as been adopted by many of our modern writers in the
so-called problem novels and novels of purpose.

Nearer to the true novel is Lodge's romantic story of _Rosalynde_, which
was used by Shakespeare in _As You Like It_. This was modeled upon the
Italian novella, or short story, which became very popular in England
during the Elizabethan Age. In the same age we have introduced into England
the Spanish picaresque novel (from _picaro_, a knave or rascal), which at
first was a kind of burlesque on the mediaeval romance, and which took for
its hero some low scoundrel or outcast, instead of a knight, and followed
him through a long career of scandals and villainies. One of the earliest
types of this picaresque novel in English is Nash's _The Unfortunate
Traveller, or the Life of Jack Wilton_ (1594), which is also a forerunner
of the historical novel, since its action takes place during that gorgeous
interview between Henry VIII and the king of France on the Field of the
Cloth of Gold. In all these short stories and picaresque novels the
emphasis was laid not so much on life and character as on the adventures of
the hero; and the interest consisted largely in wondering what would happen
next, and how the plot would end. The same method is employed in all trashy
novels and it is especially the bane of many modern story-writers. This
excessive interest in adventures or incidents for their own sake, and not
for their effect on character, is what distinguishes the modern adventure
story from the true novel.

In the Puritan Age we approach still nearer to the modern novel, especially
in the work of Bunyan; and as the Puritan always laid emphasis on
character, stories appeared having a definite moral purpose. Bunyan's _The
Pilgrim's Progress_ (1678) differs from the _Faery Queen_, and from all
other mediaeval allegories, in this important respect,--that the characters,
far from being bloodless abstractions, are but thinly disguised men and
women. Indeed, many a modern man, reading the story of the Christian;--has
found in it the reflection of his own life and experience. In _The Life and
Death of Mr. Badman_ (1682) we have another and even more realistic study
of a man as he was in Bunyan's day. These two striking figures, Christian
and Mr. Badman, belong among the great characters of English fiction.
Bunyan's good work,--his keen insight, his delineation of character, and
his emphasis upon the moral effects of individual action,--wa