New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1881-04-20
sofa" Servants aglide about the suite OF


summer chambers occasionally with sherDe@
and ices" The twins are dressed" If posi-
BILE, more fancifully and brilliantly than their
mamma" They have brilliant compilations"
The boy is in black velvet jacket with Urge
Spanish buttons of silver flagree, shirt OF
lace, and a waistcoat of white satin" This Is
in the taste of tailor, and elsewhere there are
evidences of the taste of hairdresser. Park
Lane and Holliwell-st. are not such an immense
distance from each other after all
While for purpose, we are taking rather an
extreme and oyer-general view of the books OF
Beaconsfed, we would not be understood to
underrate their cleverness. We do not believe
that they have fifty years of life in them. We
are quite certain that a century hence nobody
will read them, nor indeed as rule know any
thing about them. At the same time, it would
be useless to deny that they have an occasional
yivacity, chapters of much brilliancy, wit
sometimes not overs crupulous, and passages
here and there of real eloquence. But all these
cannot compensate for want OF purpose
higher than the selfish aspirations of the
novelist As pictures of social life of particu-
lar sort in England they may have passing
verismilitude of which we cannot judge. But
of their essential unrealty there can be no
doubt. They have higher literary character
than the average fashionable novel possesses,
but they share in its faults and partake of Its
follies Even the smartness of the early books
tires at last their splcndor i'll time ofends
aud we wonder how it was that A" The Young
Duke and Contarini Fleming" charmed us,
as Bulwcr's "Pclham" did, fifty years ago.
Why readers of the present generation have
found them so entertaining it would be inter
esting to consider. But the matter is of no con-
sequence and the author himself is not OF much
consequence now.
Sturdy ycracity and ghtforwardness of
purpose are sure to tell in the long run, in
books of fiction is in everything else. a great
deal too much is said of Lord Bcaconsiicld'
success, n if success were certain test OF
merit, political, literary or moral. The story Is
startling, but it will not mOrtally startlc those
who are familiar with English history. The
EaIl of Bcaconsficld was not the first to rise
from comparative obscurity to the dignitlcs OF
II Prime Minister. Upon the whole, success OF
this kind has been one of the comnoncSt things
in the annals of the world BARRIERS have be-
come Grand Niziers. Peasants have risen to
the command of great armies and reached the
pcnutimatc step of the throne itself. Real suc-
cess of another kind. positive according to
canons which we do not usually employ, has
been rarcr. and is and will always be of another
nature. We are not speaking of the Earl, but OF
the novcl-writcr In literature there are no
pccraecs The cynical old philosopher of
Chelsea, with that theory of success which he
preached - vocifcrousy and believed in when
he was in "A passion-.wc have just lost him, and
with all our fault-fnding and all his, have felt
that our loss was actual and tangible The
English Nation is this morning in IA regulation
state of funeral dccorum loudly protesting that
il has lost It's great man. But his death VIII
break no hearts. Indeed, in this life and tins
death there is no question of hearts at all. Put
up the hatchment lower the dust into the re-
ccptaclc provided for it. say graycly the
Yanit.ls Vanitatum, and wait for the coming OF
the next advcnturer. 1t was pretty play
nothing in the Arabian Nights finer; what
pity that it should have an end,