expression." But it is only fair to remind Mr. Fawcett that no particular disgrace is involved in earning one's breakfasts and dinners. On the contrary, hunger is a perfectly legitimate and very valuable incentive to industry. "God help the bear, if, having little else to eat, he must not even suck his own paws!" wrote Sir Walter Scott, with good-humored contempt, when Lord Byron accused him of being a mercenary poet; and we probably owe the Vicar of Wakefield, The Library, and Venice Preserved to their authors' natural and unavoidable craving for food. Besides, if the reviewers are underpaid, it is not so much their fault as that of their employers, and their breakfasts and dinners must be proportionately light. When Milton received five pounds for Paradise Lost, he was probably the most underpaid writer in the whole history of literature, yet Mr. Mark Pattison seems to think that this fact redounds to his especial honor.
But there are even worse things to be learned about the critic than that he sells his opinions for food. According to Mr. Fawcett he is distinguished for "real, hysterical, vigi-
