Notable Women Authors of the Day: Biographical Sketches. Helen Black

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СКАЧАТЬ Not a silver hair is visible on the soft, brown hair, which is simply rolled into a neat coil, high on the back of her head, and fastened by a large tortoise-shell comb. The deep grey eyes are undimmed, and wear a look of peace and resignation, nobly won; while "ever and anon of griefs subdued, there comes a token" which recalls the past. But Mrs. Riddell can smile sweetly, and when she smiles, two – yes two – absolutely girlish dimples light up the expressive countenance. She is tall, has a good carriage, and is dressed in black; she has worn no colours for over ten years.

      The little room is very simply but prettily furnished. It is lighted by one bay window reaching to the ground in front, and a glass door at the side. Soft, white rugs lie here and there on the dark red carpet, and an old-fashioned bookcase contains the works of her favourite authors. There are no particular curiosities or decorations to be seen, save one valuable bit of old Dresden china, two or three plates of ancient Crown Derby, together with a couple of quaint Delhi-work salvers, and a few pictures hanging on the walls. Of these last, two are particularly attractive. One is the Head of a Christ crowned with thorns, beautifully painted on copper; the other, over the fire place, represents the Castle of Carrigfergus, which, though built nearly a thousand years ago, is still strong enough to hold a troop of soldiers.

      Mrs. Riddell was born in Ireland, at The Barn, Carrigfergus. She was the youngest daughter of Mr. James Cowan, who held the post of High Sheriff for the county of that town.

      "Yes, I am from the north – the black north," says your hostess in a low, soft voice. "My grandfather was in the navy, and my great-grandfather fought at Culloden, so I may fairly claim to be English, Scotch, and Irish. My mother, Ellen Kilshaw, was a beautiful, graceful, and accomplished English woman. On most subjects people have two opinions, but I never heard a second opinion about my mother. Even amongst those who only knew her in later life, when stricken with disease, and changed by long years of sorrow, she stands out a distinct personality, as one of those possessed of the manners, appearance, and ideas, that we associate with the highest bred women of the past!"

      "And she was good as she was beautiful. I wish you could hear how rich and poor who knew her in the old time at The Barn still speak of her. As for me, while I speak, the grief of her death seems sharp and present as on that sixteenth of December when she left me."

      Last autumn, after a lapse of twenty-five years, Mrs. Riddell revisited her native place. "Such of our old friends as were left," she says, "I found as kind as ever."

      It must have been sad, yet sweet, for the author to recall the old reminiscences of her girlish home as she saw once more the pretty bungalow-like house, with its gardens, hot-houses, and vineries, and to visit again the spot where, at the age of fifteen, she remembers writing her first story.

      "It was on a bright moonlight night," she says – "I can see it now flooding the gardens – that I began it, and I wrote week after week, never ceasing until it was finished. Need I add it was never published?"

      She goes on eloquently to tell you of yet further recollections of the old house, the memory of her father's lingering illness, and the low, sweet tones of her mother's voice as she read aloud to him for hours together. "From my father," says Mrs. Riddell, "I think I got the few brains I possess. Undoubtedly he was a very clever man, but I never knew him at his best, for as far as my memory goes back he was always more or less a sufferer, blessed with the most tender and devoted wife man ever had."

      On her father's death, the property passed into other hands, and with but a small jointure the broken-hearted widow and her daughter left their old home. They lived afterwards, for a while, in the charming village of Dundonald in the County Down, where the young author subsequently laid the scene of her novel, "Berna Boyle," and then, after a good deal of meditation, they decided to come to London. In later years she wrote three other Irish stories, "The Earl's Promise," "The Nun's Curse," and "Maxwell Drewitt," which last contains an exciting account of an election at Connemara.

      "I have often wished," says Mrs. Riddell "we never had so decided, yet in that case, I do not think I ever should have achieved the smallest success, and even before we left, with bitter tears, a place where we had the kindest friends, and knew much happiness, my mother's death was – though neither of us then knew the fact – a certainty. The illness of which she died had then taken hold of her. She had always a great horror of pain mental and physical; she was keenly sensitive, and mercifully before the agonising period of her complaint arrived, the nerves of sensation were paralysed; first or last, she never lost a night's sleep the whole of the ten weeks, during which I fought with death for her, and – was beaten."

      Mrs. Riddell's first impressions of London are well worth recording. Coming as strangers to a strange land, throughout the length and breadth of the great metropolis, she says, "We did not know a single creature! During the first fortnight, indeed, I really thought I should break my heart. I had never taken kindly to new places, and, remembering the sweet hamlet and the loving friends left behind, London seemed to me horrible! I could not eat; I could not sleep; I could only walk over the 'stony-hearted streets' and offer my manuscripts to publisher after publisher, who unanimously declined them." The desolation of her spirit can be more easily imagined than described. Conceive the situation of the young girl, burning to earn a living by her pen, knowing that it was within her to do so, yet unacquainted with a single literary or other person; friendless, unknown, with an invalid mother, and terribly insufficient means! And when, at last, she sold a story, called "Moors and Fens," that beloved mother had passed away; and your eyes moisten as the daughter mentions the touching and filial use to which her first twenty pounds were applied.

      But Mrs. Riddell has something pleasant to say for those who declined her MSS., and it must be related in her own words: "Looking back I must say, as a rule, they were all very kind to me. I was too ignorant and heartsore to understand how gracious they were to my simplicity, even more than to my youth. Yet I shall never forget how charming Mr. George Bentley's manner seemed the first day I saw him. His father – the kindest, most impulsive, most sympathetic of men – was alive then, and for many a year afterwards; but it so happened that Mr. George Bentley was the partner whom I saw, and," she adds smiling, and naïvely, "though he, like everyone else, refused my work, still I left his office not unhappy, but thinking much more about how courteous and nice he was than of how entirely the wrong person in the wrong place I seemed to be. Ere long, with some publishers I became quite on friendly terms, and I have now known three generations of the Bentleys."

      After a short silence Mrs. Riddell resumes the subject, saying, "I must name also Mr. Charles Skeet, of King William Street, who was good enough to keep my mother supplied with books. Long as it is since he retired from business, our friendship remained unbroken until his death. He was most kind to me always. He published 'The Rich Husband,' 'Too Much Alone,' 'The World and the Church,' and 'Alaric Spencer.'"

      "I could always, when the day was frightfully cold – and what a winter that was when I first came to London – turn into Mr. Newby's snug and warm office in Welbeck Street, and have a talk with him and his 'woman of business.' I am glad to mention her name – Miss Springett. She was a lady, always kind, nice, and capable; she remained with him till her death, I believe. Everyone was good to me in those days; but, indeed, I have received, all my life through, an enormous amount of kindness, and have not a word to say against a world which has treated me far better than I deserved."

      A year after the death of her mother the young author married. Mr. Riddell belonged to an old Staffordshire family, a branch of the Scotch Riddells, of long descent and gentle blood. "Courageous and hopeful, gifted with indomitable energy," says his widow, "endowed with marvellous persistence and perseverance; modestly conscious of talents which ought to have made their mark, he, when a mere lad, began his long quest after fortune, one single favour from whom he was never destined to receive."

      Gifted with much inventive genius, Mr. Riddell was also possessed of considerable general knowledge, and was deeply versed in literature, medicine, science, and mathematics. To him his wife turned for all the СКАЧАТЬ