Mr. Howells has been compared to Washington Irving for the exquisite purity of his style, and to Hawthorne for a certain subtle recognition of a hidden meaning in familiar things. A more thoroughly genial writer, certainly, we have not, nor one more conscientious in the practice of his art.—Scribner’s Monthly.
The Young Editor, from “A Modern Instance.”
“Hullo!” he cried, with a suddenness that startled the boy, who had finished his meditation upon Bartley’s trowsers, and was now deeply dwelling on his boots. “Do you like ’em? See what sort of a shine you can give ’em for Sunday-go-to-meeting-to-morrow-morning.” He put out his hand and laid hold of the boy’s head, passing his fingers through the thick red hair. “Sorrel-top!” he said with a grin of agreeable reminiscence. “They emptied all the freckles they had left into your face—didn’t they, Andy?”
This free, joking way of Bartley’s was one of the things that made him popular; he passed the time of day, and would give and take right along, as his admirers expressed it from the first, in a community where his smartness had that honor which gives us more smart men to the square mile than any other country in the world. The fact of his smartness had been affirmed and established in the strongest manner by the authorities of the college at which he was graduated, in answer to the reference he made to them when negotiating with the committee in charge for the place he now held as editor of the Equity Free Press.… They perhaps had their misgivings when the young man, in his well-blacked boots, his grey trowsers neatly fitting over them, and his diagonal coat buttoned high with one button, stood before them with his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets, and looked down over his mustache at the floor, with sentiments concerning their wisdom which they could not explore; they must have resented the fashionable keeping of everything about him, for Bartley wore his one suit as if it were but one of many; but when they understood that he had come by everything through his own unaided smartness, they could no longer hesitate. One, indeed, still felt it a duty to call attention to the fact that the college authorities said nothing of the young man’s moral characteristics in a letter dwelling so largely upon his intellectual qualifications. The others referred this point by a silent look to ’Squire Gaylord. “I don’t know,” said the ’Squire, “as I ever heard that a great deal of morality was required by a newspaper editor.” The rest laughed at the joke, and the ’Squire continued: “But I guess if he worked his own way through college, as they say, that he hain’t had time to be up to a great deal of mischief. You know it’s for idle hands that the devil provides, doctor.”
“That’s true, as far as it goes,” said the doctor. “But it isn’t the whole truth. The devil provides for some busy hands, too.”
“There’s a good deal of sense in that,” the ’Squire admitted. “The worst scamps I ever knew were active fellows. Still, industry is in a man’s favor. If the faculty knew anything against this young man they would have given us a hint of it. I guess we had better take him; we shan’t do better. Is it a vote?”
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER.
Humor he has, and of the very highest order. It is as delicate as Washington Irving’s, and quite as spontaneous. But humor is hardly his predominant quality. He has all the wit of Holmes, and all the tenderness of Ik Marvel. He is often charmingly thoughtful, earnest and suggestive.—San Francisco Bulletin.
There is only one other pair of microscopic eyes like his owned by an American, and they belong to W. D. Howells. These two men will ferret out fun from arid sands and naked rocks, and in one trip of a league, less or more, over a barren waste, see and hear more that is amusing and entertaining than the rest of the world will discover in crossing a continent. Such men should do our traveling for us.—Chicago Tribune.