In her later years she devoted herself more to Society than to Literature, and she gave nothing to the world beyond a few fugitive pieces. But she seems to have contemplated some more extended works, of which some fragments remain among her papers. These are principally chapters of Italian or German romances, suggested by the scenes of her travels. But it appears to me that the very qualities which impart so much value to her narration of facts incapacitated her for the achievement of success as a writer of fiction. She was, in truth, anything but an imaginative person. The works which she published have little in them to attract the present generation, but in that respect they do not differ much from the writings of most of her contemporaries. No one reads “Dinarbas” now-a-days; but is “Rasselas” a popular work with the rising generation?
But even by her own generation it is probable that Miss Knight herself was held in greater esteem than her works. Madame Piozzi called her the “far-famed Cornelia Knight.” Everybody, indeed, knew her. There was scarcely a city of any note in Southern Europe in which she was not well known—and to know was to esteem and admire her for all her fine qualities of head and heart. How many friends she had, and in how many parts of the world, these volumes pleasantly indicate; and, although they are remarkably free from every kind of egotism, it is impossible not to gather from them that Miss Ellis Cornelia Knight was an amiable and accomplished person, of high principles and a blameless way of life, worthy to be held in remembrance as a bright exemplar of that best of all womanhood, an English gentlewoman.
J. W. KAYE.
Norwood. Whitsuntide, 1861.
CONTENTS TO VOL. I.
CHAPTER I.
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| Parentage of Miss Knight—Anecdotes of her Father—Her early Days—Education—Society—Sir Joshua Reynolds—Burke—Goldsmith—Baretti—Anecdote of Dr. Johnson—Death of Admiral Knight | [1] |
CHAPTER II.