_ (1859), and _Great Expectations_ (1860-61). _Our Mutual Friend_
came out in numbers (1864-65). D. was now in the full tide of his
readings, and decided to give a course of them in America. Thither
accordingly he went in the end of 1867, returning in the following May.
He had a magnificent reception, and his profits amounted to L20,000; but
the effect on his health was such that he was obliged, on medical advice,
finally to abandon all appearances of the kind. In 1869 he began his last
work, _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_, which was interrupted by his death
from an apoplectic seizure on June 8, 1870.

One of D.'s most marked characteristics is the extraordinary wealth of
his invention as exhibited in the number and variety of the characters
introduced into his novels. Another, especially, of course, in his entire
works, is his boundless flow of animal spirits. Others are his marvellous
keenness of observation and his descriptive power. And the English race
may well, with Thackeray, be "grateful for the innocent laughter, and the
sweet and unsullied pages which the author of _David Copperfield_ gives
to [its] children." On the other hand, his faults are obvious, a tendency
to caricature, a mannerism that often tires, and almost disgusts, fun
often forced, and pathos not seldom degenerating into mawkishness. But at
his best how rich and genial is the humour, how tender often the pathos.
And when all deductions are made, he had the laughter and tears of the
English-speaking world at command for a full generation while he lived,
and that his spell still works is proved by a continuous succession of
new editions.

SUMMARY.--_B._ 1812, parliamentary reporter _c._ 1835, _pub._ _Sketches
by Boz_ 1836, _Pickwick_ 1837-39, and his other novels almost
continuously until his death, visited America 1841, started _Household
Words_ 1849, and _All the Year Round_ 1858, when also he began his public
readings, visiting America again in 1867, _d._ 1870.

_Life_ by John Foster (1872), _Letters_ ed. by Miss Hogarth (1880-82).
Numerous Lives and Monographs by Sala, F.T. Marzials (Great Writers
Series), A.W. Ward (Men of Letters Series), F.G. Kitton, G.K. Chesterton,
etc.

DIGBY, SIR KENELM (1603-1665).--Miscellaneous writer, _b._ near Newport
Pagnell, _s._ of Sir Everard D., one of the Gunpowder Plot conspirators,
was _ed._ at Oxf., travelled much, and was engaged in sea-fighting.
Brought up first as a Romanist, then as a Protestant, he