their earnings, one of the most frequent and serious injuries perpetrated by the wealthy upon their indigent brethren.
Manœuvring is a detailed account of the machinations of a certain Mrs. Beaumont, a country lady, who expends a great deal of Machiavellism, left-handed wisdom, and intrigue upon the projects of her children's marriages, and also upon securing to her family the fortune of an old gentleman who never had a thought of disposing of it otherwise. The mortifications and defeats to which her circuitous policy constantly exposes her, constitute the plot and the moral of the tale, which is not ill-conceived, and yet for some cause fails to interest us long.
In Almeria, Miss Edgeworth's admirable story-telling powers, her grace and shrewdness, are once more seen at their very best. It is the history of a woman who has sacrificed all the happiness of life, all the better instincts of her nature, for the empty ambition of being admitted into the charmed circle of fashionable society; and who, though she finds out in time that it is Dead-Sea apples she has sought, has become so immeshed that she cannot break away, but leads an existence of pleasure-hunting, ever seeking, never finding that commodity, a warning example of
How the world its veterans rewards—
A youth of folly, an old age of cards.
The moral is not insisted on, but is allowed to speak for itself, and is, on that account, far more eloquent.
Except when dealing with Irish scenes, Miss Edgeworth is never happier than when painting the perverse or intriguing fine ladies of society, who, having no real troubles or anxieties to occupy them, shielded from the physical evils of existence, make to themselves
