sent the beau ideal of a gentleman and Christian, The History of Sir Charles Grandison. The almost unexampled success and popularity of Richardson's life and writings were to himself disturbed and clouded by nervous attacks, which rendered him delicate and feeble in health. He was flattered and soothed by a number of female friends, in whose society he spent most of his time, and after reaching the goodly age of seventy-two, he died on the 4th of July 1761.

The works of Richardson are all pictures of the heart. No man understood human nature better, or could draw with greater distinctness the minute shades of feeling and sentiment, or the final results of our passions. He wrote his novels, it is said, in his back-shop, in the intervals of business; and must have derived exquisite pleasure from the moral anatomy in which he was silently engaged-conducting his characters through the scenes of his ideal world, and giving expression to all the feelings, motives, and impulses, of which our nature is susceptible. He was happiest in female characters. Much of his time had been spent with the gentler sex, and his own retired habits and nervous sensibility approximated to feminine softness. He well repaid the sex for all their attentions by his character of Clarissa, one of the noblest tributes ever paid to female virtue and honour. The moral elevation of this heroine, the saintly purity which she preserves amidst scenes of the deepest depravity and the most seductive gaiety, and the never-failing sweetness and benevolence of her temper, render Clarissa one of the brightest triumphs of the whole range of imaginative literature. Perhaps the climax of her distress is too overwhelming-too oppressive to the feelings-but it is a healthy sorrow. We see the full radiance of virtue; and no reader ever rose from the perusal of those tragic scenes without feeling his moral nature renovated, and his detestation of vice increased.

Pamela' is a work of much humbler pretensions than Clarissa Harlowe:' it is like the domestic tragedy of Lillo compared with Lear or Macbeth. A simple country girl, whom her master attempts to seduce, and afterwards marries, can be no very dignified heroine. But the excellences of Richardson are strikingly apparent in this his first novel. His power of circumstantial painting is evinced in the multitude of small details which he brings to bear on his story-the very wardrobe of poor Pamela, her gown of sad-coloured stuff, and her round-eared caps-her various attempts at escape, and the conveyance of her letters-the hateful character of Mrs Jewkes, and the fluctuating passions of her master, before the better part of his nature obtains the ascendency-these are all touched with the hand of a master. The seductive scenes are too highly coloured for modern taste, and Pamela is deficient in natural dignity; she is too calculating, too tame and submissive; but while engaged with the tale, we think only of her general innocence and artlessness; of her sad trials and afflictions, down to her last confinement, when she hid her papers in the rose-bush in the garden, and sat by the side of the pond in utter despair, half-meditating suicide. The elevation of this innocent and lovely young creature to be the bride of her master is an act of justice; but after all, we feel she was too good for him, and wish she had effected her escape, and been afterwards united to some great and wealthy nobleman who had never condescended to oppress the poor and unfortunate. The moral of the tale would also have been improved by some such termination. Esquire B- should have been mortified, and waiting maids taught not to tolerate liberties from their young

masters, because, like Pamela, they may rise to obtain their hand in marriage.

'Sir Charles Grandison' is inferior in general interest, as well as truth, to either of Richardson's other novels. The 'good man' and perfect gentleman, perplexed by the love of two ladies whom he regarded with equal affection, is an anomaly in nature with which we cannot sympathise. The hero of Clarissa,' Lovelace, being a splendid and accomplished, a gay and smiling villain, Richardson wished to make Sir Charles in all respects the very opposite: he has given him too little passion and too much perfection for frail humanity. In this novel, however, is one of the most powerful of all our author's delineations-the madness of Clementina. Shakspeare himself has scarcely drawn a more affecting or harrowing picture of high-souled suffering and blighting calamity. The same accumulation of details as in Clarissa,' all tending to heighten the effect and produce the catastrophe, hurry on the reader with breathless anxiety, till he has learned the last sad event, and is plunged in unavailing grief. This is no exaggerated account of the sensations produced by Richardson's pathetic scenes. He is one of the most powerful and tragic of novelists; and that he is so, in spite of much tediousness of description, much repetition and prolixity of narrative, is the best testimony to his art and genius. The extreme length of our author's novels, the epistolary style in which they are all written, and the number of minute and apparently unimportant circumstances with which they abound, added to the more energetic character of our subsequent literature, have tended to cast Richardson's novels into the shade. Even Lord Byron could not, he said, read 'Clarissa.' We admit that it requires some resolution to get through a fictitious work of eight volumes; but having once begun, most readers will find it difficult to leave off the perusal of these works. They are eminently original, which is always a powerful recommendation. They show an intimate acquaintance with the human heart, and an absolute command over the passions; they are, in fact, romances of the heart, embellished by sentiment, and as such possess a deep and enchaining interest, and a power of exciting virtuous emotions, which blind us to blemishes in style and composition, and to those errors in taste and manners which are more easily ridiculed than avoided in works so voluminous confined to domestic portraiture.

HENRY FIELDING.

Coleridge has said, that to take up Fielding after Richardson is like emerging from a sick-room heated by stoves into an open lawn on a breezy day in May. We have felt the agreeableness of the transition: from excited sensibilities and overpowering pathos, to light humour, lively description, and keen yet sportive satire, must always be a pleasant change. The feeling, however, does not derogate from the power of Richardson as a novelist. The same sensation may be experienced by turning from Lear to Falstaff, from tragedy to comedy. The feelings cannot remain in a state of constant tension, but seek relief in variety. Perhaps Richardson stretches them too violently and too continuously; his portraits are in classes, full charged with the peculiarities of their master. Fielding has a broader canvass, more light than shade, a clear and genial atmosphere, and groups of characters finely and naturally diversified. Johnson considered him barren compared with Richardson, because Johnson loved strong moral painting, and had little sympathy for wit that was not strictly allied to virtue. Richardson,

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too, was a pious respectable man, for whom the critic entertained great regard, and to whom he was under obligations. Fielding was a thoughtless man of fashion-a rake who had dissipated his fortune, and passed from high to low life without dignity or respect; and who had commenced author without any higher motive than to make money, and confer amusement. Ample success crowned him in the latter department! The inimitable character of Parson Adams, the humour of road-side adventures and alehouse dialogues, Towwouse and his termagant wife, Parson Trulliber, Squire Western, the faithful Partridge, and a host of ludicrous and witty scenes, and characters, and situations, all rise up at the very mention of the name of Fielding! If Richardson 'made the passions move at the command of virtue,' Fielding bends them at will to mirth and enjoyment. He is the prince of novelists-holding the novel to include wit, love, satire, humour, observation, genuine pictures of human nature without romance, and the most perfect art in the arrangement of his plot and incidents.

HENRY FIELDING was of high birth: his father (a grandson of the Earl of Denbigh) was a general in the army, and his mother the daughter of a judge.

Henry Fielding.

He was born at Sharpham Park, Somersetshire, April 22, 1707. The general had a large family, and was a bad economist, and Henry was early familiar with embarrassments. He was educated at Eton, and afterwards studied the law for two years at Leyden. In his twentieth year his studies were stopped, 'money-bound,' as a kindred genius, Sheridan, used to say, and the youth returned to England. His father promised him £200 per annum, but this, the son remarked, any one might pay who would!' The same sum came to him in a few years by the death of his mother, from whom he inherited a small estate of that amount per annum. He also obtained £1500 by his marriage with Miss Cradock, a lady of great beauty and worth, who resided in Salisbury. Having previously subsisted by writing for the stage, in which he had little success, Fielding gladly retired with his wife to the country. Here, however, he lived extravagantly; kept a pack of hounds, and a retinue of servants, and feasted all

the squires in his neighbourhood. In three years he was again penniless. He then renewed his legal studies, and qualified himself for the bar. His practice, however, was insufficient for the support of his family, and he continued to write pieces for the stage, and pamphlets to suit the topics of the day. In politics he was an anti-Jacobite, and a steady supporter of the Hanoverian succession. In 1742 appeared his novel of Joseph Andrews, which at once stamped him as a master, uniting to genuine English humour the spirit of Cervantes and the mock heroic of Scarron. There was a wicked wit in the choice of his subject. To ridicule Richardson's 'Pamela,' Fielding made his hero a brother of that renowned and popular lady; he quizzed Gammar Andrews and his wife, the rustic parents of Pamela, and in contrast to the style of Richardson's work, he made his hero and his friend Parson Adams, models of virtue and excellence, and his leading female characters (Lady Booby and Mrs Slipslop) of frail morals. Even Pamela is brought down from her high standing of moral perfection, and is represented as Mrs Booby, with the airs of an upstart, whom the parson is compelled to reprove for laughing in church. Richardson's vanity was deeply wounded by this insult, and he never forgave the desecration of his favourite production. The ridicule was certainly unjustifiable; but, as Sir Walter Scott has remarked, how can we wish that undone without which Parson Adams would not have existed?' The burlesque portion of the work would not have caused its extensive and abiding popularity. It heightened its humour, and may have contributed at first to the number of its readers, but Joseph Andrews' possessed strong and original claims to public favour, and has found countless admirers among persons who knew nothing of Pamela.' Setting aside some ephemeral essays and light pieces, Fielding's next works were A Journey from this World to the Next, and The History of Jonathan Wild. A vein of keen satire runs through the latter, but the hero and his companions are such callous rogues, and unsentimental ruffians, that we cannot take pleasure in their dexterity and success. The ordinary of Newgate, who administers consolation to Wild before his execution, is the best character in the novel. The ordinary preferred a bowl of punch to any other liquor, as it is now here spoken against in Scripture; and his ghostly admonitions to the malefactor are in harmony with this predilection. In 1749 Fielding was appointed one of the justices of Westminster and Middlesex, for which he was indebted to the services of Lyttelton. He was a zealous and active magistrate; but the office of a trading justice, paid by fees, was as unworthy the genius of Fielding as Burns's provision as an exciseman. It appears, from a statement. made by himself, that this appointment did not bring him in, of the dirtiest money upon earth,' £300 a-year. In the midst of his official drudgery and too frequent dissipations, our author produced Tom Jones, unquestionably the first of English novels. He received £600 for the copyright, and such was its success, that Millar the publisher presented £100 more to the author. In 1751 appeared Amelia, for which he received £1000. Johnson was a great admirer of this novel, and read it through without stopping. Its domestic scenes moved him more deeply than heroic or ambitious adventures; but the conjugal tenderness and affection of Amelia are but ill requited by the conduct of Booth, her husband, who has the vices without the palliation of youth possessed by Tom Jones, independently of his ties as a husband and father. The character of Amelia was drawn for Fielding's wife, even down to the accident which disfigured her beauty; and the frailties of

A passage from Fielding or Smollett can convey no more idea of the work from which it is taken, or the manner of the author, than a single stone or brick would of the architecture of a house. We are tempted, however, to extract the account of Partridge's impressions on first visiting a playhouse, when he witnessed the representation of Hamlet. The faithful attendant of Tom Jones was halfbarber and half-schoolmaster, shrewd, yet simple as

a child.

[Partridge at the Playhouse.]

In the first row, then, of the first gallery, did Mr Jones, Mrs Miller, her youngest daughter, and Partridge, take their places. Partridge immediately declared it was the finest place he had ever been in. When the first music was played, he said, 'It was a wonder how so many fiddlers could play at one time without putting one another out.' While the fellow was lighting the upper candles, he cried out to Mrs Miller, Look, look, madam, the very picture of the man in the end of the common-prayer book, before the gunpowder treason service.' Nor could he help observing, with a sigh, when all the candles were lighted, That here were candles enough burnt in one night to keep an honest poor family for a whole twelvemonth."

As soon as the play, which was Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, began, Partridge was all attention, nor did he break silence till the entrance of the ghost; upon which he asked Jones, 'What man that was in the strange dress; something,' said he, 'like what I have seen in a picture. Sure it is not armour, is it?' Jones answered, That is the ghost.' To which Partridge replied, with a smile, Persuade me to that, sir, if you can. Though I can't say I ever actually saw a ghost in my life, yet I am certain I should know one if I saw him better than that comes to. No, no, sir; ghosts don't appear in such dresses as that neither.' In this mistake, which caused much laughter in the neighbourhood of Partridge, he was suffered to continue till the scene between the ghost and Hamlet, when Partridge gave that credit to Mr Garrick which he had denied to Jones, and fell into so violent a trembling that his knees knocked against each other. Jones asked him what was the matter, and whether he was afraid of the warrior upon the stage? O la! sir,' said he, "I perceive now it is what you told me. I am not afraid of anything, for I know it is but a play; and if it was really a ghost, it could do one no harm at such a distance, and in so much company; and yet if I was frightened, I am not the only person.' 'Why, who,' cries Jones, 'dost thou take to be such a coward here besides thyself? Nay, you may call me coward if you will; but if that little man there upon the stage is not frightened, I never saw any man frightened in my life. Ay, ay; go along with you! Ay, to be sure! Who's fool then? Will you? Lud have mercy upon such foolhardiness! Whatever happens it is good enough for you. Follow you! I'd follow the devil as soon. Nay, perhaps it is the devil for they say he can put on what likeness he pleases. Oh! here he is again. No farther! No, you have gone far enough already; farther than I'd have gone for

and partly on Hamlet, and with his mouth open; the same passions which succeeded each other in Hamlet succeeding likewise in him.

When the scene was over, Jones said, 'Why, Partridge, you exceed my expectations. You enjoy the play more than I conceived possible.' 'Nay, sir,' answered Partridge, if you are not afraid of the devil, I can't help it; but, to be sure, it is natural to be surprised at such things, though I know there is nothing in them: not that it was the ghost that surprised me neither; for I should have known that to have been only a man in a strange dress; but when I saw the little man so frightened himself, it was that And dost thou imagine which took hold of me.' then, Partridge,' cries Jones, that he was really frightened? Nay, sir,' said Partridge, 'did not you yourself observe afterwards, when he found it was his own father's spirit, and how he was murdered in the garden, how his fear forsook him by degrees, and he was struck dumb with sorrow, as it were, just as I should have been, had it been my own case. But hush! O la! what noise is that? There he is again. Well, to be certain, though I know there is nothing at all in it, I am glad I am not down yonder where those men are.' Then turning his eyes again upon Hamlet, Ay, you may draw your sword; what signifies a sword against the power of the devil?'

During the second act, Partridge made very few remarks. He greatly admired the fineness of the dresses; nor could he help observing upon the king's countenance. Well,' said he, 'how people may be deceived by faces? Nulla fides fronti is, I find, a true saying. Who would think, by looking in the king's face, that he had ever committed a murder?' He then inquired after the ghost; but Jones, who intended he should be surprised, gave him no other satisfaction than that he might possibly see him again soon, and in a flash of fire.'

Partridge sat in fearful expectation of this; and now, when the ghost made his next appearance, Partridge cried out, There, sir, now; what say you now? is he frightened now or no? As much frightened as you think me, and, to be sure, nobody can help some fears, I would not be in so bad a condition as-what's his name?-Squire Hamlet is there, for all the world. Bless me! what's become of the spirit? As I am a living soul, I thought I saw him sink into the earth.'

Indeed you saw right,' answered Jones. Well, well,' cries Partridge, I know it is only a play; and besides, if there was anything in all this, Madam Miller would not laugh so; for as to you, sir, you would not be afraid, I believe, if the devil was here in person. There, there; ay, no wonder you are in such a passion; shake the vile wicked wretch to pieces. If she was my own mother I should serve her so. be sure all duty to a mother is forfeited by such wicked doings. Ay, go about your business; I hate the sight of you.'

Το

Our critic was now pretty silent till the play which Hamlet introduces before the king. This he did not at first understand, till Jones explained it to him; but he no sooner entered into the spirit of it, than he began to bless himself that he had never committed murder. Then turning to Mrs Miller, he asked her If she did not imagine the king looked as if he was touched; though he is,' said he, 'a good actor, and doth all he can to hide it. Well, I would not have so much to answer for as that wicked man there hath, to sit upon a much higher chair than he sits upon. No wonder he run away; for your sake I'll never trust an innocent face again.'

The grave-digging scene next engaged the atten

tion of Partridge, who expressed much surprise at the number of skulls thrown upon the stage. To which Jones answered, "That it was one of the most famous burial-places about town.' 'No wonder, then,' cries Partridge, that the place is haunted. But I never saw in my life a worse grave-digger. I had a sexton when I was clerk that should have dug three graves while he is digging one. The fellow handles a spade as if it was the first time he had ever had one in his hand. Ay, ay, you may sing. You had rather sing than work, I believe.' Upon Hamlet's taking up the skull, he cried out, 'Well! it is strange to see how fearless some men are: I never could bring myself to touch anything belonging to a dead man on any account. He seemed frightened enough too at the ghost, I thought. Nemo omnibus horis sapit.'

Little more worth remembering occurred during the play; at the end of which Jones asked him Which of the players he had liked best?' To this he answered, with some appearance of indignation at the question, The king, without doubt.' 'Indeed, Mr Partridge,' says Mrs Miller; 'you are not of the same opinion with the town; for they are all agreed that Hamlet is acted by the best player who ever was on the stage.' 'He the best player!' cries Partridge, with a contemptuous sneer; Why, I could act as well as he myself. I am sure if I had seen a ghost, I should have looked in the very same manner, and done just as he did. And then, to be sure, in that scene, as you called it, between him and his mother, where you told me he acted so fine, why, Lord help me, any man, that is any good man, that had such a mother, would have done exactly the same. I know you are only joking with me; but, indeed, madam, though I was never at a play in London, yet I have seen acting before in the country; and the king for my money; he speaks all his words distinctly, half as loud again as the other. Anybody may see he is an actor.'

While Mrs Miller was thus engaged in conversation with Partridge, a lady came up to Mr Jones, whom he immediately knew to be Mrs Fitzpatrick. She said she had seen him from the other part of the gallery, and had taken that opportunity of speaking to him, as she had something to say which might be of great service to himself. She then acquainted him with her lodgings, and made him an appointment the next day in the morning; which, upon recollection, she presently changed to the afternoon; at which time Jones promised to attend her.

Thus ended the adventure at the playhouse, where Partridge had afforded great mirth, not only to Jones and Mrs Miller, but to all who sat within hearing, who were more attentive to what he said than to anything that passed on the stage. He durst not go to bed all that night for fear of the ghost; and for many nights after sweated two or three hours before he went to sleep with the same apprehensions, and waked several times in great horrors, crying out, Lord have mercy upon us! there it is.'

TOBIAS GEORGE SMOLLETT.

Six years after the publication of Joseph Andrews, and before Tom Jones' had been produced, a third novelist had taken the field, different in many respects from either Richardson or Fielding, but like them devoted to that class of fictitious composition founded on truth and nature. We have previously noticed the circumstances of Smollett's life. A young unfriended Scotsman, he went to London eager for distinction as a dramatic writer. In this his failure was more signal than the want of success which had attended Fielding's theatrical productions. Smollett, however, was of a dauntless intrepid spirit, and when he again resumed his pen,

his efforts were crowned with the most gratifying success. He had adopted Le Sage as his model, but his characters, his scenes, his opinions, and prejudices, were all decidedly British. The novels of Smollett were produced in the following order :1748, Roderick Random; 1751, Peregrine Pickle; 1754, Ferdinand Count Fathom; 1762, Sir Launcelot Greaves; 1771, The Expedition of Humphry Clinker. From the date of his first to that of his latest production, Smollett had improved in taste and judgment, but his powers of invention, his native humour,

and his knowledge of life and character, are as conspicuous in Roderick Random' as in any of his works. His Tom Bowling is his most perfect sea character, though in Peregrine Pickle' he has preserved the same general features, with additional colouring, and a greater variety of ludicrous incidents. The adventures of Roderick are such as might naturally have occurred to any young Scotsman of the day in quest of fortune. Scene follows scene with astonishing rapidity: at one time his hero basks in prosperity, in another he is plunged in utter destitution. He is led into different countries, whose national peculiarities are described, and into society of various descriptions, with wits, sharpers, courtiers, courtesans, and men of all grades. In this tour of the world and of human life, the reader is amazed at the careless profusion, the inexhaustible humour, of an author who pours out his Imaterials with such prodigality and facility. The patient skill and taste of Fielding are nowhere found in Smollett; there is no elaboration of character; no careful preparation of incidents; no unity of design. Roderick Random is hurried on without any fixed or definite purpose; he is the child of impulse; and though there is a dash of generosity and good humour in his character, he is equally conspicuous for reckless libertinism and mischief-more prone to selfishness and revenge than to friendship or gratitude. There is an inherent and radical meanness in his conduct towards his humble friend Strap, with whom he begins life, and to whom he is so much indebted both in purse and person. Tom Jones is always kind and liberal to his attendant Partridge, but Strap is bullied and fleeced by Roderick Random; dis