Nay, I beseech!
Most likely ’tis my sister!—Foolish child!
She has maids there enow,—Lo, they are gone!
We’ll close the night with wine.
[The drop scene descends to dumb-show].”
So we might suppose. The hospitable suggestion of Don Ferdinand has a flavor of reckless rioting about it which brings to mind the one time favorite amusement of a Tammany Hall leader—“opening wine.”
It is only fair to let him tell his own story about his literary fecundity. He says:
“Before I close my present task, I may be permitted to say a few words in regard to the observations which are uniformly made upon every author who writes rapidly and often. I will not repeat the frequently noticed fact, that the best writers have generally been the most voluminous; for I must contend that neither the number of an author’s works, nor the rapidity with which they are produced, affords any criterion whatsoever by which to judge of their merit. They may be numerous and excellent, like those of Voltaire, Scott, Dryden, Vega, Boccacio and others; they may be rapidly written, and yet accurate, like the great work of Fénélon, and they may be quite the reverse.*** I may mention, in my own case, a few circumstances which may account for the number and rapidity of my works. In the first place, all the materials for the tales I have written, and for many more than I ever shall write, were collected long before this idea of entering upon a literary career ever crossed my mind. In the next place, I am an early riser, and any one who has that habit must know that it is a grand secret for getting through twice as much as lazier men can perform. Again, I write and read during some portion of every day, except when I am travelling, and even then if possible. I need not point out, that regular application in literary, as well as all other kinds of labour, will effect results which no desultory efforts, however energetic, can obtain. Then, again, the habit of dictating instead of writing with my own hand, which I first attempted at the suggestion of Sir Walter Scott, relieves me of the manual labour which many authors have to undergo, leaves the mind clear and free to act, and affords facilities inconceivable to those who have not tried, or, having tried, have not been able to attain it.”[[37]]
I am not convinced that the custom of dictating is one which should be observed by an author who aims at the highest excellence.
In the accounts of his life and his work there are many discrepancies and contradictions. For example Mr. Allibone—who is not altogether trustworthy in details—tells us that his first book was A Life of Edward the Black Prince, published in 1822; but the Dictionary of National Biography ascribes that publication to the year 1836, and the Dictionary is undoubtedly right, for he said in 1835 “The Black Prince comes on but slowly,”[[38]] The Dictionary says that as “historiographer royal”—a sonorous title which must have afforded great pleasure to its bearer—he published in 1839 a History of the United States Boundary Question, but Mr. Allibone insists that it was not his production. I have an autograph letter of James which, I think, warrants the belief that Allibone is wrong. The letter is a good example of his serious epistolary style.