t is, one can see at a glance, a very
judicious and happy one; but I cannot adopt it, because I have not
the skill you attribute to me. It is not enough to have the artist's
eye, one must also have the artist's hand to turn the first gift to
practical account. I have, in my day, wasted a certain quantity of
Bristol board and drawing-paper, crayons and cakes of colour, but
when I examine the contents of my portfolio now, it seems as if
during the years it has been lying closed some fairy had changed what
I once thought sterling coin into dry leaves, and I feel much
inclined to consign the whole collection of drawings to the fire; I
see they have no value. If, then, _Jane Eyre_ is ever to be
illustrated, it must be by some other hand than that of its author.
But I hope no one will be at the trouble to make portraits of my
characters. Bulwer and Byron heroes and heroines are very well, they
are all of them handsome; but my personages are mostly unattractive
in look, and therefore ill-adapted to figure in ideal portraits. At
the best, I have always thought such representations futile. You
will not easily find a second Thackeray. How he can render, with a
few black lines and dots, shades of expression so fine, so real;
traits of character so minute, so subtle, so difficult to seize and
fix, I cannot tell--I can only wonder and admire. Thackeray may not
be a painter, but he is a wizard of a draughtsman; touched with his
pencil, paper lives. And then his drawing is so refreshing; after
the wooden limbs one is accustomed to see pourtrayed by commonplace
illustrators, his shapes of bone and muscle clothed with flesh,
correct in proportion and anatomy, are a real relief. All is true in
Thackeray. If Truth were again a goddess, Thackeray should be her
high priest.

'I read my preface over with some pain--I did not like it. I wrote
it when I was a little enthusiastic, like you, about the French
Revolution. I wish I had written it in a cool moment; I should have
said the same things, but in a different manner. One may be as
enthusiastic as one likes about an author who has been dead a century
or two, but I see it is a fault to bore the public with enthusiasm
about a living author. I promise myself to take better care in
future. _Still_ I will _think_ as I please.

'Are the L