the blooming daughter of the Clerkenwell
locksmith, who has given her name to the modern feminine costume of the
Watteauesque style.

The literary results of Dickens's first visit to the United States, in
1842, when he was thirty years of age, were 'American Notes, for General
Circulation'; published in that year, and containing portions of 'Martin
Chuzzlewit,' which appeared in 1844. His observations in the 'Notes'
upon the new country and its inhabitants gave great offense to the
American people, and were perhaps not in the best taste. He saw the
crude and ridiculous side of his hosts, he emphasized their faults,
while he paid little attention to their virtues; and his criticisms and
strictures rankled in the sensitive American mind for many years.

Martin Chuzzlewit, the hero of the novel bearing his name, spent some
time in the western half-settled portion of America, with Mark Tapley,
his light-hearted, optimistic friend and companion. The pictures of the
morals and the manners of the men and women with whom the emigrants were
brought into contact were anything but flattering, and they served to
widen the temporary breach between Dickens and his many admirers in the
United States. The English scenes of 'Chuzzlewit' are very powerfully
drawn. Tom and Ruth Pinch, Pecksniff, Sarah Gamp, and Betsey Prig are
among the leading characters in the work.

In 1843 appeared the 'Christmas Carol,' the first and perhaps the best
of that series of tales of peace and good-will, with which, at the
Christmas time, the name of Dickens is so pleasantly and familiarly
associated. It was followed by 'The Chimes' in 1844, by 'The Cricket on
the Hearth' in 1845, by 'The Haunted Man' in 1848, all the work of
Dickens himself; and by other productions written by Dickens in
collaboration with other men. Concerning these holiday stories, some
unknown writer said in the public press at the time of Dickens's death:
"He has not only pleased us--he has softened the hearts of a whole
generation. He made charity fashionable; he awakened pity in the hearts
of sixty millions of people. He made a whole generation keep Christmas
with acts of helpfulness to the poor; and every barefooted boy and girl
in the streets of England and America to-day fares a little better, gets
fewer cuffs and more pudding, because Charles Dickens wrote."

In 1846 he produced his 'Pictures from Italy'; 'The Battle of Life, A
Love Story,' and began in periodical form his 'De