The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1901-03-10

lar. There was moment when popu-
iarlty without permanence might have
oeen expected for Longfellow. The excel
renee OF. his moral intentions was then
more obvious than the poetry in such
| early pieces as Excelsior" and THE
fsalm of Life which yield odd results
| on analysis. But not much better can
| DE SAID for the Queen of the May" and
for parts of THE AGiller's Daughter" In
| thcse is marvellous deXterity in sinking
| But to sink and remain sunk, was MS little
| characteristic of Longfellow as of Ten
| nyson. He was true poet, in his lyrics,
| even in his TRANSACTIONS, as well as in
''Evangeline," and that excellent expert
ment, "Hiawatha," was the measure of
| the Finnish popular poems as applied to
| the not dissimilar legends of another
| woodland race. But Longfellow lacked
| that undefinable quality of the rare, the
| strange, the hitherto unheard, yet de-
| lightful note, which now and again is
| heard in the verse of Edgar Poe. He was
| an Ishmaelite in literature, his hand
| against every mans hand, and hence
seems to be less admired where he was
| personally known than in France and
England. 1t is not the famous Raven"
| but such pieces as ITO Helen, the Sleep
| err and at most a dozen others which
| give Poe his high place in the judgment
of his admirers. Not his ideas. but the
beauty of his haunting lines, confers on
him the laurel OF Bryant, as a rule,
and of Whittier almost always, the re-
verse is the truth. The acceptability of
their ideas, the refined simplicity, not the
natural magic of their form, are their
claims to renown. Except in a few
places, as in such as his "Commemora-
Mr to
bered for the wit and vigor of his Biglow
poems than for his serious verse, at least
in England; while Emerson's prose has
precedence here over his poetry. The
wisdom of the East and West blended
with his happy. courageous temper, made
Emerson a corrective Carlyle, while
Thoreau is the complement of Emerson.
Concerning the great Victorian novel
lists, Thackeray and Dickens, so much is
daily written that remark is superhuous
A master of observation of all that had
rarely been observed, a generous heart,
an original and abundant humorist the
greatest sources of mirth in our century,
Dickens appears to wear less well than
his rival. The unapproached merits of
Thackeray's style must preserve him in
literature; his pathos is rare and I'M
forced; his form of humor is as perma-
nent as that of Fielding and as success
fully matched by his phrasins. Even his
verse, mirthful or melancholy, does not
fade, and has its own place on the Dor
derland of poetry. George Eliots fame
too. must revive the success of her earlier
and more humorous novels, before she
became too fond of the Spencerian philos-
ophy and took herself too seriously, nat
ural result of adulation. Charlotte Bronte,
q hos a.
rediscovered amidst chorus of fresh APP
plauses and with perhaps rather too Gu |
rious Investigations. In America, after |
Hawthorne, DR.. oliver Wendell Holmes |
and Mrs. Beecher Stowe were the novel |
lists most generally admired in England, |
when Thackeray and Dickens were verg- |
ing to their decline. 1t is, indeed, to be |
regretted that DR.. Holmes did not write |
more fiction when in his prime. His ex-
cellent and original Elsie Venner'' and |
Guardian Angel" with their humorous
pictures of real life, and their thread of |
phantasy. half mystical, half scientific |
border (as often in the Poet and PRO
fessor at the Breakfast Tablet on the |
ground of ''psychical research DIR.
Holmes was not merely, in verse and
prose, an exquisite wit, but man of
rare knowledge, a man of science, and
sturdy defender of the purity of the Ian
guage. Mrs. Beecher Stowe, on the other
hand, took the world by storm with a
vivid tract in the form of fiction; a book
now not easy to criticise, but which can
still move to laughter and tears. II is my
insular ignorance" which prevents me
from approaching other American fc-
lions of that age. before the days of
writer's still happily living and working.
T.
Henry James, Stephen Crane, and scores
u others who, being here TO speak for
themselves, shall not be commented upon
n this place. With Mr.. Howers as a
;ritic, l have tried to break lances, while
'eady to admit one of his main conten-
ions, that the art of Scott Thackeray.
Dickens and others of our fathers would |
AVE profited much by being a finer art,
" condensation, by omission. by avoid
nee Of the superfluous. But that our
modern fiction is a greater art, that ro-
}ance and storytelling and adventure are
obsolete, or ought to be obsolete that I | s
an never admit, while human nature is
iuman nature. Mankind will never be | ,
ontent, in fiction, with tales of the psy- /
biology of the ordinary person. ordinary /
s we are, We desire to be, like Homer's
ieracles, conversant with great adven- 9
ures. Mr.. Howells perhaps may think a
Lristotle a Greek snob when he maintains /
hat Tragedy must find its theme in the ;
orrows Of the god-descended Kings. Are /
OF the griefs of the poor of the middle Il
lasses as poignant? They are; but they /
o not involve such heights and deeps of y
)rtune. raising or wrecking whole States. | I
s do the woes ''of Thebes, or Aureus line" f
he fall of Prince Charles from an hour t
ven of shadowy royalty, from the leader !
hip of an army. from the wondering ad-
liration of Europe and the applause of c
oItaire into the subject and dependent | Il
1t is an example of modern historical Z
'agedy; in its elevation and it's decline h
ore apt to move pity and terror than Ii
lie circumstance that journalist has a
ken to drink. "a
AS in the case of America. so In that of a
ngland. | cannot enter into the merits S
living novelists in so wide task thing g
the brief review of a century. Mr. | II
eredith, as veteran of the sixties has | II
Town, perhaps, fully what is the nature c.
his achievement; he shines as a creator u
character (the highest praIse) and as a | IL
ritter with a thoroughly original view of / W
e world, as a poet and as wit. That al
s manner is entirely fortunate, and not | oil
ther tinged with willful eccentricities Il,
re those of Browning and Carlyle, can | to
arcely be disputed. An accomplished W
Jung novelist has admitted to me that NJ
S manner is Catching and that he has ~
struggle against half-conscious efforts or
imitation. Others do not struggle; and an
ost grow older before they are able to ia
rite like themselves, with their own -. ~
ices. Even Mr.. Stevenson was caught Isl
nj haip | IA