of Collins and Wickham;[1] with Lamb's avowal that he would rather lose the legacy Dorrell cheated him out of than "be without the idea of that specious old rogue;" and with the dismay of Don Antonio over the restored sanity of Don Quixote.[2] It is the secret of Trollope's charm, as Hawthorne indicated when he described the impression of those "beef and ale" novels,—
"* * * as if some giant had hewn a great lump out
of the earth and put it under a glass case, with all its inhabitants
going about their daily business, and not suspecting that
they were being made a show of."
It would have been a saving grace to many of the dramatis
personæ if they could have shared the experience of
a romantically inclined youth who, after building an air
castle in which he figured first as a conquering hero and
then as a magnanimous patron, suddenly "came to:"[3]
"And then he turned upon himself with laughter, discovering
a most wholesome power, barely to be suspected in him yet."
"What a pity it is," exclaimed Butler,[4] "that Christian
never met Mr. Common-Sense with his daughter,
- ↑ In his initial pleasure over Wickham, he defies "even Sir William Lucas himself to produce a more valuable son-in-law," but later, after reading a letter from Collins, he concludes,—"I cannot help giving him the preference even over Wickham, much as I value the impudence and hypocrisy of my son-in-law."
- ↑ "God forgive you," he exclaims to Carrasco, "the injury you have done the whole world, in endeavouring to restore to his senses the most diverting madman in it. Do you not see, sir, that the benefit of his recovery will not counterbalance the pleasure his extravagancies afford?" III, 449.
- ↑ Evan Harrington, 457. Cf. a similar idea in The Shaving of Shagpat. The narrator of The Newcomes speaks in the Preface of the "pert little satirical monitor" which sprang up inwardly and upset the fond humbug he was cherishing. It is a curious circumstance that neither Dickens nor Thackeray, with all their humor, could create characters with that quality. Even of Becky it might be said that she never did a foolish thing, nor ever said a wise one.
- ↑ Note Books, 189.
