Cabinet Minister,' the scene of which is laid during the regency of George the Fourth, and includes among its characters the great name of Sheridan; 'Preferment, or my Uncle, the Earl,' containing some good sketches of drawing-room society, but no plot; and the 'Courtier of the Days of Charles the Second,' and other tales. Next year we have the 'Dowager, or the New School for Scandal;' and in 1841 'Greville, or a Season in Paris;' 'Dacre of the South, or, the Olden Time' (a drama;) and 'The Lover and her Husband,' etc., the latter a free translation of M. Bertrand's Gerfaut. In 1842, Mrs. Gore published 'The Banker's Wife, or Court and City,' in which the efforts of a family in the middle rank to outshine a nobleman, and the consequences resulting from this silly vanity and ambition, are truly and powerfully painted. The value of Mrs. Gore's novels consists in their lively caustic pictures of fashionable and high society.
"Besides the works we have mentioned, Mrs. Gore has published 'The Desennuy,' 'The Peeress,' 'The Woman of the World,' 'The Woman of Business,' 'The Ambassador's Wife,' and other novels. She contributes tales to the periodicals, and is perhaps unparalleled for fertility. Her works are all of the same class—all pictures of existing life and manners; but the want of genuine feeling, of passion and simplicity, in her living models, and the endless frivolities of their occupations and pursuits, make us sometimes take leave of Mrs. Gore's fashionable triflers in the temper with which Goldsmith parted from Beau Tibbs—'The company of fools may at first make us smile, but at last never fails of rendering us melancholy.'"
Besides these narrative fictions, Mrs. Gore has made some contributions to the stage—"The Maid of Croissy," "The Sledge-Driver,"—little dramas from the French,—"The School for Coquettes," and other comedies. Sir Walter Scott showed, by the examples of Le Sage and Fielding, that a successful novelist could scarcely be fitted for dramatic compositions; his own attempt in that way came afterwards to support his theory. The plays of Mrs. Gore may, then, without disparaging her abilities, be acknowledged but mediocre achievements.
Respecting this lady's domestic life, it may just be observed that the date of her birth must be looked for somewhere about the close of the last century; that she married, in 1823, Mr. Charles Gore, who at the time held a commission in the British army; this gentleman, who had long been a confirmed invalid, died some years since; by him our gifted authoress bad two children, a son and a daughter, the latter of whom married, quite recently, the Hon. and Rev. Lord John Thynne. For many years Mrs. Gore has resided chiefly in France.
GOTTSCHED, LOUISA ADELGUNDE VICTORIA,
Was born at Dantzic, in 1713. Her maiden name was Kalmus. When only sixteen years of age, she married Professor Gottsched, of the Leipsic university. She aided her husband in all his literary labours; and appeared, in a short time after her marriage, as an authoress under her own name. Her style is pronounced by critics as superior to that of her husband; though he enjoyed a great reputation as an author. She wrote a number of melo-
