Frances Burney.
When a novelist did appear, a girl gifted with a delight in observing traits of character, and recording12 them from her early teens in a diary; when Fanny Burney came, she received such a welcome as warms the heart after all these years. Frances Burney (1752-1840) was born while the Elibank Plot for kidnapping the Royal family in the interests of the King over the water was maturing, and she outlived by eight years the author of "Waverley, or 'Tis Sixty Years Since".
[Pg 531]
The daughter of Dr. Burney, a teacher and historian of music, and a friend of the great wits, Johnson, Burke, Reynolds, Garrick, and the rest, Miss Burney, from childhood, was observing mankind and womankind; was reading "The Vicar of Wakefield," and Sterne, the novels of the Abbé Provost and of Marivaux, and apparently13 of Smollett no less than of the moral Richardson. She was writing, too, in secret; but at the command of her stepmother, probably when she herself was about 16 or 17, she burned all her works, including a novel on which her first published romance, "Evelina" (1778), was based, or rather out of which it was developed. We cannot estimate the merits of those "first blights," as Keats says, but "the little character-monger," as Johnson called her, continued to make her sketches15 of character in her Journal and in letters to her kind old mentor16, "Daddy Crisp," a man much older than her father, who had retired17 from society and the sorrows of the playwright18 to a hospitable19 country house near Epsom. As the favourite and assistant of her musical and historical father, the retiring observant girl lived till, at about the age of 24, she returned to her first love, and, under great difficulties, wrote, and copied in a feigned20 hand, her "Evelina". With secrecy21 enough for a Jacobite conspiracy22 the book was conveyed to a bookseller, accepted, and published in 1778. Among her burned works was "The History of Caroline Evelyn," a young woman of moving adventures, whose mother was a vulgar barmaid, married, for the second time, in France, to a Monsieur Duval. As Caroline died of a broken heart, leaving a legitimate23 daughter, Evelina, Miss Burney told the story of that daughter's fortunes, situated24 as she was between her well-born English father's kin1 and her barmaid Frenchified mother, with her grotesque25 associates. The scheme had great possibilities, of which the author took full advantage; her chief successes being the members of the City family, the Branghtons, their smart low-bred friend, Mr. Smith, and the naval26 Captain Mirvan, whose language is discreetly27 veiled, while his bullying28 of Madame Duval and other persons is rather more than Smollettian. Evelina, through all the dangers which then beset30 the fair at Vauxhall and other resorts of the gay, reaches the haven31 where[Pg 532] she and Lord Orville would be, and all ends happily, as in a novel all ought to end. There is an extraordinary wealth of characters, Burke thought them too abundant. The novel set literary society on fire with delight and admiration32, Dr. Johnson leading the chorus of praise, and Miss Burney was his darling, and was welcomed by Mrs. Thrale, Reynolds, Burke, Garrick, Mrs. Montagu; even Horace Walpole, though he kept his head, applauded. The triumphs of Fanny are recorded in her Diary and Letters, a contribution to history even more delightful33 than her "Evelina". All the good fortunes that Miss Austen missed, or shunned34, fell to Miss Burney, who well deserved them. Her later novel, "Cecilia" (1782) is not really inferior to "Evelina," but it is not "the first sprightly35 runnings". After her years as a tiring woman of Queen Charlotte (whereof the record in her Diary is at least on a level with her novels), her "Camilla" appeared, was subscribed36 for by all the world and Miss Austen, and was censured37 by John Thorpe in "Northanger Abbey". This immortal38 crown is hardly deserved by "Camilla". The story of Miss Burney's marriage to that amiable39 émigré, the Comte d'Arblay, is told in Macaulay's famous essay, which, again, is toned down and corrected by Mr. Austin Dobson ("Fanny Burney" in "English Men of Letters"). But the novels themselves, and the Diary, remain monuments, and not dull but delightful monuments, of social and personal history. We need not dwell on that lucrative40 failure, "The Wanderer" (1814). Miss Burney had opened the way, which was later to be trodden by the lighter41 feet of a far greater genius, whom some men have named with Shakespeare—Jane Austen.
Mrs. Radcliffe.
It is impossible to restore a faded popularity, and in a generation which sees at least two dozen new novels bloom every week, the desire to revive the taste for Mrs. Radcliffe's romances is a "vain hope and vision vain". None the less, Mrs. Radcliffe (Ann Ward42, born in the birth year of Horace Walpole's "Castle of Otranto," 1764, and married to a Mr. Radcliffe in 1787), was the grandmother, as Horace Walpole was the great-grandfather, of the Romantic school of fiction. Her first tale, "The Castles of Athlin[Pg 533] and Dunbayne" (1789) is but a pioneer work: Mrs. Radcliffe knew nothing of the castles and manners of the Mackays, Sinclairs, and Gunns "in the dark ages". In 1790, with "The Sicilian Romance," Mrs. Radcliffe "found herself," and opened the way for all the terrors of Mr. Rochester's house in "Jane Eyre". The remarkable43 phenomena44 of the haunted Sicilian castle are not supernormal, but, till you discover that they are caused by the concealed45 wife of the proprietor47 (Ferdinand, fifth Marquis of Mazzini), they strike terror; later they move pity. "Northanger Abbey" is the inspired parody48 of Mrs. Radcliffe's effects in this work, which also contains the germ of a thrilling scene in R. L. Stevenson's "Kidnapped". In "The Romance of the Forest" (1791) Mrs. Radcliffe struck the keynote of the novels about the Valois Court, which we owe to her spiritual descendants, Alexandre Dumas and Mr. Stanley Weyman. To "local colour" and the historical "atmosphere," Mrs. Radcliffe was indifferent; but she always had a story to tell, a story new and startling; and she managed her chiaroscuro49 with the touch of genius. She awakened50 curiosity, she struck terror; she skilfully51 interwove the many threads of her plots; she was far from being destitute52 of humour; and her Italian landscapes are designed after Poussin and Salvator Rosa. "Every reader," says Scott, "felt her force, from the sage53 in his study to the family group in middle life." Her "Mysteries of Udolpho" is hardly worthy54 of its reputation. But in "The Italian" she anticipates the manner of Hawthorne; her wicked Monk55, Schedoni, is (as Scott himself saw and said), the original of Byron's Giaour, and his other darkling lurid56 heroes; and her comic valet, Paolo, who loyally follows his master into the dungeon57 of the Inquisition, is the model of Sam Weller, in the Fleet Prison, with Mr. Pickwick. Mrs. Radcliffe's genius is not appreciated merely because she is not read. The student who gives her a fair chance is carried away by the spell of this "great enchantress"; and "The Italian" is by far the best romantic novel that ever was written before Scott. He applauded her with his wonted generosity59, but objected to her habit of explaining away her supernormal incidents. But this was done in homage60 to the stupid "common sense" of her age. After her masterpiece[Pg 534] "The Italian," Mrs. Radcliffe deserted61 fiction; wrote "The Female Advocate" in defence of "Woman's Rights," and suffered from unhappy domestic circumstances for which she was in no way responsible. She died in 1823.
Maria Edgeworth.
A more fortunate and prosperous pioneer than Mrs. Radcliffe in the way of novel-writing was Maria Edgeworth. Born on 1 January, 1767, at Black Bourton, not far from, Oxford62, Miss Edgeworth was the daughter of Richard Edgeworth, an Irish landlord and British moralist. In the words of "Hudibras" he
Married his punctual dose of wives
to the number of four, and had four families. They were wonderfully harmonious63, and as Maria Edgeworth was of the first family, and only some twenty-two years younger than her father, she was the constant companion of an energetic and intelligent man, reckoned one of the leading bores of his age, and tinctured with the ideas of his friend, the humourless Mr. Thomas Day, author of "Sandford and Merton". Miss Edgeworth saw much of Irish life, fashionable and rustic64, at Edgeworthstown, and very early began to write under the direction of her father, whose Muse65 was the didactic. She wrote the stories in "The Parents' Assistant" for her own little brothers and sisters, to whom, as to children generally, she was devoted66. The self-consciously virtuous67 Frank is her father, idealized (we cannot believe that she consciously satirized68 him), and the ever-delightful Rosamond is herself. Modern children may rage against the cruelty of the mother of Rosamond, in the tale of "The Purple Jar," but probably children of an earlier date were too much interested in Rosamond and the jar to grieve over the heroine's lack of shoes. "Lazy Lawrence," "Simple Susan," "Waste Not, Want Not," and the rest, are all dear to persons who read them at the right age, and draw from the last-named tale an undying love of long, sound pieces of string, saved from parcels.
It seems to be a matter of ascertained69 fact that Mr. Edgeworth too often had his oar70 in the paper boats of his daughter's[Pg 535] novels, that he altered, and transposed, and suggested, and inserted moral sentiments; and could not keep the maxims71 of Mr. Thomas Day out of the memorial. Miss Edgeworth had abundance of humour, and would not have made Sir James Brook3 lecture to Lord Colambie, a total stranger, "on all ancient and modern authors on Ireland from Spenser" (why not from Giraldus Cambrensis?) "to Young and Beaufort". In "Castle Rackrent" (1800) Mr. Edgeworth had no hand, and it is reckoned the best of Miss Edgeworth's books on Ireland. It is not a novel: Thady, an ancient peasant, merely tells the tale of four generations of O'Shaughneseys, squires72 who much resembled the Osbaldistone family as described by Diana Vernon. All were greedy and reckless oppressors of their devoted tenantry, but one was more of a drunkard, another more of a litigant73, another more of a cruel debauchee, and the last more of a good-natured fool, as innocent of worldly matters as Leigh Hunt (but not so much to his own advantage), than the rest. Their wives are worthy of them. Poor Thady maintains his "great respect for the family" throughout, and there is a humorous pathos74 in his topsy-turvy code of ethics75, constructed out of insanely depraved Irish moral conventions of the period. The fairy belief, and the Banshee, peep out in the notes: Miss Edgeworth was the precise reverse of Mrs. Radcliffe in the matter of romance. The book at once became popular, with "Belinda," a very readable story of London society, and "The Absentee," in which the Irish characters are much better when in their own green isle76 than when abroad. The horrors of an estate ruled by a corrupt77 and cruel agent are barely credible78, and the hero is a wooden if generous puppet, while Lady Colbrony, trying to be more English than the English, in London, is not really so amusing as similar characters in Thackeray. Scott, with his usual generosity, publicly asserted more than once that Miss Edgeworth's example led him to attempt the delineation79 of his own country-folks; and perhaps the happiest of weeks at Abbotsford was spent during Miss Edgeworth's visit. In Paris, Edinburgh, and London she was a lioness, and enjoyed all the pleasant rewards of friendship and fame which fortune denied to Miss Austen. Her later novels, "Ormonde," "Harrington," and[Pg 536] "Helen," were duly appreciated; in May, 1849, she ended a long, happy, and beneficent life.
Charles Brockden Brown.
Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810) is commonly regarded as the first American novelist. He came at an unfortunate moment, for in the years of his activity as a romancer (1797-1801) English fiction was at a low ebb80, and, uninfluenced by Fielding and Sterne, and neglectful of Fanny Burney, he followed Godwin (in "Caleb Williams"), and adopted the mysterious effects of Mrs. Radcliffe. In his "Wieland," the terrific and fatal agency which brings down fate, is akin81 to that which Monsieur de Saint Luc used to frighten Henri III., and which Chicot exposed, in Dumas's novel. In "Arthur Mervyn," Brown wrote with much vigour82 a realistic description of a yellow fever hospital. His friendly critics place him above Mrs. Radcliffe in his mastery of the truly horrid83; but though his books were republished in England, they do not appear in the list of Miss Catherine Morland in "Northanger Abbey". If Brown were superior to the great enchantress, at least he followed the model which she had created, without the humour which affords relief in "The Italian". He did not deal in Italian castles and abbeys of the Valois period, but cast his romances in his native Philadelphia.
Jane Austen.
Scott's first novel was finished and published in 1814. His friend, Morritt of Rokeby, said that before "Waverley" appeared, novels were read only by ladies' maids and seamstresses. Yet, eighteen or nineteen years before the birth of "Waverley," novels as great in their own style as Scott's, and as imperishable, had been written by a girl of 21, whose first published works of fiction came earlier than "Waverley" into the world. Before 1803, Jane Austen (born 1775) had written "Northanger Abbey"; before the beginning of the nineteenth century "Pride and Prejudice" and "Sense and Sensibility," were completed by her. But though a speculative84 publisher bought "Northanger Abbey" in 1803, he[Pg 537] never published it, and "Sense and Sensibility" (1811) with "Pride and Prejudice" (1813), lay long neglected, like the poems of Theocritus in their dark chest, before they were given to the world. They were not received, like Miss Burney's "Evelina," with triumphant85 acclaims86; the author was not surrounded and flattered by the wits, as was Miss Burney. Indeed Jane Austen, in her lifetime, was never made a lioness. Slow and all but silent approval of her genius advanced by degrees and deepened into the diapason of her ever-widening renown87.
She was the daughter of a country clergyman, the Rector of Steventon in Hampshire, much of her later life (she died at 42, in 1817) was passed at the hamlet of Chawton near Winchester. Bath was her metropolis88; she describes its pleasure and society with inimitable charm and humour in "Northanger Abbey," and "Persuasion89," published after her death, in 1818. She lived in the heart of a kind and happy family, among her nephews and nieces, brothers and sisters, with such squires, clerics, doctors, solicitors90, sportsmen, naval officers, and old maids as clustered round or visited Steventon and Chawton. She watched them with a smiling intense observation; she winced91 from their mindless gregariousness92; they are never out of their neighbours' houses. But she was only a very little cruel, even to the most brainless of baronets, or the stupidest of mothers, or the least well-bred of jolly good-humoured matrons, or the noisiest of children. She does show the trifling93 defects of spoiled children, but she was the kindest and best-beloved of aunts. Meanness she does brand in the really awful characters of John Dash wood and his wife; stupid pride in Sir Walter Elliot and Lady Catherine de Bourgh (who receives her deserts from Miss Elizabeth Bennet), and clerical sycophancy94 in the immortal Mr. Collins. But Mr. Collins is so amusing that we can no more be angry with him than with Mr. Pecksniff. Mr. Woodhouse, in "Emma," is next door to an idiot, and in actual life he would have been insufferable, except to the good and gentle. But the excellence95 of his heart, and the sweetness of his manners, cause him to be surrounded by patient and silent affection from all who know him; and not less good and fortunate is the most voluble of chatter-boxes,[Pg 538] Miss Bates. Only for a single moment is Emma, the heroine, unable to hold her peace when Miss Bates is too intolerable; and this youthful excess is bitterly repented96 by the beautiful sinner. Emma was extremely young when she was a snob97, Miss Austen did not draw an angel in Emma, but a good, human girl. We cannot really call Miss Austen severe, though we cannot but see how much she must have suffered among people so dull that a lady's recollection of the name of her dead son's naval Captain is described as "one of those extraordinary bursts of mind that sometimes do happen".
Less than twenty years divided Miss Burney's "Evelina" (1778) from the composition of "Northanger Abbey" and "Pride and Prejudice". These years had brought an astonishing change. The Smollettian element in Miss Burney's books and the horse-play have vanished; vanished has that amazing style which the fair Fanny evolved. The manners of naval officers have passed from the brutal98 to the courtly. Miss Burney is antiquated99, she is archaic100, she belongs to another world than ours, while Miss Austen is perennially101 fresh, and sparkling with wit; she recaptures, without imitation, the humour and the ease of Addison. Unlike Scott, she is almost never stilted102: her people, as a rule, talk like men and women of this world, not like Helen Macgregor. "Northanger Abbey," which is in part meant as a quiet but delightful mockery of Mrs. Radcliffe's haunted abbeys, secret panels, and mysterious sounds, was written but six years after "The Sicilian Romance" sent a shudder103 through its myriad9 readers; and is almost of the year of "The Mysteries of Udolpho". The girl of the Steventon rectory was already mocking "The Great Enchantress," and the smile outlives the shriek104.
Miss Austen shunned the romantic—like Wordsworth she might have said "the moving accident is not my trade," but her incidents move us (for example, Louisa Musgrove's fall off the Cobb at Lyme Regis); and the mystery of Jane Fairfax's piano in "Emma," is as exciting as the black curtain behind which Catherine Morland expected to discover the skeleton of Laurentina. John Thorpe said of Mrs. Radcliffe's novels (which he had not read), "there is some fun and nature in them" (and there is plenty[Pg 539] of fun), Miss Austen found in them much more of fun than of nature.
It is said that she is afraid of the passions, but what can be more passionate105 than the constancy of Anne Elliot, or more ardent106 than the first love of Marianne Dashwood? All the family of the Bennets are charming or diverting in their various ways; the humorous father, the foolish mother, the witty107 and spirited Elizabeth, the gentle, beautiful Jane, the pedantic108 Mary, the colourless Kitty, and Lydia who might have shone in a comedy by Vanbrugh. It is rather hard to believe that Elizabeth could accept Darcy after he, like the Master of Ravenswood, had told his lady that her father was not a gentleman. But then Elizabeth came to see Darcy's house and place in Derbyshire!
If one novel is not quite so good as the rest, it is "Mansfield Park"; but to name it recalls Mrs. Norris, and the return of the heavy father as his progeny109 are rehearsing a dubious110 play from the German; and one has a tenderness for the good little heroine, and for her rather squalid kinsfolk, and for both of the naughty Crawfords. "Mansfield Park" is a masterpiece like the rest. Perhaps Miss Austen's heroes are not so good as her heroines; but Henry Crawford and Frank Churchill, in "Emma" prove that her young men are not mere58 lay figures.
She never went outside of the life she knew to draw wicked dukes and the virtuous poor; she had no villains111, no rebels; if she read Crabbe's lurid and realistic studies of poverty and crime, she did not imitate them in prose. Her characters are perfectly113 indifferent to public affairs, throughout the struggle with Napoleon; except when the authoress cannot conceal46 her passionate enthusiasm for the men who fought under Nelson and Collingwood. But the expression is not enthusiastic in terms.
Miss Austen's art has the exquisite115 balance and limit of Greek art in the best period. She knew what she could do, she did it to perfection; and, naturally, the humourless Charlotte Bront? thought her tame and dull. But from Scott himself to Macaulay and Archbishop Whately, nay116, from the Prince Regent (George IV., who had a set of her novels in each of his houses), the best judges recognized the greatness of one of the six greatest English[Pg 540] writers of fiction, and, a century after the publication of "Pride and Prejudice," she is a more popular favourite by far than in her own brief day. To judge by a miniature of Miss Austen, done when she was of the age when Catherine Morland began to give up playing cricket and baseball, her face and figure were as bright and charming as her genius. Like Milton's Eve, Miss Austen is "fairest of her daughters" in art, though among them are Mrs. Gaskell and Miss Thackeray (Lady Ritchie).
Walter Scott.
The Novelist.
When Scott, in 1814, sought for some fly-hooks in a bureau, and found the lost first chapter of "Waverley," a novel begun in 1805, prose fiction seemed to be under general contempt, was only fit for milliners, said his friend Morritt of "Rokeby". Yet, in fact, the good novel was not left without a witness. Miss Edgeworth's tales of Irish life and manners excited, said Scott, his own wish to write of his own people, and Miss Edgeworth's "Castle Rackrent" is of 1800. Jane Austen had written "Northanger Abbey" in 1797; it remained unpublished, but "Sense and Sensibility" is of 1811, "Pride and Prejudice" of 1813; thus both were prior to "Waverley". But neither, great as are their merits, attracted attention then, as Miss Burney's novels had done from the first; and probably the contempt of novels was one of the various causes, the chief being that "it was his humour," which made Scott conceal his authorship of his prose romances.
"Waverley"—in the first and long-lost chapters—is reckoned tame; but the hero's youth in peaceful rural England was deliberately117 designed as a quiet approach to his richly varied118 adventures under the White Cockade. From the moment when Waverley enters the village, so strange to English eyes, and the still stranger castle, of Tullyveolan, he passes into the land of romance; all was, to English readers, as novel and unexpected as if Edward had joined a tribe of Central Africa. The ancient feudal119 manners, Lowland or Highland120; the learned, eccentric, brave old baron; the half idiot jester, Davy Gellatley; the Bailie, Balmawhapple;[Pg 541] the clansmen, the Celtic chief, Fergus MacIvor; the survivor123 of the Remnant, gifted Gilfillan, were humorous and masterly creations, while the gallant124 figure of the doomed125 Prince and his wonderful adventure, narrated126 with sympathy, completed the charm. The world was taken by storm, believed in Flora127 MacIvor, and wept afresh over the shambles128 of Carlisle.
Written in six weeks, the romance of "Guy Mannering" (1815), with its pell-mell of characters from the Colonel (who was thought like Scott), and his lively dark-eyed daughter Julia, (certainly like Mrs. Scott), to Pleydel, Meg Merrilies, Glossin, the bankrupt Bertram laird, to Dominie Sampson, and Dandie Dinmont with his dogs, was only less popular from the first. "The Antiquary" (1816) added a romance of dark complexion130 to a study of modern manners of the preceding decade; while "Old Mortality," at the end of the year, did for 1679 and the Covenanters, with even greater skill, what "Waverley" had done for the clans122 and the Forty-five. "Old Mortality" is probably the greatest of Scott's historical novels. The friends of the persecuted131 Remnant exclaimed against historical unfairness, but the friends of the "Indulged" of 1679, and of Claverhouse, had as good a right to pick a quarrel.
"The Black Dwarf132" was condemned133 by Blackwood the publisher, and posterity134 has not differed from his verdict. The story had been written on a larger scale, but was truncated135, said Scott, to the proportions of the dwarf. In 1817 "Rob Roy" gave us the best of all Scott's heroines, Diana Vernon, and the deathless Andrew Fairservice, and Bailie Nicol Jarvie, and the Dougal creature, with Rob himself, a tower of strength; but Helen, his wife, is somewhat melodramatic (as probably she actually was) and the plot, with its financial embroilment136, is "only good for bringing in fine things".
It is difficult to decide between the rival excellences137 of "The Heart of Midlothian" (1818) (with another heroine, Jeanie Deans, as good and original in her way as Diana Vernon) and of "Old Mortality". We are apt to prefer the novel which we read last. Written "in torments," and totally forgotten by Scott after he had composed it, "The Bride of Lammermoor" has won tears[Pg 542] for generations, though the doomed Master is something of a lay figure, and the pathos of the old Steward138 is better than his humour, which grows mechanical. The darkening of the omens139 towards the close is matched only in the "Odyssey140" and "Njal's Saga"; for, though the novel is not in the first rank, it contains much of the author's best, and could have been written by no other mortal. With "The Bride" came the brief "Legend of Montrose," in which the great Marquess is half-forgotten, for Dugald Dalgetty, that matchless creation, runs away with Scott's fancy, happily carrying him to meet the rival Marquess of Argyll. Confessedly Scott could adhere to no predetermined plan (he tried to do so, again and again, but was conscious of failure); his characters were alive and masterful, and led him where they would, but he had never contemplated141 a romance in a theme above romance, the Action and Passion of Montrose.
Leaving Scotland—lest the field should be overworked—for England and the Middle Ages, Scott, in 1819, won the hearts of most boys and many men, by "Ivanhoe," the crusader who returns disguised, like de Wilton in "Marmion". It is to be believed that Scott disliked Rowena at least as much as Thackeray did, and was no less in love than he with Rebecca. Merely to think of the characters is a pleasure—Gurth, Wamba, Locksley, de Bracy, Friar Tuck, Isaac, the Abbot, while, if Urfried is extremely incoherent in her pagan creed143, the Templar is Byronic enough for the taste of that day; Scott, in fact, could draw a dark Byronic dare-devil before Byron came into the field. "The Monastery144" (1820) with the White Lady of Avenel, and the Euphuist Knight145, was not well received, but Sir Walter boldly carried on the tale in an infinitely146 better sequel, "The Abbot," with all the charm and horror of Mary Stuart at Loch Leven, with a hero full of spirit, and a heroine worthy of him in Catherine Seyton.
In "Kenilworth" (1821), a most audaciously anachronistic147 tale, Scott treated Queen Elizabeth with a chivalry148 amazing in a Scot; his fated heroine, Amy Robsart, has unusual spirit and womanliness, and his villain112, Varney, is his Iago, while Michael Lambourne is a perfect sketch14 of the Elizabethan adventurer of the baser sort.
[Pg 543]
In "The Pirate" (1821) Scott chose the scene of his tour in the Orkney Islands (1814), and his hero is, like George Staunton in "The Heart of Midlothian," rather a Byronic being. Minna and Brenda, the two fair sisters, were immensely admired, but Norna of the Fitful Head is much inferior to Madge Wildfire and Meg Merrilies as a seeress and a romantically eccentric being; while Claude Halcro and Triptolemus Yellowley are the least entertaining of "Scott's bores".
"The Fortunes of Nigel" (1822) is enriched with all the wealth of Scott's knowledge of Elizabethan and Jacobean plays and pamphlets, and the unsatisfactory hero, much the least sympathetic of Scott's jeunes premiers149, is redeemed151 by the delightful humours of gentle King Jamie, by the two grim Trapbois, father and daughter, by the flower of Scottish serving-men, Richie Moniplies, and by all the life of the Court, of the Ordinary, and of Alsatia.
In "Peveril of the Peak" (1823) Scott is less fortunate in his treatment of English society during the Popish Plot, a theme which seemed "made to his hand". His Charles II. is the least excellent of his kings, and the plot is more than commonly rambling152, while Fenella is the feeblest of his romantic and eccentric puppets. "Quentin Durward," on the other hand, with the adventures of a gallant but canny153 Scot at the perilous154 Court of Louis XI., is perhaps the best constructed of all his novels. In drawing Louis XI. the author excels himself; we have not too much of Leslie le Balafré, the Dugald Dalgetty of the age; the adventures are many and exciting, and the book was welcomed eagerly in France, though at first it was scarcely appreciated at home.
"St. Ronan's Well" was a tale of contemporary manners, but Scott was not skilled in describing the humours of a Tweedside watering-place, interwoven as they are with a dark domestic tragedy, spoiled by an incongruous conclusion which was forced on the author by the prudery of James Ballantyne. In "Redgauntlet," Scott recovered himself: the manners and characters are a little earlier than those of his own boyhood, and mingled155 with the adventures of the hero on the Border is the last tragic156 appearance of that Prince who, twenty years earlier, had shaken the three kingdoms with the claymores of the clans.
[Pg 544]
The brief "Wandering Willie's Tale," in "Redgauntlet," is Sir Walter's masterpiece of humour and terror: this story he worked on very carefully, and his care was rewarded. The Edinburgh lawyers, the eccentrics, Nanty Ewart, and the heroine of the Green Mantle157, are worthy of their places in this great romance, made the more moving by many touches of autobiography158.
"The Talisman159" (1825) is a brilliant tale of C?ur de Lion and Saladin; "The Betrothed160" is less appreciated than it ought to be. In 1825-1826 came the ruin of Scott, entailed161 by that of his publisher, Constable162. How he bore it, how he laboured and died to redeem150 it, by long heavy task work at "The Life of Napoleon,"—by "Woodstock," in which the characters of Cromwell and of Charles II. in youth, are among his best creations; by "The Fair Maid of Perth," with the great character of the timid chief, and the finale of the Clan121 Battle of Perth; by "The Chronicles of the Canongate," and by his latest works, written with a half-palsied hand, composed by a brain in ruin, yet again and again inspired,—is a familiar story. The eyes are dimmed as these words are penned; so potent163 is the spell of that rich, kind genius, of that noble character, over the hearts of those who love and honour the great and good Sir Walter.
He created the historical novel; he opened the way in which no man or woman has followed him with such genius as his: we may say this even while we remember "Esmond" and "The Virginians"; "Kidnapped," "Catriona" and "The Master of Ballantrae"; "Les Trois Mousquetaires" and "La Dame29 de Monsoreau".
After a voyage to Italy, Sir Walter returned to Abbotsford, where he died in his own house with the murmur164 of Tweed in his ears as he passed away (September, 1832). "I say," wrote Byron emphatically, "that Walter Scott is as nearly a thoroughly165 good man as a man can be, because I know it by experience to be the case."
James Fenimore Cooper.
James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851), bearing a name dear to grateful boyhood, is even now, with Hawthorne—an infinitely[Pg 545] greater man—the American novelist best known on the Continent of Europe. In France as in England, he was the delight of the youth of men of letters; among the characters of fiction concerning whom Thackeray says Amo he places Leather Stocking with Dugald Dalgetty. Many of us, no doubt, at about the age of 10, have made stone heads for our arrows, like the noble neolithic166 Indian braves of Cooper, and have found (like Scottish savages167, when flint was scarce) that slate168 served our purpose.
Cooper was born in New Jersey169, and passed his childhood on his father's new settlement at Otsego Lake. Here were real deer and real Red Indians, and here Cooper's ply170 was taken. He was sent down from Yale, as inappreciative of the studious habits of the Pale Faces. He went to sea, thus obtaining another string to his bow as a novelist; next saw service in the Navy, by lake and sea; and, after a subsequent life of leisure, was stimulated172 by a bad English novel to vow173 that he could write a better,—his tale of English life, "Precaution," has not had the vogue174 of "Persuasion". Cooper turned to American topics in "The Spy," a story of the War of Independence; Scott's example may have led him to choose a recent historical topic; his knowledge of the forests and his remarkable hero, Harvey Birch, did the rest, and his success was assured; his work was welcomed both in France and England. Then came "The Pioneers," the first in composition of the five tales where Leather-Stocking, with his peculiar175 and silent laugh, leads us through forests, haunted by the Mingo and other fearful wild fowl176. Then he turned to the sea, to Paul Jones, that renegade of Galloway, and Long Tom Coffin177; this was the first of various novels of the Navy which are to American boys what Marryat's were and ought to be to our own. "The Last of the Mohicans," of 1826, marks the culmination178 of Cooper's talent, and Chingachgook, the Great Serpent, and Uncas, if not the paleface heroine, are imperishable in the memory. Cooper's visit to Europe led him into writings which rather exacerbated179 the American Eagle and the British Lion. Most of his very numerous later works are more or less polemical. He was no psychologue, his heroines are forlorn of admirers; in style he had nothing to touch R. L. Stevenson; he is "Cooper of the wood and wave".
[Pg 546]
Washington Irving.
The true beginner of accomplished180 literature in America was Washington Irving, born in New York, 3 April, 1783; his father was of the old Border family of the name, his mother, the daughter of an English clergyman. In his twenty-first year he visited Europe; on his return, with friends named Paulding, wrote light essays in a serial181 named "Salmagundi," and, later, a burlesque182 "History of New York," with the humours of "Diedrich Knickerbocker," a book in which Scott recognized gleams of Sterne and Swift. After the war ending in 1815, when he was under canvas, if not under fire much, he revisited England, and stayed with Scott at Abbotsford, of which he has left a pleasant record. In 1819 appeared his "Sketch Book" with the immortal story of Rip Van Winkle, and the "Legend of Sleepy Hollow". He had not quite shared Scott's enthusiasm for the scenery about Abbotsford, mainly resting for its charm on historical and legendary183 associations unfamiliar184 to him, but he gave legends to his native Catskill Hills, and the Hudson River. His style has an Addisonian felicity and kind humour; and in his "Bracebridge Hall" he handled old-fashioned England as if he loved it. His "Tales of a Traveller" (he now visited Italy, France, and Spain) are not, throughout, of his best work. Spain and the Spanish inspired his "Life of Columbus," which in England was deservedly popular, and the picturesque185 "Conquest of Granada," and "The Alhambra." In 1829, Irving became secretary of the American Legation in London, and, returning, produced "Astoria," to boys, at least, a delightful account of the wilds. In 1842 he went as American Minister to Spain, and, at home, wrote an attractive "Life of Mahomet". He carried into historical work the grace of his essays, and the power of visualizing186 characters and events. He did not write of Europe as an American, with his eyes very open to the comparative merits of his own country; and he did not write of America as a European. He was at home in the past as in the present, and though in his country's literature he was a pioneer, his performance has none of the roughness of pioneering work. He had the amiability187 of his favourite Goldsmith,[Pg 547] whose biography he wrote. He died in November, 1859. If he were not a great writer, he is a delightful writer; we think of him with Addison and Goldsmith, without the occasional little petulancies of the author of "The Vicar of Wakefield". When he began his work America had no literature, when he died her chief poets and historians had given full assurance of their powers.
Magazines and Essayists.
Magazines, critical, literary, social, and antiquarian magazines, had flourished in the later years of the eighteenth century. With the nineteenth, in 1802, appeared "The Edinburgh Review," critical and political, edited by Francis Jeffrey (born at Edinburgh, 1773, died 1850). Though a man of ability and of a crackling kind of cleverness, Jeffrey was wholly incompetent188 to criticize the works of the great romantic poets, the chief glories in literature of an age so rich in the renowns of war. Scott aided Jeffrey at first, but partly vexed189 by the coxcombry190 of his review of "Marmion," more by the pro-French tone of his Whig review, the Sheriff deserted the "Blue and Buff," and helped to found the Tory "Quarterly Review," published by Murray, and edited by the learned but crabbed191 and dilatory192 Gifford. Both magazines had esteemed193 contributors: the "Edinburgh" was enlivened by the high spirits and wit of Sydney Smith (1771-1845), qualities not always controlled by good taste when he made merry with Nonconformists—Bishops, of course, were reckoned fair game—and with squires, old familiar butts194 of every wit. Henry Brougham, later Lord Brougham (1778-1868), was always ready to write the whole magazine, if needful; what Macaulay thought of him, much later, may be read in the letters of the historian. Edinburgh professors and Francis Horner helped. Horner died young; much had been expected of him. The modern reader of the old "Edinburghs" will not find in them much entertainment, except from Sydney Smith's gaiety and Jeffrey's exhibitions of conceited195 incompetence196 as a judge of poetry. Both the "Edinburgh" and the "Quarterly," carried political rancour into literary criticism; both dealt in insolent197 personal bludgeon-work. From such matter the contributions in the[Pg 548] "Quarterly" of Southey and Scott were free, and as Scott dealt with topics of permanent literary and historical interest, his essays retain their value: though Canning and other contributors to the "Anti-Jacobin" wrote for the "Quarterly," their buoyant humour of parody and their high spirits did not lighten up its august pages. As the younger poets, Shelley, Byron, and Keats, were either revolutionary or, in Keats's case, supposed to be, at least, Whigs and associates of Whigs, the "Quarterly" was more frequently disgraced by political abuse of poetical198 works than the "Edinburgh".
"Blackwood's Magazine," after a few months of stagnation200, came into the hands of Mr. Blackwood, a bookseller of sound sense and masterful character, who was practically his own editor, though he allowed John Wilson (1785-1854) and John Gibson Lockhart (1794-1854) to play their pranks201. Wilson, of Magdalen College, Oxford, was a splendid athlete, and excelled in country sports; Lockhart, of Balliol, very young in 1817, was of remarkable beauty, with a strongly sarcastic202 pen ("The Scorpion"), and as sardonic203 as his far-away cousin in the past, Lockhart of Carnwath, the manager of Jacobite affairs under James VIII. and III., and the author of valuable Memoirs204. These two, on a night of claret and mirth, composed "The Chaldee Manuscript," a jape written in Scriptural style on all the notables of Scottish literary society. To persons who understand the allusions205, it is still full of very mirthful matter, but many grave sufferers were as little amused as John Knox was by a delightful parody of himself and his associates by young Thomas Maitland, brother of Maitland of Lethington, Secretary of State to Queen Mary. Thenceforth, "Blackwood's," was for several years engaged in broils206, which culminated207 in the death of John Scott, then Editor of "The London Magazine" in which Lamb often wrote. In this serial Scott attacked Lockhart, who went to London to fight him. Scott kept advancing reasons for not meeting Lockhart, who "posted" him and went home. Scott then entangling208 himself in a dispute with Lockhart's college friend, Christie, put himself in the hands of Horace Smith of "The Rejected Addresses," and of Mr. Patmore. Mr. Patmore's ignorance of the laws of the[Pg 549] duello made it necessary for Christie (who had fired once in the air, and thereby209 legally ended the duel) to shoot in the direction of Scott, who fell mortally wounded. The brawls210 of "Blackwood's" were detested211 by Sir Walter Scott, whose daughter Lockhart had married. Wilson, who had no connexion with this tragedy, was an early devotee of Wordsworth's poetry, and himself wrote "The Isle of Palms," "The City of the Plague," and two or three "Kailyard" novels. His memory is best preserved by the high spirits and occasional sentiment and humour of his "Noctes Ambrosian?," dialogues in which the Ettrick Shepherd is the most conspicuous212 hero; not always with his own good will or to his own advantage. Wilson was of a most mercurial213 temperament214; his fiery215 style was apt to be too florid; his caprices of temper were unaccountable; and probably his most permanent work is found in his descriptions of nature and of sport. He was for long Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. Lockhart is seen to most advantage in his immortal "Life of Sir Walter Scott," a noble union of perfect candour with passionate affection for the great man of whom he wrote. His social fastidiousness must always have been vexed by Scott's intimacy216 with the Ballantyne brothers, who, again, had been incapable217 of controlling Scott's tendency to large expenditure218; indeed, the books of the firm were in a state of chaos219. The strictures on these Ballantynes were a blemish220 in a book which, with Boswell's "Johnson," holds the highest place in English literary biography. It is even more in a few pieces of original verse (such as Carlyle's favourite, "It is an Old Belief") than in the best of his "Spanish Ballads222" that Lockhart reveals the poetry within him, and the tenderness of a heart on which he laid the fetter223 lock of his ancient scutcheon. Of his novels, as we have said, "Adam Blair" is by far the best. He became Editor of the "Quarterly Review" in 1825; his death (1854) took him from a world darkened for him by many bereavements and other sorrows. His body sleeps in Dryburgh Abbey, "at the feet of Sir Walter Scott".
We now turn to the great essayists of the early nineteenth century.
[Pg 550]
Charles Lamb.
He who would write briefly224 of Charles Lamb is under this disadvantage: to open a volume of Lamb's essays or letters is to remain absorbed in them, and in wondering affectionate admiration. A man is fascinated by the book, however often read before, and cannot take up the pen.
Born in Crown Office Row, in the Temple (10 February, 1775), Lamb was the son of the clerk of a barrister, Samuel Salt, a Lincolnshire man; his maternal225 grandmother was housekeeper226 at the ancient house of Blakesware, in Herts. Lamb has described these people and that place in his essays, "Old Benchers of the Inner Temple," "Blakesmoor in H——shire," and his own infantile mental state (much like that of R. L. Stevenson in some ways), in "Witches and Other Night Fears," while his own and Coleridge's school days are commemorated227 in "Recollections of Christ's Hospital," and (here he assumes the part of Coleridge), in "Christ's Hospital Five and Thirty Years Ago". To begin the study of Lamb with these essays is in part to understand him, and is wholly to fall in love with him. We see his father, with his honesty, courtesy, and courage; with his "merriest quips and conceits228" and many little artistic229 accomplishments230, "a brother of the angle, moreover," devoted to the theatre, an enthusiast114 for Garrick, and, too early, "in the last sad state of human weakness," babbling231 of his boyhood. Lamb inherited the "merry quips," and was an inveterate232 punster. The "conceits" derived233 from constant reading of Burton and Sir Thomas Browne, and the then neglected early dramatists, abound234 in his style. The love of the stage he also inherited, and constantly expresses; and, he says, "from my childhood I was extremely inquisitive235 about witches and witch stories," and fond of a picture in a great book on the Bible "of the Witch Raising of Samuel, which I wish I had never seen". (The present writer's childhood was dominated by the same picture.) He never laid his head on the pillow, from his fourth to his eighth year, "without an assurance which realized its own prophecy" of seeing some frightful236 spectres. He supposed that these imaginations might date from "our ante-mundane condition".[Pg 551] They were, in fact, proofs of his imaginative genius in infancy237, for any child may have the fears, yet never fancy that it sees the phantasms. Conceivably the strain of madness in Lamb's blood, the madness which made his sister Mary slay238 her own mother, and affected239 her at frequent intervals240, was also for something in his childish terrors. In later life his dreams wandered in great cities never visited by him, which he saw "with a map-like distinctness of trace, a daylight vividness of vision". He thought that "the degree of the soul's creativeness in sleep might furnish no whimsical criterion of the quantum of poetical faculty241 resident in the same soul waking". His verses, like "When maidens242 such as Hester die," though exquisite, give less proof of his poetical faculty than his essay on "Dream Children," and on his lost love, which is perhaps the most beautiful example of his peculiar pathos.
Thus, throughout his essays, Lamb is constantly studying and revealing himself, his sister, his friends, with varying disguises and alterations243 of circumstance. In his "Character of the Late Elia," (his pseudonym) he is his own critic. "Better it is that a writer should be natural in a self-pleasing quaintness244, than to affect a naturalness (so called) that should be strange to him." Unnatural246 it would have been to him, even in the briefest note to a friend, to write in a plain forthright247 style, but his quaintnesses and his conceits are never obscure. Elia "gave himself too little concern about what he uttered and in whose presence". That this is too true appears in the famous scene where he desired "to feel the bumps" of a very stupid comptroller of stamps, and was not to be restrained by Wordsworth's mild "My dear Charles!" What pranks, with his confessed "imperfect sympathy" with Scots, he may have played before the avenging248 Carlyle, no man knows. His friends "were, for the most part, persons of uncertain fortune ... a ragged249 regiment250". "He never greatly cared for the society of what are called good people." "The impressions of infancy had burnt into him, and he resented the impertinence of manhood." Passing all his best hours at a desk in the India Office, he returned to his gambols251 when free. His essays were part of his playtime; in them he was his real self.
[Pg 552]
From 1782 to 1789 he was at Christ's Hospital, but did not attain252 to the high rank of Grecian, nor enter either of the Universities which he loved. He continued to meet Coleridge during vacations at "The Salutation and Cat," and contributed verses to Coleridge's volume of 1796 (Cottle, Bristol). In 1796 befell the tragedy in his family, and henceforth the care of his sister Mary (the Bridget of Elia) dominated his existence of unrepining self-sacrifice. In literature (in addition to the old writers), he admired Burns, and Wordsworth, from the first. It is more curious that Burger's ballad221 of Lenore (the Death-ride) struck Lamb as potently253 as it inspired Scott, who appreciated Lamb much more than he was by Lamb appreciated, and in vain invited this resolute254 Cockney to visit Abbotsford. In 1797 he contributed more sonnets255 to a volume by Coleridge and Lloyd, and in 1798 published his tale "Rosamund Gray",
Friends going up to examine it
Observe a good deal of Charles Lamb in it
(to parody Browning), it has passages of his style, quotations256 from his favourite old authors; one chapter is an essay in his own manner, and there is even an anticipation257 of "Dream Children". Shelley praised the story highly, but Lamb was not enthusiastic about Shelley's poems or Byron's. His "John Woodvil" was intended for the stage, and the tragedy was published in 1802. It contains fine passages of verse, and a great deal of the "local colour" of the Restoration; perhaps the chief merit lies in the restoration of the accents of old poetry. The farce258 of "Mr. H." was a foredoomed failure. There is room for variety of opinion as to the suitability of the "Tales from Shakespeare" (much of which was executed by Mary Lamb), for children; but the peculiar merits of the style are beyond dispute. The same remark may be made on "The Adventures of Ulysses". On the other hand the notes to the "Specimens259 of English Dramatic Poets" (1808) reveal Lamb at his best as a critic and a master of language, while the selections are invaluable260 to readers who have not the time nor the taste for the perusal261 of the entire works of many most unequal dramatists. The book was a revelation to[Pg 553] all but a few readers who, like Scott, had dwelt much with Marlowe, Chapman, Ford4, Webster, and the rest.
Lamb "found himself" and found a public, at first small but ever increasing, when he wrote his first essays for "The London Magazine" in 1820, under the name of Elia. (Republished as "Essays of Elia" in 1823.) The very names of the essays are fragrant262 in the memory, and the characters drawn263 have become household words, while the personal touches are, with Lamb's delightful and fantastic letters, his best biography. In 1825, Lamb retired, with a liberal pension, from the India Office, and was "a freed man after thirty-three years' slavery" (see his essay "The Superannuated264 Man"). Lamb's "Last Essays" were published in 1833, and the author did not long survive the death of his life-long friend, Coleridge, in July, 1834; he passed away on 27 December, 1834. His name stands with those of Addison and Steele among English essayists: indeed he is much more read than they, as he was nearer to our own time, while more closely connected than they with the best literature of the great centuries which preceded the eighteenth. His self-revelations too are more serious than those of his famous predecessors265, and the character revealed is more potently attractive.
Leigh Hunt.
Born nine years after Lamb (in 1784) and, like Lamb and Coleridge, educated at Christ's Hospital, Leigh Hunt perhaps holds, after Lamb and Hazlitt, the third place among the English essayists of his age. While love of literature, of wide and very miscellaneous reading in old English and Italian poetry was the chief pleasure of Hunt, he also took, with great vigour, a side in the politics of his age. A "Friend of the People," a contemner266 of kings, and no sympathizer with his country in the Napoleonic wars, Hunt, with his brother John, started, in 1808, "The Examiner," a Radical267 weekly journal of politics and literature. In 1812 he published what the law called a libel on the Prince Regent, and for two years occupied prison rooms which he decorated in his own taste (leaning to roses on the wall-paper, and plaster casts), among these he received his friends. Though he had a rapid perception[Pg 554] of new poetic199 excellence, though he was the first to perceive and welcome the star of Keats, and, almost alone, encouraged and applauded Shelley, Hunt was blind to the merits of poets who were not of his own political party. In the text and notes of his "Feast of the Poets" (1814), first published in "The Reflector," he insulted Scott, Coleridge, and Wordsworth,—and made "for" rhyme to "straw". When his "Story of Rimini" appeared (1816), it told Dante's tale of Paolo and Francesca with a Cockney jauntiness268, and abounded269 in such epithets270 as "perky," "bosomy," "farmy," "winy Hunt's theory was that "the harmonious freedom of our old poets"—"their freedom in continuing the sense of the heroic rhyming couplets," should be "united with the vigour of Dryden". His verse was based on Chaucer's, and on some examples of the seventeenth century, and his metrical example influenced Shelley, while Keats followed him in re-telling Italian stories, and, at first, even in his affectations.
"Rimini" and its author were furiously attacked, for reasons of politics, by the young Tory writers in "Blackwood's Magazine," to whom Hunt's ineradicable vanity and lack of taste lent handles. He was dubbed271 "King of the Cockneys," and Keats himself shrank from his ways and manners. He joined Byron and Shelley in Italy in 1822; they were to work together on a journal, "The Liberal," but, from the first, and especially after the death of Shelley, the relations of Byron with the needy272 and familiar Hunt were intolerably unpleasant. In 1828, after Byron's death, Hunt avenged273 himself in his "Lord Byron and His Contemporaries," a book which, as he came to see, should never have been written.
The rest of Hunt's life was spent in journalism275, mainly literary; his essays, often delightful reading, were republished in "Men, Women, and Books," "Imagination and Fancy," "A Jar of Honey from Mount Hybla," while in his last work, "Autobiography," he forgives all his enemies, among whom he had actually reckoned Sir Walter Scott. He was the friend of Dickens and Carlyle. He wrote concerning Carlyle's style: "How could he exculpate276 this style, in which he denounces so many 'shams,' of being itself a sham129? of being affected, unnecessary, and ostentatious? a jargon277 got up to confound pretension278 with performance, and reproduce[Pg 555] endless German talk under the guise142 of novelty?" Here was candour: Leigh Hunt cultivated the virtue279 described as "the independence of the heart".
William Hazlitt.
Lamb as a man was universally beloved, except by Carlyle, and as a writer he is the friend of the human race. On the other side, Lamb's friend and fellow-essayist, William Hazlitt, in a letter to Leigh Hunt, says, "I want to know why everybody has such a dislike to me". There is much pathos and a plentiful280 lack of humour in the question. The brief answer is that Hazlitt acted as if he were trying to make himself disliked. In this he was pretty successful; he quarrelled even with Lamb, but never shook Lamb's constant affection. There is so much of Hazlitt's self in his works that, greatly as his good qualities delight us, there are times when we can scarcely forgive his defects, and are apt to conceive a personal grudge281 against him.
Born at Maidstone on 10 April, 1778, Hazlitt was the son of a distinguished282 Nonconformist minister. After visiting America, which was not tolerant of his doctrines283, the elder Hazlitt returned, to England, where the son resided from 1788 to 1802. In 1798 he met Coleridge preaching in a blue coat and white waistcoat. The great and peculiar merit of Hazlitt's essays is his power of expressing and communicating the zest284 of his enjoyment285 of nature, human nature, preaching, juggling286 performances, prize-fighting, painting, fiction, sculpture, and the game of fives. In his description of the voice, the manner, the personal magic of Coleridge, then in his glorious youth, Hazlitt outshines himself, as he does in his criticism of Cavanagh's style in the fives-court. Hazlitt visited Coleridge at Stowey, and heard Wordsworth read his "Peter Bell"; heard Coleridge speak with contempt of Gray, and with intolerance of Pope, and express a dislike of Dr. Johnson!
These were divine days; but politics crossed the friendships of Hazlitt. The others had been enthusiasts287, like himself, for the French Revolution, but not for Napoleon, as objecting to be emancipated288 by a hero who subdued289 hereditary290 kings, and supplied to conquered nations his own brothers and captains to be their[Pg 556] princes. Hazlitt, on the other hand, rejoiced in the superb genius of Napoleon as he did in that of Shakespeare and in the sunlight. Bonaparte he could no more keep out of his essays on Poetry than Mr. Dick could banish291 "that comely292 head" of Charles I. from his memorial. To Hazlitt, Wordsworth, Coleridge, and other friends became anathema293, as renegades; and it is when we read his odious294 attack on Coleridge's poetry, in "The Edinburgh Review," that we understand "why everybody has such a dislike of me".
People who have read his "Liber Amoris," still more they who have studied the original letters partly published in that book, perceive other ways in which Hazlitt became antipathetic to human nature. He was, in the Scots phrase, "thrawn," and as he could seldom avoid exhibiting his temper in his writings, he may be and is admired for his generous qualities, and power of interpreting poetry and art, of elevating and enlivening the appreciative171 powers of his readers; but he can never be liked without reserve. His course of life, after he abandoned the study of metaphysics and the art of painting for the lecture-room and the pen of the ready essayist, put him too much in the way of temptation. He was too free to bring his personal and political animosities into his work, "it is such easy writing". He was also unskilled in the management of his life, and both his marriages (not to mention the unsuccessful passion of his "Liber Amoris") were fountains of bitterness. Living in London (1812-1820), Hazlitt gave his lectures on "English Poetry," and "Comic Writers" (1818-1819). Of 1817 are his "Characters of Shakespeare's Plays," and his "Round Table," essays on all sorts of subjects reprinted from Leigh Hunt's paper "The Examiner". In the work on poetry it is surprising to find him ranking Ossian with Homer, the Bible, and Dante, but when he gives his reasons it is natural to envy his powers of appreciation295 and enjoyment. To read him on Chaucer and Spenser is to desire to read Spenser and Chaucer themselves, so nobly does he recommend them, and Shakespeare, and so on, till, over Burns, he falls into a quarrel with Wordsworth, and then lashes296 "The Lake School," sniffs297 at Scott, and discovers but "one fine passage" in "Christabel". His politics prevent him from appreciating what[Pg 557] is excellent in the Cavalier poets, and even when writing of Milton, Satan suggests to him Bonaparte, and he goes off full-mouthed on that trail. Among the novelists he is as much at home, and as convincingly right in his criticisms, especially of Richardson, as he is lost in a mist when he touches on Racine and Molière. Over Scott's novels he first breaks into a passion of admiration, and then, remembering politics, pelts298 the author (who never gave a thought to him) in the manner of Gulliver's Yahoos.
Hazlitt, unhappily, lived at a time when both parties in the State carried, with inconceivable rancour and stupidity, their politics into the field of literary criticism. His "Characters of Shakespeare" was slandered299 by Gifford in "The Quarterly Review," and he keeps telling us the sale of the book was stopped. Why members of his own party did not continue to buy it, he does not ask. In "Blackwood's Magazine" (1817-1818) he was styled "pimply-faced Hazlitt," a leader of "the Cockney School," and he says that Keats died of being called a Cockney. In fact, these stupidities did not affect Keats more than any other man of sense, while Hazlitt never ceased to avenge274 on people perfectly innocent, and on the guilty Gifford, the insults which he ought to have disregarded. For these reasons, and because he wrote so much, his essays are unequal, though when he is at his best, and he is often at his best, he is in the foremost rank of critics. He died in 1830. "Well, I have had a happy life," was among his latest words, and his finest works are reflections of his happiest hours.
Thomas de Quincey.
An essayist whose works are probably more read than those of Leigh Hunt is Thomas de Quincey, one of the extraordinary men whose boyhood was in the eighteenth, and whose works were produced in the first half of the nineteenth century. Born in Manchester in 1785, and dying in Edinburgh in 1859, De Quincey was precisely300 the contemporary of Hunt. His father, dying young, left his children adequately provided for, and, to judge by De Quincey's Autobiography, they were extraordinary children. William, the invincibly301 amusing, died young, and De Quincey's first[Pg 558] great sorrow was the death of Elizabeth, when he himself was 6 and she was not 10 years of age. His description of the vision and the mysterious music which attended his visit to her as she lay dead, is one of the most remarkable and characteristic passages in his writings. Sixty-nine years later, "his very last act was to throw up his arms and utter, as if with a cry of surprised recognition, 'Sister! Sister! Sister!'" He was, indeed, a born seer; and probably other persons, if so ill-advised as to follow his example in taking quantities of laudanum, would not behold302 the visions which first charmed and then tormented303 "The English Opium304 Eater".
De Quincey was a wanderer and a fugitive305 from his school days, at least such he became after receiving an accidental stroke on the head from a cane306, which prostrated307 him for weeks, and quite conceivably was one cause of his eccentricities308. As he has told us he ran away, quite needlessly, from school at 16 or 17, tramped, a sentimental309 traveller, in North Wales, starved, lurked310, and walked the midnight streets of London with Ann, ran away from Oxford (Worcester College) when his papers had astonished and delighted the examiners, and, generally, flew in the face of common sense. He came into his little fortune, behaved to Coleridge with the generosity of Shelley, settled long near Wordsworth at Grasmere, made the acquaintance of John Wilson (Christopher North), married a country girl, and fell into the miseries311 of the opium eater. Poverty ensued, De Quincey returned to his fugitive life of lurking312 in London, and, in 1821, astonished the world of readers by "The Confessions313 of an English Opium Eater," published in "The London Magazine," for which Lamb and Hazlitt used to write. De Quincey was acquainted with Lamb, and Wordsworth and Coleridge he knew well. But he belonged to none of the rival sets of writers, "Cockneys" or Edinburgh wits; and, in his freakish moods of schoolboy-like high spirits, he wrote personal banter314 of his best friends, deriding315 Coleridge's corpulence and "large expanse of cheek"; the retort, as to cheek, was obvious. In 1830 De Quincey moved to Edinburgh; and in lodgings316 there, and at a cottage near Lasswade on the Esk, he mainly passed the rest of his strange, industrious317, eccentric life. He wrote[Pg 559] alternately for Blackwood's and Tait's magazines: almost the whole matter of his sixteen volumes appeared originally in magazines, and was written with the wolf and the printer's boy at the door. His vast store of reading, accumulated before 1821, embraced the old English writers and the new German philosophers, magic, political economy, and the records of police trials.
That sketch for a murder with a pair of dumb-bells, by the murderer Thurtell, "the same who was generally censured for murdering the late Mr. Weare," occurs, not only in the essay on "Murder Considered as One of the Fine Arts," but in the long essay on "Style". The story of the very mysterious murder, at noon-day, of Mrs. Ruscombe in Bristol, is very well told in "Autobiographic Sketches" ("The Priory"). Confessedly some essays, such as "Dream-fugue" in "The English Mail Coach," are records of visions inspired by opium: "the Dream knows best; and the Dream, I say again, is the responsible party". These essays on the Mail Coach, then the marvel318 of rapidity of travel, offer, in miniature, the type of De Quincey's style, with its sonorous319 poetic cadences320, its quaint245 colloquial321 familiarities,—with his insatiable intellectual curiosity, and his digressiveness—he discusses the origin of the word "snob". Finally the Dream has its way, after the wonderful description of the laurelled coach bearing news of Wellington's and Blücher's victory to England, and to two lovers the sudden face of death.
De Quincey, with his wide reading, with the songless poet in his nature, and with his strange freakish habits, his following a chance association of ideas far beyond the field of his essay, is, naturally, one of the most unequal of writers. His prose is, on occasion, "aureate" or ornate, in a manner which has, perhaps, had its day; and again he deals in schoolboy slang. Only parts of his famous essay on Jeanne d'Arc are excellent: taste has moved away from, and may return to, the mystic eloquence322 of "The Three Ladies of Sorrow". But in De Quincey there is variety enough for all tastes, and he is perhaps especially inspiring and delightful to young readers. He died at Edinburgh on 8 December, 1859.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
kin
|
|
| n.家族，亲属，血缘关系；adj.亲属关系的，同类的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
baron
|
|
| n.男爵；(商业界等)巨头，大王 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
brook
|
|
| n.小河，溪；v.忍受，容让 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
Ford
|
|
| n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
feat
|
|
| n.功绩；武艺，技艺；adj.灵巧的，漂亮的，合适的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
poignant
|
|
| adj.令人痛苦的，辛酸的，惨痛的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
mythology
|
|
| n.神话，神话学，神话集 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
wilderness
|
|
| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
myriad
|
|
| adj.无数的；n.无数，极大数量 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
myriads
|
|
| n.无数，极大数量( myriad的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
stereotyped
|
|
| adj.(指形象、思想、人物等)模式化的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
recording
|
|
| n.录音，记录 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
apparently
|
|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
sketch
|
|
| n.草图；梗概；素描；v.素描；概述 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
sketches
|
|
| n.草图( sketch的名词复数 )；素描；速写；梗概 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
mentor
|
|
| n.指导者，良师益友；v.指导 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
retired
|
|
| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
playwright
|
|
| n.剧作家，编写剧本的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
hospitable
|
|
| adj.好客的；宽容的；有利的，适宜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
feigned
|
|
| a.假装的，不真诚的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
secrecy
|
|
| n.秘密，保密，隐蔽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
conspiracy
|
|
| n.阴谋，密谋，共谋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
legitimate
|
|
| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
situated
|
|
| adj.坐落在...的，处于某种境地的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
grotesque
|
|
| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
naval
|
|
| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
discreetly
|
|
| ad.(言行)审慎地，慎重地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
bullying
|
|
| v.恐吓，威逼( bully的现在分词 )；豪；跋扈 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
dame
|
|
| n.女士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
beset
|
|
| v.镶嵌；困扰，包围 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
haven
|
|
| n.安全的地方，避难所，庇护所 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
admiration
|
|
| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
delightful
|
|
| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
shunned
|
|
| v.避开，回避，避免( shun的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
sprightly
|
|
| adj.愉快的，活泼的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
subscribed
|
|
| v.捐助( subscribe的过去式和过去分词 )；签署，题词；订阅；同意 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
censured
|
|
| v.指责，非难，谴责( censure的过去式 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
immortal
|
|
| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
amiable
|
|
| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
lucrative
|
|
| adj.赚钱的，可获利的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
lighter
|
|
| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
ward
|
|
| n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
remarkable
|
|
| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
phenomena
|
|
| n.现象 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
concealed
|
|
| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
conceal
|
|
| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
proprietor
|
|
| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
parody
|
|
| n.打油诗文，诙谐的改编诗文，拙劣的模仿；v.拙劣模仿，作模仿诗文 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
chiaroscuro
|
|
| n.明暗对照法 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
awakened
|
|
| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
skilfully
|
|
| adv. (美skillfully)熟练地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
destitute
|
|
| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
sage
|
|
| n.圣人，哲人；adj.贤明的，明智的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
worthy
|
|
| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
monk
|
|
| n.和尚，僧侣，修道士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
lurid
|
|
| adj.可怕的；血红的；苍白的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
dungeon
|
|
| n.地牢，土牢 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
mere
|
|
| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
generosity
|
|
| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
homage
|
|
| n.尊敬，敬意，崇敬 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
deserted
|
|
| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
Oxford
|
|
| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
harmonious
|
|
| adj.和睦的，调和的，和谐的，协调的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
rustic
|
|
| adj.乡村的，有乡村特色的；n.乡下人，乡巴佬 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
muse
|
|
| n.缪斯（希腊神话中的女神），创作灵感 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
devoted
|
|
| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
virtuous
|
|
| adj.有品德的，善良的，贞洁的，有效力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
satirized
|
|
| v.讽刺，讥讽( satirize的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
ascertained
|
|
| v.弄清，确定，查明( ascertain的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
oar
|
|
| n.桨，橹，划手；v.划行 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
maxims
|
|
| n.格言，座右铭( maxim的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
squires
|
|
| n.地主，乡绅( squire的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
litigant
|
|
| n.诉讼当事人；adj.进行诉讼的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
pathos
|
|
| n.哀婉，悲怆 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
ethics
|
|
| n.伦理学；伦理观，道德标准 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
isle
|
|
| n.小岛，岛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
corrupt
|
|
| v.贿赂，收买；adj.腐败的，贪污的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
credible
|
|
| adj.可信任的，可靠的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
delineation
|
|
| n.记述；描写 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
ebb
|
|
| vi.衰退，减退；n.处于低潮，处于衰退状态 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
akin
|
|
| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
vigour
|
|
| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
horrid
|
|
| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
speculative
|
|
| adj.思索性的，暝想性的，推理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
triumphant
|
|
| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
acclaims
|
|
| 向…欢呼( acclaim的第三人称单数 )； 向…喝彩； 称赞…； 欢呼或拥戴（某人）为… | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
renown
|
|
| n.声誉，名望 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
metropolis
|
|
| n.首府；大城市 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
persuasion
|
|
| n.劝说；说服；持有某种信仰的宗派 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
solicitors
|
|
| 初级律师( solicitor的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
winced
|
|
| 赶紧避开，畏缩( wince的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
gregariousness
|
|
| 集群性；簇聚性 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
trifling
|
|
| adj.微不足道的；没什么价值的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
sycophancy
|
|
| n.拍马屁，奉承，谄媚；吮痈舐痔 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
excellence
|
|
| n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
repented
|
|
| 对（自己的所为）感到懊悔或忏悔( repent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
snob
|
|
| n.势利小人，自以为高雅、有学问的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
brutal
|
|
| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
antiquated
|
|
| adj.陈旧的，过时的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
archaic
|
|
| adj.(语言、词汇等)古代的，已不通用的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
perennially
|
|
| adv.经常出现地；长期地；持久地；永久地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
stilted
|
|
| adj.虚饰的；夸张的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
shudder
|
|
| v.战粟，震动，剧烈地摇晃；n.战粟，抖动 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
shriek
|
|
| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
passionate
|
|
| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
ardent
|
|
| adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
witty
|
|
| adj.机智的，风趣的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
pedantic
|
|
| adj.卖弄学问的；迂腐的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
progeny
|
|
| n.后代，子孙；结果 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
dubious
|
|
| adj.怀疑的，无把握的；有问题的，靠不住的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
villains
|
|
| n.恶棍( villain的名词复数 )；罪犯；（小说、戏剧等中的）反面人物；淘气鬼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
villain
|
|
| n.反派演员，反面人物；恶棍；问题的起因 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
enthusiast
|
|
| n.热心人，热衷者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
exquisite
|
|
| adj.精美的；敏锐的；剧烈的，感觉强烈的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
nay
|
|
| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
deliberately
|
|
| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
118
varied
|
|
| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
feudal
|
|
| adj.封建的，封地的，领地的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
highland
|
|
| n.(pl.)高地，山地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
clan
|
|
| n.氏族，部落，宗族，家族，宗派 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
clans
|
|
| 宗族( clan的名词复数 )； 氏族； 庞大的家族； 宗派 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
survivor
|
|
| n.生存者，残存者，幸存者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
124
gallant
|
|
| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
125
doomed
|
|
| 命定的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
126
narrated
|
|
| v.故事( narrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
127
flora
|
|
| n.(某一地区的)植物群 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
128
shambles
|
|
| n.混乱之处；废墟 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
129
sham
|
|
| n./adj.假冒(的)，虚伪(的) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
130
complexion
|
|
| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
131
persecuted
|
|
| （尤指宗教或政治信仰的）迫害(~sb. for sth.)( persecute的过去式和过去分词 )； 烦扰，困扰或骚扰某人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
132
dwarf
|
|
| n.矮子，侏儒，矮小的动植物；vt.使…矮小 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
133
condemned
|
|
| adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
134
posterity
|
|
| n.后裔，子孙，后代 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
135
truncated
|
|
| adj.切去顶端的，缩短了的，被删节的v.截面的( truncate的过去式和过去分词 )；截头的；缩短了的；截去顶端或末端 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
136
embroilment
|
|
| n.搅乱，纠纷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
137
excellences
|
|
| n.卓越( excellence的名词复数 )；（只用于所修饰的名词后）杰出的；卓越的；出类拔萃的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
138
steward
|
|
| n.乘务员，服务员；看管人；膳食管理员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
139
omens
|
|
| n.前兆，预兆( omen的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
140
odyssey
|
|
| n.长途冒险旅行；一连串的冒险 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
141
contemplated
|
|
| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
142
guise
|
|
| n.外表，伪装的姿态 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
143
creed
|
|
| n.信条；信念，纲领 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
144
monastery
|
|
| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
145
knight
|
|
| n.骑士，武士；爵士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
146
infinitely
|
|
| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
147
anachronistic
|
|
| adj.时代错误的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
148
chivalry
|
|
| n.骑士气概，侠义；（男人）对女人彬彬有礼，献殷勤 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
149
premiers
|
|
| n.总理，首相( premier的名词复数 )；首席官员， | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
150
redeem
|
|
| v.买回，赎回，挽回，恢复，履行（诺言等） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
151
redeemed
|
|
| adj. 可赎回的，可救赎的 动词redeem的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
152
rambling
|
|
| adj.[建]凌乱的，杂乱的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
153
canny
|
|
| adj.谨慎的，节俭的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
154
perilous
|
|
| adj.危险的，冒险的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
155
mingled
|
|
| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
156
tragic
|
|
| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
157
mantle
|
|
| n.斗篷，覆罩之物，罩子；v.罩住，覆盖，脸红 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
158
autobiography
|
|
| n.自传 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
159
talisman
|
|
| n.避邪物，护身符 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
160
betrothed
|
|
| n. 已订婚者 动词betroth的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
161
entailed
|
|
| 使…成为必要( entail的过去式和过去分词 )； 需要； 限定继承； 使必需 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
162
constable
|
|
| n.(英国)警察，警官 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
163
potent
|
|
| adj.强有力的，有权势的；有效力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
164
murmur
|
|
| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
165
thoroughly
|
|
| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
166
neolithic
|
|
| adj.新石器时代的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
167
savages
|
|
| 未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
168
slate
|
|
| n.板岩，石板，石片，石板色，候选人名单；adj.暗蓝灰色的，含板岩的；vt.用石板覆盖，痛打，提名，预订 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
169
jersey
|
|
| n.运动衫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
170
ply
|
|
| v.(搬运工等)等候顾客，弯曲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
171
appreciative
|
|
| adj.有鉴赏力的，有眼力的；感激的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
172
stimulated
|
|
| a.刺激的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
173
vow
|
|
| n.誓(言)，誓约；v.起誓，立誓 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
174
Vogue
|
|
| n.时髦，时尚；adj.流行的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
175
peculiar
|
|
| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
176
fowl
|
|
| n.家禽，鸡，禽肉 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
177
coffin
|
|
| n.棺材，灵柩 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
178
culmination
|
|
| n.顶点；最高潮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
179
exacerbated
|
|
| v.使恶化，使加重( exacerbate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
180
accomplished
|
|
| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
181
serial
|
|
| n.连本影片，连本电视节目；adj.连续的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
182
burlesque
|
|
| v.嘲弄，戏仿；n.嘲弄，取笑，滑稽模仿 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
183
legendary
|
|
| adj.传奇（中）的，闻名遐迩的；n.传奇（文学） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
184
unfamiliar
|
|
| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
185
picturesque
|
|
| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
186
visualizing
|
|
| 肉眼观察 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
187
amiability
|
|
| n.和蔼可亲的，亲切的，友善的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
188
incompetent
|
|
| adj.无能力的，不能胜任的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
189
vexed
|
|
| adj.争论不休的；（指问题等）棘手的；争论不休的问题；烦恼的v.使烦恼( vex的过去式和过去分词 )；使苦恼；使生气；详细讨论 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
190
coxcombry
|
|
| n.（男子的）虚浮，浮夸，爱打扮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
191
crabbed
|
|
| adj.脾气坏的；易怒的；（指字迹）难辨认的；（字迹等）难辨认的v.捕蟹( crab的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
192
dilatory
|
|
| adj.迟缓的，不慌不忙的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
193
esteemed
|
|
| adj.受人尊敬的v.尊敬( esteem的过去式和过去分词 )；敬重；认为；以为 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
194
butts
|
|
| 笑柄( butt的名词复数 )； （武器或工具的）粗大的一端； 屁股； 烟蒂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
195
conceited
|
|
| adj.自负的，骄傲自满的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
196
incompetence
|
|
| n.不胜任，不称职 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
197
insolent
|
|
| adj.傲慢的，无理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
198
poetical
|
|
| adj.似诗人的；诗一般的；韵文的；富有诗意的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
199
poetic
|
|
| adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
200
stagnation
|
|
| n. 停滞 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
201
pranks
|
|
| n.玩笑，恶作剧( prank的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
202
sarcastic
|
|
| adj.讥讽的，讽刺的，嘲弄的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
203
sardonic
|
|
| adj.嘲笑的，冷笑的，讥讽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
204
memoirs
|
|
| n.回忆录；回忆录传( mem,自oir的名词复数) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
205
allusions
|
|
| 暗指，间接提到( allusion的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
206
broils
|
|
| v.（用火）烤（焙、炙等）( broil的第三人称单数 )；使卷入争吵；使混乱；被烤（或炙） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
207
culminated
|
|
| v.达到极点( culminate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
208
entangling
|
|
| v.使某人（某物/自己）缠绕，纠缠于（某物中），使某人（自己）陷入（困难或复杂的环境中）( entangle的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
209
thereby
|
|
| adv.因此，从而 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
210
brawls
|
|
| 吵架，打架( brawl的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
211
detested
|
|
| v.憎恶，嫌恶，痛恨( detest的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
212
conspicuous
|
|
| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
213
mercurial
|
|
| adj.善变的，活泼的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
214
temperament
|
|
| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
215
fiery
|
|
| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
216
intimacy
|
|
| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
217
incapable
|
|
| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
218
expenditure
|
|
| n.(时间、劳力、金钱等)支出；使用，消耗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
219
chaos
|
|
| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
220
blemish
|
|
| v.损害；玷污；瑕疵，缺点 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
221
ballad
|
|
| n.歌谣，民谣，流行爱情歌曲 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
222
ballads
|
|
| 民歌，民谣，特别指叙述故事的歌( ballad的名词复数 )； 讴 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
223
fetter
|
|
| n./vt.脚镣，束缚 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
224
briefly
|
|
| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
225
maternal
|
|
| adj.母亲的，母亲般的，母系的，母方的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
226
housekeeper
|
|
| n.管理家务的主妇，女管家 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
227
commemorated
|
|
| v.纪念，庆祝( commemorate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
228
conceits
|
|
| 高傲( conceit的名词复数 )； 自以为； 巧妙的词语； 别出心裁的比喻 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
229
artistic
|
|
| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
230
accomplishments
|
|
| n.造诣；完成( accomplishment的名词复数 )；技能；成绩；成就 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
231
babbling
|
|
| n.胡说，婴儿发出的咿哑声adj.胡说的v.喋喋不休( babble的现在分词 )；作潺潺声（如流水）；含糊不清地说话；泄漏秘密 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
232
inveterate
|
|
| adj.积习已深的，根深蒂固的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
233
derived
|
|
| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
234
abound
|
|
| vi.大量存在；(in，with)充满，富于 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
235
inquisitive
|
|
| adj.求知欲强的，好奇的，好寻根究底的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
236
frightful
|
|
| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
237
infancy
|
|
| n.婴儿期；幼年期；初期 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
238
slay
|
|
| v.杀死，宰杀，杀戮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
239
affected
|
|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
240
intervals
|
|
| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
241
faculty
|
|
| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
242
maidens
|
|
| 处女( maiden的名词复数 )； 少女； 未婚女子； （板球运动）未得分的一轮投球 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
243
alterations
|
|
| n.改动( alteration的名词复数 )；更改；变化；改变 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
244
quaintness
|
|
| n.离奇有趣，古怪的事物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
245
quaint
|
|
| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
246
unnatural
|
|
| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
247
forthright
|
|
| adj.直率的，直截了当的 [同]frank | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
248
avenging
|
|
| adj.报仇的，复仇的v.为…复仇，报…之仇( avenge的现在分词 )；为…报复 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
249
ragged
|
|
| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
250
regiment
|
|
| n.团，多数，管理；v.组织，编成团，统制 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
251
gambols
|
|
| v.蹦跳，跳跃，嬉戏( gambol的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
252
attain
|
|
| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
253
potently
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
254
resolute
|
|
| adj.坚决的，果敢的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
255
sonnets
|
|
| n.十四行诗( sonnet的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
256
quotations
|
|
| n.引用( quotation的名词复数 )；[商业]行情（报告）；（货物或股票的）市价；时价 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
257
anticipation
|
|
| n.预期，预料，期望 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
258
farce
|
|
| n.闹剧，笑剧，滑稽戏；胡闹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
259
specimens
|
|
| n.样品( specimen的名词复数 )；范例；（化验的）抽样；某种类型的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
260
invaluable
|
|
| adj.无价的，非常宝贵的，极为贵重的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
261
perusal
|
|
| n.细读，熟读；目测 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
262
fragrant
|
|
| adj.芬香的，馥郁的，愉快的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
263
drawn
|
|
| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
264
superannuated
|
|
| adj.老朽的，退休的；v.因落后于时代而废除，勒令退学 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
265
predecessors
|
|
| n.前任( predecessor的名词复数 )；前辈；（被取代的）原有事物；前身 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
266
contemner
|
|
| n.谴责者，宣判者，定罪者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
267
radical
|
|
| n.激进份子，原子团，根号；adj.根本的，激进的，彻底的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
268
jauntiness
|
|
| n.心满意足；洋洋得意；高兴；活泼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
269
abounded
|
|
| v.大量存在，充满，富于( abound的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
270
epithets
|
|
| n.（表示性质、特征等的）词语( epithet的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
271
dubbed
|
|
| v.给…起绰号( dub的过去式和过去分词 )；把…称为；配音；复制 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
272
needy
|
|
| adj.贫穷的，贫困的，生活艰苦的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
273
avenged
|
|
| v.为…复仇，报…之仇( avenge的过去式和过去分词 )；为…报复 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
274
avenge
|
|
| v.为...复仇，为...报仇 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
275
journalism
|
|
| n.新闻工作，报业 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
276
exculpate
|
|
| v.开脱，使无罪 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
277
jargon
|
|
| n.术语，行话 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
278
pretension
|
|
| n.要求；自命，自称；自负 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
279
virtue
|
|
| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
280
plentiful
|
|
| adj.富裕的，丰富的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
281
grudge
|
|
| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
282
distinguished
|
|
| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
283
doctrines
|
|
| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
284
zest
|
|
| n.乐趣；滋味，风味；兴趣 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
285
enjoyment
|
|
| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
286
juggling
|
|
| n. 欺骗, 杂耍(=jugglery) adj. 欺骗的, 欺诈的 动词juggle的现在分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
287
enthusiasts
|
|
| n.热心人，热衷者( enthusiast的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
288
emancipated
|
|
| adj.被解放的，不受约束的v.解放某人（尤指摆脱政治、法律或社会的束缚）( emancipate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
289
subdued
|
|
| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
290
hereditary
|
|
| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
291
banish
|
|
| vt.放逐，驱逐；消除，排除 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
292
comely
|
|
| adj.漂亮的，合宜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
293
anathema
|
|
| n.诅咒；被诅咒的人(物)，十分讨厌的人(物) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
294
odious
|
|
| adj.可憎的，讨厌的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
295
appreciation
|
|
| n.评价；欣赏；感谢；领会，理解；价格上涨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
296
lashes
|
|
| n.鞭挞( lash的名词复数 )；鞭子；突然猛烈的一击；急速挥动v.鞭打( lash的第三人称单数 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
297
sniffs
|
|
| v.以鼻吸气，嗅，闻( sniff的第三人称单数 )；抽鼻子（尤指哭泣、患感冒等时出声地用鼻子吸气）；抱怨，不以为然地说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
298
pelts
|
|
| n. 皮毛，投掷, 疾行 vt. 剥去皮毛，（连续）投掷 vi. 猛击，大步走 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
299
slandered
|
|
| 造谣中伤( slander的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
300
precisely
|
|
| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
301
invincibly
|
|
| adv.难战胜地，无敌地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
302
behold
|
|
| v.看，注视，看到 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
303
tormented
|
|
| 饱受折磨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
304
opium
|
|
| n.鸦片；adj.鸦片的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
305
fugitive
|
|
| adj.逃亡的，易逝的；n.逃犯，逃亡者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
306
cane
|
|
| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
307
prostrated
|
|
| v.使俯伏，使拜倒( prostrate的过去式和过去分词 )；（指疾病、天气等）使某人无能为力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
308
eccentricities
|
|
| n.古怪行为( eccentricity的名词复数 )；反常；怪癖 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
309
sentimental
|
|
| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
310
lurked
|
|
| vi.潜伏，埋伏（lurk的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
311
miseries
|
|
| n.痛苦( misery的名词复数 )；痛苦的事；穷困；常发牢骚的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
312
lurking
|
|
| 潜在 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
313
confessions
|
|
| n.承认( confession的名词复数 )；自首；声明；（向神父的）忏悔 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
314
banter
|
|
| n.嘲弄，戏谑；v.取笑，逗弄，开玩笑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
315
deriding
|
|
| v.取笑，嘲笑( deride的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
316
lodgings
|
|
| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
317
industrious
|
|
| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
318
marvel
|
|
| vi.(at)惊叹vt.感到惊异；n.令人惊异的事 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
319
sonorous
|
|
| adj.响亮的，回响的；adv.圆润低沉地；感人地；n.感人，堂皇 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
320
cadences
|
|
| n.（声音的）抑扬顿挫( cadence的名词复数 )；节奏；韵律；调子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
321
colloquial
|
|
| adj.口语的，会话的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
322
eloquence
|
|
| n.雄辩；口才，修辞 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |