Page:George Eliot and Judaism.djvu/59

cide, and places her privately in the house of the mother of his friend, Hans Meyrick, where she pines restlessly for the mother and brother whom she has lost. Deronda discovers the brother—gains access to the mental life of that wonderful man—becomes his friend, and the resolute advancer of his ideas—brings the brother and sister together, and finally marries Mirah, after his mother, the singer Alcharisi, has declared to him his Jewish origin. The story closes as he is setting out for Palestine with his bride to make the acquaintance of a land the political existence of which it is his mission and his grandest aim to restore; and we might inscribe it "A Jewish Tale." Deronda is the centre, however, of both narratives, for he is the magnet towards which Gwendolen is mysteriously drawn and fixed. But this circumstance would, of itself, scarcely be a sufficient and satisfactory apology for the