"ADAM BEDE."—GEORGE ELIOT'S GREAT STORY SAID TO BE FOUNDED ON FACTS.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3077, 7 May 1881, Page 3

"ADAM BEDE."—GEORGE ELIOT'S GREAT STORY SAID TO BE FOUNDED ON FACTS.

A London correspondent of tho Chicago Times says : George Eliot's " Adam Bede " has been traced in all its details by Guy Roslyn, the poet, to Derbyshire, one of tho most picturesque counties in England. He says that the action in "Adam Bede" can at once be identified with Wicksworth, in Derbyshire. Dinah Morris is Elizabeth Evans, a well-known female preacher, who played an important part in Derbyshire Methodism. Adam Bede waa Win. Evans. Between the story of the heroine of fiction and of fact there is great similarity. Both

are Quakers, and consequently wear Quaker bonnets.. Dinah Morris preaches on Hayslope Green, Elizabeth Morris on Boston Green ; the former stayed in prison with a woman named Hetty Sorrel, who was imprisoned for the murder of her illegitimate child ; the latter did a similar act of benevolenco to a young girl accused of a like crime. Guy Roslyn proves beyond any doubt that George Eliot not only described Derbyshire scenery in her novels, but also that in the case of "Adam Bede " she took all her main incidents from a village history which was known and printed some time back, to support the assertions that the work of George Eliot was intimately associated with Derbyshire. I myself know the district well, and have investigated many of the documents in the case, and am in a position to indorse the correctness of the following true story on which " Adam Bede " is founded :

[ William Evans of Ellaston was a joiner [ and builder. He had a large business ; his brother was a preacher and a " Methody." Particulars are given of the life of Samuel Evans in a brochure published in 1859. This is called " Seth Bebe, ( The Methody,' his Life and Labours "; chiefly written by himself. In the village referred to as Hayslope, in " Adam Bede,' is fully identified, and may be seen to-day, little altered by the hand of time. The " Methodies " have a handsome chapel there now, and the green, were Dinah breathed forth holy prayers, in 1818, was inclosed. The signboard of the "Donnithorne Arms" still hangs out, and the red brick hall is still in existence. It is described by Samuel Evans as a slow place, where people live on with little exertion and no care. Samuel Evans was born at Boston, about sixteen miles from Derby, and about four miles from Ashbourne, a spot pleasantly situated on the little river Dove. In 1857 there' were 475 inhabitants—-237 males and 238 females. Samuel was born in 1777. His father was a village carpenter, "an honest, respectable man, as things went;" but during the last years of his life he used to pass most of his time in the village ale-house, to the great grief of his family. His wretched death made a great impression on Seth. The poor old man went out very late one night, and in making his way home he fell into a brook, were he was tound dead next morning, scarcely covered by water. In the novel Seth loses his father in the same way. Seth and Adam " were coming across the valley now, and had entered the pasture through which the brook ran. 'Why, what's that sticking against the willow ?' continued Seth, beginning to walk faster. Adam's heart rose to his mouth ; the vague anxiety about his father was changed into a great dread. . . . This was the first thought that flashed through Adam's conscience, before he had time to seize the coat and drag out the tail,' heavy body. Seth was already by his side, helping hira, and when they had. it on the bank, the two son 3 in the first moments knelt and looked with mute awe at the glazed eyes, forgetting that there was need of action —forgetting everything but that their, father was dead.'' _ Instances such as these have been pointed out to me ad infinitum by Guy Roslyn, who recently published some sketches of identification between the " fact and fiction" of George Eliot's famous' story. Before issuing his little work, Mr Roslyn tells me he wrote a polite note to Miss Evans (then supposed to be the wife of Mr Lewes, the philosophic author), and was answered in her behalf by Mr Lewes, who, in term 3 anything but friendly declared that Dinah Morris was never intended to be a representation of Mrs Elizabeth Evans, and that any indentification of the' two, or any other character in "Adam Bede," with real persons, would bo protested against as not only false in fact, and tending to perpetuate false notions about art, but also as a gross breach of decorum.

. " Mr Lewes assumed towards me a tone so aggressive and arrogant," said Mr Roslyn in a chat I had with him yesterday, " that I at once submitted my papers to the editor of London Society, who published them. George Eliot made no protest on her own account, and she must have felt some pangs of regret at Mr Lewes' emphatic contradiction on seeing, when next she visited the Derbyshire church-yard, a tablet bearing this inscription :

Erected by Grateful Friends, In Memory of MRS ELIZABETH EVANS, (Known to the world as " Dinah Bede "). Who during many years proclaimed alike in the oj)en air, the sanctuary, and from h.use to. house, the love of Christ