries so early in the narrative, that it is not unfair to either the writer or the reader to divulge the fact. He exhibits, without over-describing her; he puts her into the story here and there,-with subtle, careful, real touches, never exaggerated. Her womanly little ways, her instinctive prudence, her readiness to take a hint, her good-humour, her real refinement, so nicely differentiated from the "mere veneer," her helpfulness, her cleverness, her unsen- timental but genuine love for her unsuccessful husband, all make up a pleasant picture of a woman facile a vivre, and yet to be relied on in great emergencies, too. Perhaps Mr. Burke makes her a little too practically philosophical,—not for the position, and for her husband's welfare, but for life-likeness. Does there really exist a woman—did he ever know one—so absolutely free from the tendency to "worry," as Sybil Per- ceval p There is a short but admirable scene in the second volume, in which the character of Sybil is perfectly brought out. It occurs at a crisis, when the long list of misfortunes and vain efforts—none of the latter particularly painful, and some pleasantly ludicrous—has come to a conclusion, in the following manner :— "Sybil was reading a letter. From my brother Harold,' said she. He has just changed his station, and he likes his new quarters very much. Garmagard--somevvhere in the North-West of India—not far from the Hills. The capital is a largo town, he says, with a Government House, and plenty of English people, both civil and mili- tary.'—' Suppose we go out there,' said Humphrey."
By this time, the ex-Guardsman has come painfully near the end of his resources—that there has been no fault of his own, the story, which it is not our business to tell, amply proves— and he has been snubbed by friends freely, and cheated by per- sons whose business it is to cheat; he has had ample experience of the hollowness of expectations from acquaintances invested with the little brief authority of officialism, and also of the evils of such an up-bringing as his own ; and now, nothing has "turned up," and "something must be done." He must really "make a beginning," and it had better be at Garmagard. All this portion of the story is very clever,—how the poor young couple, not far, then, from the melancholy estate in which people are described as "having seen better days," put their house into the hands of an agent, and what comes of that rash act ; how their few friends regard their intention, and how things look when everything is sold, and the result, in money, is before them,—all this is admirably told. Humphrey thinks it would perhaps be better that he should go " out " alone, leaving Sybil with a friend—a real friend, this one— and "see what he can get to do." Apropos of this is the characteristic little bit to which we have alluded. Humphrey has not the courage to break this grand notion of his to Sybil, but he says something like it to the friend (Lady Blis- worth), and she writes a very kind letter to Sybil, asking her to stay with herself and Lord Blisworth, and adding, "I hope we shall be able to make the time pass as pleasantly as may be, in the absence of Mr. Perceval." Then Sybil hands the letter to Humphrey, with a sentence of hearty gratitude to Lady Blisworth, and goes on to say :— " Well, I will go and lunch with her to-day, and tell her as well as we can what I think of her. But, you naughty boy, what made you go and tell her that you were going to leave me behind In- deed, I did not. I only told her of what I feared you might have to suffer if you came with me at first.'—`And what do you think I should suffer, if you wont away and left me ' Humphrey thought lie would perhaps have suffered nearly as much, and his honest face betrayed his thoughts ; and Sybil ceased her badinage, to toll him how well she knew he had only thought of her happiness, and not at all of hie own, in his plans. And then she continued, 'But you were quite wrong, my dear old boy. It was a very stupid plan to think of trying to make me happy by making yourself miserable."
We would prefer that Sybil should not say "my dear ' old boy," but that is a trifle ; she comes out capitally under all circumstances, and especially at Garmagard, where she finds herself among some odd and amusing specimens of Anglo- Indian society. Mr. Burke is in his element, and very happy while hitting off the cranks and quiddities of " station " life ; indeed, he takes the Percevals to Giirmagard rather too manifestly in order to get his own fling at those characteristics. His descriptions of scenery are extremely interesting and vivid, introduced with good-taste, and not to the arrest or detriment of the story. As a whole, his novel makes a pleasant and favourable impression, although it is of a superficial kind, when the tone is compared with the incidents. One feels that force of character and depth of feeling are alike wanting ; not so much that the writer could not compass and convey both, as that he has not considered the gravity of certain incidents—the family disgrace of the Mainwarings, for instance—so carefully as he has studied the peculiarities of his people. He has given the humorous side of his " situations " a slightly undue preponder- ance, probably because he has kept too constantly in view that power of making things come right in the end which a skilful novelist will ignore to himself so far as he can, throwing himself into the actual influence and aspect of calamity with as much as possible of the finality with which calamity always invests itself to the feelings and the imagination of the sufferers. Mr. Burke possesses the rare quality of happy and spontaneous humour, his book is thick-set with keen and amusing remark, and comment, charming little bits of satire without spite, and neat touches of delineation and definition which tell like fine strokes in etching. He ought to be a master of the short-story-writing art, in which there are so few masters, for where the one dramatic occasion of his novel arises, he uses it with effect quite out of propor- tion in its vigour to the style of the preceding parts of the story, and makes it stand apart from them in a manner which is striking, but, strictly considered, a defect in art. He makes a great covp with the incident itself, but it does not fill an adequate place in the narrative. The most original character in the book, and perhaps the best drawn all through, is that of Charles Perceval, the father of Humphrey, "one of those easy- going products of modern civilisation with which England, and especially London, abounds." The preliminary sketch of him and all the touches by which he portrays himself, are admirable. His death is a foreseen necessity of the story, but it is also a great loss to the book.
Mr. Burke's novel suggests the reflection that it is a good thing to have a young man" of fashion," a Guardsman, a person who has "seen life," and is a member of that world with which the young-lady novelists who do not adorn our literature are so fond of dealing, depicted by a man. We may presume that Mr. Burke is even a young man, and in the " world " of which he writes. Yet his hero, the ex-Guardsman, the club-man, the "eligible" Humphrey Perceval, is a good, honest fellow, who woos and wins a good, honest girl ; never covets his neigh- bour's wife, or neglects his own ; neither lies, gambles, blas- phemes, boasts, nor bullies, but is, in a word, totally unlike the unclean beast of the modern idolatry. We are indebted to Mr. Burke for a good novel, and a wholesome hero. Young ladies, and others who write novels, please copy.
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