The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1892-12-01
Unended Books.

The best known instance of great work left
unfinished by the author is Dickens Edwin
Brood" but it is by no means exceptional.
1t is. however. a remarkable fact that Dickens
makes reference to his apprehension that an
other of his works would never be completed,
for in his postscript to "Our Mutual Friend"
written in September. 1865, he recalls the circum-
stances of his being in "a terribly destructive &C
cident" on the Southeastern railway, on Friday,
June 8. in that year His concluding words are:
Il remember with devOut thankfulneSs that
can never be much nearer parting company with
my readers forever than l was then, until there
shall be written against my life the two words
with which have this day closed this bOok-the
end" The mystery of Edwin brood was never
solved.
Death came to Thackeray as he was writing
these words in " Denis Duval:' Behold FiniS
itself came to an end and the Infinite began
Wilkie Collins had not concluded " Blind Love-
when he was seized with his fatal Illness and his
novel was finished by another hand.
Helen Hunt Jackson was never able to con-
clude her novel. "Zeph.' In her last hours she
wrote to her publisher:
81 am very sorry cannot finish 'Zeph.' Per-
haps it is not worth publishing in its unfinished
state. as the chief lesson for which wrote it was
to be fOrcibly told at the end. l suppose there
will be some interest in it as the last thing
wrote. will make short outline of the plot of
the close of the story
1t is. not always death which is responsible for
the fragmentary state in which great works have
been left
Sometimes an author wearies of his subject:
sometimes he is appalled, by the magnitude of
his task. as was Buckle, who, in his g History of
Civilization. declared that he was like traveller
and the further he iourneyed the more distant
the horizon seemed SO his gigantic labor was
not proceeded with.
Dean Swift was writing long poem called
1.-The Legion Club" when he was seized with a
painful malady. and he never afterwards cared
to continue that or any other literary work.
Byron's " Don JUAN" although consisting of IS
long cantos, breaks off in the middle of an adj
venture 1t is related that he had been speaking
of the sympathy which his poetry must excite in
his daughter. when Lady Blessngton, to whom
his remarks were addressed, reminded him that
Don Juan was not likely to win any wOman's
admiration.
Byron remained thoughtful and silent for sew
era minutes. and then replied, 4" You are right;
never recOllected this will write no more of
it: would that had never written a line
NOltllVSt llIlcSt lS1N. Is Oily Il
fragment. The poet himself declared that there
were . three parts yet to come but they never
came from his own pen.
Many ingenious SpeculatiOnS have been ndulg
ed in as to how the fantastic story was to con-
clude, and it has even been limited that COlerdge
himself could not determine how to solve the
mystery.
He may have lost the inspiration. and feared
to disappoint the public or earn its censure
Macaulay'S Amanda is a fragment, so is
Leigh Hunts "CambuS Khan" though the poet
promises in the last lines to tell What sweet
and sad new knowledge there befel the lady of
the ring within a warbng del''
This is analogous to WOrdSwOrth'S conclusion
to 1.-The Excursion which declared that " flu
ture labOrs shall not leave untold the later his
tory of the wanderer. But nothing more was
recortled.-.MinnedpOli Tribune.