STUDIES OF A BIOGRAPHER
NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY
Mr. Sidney Lee has recently (February 1896) delivered at the Royal Institution a lecture upon National Biography. No one has a better right to speak upon the subject. He has been sole editor of the later volumes of the Dictionary of National Biography, and, as I can testify, had a very important share in preparing every previous volume. He spoke, therefore, from considerable experience, and if I were to deal with his subject from the same point of view, I should have little more to do than say 'ditto' to most of his remarks. I would not contradict even his statistics, although, as a matter of fact, they differ to some extent from my own calculations—I put that down to the known perversity of arithmetic in general. But I also think that in dealing briefly with a large subject, he left untouched certain considerations which are a necessary complement to his argument. I shall venture from this point of view to say
