The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-03-31
w WILLIAM r1AkEPEACE THACKERAY

Although Thaekery had accepted for himself considerable literary reputa- ton before the publication of Vanity Fair" 1t was only with the appearance of that novel that he can be said to have reached that place in English lit- erature which has been his ever since.
 Vanity Fair is the best known of Thackerays works, and it has given him a reputation as a cynic which he hardly deserves common criticism of the story is that tho good people in ft are all fools and the clever people wholly unfounded. It is a cynical story, but Thackeray was more than cynic--he was, or thought himself, to be at that time, man with mission to castigate society and expose it's shams: and being society man" himself he knew all about 1t.
 Thackeray called Vanity Fair" "A novel without hero" but it certainly does not lack heroine. for in the per son Of Becky sharp 1t has a character drawn with such skill and power that tt will live as long as any creature that ever sprang from the imagination of 6 novelist
 Thackeray claimed that in Vanity Fair" he represented people as they were; but the verdict of the world has been that in his story he did not give human nature square deal. He him. 
 the story Is a great one by great author, and though the medicine ad- ministered to our fellies in 1t is un- pleasant, 1t Is doubtless wholesome.
 Amelia Sedley. arriving home after being graduated, brought to her fa- ther's house for a brief visit her dear, dear school friend, Rehecca sharp. Re- becca had been educated at the admir- able establishment of Miss Pinkerton in consideration of making herself use- ful In many ways to the learned pre- ceptress. especially in teaching the French language, in which Becky was most proficient.
 She had green eyes. q slight figure, no principles and more than the ordi- nary amount of brains. Her father had been absolute and impecunious artist, and her mother, rumor said, French opera dancer. But both were dead and Rebecca, being thrown en- firely upon her own resources, deter mined to take the world by the throat and make 1t stand and deliver. The world had not used her so kindly that she should spare it, she told herself.
 Amelia Sedley was a simple, cling ing, little pink and white thing, all kindness of heart and sentiment She had been quite overpowered and led captive by the Intellectually brilliant Rebecca, who also appealed to her
 
 penniless state in which 1t had pleased fate to place her.
 The two young ladies having been graduated from Miss Pinkerton's acad- emy. Rebecca had obtained position as goyerness in the family of Sir Pitt Crawiey. bart, to whose country house of Qpeen's Crawley she was to repair as soon as her visit to the Sedleys should be over. But sRebecca, who be- lieved in making hay while the sun shone, improved the time of her visit by making eyes at and singing songs to Amelia's brother, Joseph, collector of Boggley Wollah in the service of the Honorable East India Company, home on furlough
 Jos was very fat and very bashfuI in women's society. but Rebecca's green eyes and her plaintive little songs made a conquest of him at once. Unfortunately for Becky's plans, the stout civilian took his sister and Miss Sharp to Vauxhall, where he drank too much punch, and in the deltrium of his affections put his arm around Re- becca's waist while he sang in a bac- chanal voice, Hey, my fiddle, fiddle darling" to the scandal and amuse- ment of the company there assembled. The next morning, terrified at the thought of his exploits of the night before. he fled from the house and soon afteFward returned to the lucra-
 
 the consideration of the fact that even the seemingly most securely hooked fish sometimes gets away.
 However, not whit discouraged by the failure of her first venture in the world. Rebecca proceeded to Queens Crawley, as resolved as ever to con quer fortune. She found the old baro- net. Sir Pitt Crawiey a most disrepu- table rake, with tha manners and speech of rustic clown and taste for low life and low company that vastly scandaiized both his eldest son, Pitt. and his second son, Captain Raw don cFawley, of the Guards, a tremen- dous ''swell.' who had little to do with Queens Crawley or any of its oc- cupants.
 but he was a typical Life Guardsman, very much in the fashion, very fond of cards, boxing and other gentlemanly diversions, huge of stature and heir presumptive of his aunt, Miss Crawley, Sir Pitts sister. Though he was head over heels in debt, he got along ex- tremely well in life and was nightly looked up to by the young men of his set. His brother, Pitt Crawley, was his exact opposite--a correct young gentleman with political aspir- ations, who had been called Miss Crawley" at school, and was now prominent in "seFious" society. He was engaged to his cousin, Lady Jane sheepshanks daughter of the dowagar Lady Southdown well known for her persistent dissemination of auaek med 1cine and quack theology.
 At Queens Crawley Rebecca found herself governess of two young ladies, daughters of the second and present Lady Crawley, whose father had been an ironmonger of the neighboring vil- 1age of Mudbury. She, poor woman. was fading gradually to her grave, crushed under the weight of Sir Pitts brutality and the burdens of the high