Children of destiny — Reading Notes

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In Category - England London Nineteenth Century Fiction

Authors: Seawell, Molly Elliot, 1860-1916, Wenzell, A. B. (Albert Beck), 1864-1917 [Illustrator] Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2022 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: Historical fiction; Rich people -- Fiction; Virginia -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 97,090

Reading time 423 min

Text sections 26

The source record for Children of destiny — Reading Notes measures this digital text at 97,090 words, 7 hr 3 min estimated reading time, and 26 detected text sections.

The text analysis averages about 18.1 words per sentence, while the detected sections provide another way to judge how the source is divided.

Project Gutenberg metadata also associates the work with “Historical fiction,” connecting these edition facts with the source record’s subject description.

Source: Project Gutenberg record #69193

Molly Elliot Seawell's 1893 novel contrasts Virginia plantation life with London society through precise diction, dialogue, and descriptive detail. The excerpts reveal a narrator attuned to social performance, class dynamics, and the tension between freedom and obligation, as seen in the reapers' song, the horse-riding scene, and Skelton's internal debate.

Editorial Edition Score 4.9/5

★★★★★ ★★★★★

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Description quality20 pts
Title & short description10 pts
Source metadata20 pts
Text length15 pts
Chapters / structure15 pts
EPUB file integrity20 pts

Total of 100 points, scaled to a 2.5-5.0 range. Editions with an empty description or a missing EPUB file are not scored.

Edition quality

File: pg69193

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The hot June sunshine poured down upon the great fields of yellow wheat at Deerchase, and the velvet wind swept softly over them, making long billows and shadowy dimples in the golden sea of grain. The air was all blue and gold, and vibrating with the music of harvest time--the reedlike harmonies of the wind-swept wheat, the droning of many bees, the merry drumming of the cicada in the long grass, and, above all, the song of the black reapers, as they swung their glittering scythes in the morning sun. One side of the vast field was skirted by purplish woods, through which went constantly a solemn murmur--the only sad note in the symphony. On the other side rose great clumps and groves of live oaks and silver beeches and feathery elms, shading a spacious brick house with innumerable peaks and gables. Beyond this house and its pleasure grounds a broad and glittering river went merrily on its way to the south Atlantic. Nature in this coast country of Virginia is prodigal of beauty, and bestows all manner of charms with a lavish hand. Here are found blue rivers and bluer skies, and pale splendours of moonlit nights and exquisite dawns and fair noons. Here Nature runs the whole gamut of beauty--through the laughing loveliness of spring mornings, the capricious sweetness of summer days, when the landscape hides itself, like a sulky beauty, in white mists and silvery rains, to the cold glory of the winter nights; there is no discord nor anything unlovely. But in the harvest time it is most gracious and love-compelling. There is something ineffably gay in harvest, and the negroes, those children of the sun, sang as merrily and as naturally as the grasshoppers that chirped in the green heart of the woods.

The long row of black reapers swung their scythes in rhythm, their voices rising and falling in cadence with the cutting of the wheat. The head man led the singing as he led the reapers. After them came a crowd of negro women, gathering up the wheat and tying it into bundles--it was as primitive as the harvesting in the days of Ruth and Boaz. It was not work, it was rather play. The song of the reapers had an accompaniment of shrill laughter from the women, who occasionally joined in the singing--

“When I was young, I useter to wait Behine ole marster, han’ he plate, An’ pass de bottle when he dry, An’ bresh away dat blue-tail fly.”

The men’s voices rolled this out sonorously and melodiously. Then came the chorus, in which the high sweet voices of the women soared like the larks and the thrushes:

“Jim, crack corn, I doan’ keer, Jim, crack corn, I doan’ keer, Jim, crack corn, I doan’ keer. Ole--marster’s--gone--away!”

The last line was a wail; but the first lines were full of a devil-may-care music, which made some of the women drop their bundles of wheat, and, picking up their striped cotton skirts, they danced a breakdown nimbly. A dozen little negro boys carried buckets of water about the field to refresh the thirsty harvesters, and one negro girl, with her arms folded and a great pail on her head of whisky and water with mint floating around in it, was vociferously greeted whenever she appeared, and a drink from the gourd in the pail invariably caused a fresh outburst of song.

Hot and bright as the fields were, it was not too hot and bright for these merry labourers. But there was a stretch of coolness and of shade on the edge of the woods where the dew still sparkled upon the blackberry-bushes and the grass and undergrowth. And in a shady place under a hawthorn bush sat a black-eyed little boy with a dog across his knees. They had for company a Latin book, which the boy made a lazy pretence of studying, wearing all the time a sulky scowl. But when he found that he could put the book to a better use than studying, by propping the dog’s head upon it so as to bring the tawny, intelligent eyes upon a level with his own, the scowl cleared away. His face, then, though full of archness and sweetness, was not altogether happy. He gazed into the dog’s eyes wistfully, for, although many people gazed upon him kindly, no creature in the wide world ever gazed upon him so affectionately as this one poor brute of a dog.

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From its first paragraph, Children of Destiny establishes a narrator who moves between lyrical description and sharp social observation. The harvest scene at Deerchase is rendered in sensuous detail—'blue and gold' air, 'reedlike harmonies' of wind-swept wheat—yet the singing reapers are introduced as 'those children of the sun,' a phrase that signals the novel's interest in the gap between pastoral beauty and the human hierarchies that sustain it. The narrator's voice, at once poetic and ironic, will prove central to the book's treatment of its characters.

Diction and the Performance of Class

The excerpts show Seawell using dialogue to mark social position and self-awareness. When Tom Shapleigh blurts 'you're a mighty fine woman' to Mrs. Blair, the narrator notes his 'bluff good-nature' and his awkward stop—a small moment that reveals how class and gender constrain even spontaneous speech. Mrs. Blair's reply, 'with sarcastic politeness,' is a verbal performance that maintains her dignity while deflecting the compliment. Later, Blair's self-deprecating line 'I'm the most petticoated man in the county' is undercut by the narrator's observation that 'the hen-pecked men are never the ones who parade the fact openly.' These exchanges do not merely advance plot; they expose the gap between what characters say and what the narrator implies about them.

The Weight of Unspoken Rules

Seawell's narrator frequently steps back to comment on the social codes that govern her characters. Skelton's internal debate about his fortune and Sylvia is presented not as romantic longing but as a calculation of 'mastery of conditions.' The narrator observes that 'he wanted all of the power of money, but he wanted to be as free as other men were; and as it was, he was not free, but a slave.' This inversion—a wealthy man feeling enslaved by his own inheritance—is typical of the novel's method: it uses the language of liberty and bondage to probe the constraints of social position. The phrase 'a crumpled rose-leaf troubled him' suggests a narrator who sees through Skelton's self-importance while still taking his dilemma seriously.

Setting as Social Stage

The opening description of Deerchase is not merely scenic; it establishes a world where nature and labor are intertwined. The reapers' song—'When I was young, I useter to wait / Behine ole marster, han’ he plate'—is presented as part of the 'symphony' of harvest, but the dialect and content remind readers that this beauty depends on enslaved labor. The narrator's comment that the harvesting was 'as primitive as the harvesting in the days of Ruth and Boaz' uses biblical allusion to dignify the scene while also hinting at anachronism. Later, the racecourse scene is filled with 'carriages and horsemen' and 'gayest dresses,' but the narrator notes that 'men were not confined to sombre black'—a detail that quietly dates the action and underscores the performative nature of public life.

Narrative Voice and Ironic Distance

Seawell's narrator maintains a consistent ironic distance from the characters, especially in moments of emotional intensity. When Mrs. Blair shows 'perfectly indomitable pluck' during the race, the narrator's admiration is tempered by the observation that her husband 'dashed off, and, jumping his horse over the fence, disappeared.' The contrast between Elizabeth's composure and Blair's flight is left for the reader to weigh. Similarly, Skelton's eye 'sought' Lewis 'occasionally' while he debated his own future—a detail that suggests his affection is real but secondary to his calculations. The narrator never moralizes directly, but the accumulation of such observations creates a portrait of a society where personal feeling is always entangled with property and reputation.

Dialogue as Revelation

Several exchanges in the excerpts reveal character through what is left unsaid. When Sylvia cries out at Black Bess's behavior, Mrs. Blair's reply—'Don't be afraid, I can manage her'—is described as 'sarcastic politeness,' a phrase that condenses her social skill and her irritation. Blair's laughter at being called 'petticoated' is a performance of ease that the narrator immediately undercuts. These moments show Seawell using dialogue not just to advance the story but to create a layered social world where every word carries subtext.

Readers attentive to diction and narrative stance will find Children of Destiny rewards careful attention to its ironies. The excerpts suggest a novel less concerned with plot than with the texture of social life—the way people speak, the rules they obey, and the self-deceptions they practice. The narrator's voice, at once lyrical and detached, invites the reader to see both the beauty and the cost of the world it describes.

Years at this desk teach you how books whisper to each other across the shelves. Seawell’s Virginians knew the weight of obligation, how a duty can feel like a cage of fine mesh. I find the same shadow in Murder in the maze — Story, Setting & Ideas — that quiet turn where a choice narrows, and the path ahead is strangely familiar. A kinship of restraint, if you will.