“Mr. D'Israeli has said that ‘the false idea which a title conveys is alike prejudicial to the author and the reader, and that titles are generally too prodigal of their promises;’ but yet there is an error on the other hand to be avoided, for if they say too little they may fail of attracting notice. I bore in mind what Baillet says upon this subject, to which he has devoted a long chapter: le titre d'un Livre doit être son abregé, et il en doit renfermer tout l'esprit, autant qu'il est possible. Il doit être le centre de toutes les paroles et de toutes les pensées du Livre; de telle sorte qu'on n'y en puisse pas même trouver une qui n'y dit de la correspondance et du rapport. From this rule there has been no departure. Every thing that is said of Peter Hopkins relates to the Doctor prospectively, because he was the Doctor's master: every thing that may be said of, or from myself, relates to the Doctor retrospectively, or reflectively, because he, though in a different sense, was mine: and every thing that is said about anything else, relates to him collaterally, being either derivative or tributary, either divergent from the main subject, or convergent to its main end.
“But albeit I claim the privilege of motley, and in right thereof
I must have liberty
Withal, as large a charter as the wind,
To blow on whom I please;——2
yet I have in no instance abused that charter, nor visited any one too roughly. Nor will I ever do against all the world what John Kinsaider did, in unseemly defiance,—nor against the wind either; though it has been no maxim of mine, nor ever shall be, to turn with the tide, or go with the crowd, unless they are going my road, and there is no other way that I can take to escape the annoyance of their company.”
2 SHAKESPEARE.
“And is this any reason, Mr. Author, why you should get on as slowly with the story of your book, as the House of Commons with the business of the nation, in the present reformed Parliament, with Lord Althorpe for its leader?”
“Give me credit, Sir, for a temper as imperturbably good as that which Lord Althorpe presents, like a sevenfold shield of lamb's wool, to cover him against all attacks, and I will not complain of the disparagement implied in your comparison.”
“Your confounded good temper, Mr. Author, seems to pride itself upon trying experiments on the patience of your readers. Here I am in the middle of the third volume, and if any one asked me what the book is about, it would be impossible for me to answer the question. I have never been able to guess at the end of one chapter, what was likely to be the subject of the next.”
“Let me reply to that observation, Sir, by an anecdote. A collector of scarce books was one day showing me his small but curious hoard; ‘Have you ever seen a copy of this book?’ he asked, with every rare volume that he put into my hands: and when my reply was that I had not, he always rejoined with a look and tone of triumphant delight, ‘I should have been exceedingly sorry if you had!’
“Let me tell you another anecdote, not less to the purpose. A thorough-bred fox-hunter found himself so much out of health a little before the season for his sport began, that he took what was then thought a long journey to consult a physician, and get some advice which he hoped would put him into a condition for taking the field. Upon his return his friends asked him what the Doctor had said. ‘Why,’ said the Squire, ‘he told me that I've got a dyspepsy:—I don't know what that is: but it's some damn'd thing or other I suppose!’—My good Sir, however much at a loss you may be to guess what is coming in the next chapter, you can have no apprehension that it may turn out anything like what he, with too much reason, supposed a dyspepsy to be.