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the "Queen of Connaught" is admired and praised.

Again, let us instance that exquisite little prose poem by Mrs. Oliphant, "The Curate in Charge." Suppose that a woman talented and cultivated, but a novice in the literary world, had written that singularly perfect little tale, word for word, as it now stands in print, we venture to assert that she would have found infinite difficulty in finding a publisher. Being the work of Mrs. Oliphant, who has already well won her literary spurs, it was published unread; and had it been trash, pure and simple, her name would have floated it.

How, then, it may very fairly be asked, is the unknown author of really good work to find an opening in the literary world? The answer, no doubt, will be, that good work always makes its way; but although some exceptions could of course be found, the assertion, as a general rule, is not altogether true. With every desire to allow to genius the power assigned to it by enthusiastic believers in the divine gift, we adhere to our opinion -that the innumerable ordinary readers of fiction in the United Kingdom, who simply read to be amused, prefer the weakest trash, if only the name of some wellknown writer appears on the titlepage, to a work of real merit by a new, and therefore unknown and unproved writer.

It follows as a matter of course that editors must cater for their public; thus, for example, we have had lately in a popular magazine a tale called "Two Destinies," of which the author, Wilkie Collins, ought to be heartily ashamed, and in the same periodical is running now-October, 1876-a vulgar and commonplace story from the pen that some years ago gave us the series of delightful novels which closed with the "Last Chronicle of

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But protest is powerless to break up the cliqueism that exists in the literary world, and so long as the majority of readers are satisfied with scamped work from the pen of a popular author, it is useless for the few readers who could and would appreciate novelty, especially when it is attractive and of sterling value, to lift up their voices and ask for new bread in the place of old stones.

In acknowledging the popularity of the "Queen of Connaught "the first work we believe of its author-we may seem to have contradicted our previous statement that books by unknown writers are not welcomed by the reading public; but our argument is, that a well-known author is sure of acceptance from the public, while the chances are largely against the beginner.

Without doubt, "Critics" are the best abused people in the world. Washington Irving-a man not given in general to severity of speech-has said that " Critics are a kind of freebooters in the republic of letters, who, like deer, goats, and divers other graminivorous animals, gain subsistence by gorging upou buds and leaves of the young shrubs of the forest trees, robbing them of their verdure, and retarding their progress to maturity."

There is such a curious similarity between the opinion expressed by the genial American and a remarkably clever but not very genial English author, W. S. Landor, that we

must quote his words also. He says, "They (the critics) hunt over domains more extensive than their own, trample down fences which they cannot clear, strip off the buds, and tear away the branches of all the most promising young trees that happen to grow in their road, plough up the lawns, muddy the waters, and when they return benighted home again, carouse on reciprocal flattery,"

Now this is very severe, and it would be hard indeed if the poor critics had not a friend to break a lance in their defence. They shelter themselves, it is true, under the broad shield of "Anon.," but we cannot believe that they are brimfull of animosity to the race of authors whose works are put into their hands for review. We are inclined to think that critics are for the most part genial and pleasant gentlemen, and we pity them most sincerely for being obliged to read, as we suppose read they must, all the trash in the shape of the many hundred volumes of novels that daily, weekly, and monthly issue from the press. We can but hope that in many instances they follow the advice of-we believe-Sydney Smith, and simply cut the leaves and smell the paper knife!

Writers of undoubted genius, such as Byron, Keats, and Shelley, suffered keenly from adverse criticism, and it is quite possible that they may have been attacked by the reviewers from motives not wholly literary; but it is a grave error for a critic to allow himself to be swayed either by personal or popular prejudice when he sits down to pass judgment upon the work of an author to whom fair, honest praise and judicious censure might be of great and lasting value.

Charlotte Brontë, in her dreary home in Yorkshire, quivered and writhed under the criticisms which, in our opinion, did much to confer

upon "Jane Eyre" the popularity it attained. It was without doubt a wonderful and curious book, and our children's children will take it down in years to come from the library shelves, and read it with interest and astonishment as the work of a girl who did not know anything of the world. But "Jane Eyre," with all its brilliant cleverness, was not faultless, and the critics who told the author that hard truth were more certainly her friends than if they had lavished upon her indiscriminate and careless praise.

The books that provoke censure mingled with genuine praise are, as time will prove, the books that have in them power and vitality. Were the novels of Thackeray, Dickens, Kingsley, and George Eliot-to name four only of our best writers, three of whom, alas, can never write for us again-praised without stint? Were not the blemishes that defaced the noble group of life-like characters conceived by the genius, and put before our delighted eyes by the magic of George Eliot's matchless pen, all pointed out, and yet her light has not been quenched, because it was not an ignis fatuus in the world of letters-that bright firmament in which there are a few radiant planets, some fixed, and not a few wandering stars, but whose milk-and-watery way is crowded to suffocation.

The point upon which legitimate fault can be found with the critics of to-day-not the "baser herd,' but the cultivated and intelligent who write for the press-is not that they smoke and scorch tyros to death, not that they quench modest rays which, under more tender treatment might have warmed a hearthstone, if not lit up a shrine; but that they praise everything, good, bad, and indifferent, that comes in their way, instead of at once and for ever extinguishing tyros who, having nothing to do and

plenty of time to do it in, sit down and fill three volumes with sentimental rubbish-and sometimes there are more serious errors than mere sentiment-who pay a publisher for bringing out the book, who have it advertised with a long train of favourable criticisms extracted from Press notices tacked on after the name, then forthwith imagine themselves famous, and sit down complacently to write again.

We select at random some extracts from "Opinions of the Press," taken from the advertising sheets of the monthly magazines, and without exception they are favourable to the novels under review :

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"It would be difficult to find a volume more congenial on a summer's afternoon, either by the seaside or in the fields."

"A story which is not only well written, but thoroughly interesting." "We wish it were our fate to read more novels of this description."

And so on ad infinitum.

The foregoing are not, we contend, specimens of the wholesome criticism which will tend to sift for the reading world the chaff from the grain, and help the formation of sound judgment on the part of those who are too thoughtless, and, in some respects, too ignorant, to discern for themselves the good fruit upon the tree of knowledge from the worthless and impure. They are merely the criticisms of critics who are too careless, or too good-natured to put an end to the tuneless little piping which they probably, in their hearts, think too weak to hurt any one. But to intelligent readers sharp censure would be more valuable than indiscriminate praise, for we must consider the latter somewhat dearly to Mudie for books which neither bought when it induces us to send amuse nor elevate, and which have not even the negative merit of lulling us into the forgetfulness of sleep.

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LITERARY NOTICES.

Rahel: Her Life and Letters. By Mrs. Vaughan Jennings. H. S. King & Co.: London, 1876. We cannot help thinking Mrs. Jennings is too late with her publication. More than forty years have elapsed since the death of the person to whom it relates, and nearly as many since Mr. Carlyle gave some account of her and her letters in an article on the volumes edited by her husband, Varnhagen von Ense, which contained her correspondence and descriptive memoirs of her friends. It was of course impossible in a paper, the greater part of which, was devoted to Varnhagen himself and his writings, to find room for much biographical detail respecting his wife, or many extracts from her letters; but had there been any demand for further particulars, it would surely have been supplied long before now. If what Mr. Carlyle wrote did not awaken sufficient interest among English readers to encourage the publication of a more complete account while her memory was still fresh in the minds of many who are no longer living, there would seem to be less encouragement now. Be this as it may, we must do Mrs. Jennings the justice to say, that portion of the volume which proceeds from her pen is written with vivid force, and gives evidence of ample acquaintance with the leading persons and events of the time. Though professedly devoted to the life and letters of Rahel, the work is not confined to her. Accounts of her

friends are also given, and not merely their correspondence with her, but also with each other.

Rahel appears to have been one of the most remarkable women of her time. Carlyle calls her "a kind of spiritual queen in Germany." She was regarded as a high authority in literature, and had the honour of having been the first to render Goethe duly appreciated by his countrymen. Her salon was for about twenty years the resort of all who were distinguished in society, literature, science, art, philosophy, and theology. She numbered among her intimate friends such eminent men as Moses Mendelssohn, Schleiermacher, Frederick Schlegel, Fichte, Tieck, and others; won tributes of the highest admiration from Goethe and Jean Paul Richter; and even vanquished the vanity of Madame de Staël, so far as to extort from her the acknowledgment that the extraordinary accounts she had heard of her with incredulity were not at all exaggerated. Count Custine, in an article upon her in the Revue de Paris for November, 1837-not the Revue des Deux Mondes for December, as Mrs. Jennings erroneously statesdescribes her as "the light of minds, the guide of hearts," and says,

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she had the intellect of a philosopher, and the heart of an apostle, and nevertheless was a child and a woman as much as any one can be." It is but natural that her husband should be still more eloquent in her praise. According to him she was

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