The Sun.
London, England, 1868-03-03 00:00:00

is dear old Pickwick—that modern Don Quixote,
sane and rotund, with a squire surpassing Sancho
in wit and tact, " wise saws and modern instances;"
and here are the susceptible Tupman and the irre-
pressible Winkle, and the poetic Snodgrass ; here,
of course, is Bob Sawyer, with Ben Allen and Jack
Hopkins, and we hear their thrilling stories of sur-
gery, and we see the fierce encounter between
Noddy and Gunter, and we feel the chagrin of host
and guests when the remorseless Mrs. lladdles re-
fuses warm water, though we know they will get
very satisfactorily drunk on cold punch, and we
shrink from their dismay when that night-capped
Nemesis appears to drive them forth in a highly
precipitous and opprobrious manner. And now the
magic picture fades from before our eyes, wet with
tears of delicious laugLter— the great magician
closes his magic book, inclines his head, and
vanishes.

Mr. Dickens's reading version of " David Cop-
perfield," a marvellous piece of condensation and
reconstruction, contains much of the richest hu-
mour and deepest pathos of that most delightful of
all his novels—the one, perhaps., iu which there is
most of the man, his tenderest sympathies, his most
golden memories. On the voice of the reader, we
are borne back to the time when we first read that
story, so touching, yet so inspiring, so gracious in
its humanity, so pure in its Christianity. How
young we grow as AN e listen !--how we shake off the
dust of the world, and become fL esh-bearted, like
Daisy. What poor things confeatiollil fine Man--
ners and mere brain culture seem to us before the
rugged manhood, the grand simplicity of poor
Peggotty and Ham. How the little child-wife's
story, swinging like a light gossamer web from sha-
dow to sunshine, glistens for us with the morning
dew of new fancy and tenderness.
In the personation of Mr. Peggotty and in the
description of the shipwreck, Mr. Dickens, we
think, displays his greatest dramatic power. His
rendering of the agony of the poor fisherman, on
hearing of the elopement of his " little Em'ly," is
noble, tragic acting. And then the shipwreck !
How that marvellous word-painting, so like one of
the awful shipwrecks of Turner, puts on new vivid-
ness and fearfulness with his action, his tones, the
changing expression of his face, eager, passionate,
awe-struck. Tben the homely grandeur of poor
Ham's life, crowned by his divine act of self-sacri-
fice, appeals to our hearts as never before. What a
death was that ! how piteous, how sublime !
After the tempest of winds and waves and
human passions, after that double wreck, how
sweet the fantastic love story of Harry the
Brave and Norah the Fair. How refreshing the
charming drollery of Boots ! Surely " Boots at
the Holly Tree Inn " is the most dainty and
delicious of all the shortest stories of Mr. Dickens ;
a fairy idyl, a bud of a romance, a tender burlesque
of love, a frolic of authorship. It is full of quaint
anomalies, of surprises, of fun and pathos. In the
author's reading the wee runaway couple come be-
fore us almost bodily, the gallant little cherub, the
pouting little angel in her " sky-blue mantle," and
talk to us, through faithful " Boots;" and we are
more delighted with them than an audience of
children could be by the illustrious General, Mrs.
Tom Thumb, and the baby. Boots seems to be a
sort of cousin german to Scan "Weller, with more
poetry and tenderness, and, perhaps, a rarer vein of
humour. There are people in this personation
which even our Jefferson could hardly equal. For
instance, the " Certainly, sir," in reply to Master
Harrow's declaration, " It is better than millions of
diamonds to be liked by Norah," and that ini-
mitable " Such, sir, is the depravity of human
nature."

As Mr. Dickens has decided not to visit our
Western cities, he will scarcely be able to realise
the most wondrous transatlantic work of the last
twenty-five years; nor will he, perhaps, note any
remarkable social changes in Eastern citils, as he
accepts no hospitalities and has very few visitors.
Everybody uuderstauda, Lotvever, that this °aro-
ful reserve is a necessity of his hurried, labori-
ous life, and he must be conscious of a genuine
kindly interest in him, an atmosphere of welcome,
which a little lingering illwill here and there can-
not poison. Some there are from whose palates the
sweets of a dozen romances have not taken the
wholesome bitter of the " Notes," and more who
hold " Martin Chuzzlewit" in grim, uncomfortable
remembrance. A few foreign-born " Native Ame-
ricans" have denounced him for lack of sympathy
with us as a nation. " Pograrn Redivivus" has
orated through some obscure journals, and " Jeffer-
son Brick" has been " on the rampage" now and
then ; but it amounts to nothing, this slight coun-
ter current in the tide of a generous popular enthu-
siasm. Some attacks (for criticisms they cannot be
called) have been made on the artist and the man ;
attacks utterly vulgar and sordid in their charac-
ter. A coarse tirade by a nameless journalist
against an author on whose fame, as on the domi-
nion of his Sovereign, the sun never sets—whose
power over human hearts and imaginations is abso-
lutely Shaksperian—would be shocking, if it were
not pitiably foolish and futile. It reminds one of
the mad charge sometimes made by an irate young
buffalo of the plains on a locomotive under fail
headway. There is a great tossing up of earth, a
frantic plunge, a brief bellow, and —something goes
on, and it is not the buffalo.

GRACE GREENWOOD.