ROSA NOUCHETTE CAREY.

WRITING A NEW STORY FOR “THE GIRL’S OWN PAPER.”

Inan age when many books on every sort of subject and vexed question are being daily launched into the world, it is a relief to turn to the pure, wholesome novels of Rosa Nouchette Carey, the popular authoress, who has steadily held her ground with her public since the production of her first book,Nellie’s Memories, composed and related verbally to her sister, while yet in her teens, though not actually written until some few years later.

The youngest girl but one of a family of seven, and in her girlhood delicate in health, which caused her education to be somewhat desultory, Rosa Carey soon displayed an aptitude for composing fiction and little plays which she and her sister acted, one of her chief amusements being to select favourite characters from history and from fiction, and trying to personify them, while her greatest pleasure was to relate short stories to this same younger sister over their needlework. It is a strange fact that, during her simple, happy, uneventful girlhood, chiefly spent in reading, in writing poetry, and in other girlish occupations, Rosa Carey, who was of a somewhat dreamy and romantic disposition, feeling the impossibility of combining her favourite pursuits with a useful domestic life, and discouraged by her failures in this respect, made a deliberate and, as it afterwards proved, a fruitless attempt to quench her longing to write. This unnatural repression, however, of a strong instinct could not be conquered, and after some years she yielded to it.

She was born in London, near old Bow Church, but has no very distinct remembrances of the house and place. Later, the family moved to Hackney, into what was then a veritable country residence, and there many happy years were spent. Her mother was a strict disciplinarian, and very practical and clever, while her father was a man universally beloved and respected, by reason of his singularly amiable character, his integrity, and his many virtues.

The next move was to Hampstead, where the young girl’s schooldays began, and it was then that she met and formed a strong friendship with the late Mathilde Blind, the talented author ofThe Descent of Man, and translator of Marie Bashkirtseff’s Journal and other works. This attachment, mutually enthusiastic and full of interest, was only interrupted by a divergence of religious opinions. Rosa Carey, adhering to the simple faith of her childhood, could not follow Mathilde Blind, who was educated in the extreme school of modern free-thought, and the friends, with sorrow but with yet unabated affection on each side, drifted apart.

Meanwhile, the large and happy family was being gradually broken up. First the beloved father passed away. On the same day that, three years before, had witnessed his death, their mother, too, was taken to her rest, and shortly after, the two sisters went to Croydon, to superintend their widowed brother’s home. Miss Carey’s real vocation in life seemed to spring up, and the literary work was but fitfully carried on, for, on the marriage of her sister to the Rev. Canon Simpson, vicar ofKirkby Stephen, Westmoreland, and the subsequent death of her brother, the sole charge of the young orphans devolved upon her.

As the years rolled by, circumstances tended to break up that home also. The young people grew up and scattered, and out of Miss Carey’s four charges three are now married. Then, her pleasurable duties being accomplished, the partially disused pen was resumed, and the author found leisure to return to literary pursuits. She has for the last twelve years made her home in the ancient and historic village of Putney, which, although it has lost much of its quaint and picturesque environment since the destruction of the toll-house and the old bridge of 1729, with its twenty narrow openings—erstwhile the delight of artists—has yet a few “bits” left that have escaped the hands of the Philistines.

Miss Carey’s pretty red-brick house of the Queen Anne style of architecture, and into which she has only more recently moved, is situated near the bend of the road. A broad gravelled path, running the whole length of the house in front, is bordered with shrubs and flowering plants. The spacious hall opens on the right and front into the chief living-rooms, the long French windows of which lead into the conservatory. One of the great attractions of the commodious and artistic residence is the pleasant garden at the back, at once the pride and delight of the author, where countless blackbirds, thrushes, and other singing-birds, are wont to congregate, and where in summer, under the gigantic chestnut tree with its widely-spreading branches, she and her home-mates spend many a happy hour. The home party consists likewise of her widowed sister, Mrs. Simpson, and of her friend, Helen Marion Burnside, the well-known poet and author ofThe Deaf Girl Next Door, and of a lately-published volume entitledDriftweed.

The drawing-room is bright and cheerful with its wide, lofty window, and pretty side windows, its parquet floor liberally strewn with Persian rugs, and its cosy corner hung with Oriental tapestries. Miss Carey’s own study is upstairs, half-way up the wide staircase, and overlooks the garden. There is an oak knee-hole writing-table, with raised blotting-pad. On one side well-filled bookcases, here a low spring couch, there lounging-chairs, big and little, and a cabinet covered with photographs, together with vases of flowers, and many little odds and ends of china. The whole is restful to the eye, thoroughly comfortable and attractive. Amid these peaceful surroundings Miss Carey writes her novels. She recalls to mind a little anecdote connected with her earliest effort—Nellie’s Memories. With no introduction, and quite unacquainted then with any publishers, she took the MSS., with much trepidation, to Mr. Tinsley, who refused to read it. This was a great disappointment, and some months later, she mentioned the matter to Mrs. Westerton, of Westerton’s Library. This kindly woman volunteered to induce him to change his mind, and did so with such good effect that, on hearing at a wedding-party the reader’s opinion was distinctly favourable, she hastened away from the festive gathering to impart the good news to the young author, a kindness that Miss Carey declares she “shall always remember with gratitude, and the very dress that the good-natured messenger wore on the occasion is stamped upon her recollection for evermore.”

This pretty domestic story of English home-life found favour with the public from the outset. It became widely known, and has been constantly republished up to the present date. The girl-author’s name and fame were made at once, at which no one seemed surprised but she. Old and young alike “took to” the charming tale, free from any dramatic incidents or mystery, owing to the unflagging interest, and the high tone of the work, not to speak of the striking individuality of the characters.Wee Wifiefollowed, and the author, who alone pronounced it to be a failure, actually refused at first to allow it to be brought out again when demanded lately, as she feared it might not add to her literary reputation, but upon being pressed, she re-wrote and lengthened it, without, however, altering the plot, and it has passed into a new edition.

Among her succeeding novels, which are too well known to need more than a passing comment, may be notedBarbara Heathcote’s Trial,Robert Ord’s Atonement,Wooed and Married,Heriot’s Choice, andMary St. John. Ever anxious to do good and not harm, and to write books that any mother can give her girls to read, Rosa Carey’s works are characterised by a tendency to elevate to lofty aspirations, to noble ideas, and to purity of thought. During her residence at Putney she has also writtenLover or Friend,Only the Governess,The Search for Basil Lyndhurst,Sir Godfrey’s Grand-daughters,The Old, Old Story,The Mistress of Brae Farm, andOther People’s Lives—a collection of short stories—while her latest book is entitledMollie’s Prince. InThe Girl’s Own Paperher short stories, which run serially for six months, are well known and eagerly looked for. In these, alike as in her longer works, the descriptive power, the fertility of resource and originality, prove that unceasing interest can be maintained while dwelling in a thoroughly healthy literary atmosphere. The first chapters of a new story will appear in our next monthly part.

It is clearly noticeable that while some of Rosa Carey’s earlier books indicate a tone of sadness running through them—a circumstance that she is somewhat inclined to regret, but they were tinged with many years of sorrow—the healing hand of time has done its merciful work, and she now writes in a more cheerful vein. Nor is there wanting a strong sense of quiet fun and humour which especially permeates her delightful novelNot Like Other Girls, a book that should surely stimulate many young women to follow the example of the three plucky heroines therein depicted with so much spirit.

While never exactly forming plots, when Miss Carey is about to begin a story, she thinks of one character, and works around that, meditating well the while over the others to be introduced. Then she starts writing, and soon gets so completely to live in and with her creations, that she feels a sense of loss and blank when the book is coming to an end, and while she has to wait until another grows in her mind. But, after all, her writing—the real work of her life—has often to be made a secondary consideration, for in her strong sense of family duty and devotion, and being the pivot round which its many members turn in sorrow or in sickness, the most important professional work is apt to be laid aside if she can do aught to comfort or to relieve them.

Nor have her sympathies been exclusively limited to her own people. Ever fond of girls, and keenly interested in their welfare, Miss Carey conducted for many years a weekly class that had been formed in connection with the Fulham Sunday School for young girls and servants over fifteen years of age, many of whom have had good reason to remember with gratitude the kindly encouragement and the wise counsel bestowed upon them by the gentle and sympathetic author, Rosa Nouchette Carey.

Helen C. Black.

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