W. H. Ainsworth
-WILLIAM HARRISON AINSWORTH-
Books, indeed, there were in plenty. Lady Blessington produced her ‘Victims of Society’ and ‘Sunday at the Zoo;’ Mr. Lytton Bulwer his ‘Duchesse de la Vallière,’ ‘Ernest Maltravers,’ and ‘Athens, its Rise and Fall;’ Miss Mitford her ‘Country Stories;’ Cottle his ‘Recollections of Coleridge;’ Harrison Ainsworth, ‘Crichton;’ Disraeli, ‘Venetia;’ Talfourd, ‘The Life and Letters of Charles Lamb;’ Babbage, a ‘Bridgwater Treatise;’ Hook, ‘Jack Brag;’ Haynes Bayley, his ‘Weeds of Witchery’—a thing as much forgotten as the weeds in last year’s garden; James, his ‘Attila’ and ‘Louis XIV.;’ Miss Martineau, her book on ‘American Society.’ I find, not in the book, which I have not read, but in a review of it, two stories, which I copy. One is of an American traveller who had been to Rome, and said of it, ‘Rome is a very fine city, sir, but its public buildings are out of repair.’ The other is the following: ‘Few men,’ said the preacher in his sermon, ‘when they build a house, remember that there must some day be a coffin taken downstairs.’ ‘Ministers,’ said a lady who had been present, ‘have got into the strangest way of choosing subjects. True, wide staircases are a great convenience, but Christian ministers might find better subjects for their discourses than narrow staircases.’
THE FRASERIANS.
In addition to the above, Hartley Coleridge wrote the ‘Lives of Northern Worthies;’ the complete poetical works of Southey appeared—he himself died at the beginning of 1842; Dion Boucicault produced his first play, being then fifteen years of age; Carlyle brought out his ‘French Revolution;’ Lockhart his ‘Life of Scott;’ Martin Tupper the first series of the ‘Proverbial Philosophy;’ Hallam his ‘Literature of Europe;’ there were the usual travels in Arabia, Armenia, Italy, and Ireland; with, no doubt, the annual avalanche of sermons, pamphlets, and the rest. Above all, however, it must be remembered that to this time belong the ‘Sketches by “Boz”’ (1836) and the ‘Pickwick Papers’ (1837–38). Of the latter, the Athenæum not unwisely remarked that they were made up of ‘three pounds of Smollett, three ounces of Sterne, a handful of Hook, a dash of a grammatical Pierce Egan; the incidents at pleasure, served with an original sauce piquante.... We earnestly hope and trust that nothing we have said will tend to refine Boz.’ One could hardly expect a critic to be ready at once to acknowledge that here was a genius, original, totally unlike any of his predecessors, who knew the great art of drawing from life, and depicting nothing but what he knew. As for Thackeray, he was still in the chrysalis stage, though his likeness appears with those of the contributors to Fraser’s Magazine in the portrait group of Fraserians published in 1839. His first independently published book, I think, was the ‘Paris Sketch Book,’ which was not issued until the year 1840.
MATTHEW ARNOLD
Here, it will be acknowledged, is not a record to be quite ashamed of, with Carlyle, Talfourd, Hallam, and Dickens to adorn and illustrate the year. After all, it is a great thing for any year to add one enduring book to English Literature, and it is a great deal to show so many works which are still read and remembered. Lytton’s ‘Ernest Maltravers,’ though not his best novel, is still read by some; Talfourd’s ‘Charles Lamb’ remains; Disraeli’s ‘Venetia;’ Lockhart’s ‘Life of Scott’ is the best biography of the novelist and poet; Carlyle’s ‘French Revolution’ shows no sign of being forgotten.
