Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878

In Short

This volume is a curated miscellany of late-1870s literature and social commentary, serving as a time capsule of the era’s preoccupations. It weaves together travelogues of old English towns and Mediterranean ruins, fictional accounts of American expatriates in Paris, and scholarly inquiries into political history and sociology. By offering a diverse range of voices—from romantic storytellers to rigorous census historians—the collection illustrates how the readers of 1878 balanced their hunger for exotic exploration with a grounding need to understand the structural mechanics of their own rapidly changing world.

The Story

The volume opens with a wanderer’s tour of Bristol, where the reader is invited to walk through narrow, gabled streets that seem to heave against the sky, finding remnants of a past defined by charity schools and ancient architecture. This sense of historical immersion is mirrored in a deep dive into the life of Francis Bonivard, the "Prisoner of Chillon," whose struggle for Genevan liberty serves as a sobering reminder of the costs of idealism. We see how history—often written by the victors or later sanitized by scholars—clashes with the gritty, often unpoetic reality of an individual’s life, including the mundane disputes and character flaws that accompany greatness.

The focus shifts to the personal sphere with the story of Paletta, a young New England artist who travels to Paris to join an atelier des dames. Her journey is one of immense hope tempered by the reality of poverty and the "shabby economies" required to sustain a life of art. She seeks a "divine ideal" while navigating a city that smells of vile-smelling lavoirs and cheap kitchens, representing the hopeful but anxious spirit of the American abroad. Her internal narrative is a quest for self-actualization, where the mountains of her struggle are reduced to molehills by the sheer strength of her youthful resolve.

Back in America, the narrative enters the quiet, cloistered world of Belfield. Here, the story follows James Floyd Randolph and his companions—Jack, Harry, and the captivating Georgy Lenox. Their lives are marked by the long shadows of the American Revolution and the internal, often unspoken tensions of young love. The atmosphere is thick with the scent of lilacs and the distant sound of rain, while the boys harbor secret devotions, projecting their literary ideals onto Georgy. This domestic tranquility is disrupted by family secrets, hidden engagements, and the quiet, desperate maneuvering of those trying to secure their futures without losing their sense of honor.

The volume concludes by widening its lens to the global and the technical. It explores the tension between foreign cultures—such as the volatile skirmishes between Russian and Tartar workmen in Kazan—and the dry, bureaucratic evolution of the United States census. The final pieces reflect on the necessity of "holiday" from the machinery of self-government, suggesting that even in a republic, there must be moments where the citizen turns their back on political vigilance to simply exist. The ending is not a singular climax but a return to the quiet, observant stance of the individual looking out at a world that is messy, contradictory, and stubbornly, persistently human.

How It Unfolds

The picturesque heritage The journey begins in Bristol, where the reader is introduced to the "quaint garb" of charity children and the romantic, if odorous, history of the city’s ancient streets. This sets a tone of reflective, observant travel.

The artistic pilgrimage The narrative moves to Paris with Paletta, detailing her transition from photograph-coloring to high-minded art study. The focus here is on the emotional weight of ambition and the stark contrast between the "enchanted" goal and the daily reality of a cramped, gray city.

The domestic landscape We are transported to the quiet town of Belfield, where childhood memories and local history intersect. The story shifts to the private lives of young people, exploring how past political convictions and present romantic rivalries define their small-town world.

The historical struggle A shift toward the political and the scholarly examines the life of the Prisoner of Chillon, Francis Bonivard. This section documents the clash between individual sacrifice and the cold judgment of historical committees.

The clash of cultures The volume ventures into the rougher territories of the East, sharing stories of ethnic tension among workmen in Kazan and the eccentricities of household staff. These anecdotes highlight the complexity of human interaction across class and geography.

The final reflection The collection closes by considering the burden of citizenship. It argues for the importance of intellectual leisure and the occasional, necessary abandonment of political duty in favor of the simple, unobserved life.

The People

Paletta embodies the nineteenth-century American dreamer, moving from a life of "detestable" commercial work to the aspirational, if difficult, pursuit of fine art in Paris. She is marked by an anxious gray-eyed intensity and a stubborn refusal to be defeated by poverty.

James Floyd Randolph, the narrator of the Belfield sequence, represents the imaginative youth whose reality is constantly filtered through the lens of the books he reads. He is a boy of "old longings and resolves," caught in a quiet rivalry for the affections of the golden-haired Georgy Lenox.

Georgy Lenox is the object of the boys' collective, unspoken devotion. She is a figure of grace and mystery, transformed in the minds of her suitors into a series of historical and literary archetypes, yet she remains a distinct, living presence in the quiet streets of her town.

Francis Bonivard serves as the volume’s historical anchor. A man who sacrificed his freedom for the liberties of Geneva, he is portrayed not as a saintly figure but as a complex, often difficult man whose later life was marked by loneliness and the frustration of seeing his own historical record rejected by his peers.

Anarky is a vivid character in the household scenes, a woman of sharp tongue and deep emotion who manages the chaos of a house filled with disparate personalities. Her volatile relationship with the staff—particularly the unflappable Chang-how—provides a grounded, human contrast to the more abstract political and artistic discussions elsewhere in the volume.

In Its Own Voice

"After years of patient endeavor, of hope deferred and heart oftentimes made sick, Paletta found herself at last in Paris."

This line introduces Paletta’s arrival in the city, marking the end of a long period of professional frustration and the beginning of her artistic journey.

"Banners streamed, bugles blew, spears gleamed, knights jostled in my world."

The narrator, James Floyd Randolph, describes his internal state while lost in a Waverley novel, illustrating the vivid, escapist life he lived as an imaginative boy.

"Self-government is such very hard work that those engaged in it are entitled to occasional holidays."

This observation, found in the concluding reflections, highlights the volume’s argument that even in a highly political society, the individual must find time to disconnect from the "machinery" of the state.

What It's Really About

At its core, this volume explores the tension between the romanticized ideal and the mundane reality of existence. Whether it is the artistic "divine ideal" sought in a dirty Parisian street, the legendary heroics of a political prisoner contrasted with his actual, abrasive personality, or the grand history of a nation reduced to the dry, technical columns of a census, the text consistently asks how we reconcile our lofty ambitions with our everyday circumstances. It suggests that human life is defined by this "fever" of striving, yet it also advocates for the quiet, necessary grace of stepping back from that struggle to simply observe, breathe, and live in the present.

Why Read It Today

Readers who enjoy the slow, deliberate pace of nineteenth-century prose will find much to admire here. This volume is not a fast-paced thriller; it is an experience of immersion, capturing the texture of a world that feels both distant and surprisingly recognizable. You will find the descriptive passages—the smell of lilacs in a quiet sitting room, the sight of the "dark-red tower" of a Tartar gateway—to be deeply evocative.

However, the reader should be prepared for the period-specific attitudes embedded in the text. The writing reflects the prejudices and social hierarchies of the 1870s, particularly in its depictions of class, nationality, and race. Some modern readers may find the dialect used for certain characters—such as the scenes featuring Anarky and Chang-how—to be a jarring example of the period's limitations in representation. Furthermore, the inclusion of extensive historical footnotes and dry census reports requires a specific kind of patience. If you value the experience of wandering through a dense, unhurried, and genuinely multifaceted historical archive, you will find this volume a rewarding, if challenging, companion that offers a rare, unfiltered look at the intellectual pulse of the late Victorian age.