, the comic draughtsman--the one to write, and the other to
illustrate a book which should exhibit the adventures of a party of
Cockney sportsmen. Hence the appearance of _Pickwick_, a book which made
its author's reputation and the publishers' fortune. After the work had
commenced, poor Seymour committed suicide, and Mr Hablot K. Browne was
selected to continue the illustrations, which he did under the signature
of "Phiz." Meanwhile, Mr Dickens had courted and married the daughter of
Mr George Hogarth, then, and now, a musical writer; a man of
considerable attainments, and who, in his earlier days, whilst a writer
to the Signet in Edinburgh, enjoyed the intimate friendship of Sir
Walter Scott, Jeffrey, and the other literary notables at that day
adorning the Modern Athens. The great success of _Pickwick_ brought down
upon its author demands from all sides for another work, and "Boz"
agreed to write _Nicholas Nickleby_, to be published in monthly parts.
In the prefatory notices, which give additional value to the cheap and
elegant reprint of the works of Dickens, we are indulged with slight
glimpses of his own recollections, personal and literary.' It is
unnecessary to note the titles of Mr Dickens's subsequent works, all of
which have justly obtained popularity. He has latterly entered on a path
not dissimilar to our own, and in this he has our very best wishes. The
cause of social melioration needs a union of hearts and hands.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Bogue, London: 1852.

ARCHBISHOP WHATELY'S BOOK OF SYNONYMS.

Accuracy of language is one of the things which, in ordinary speech and
writing, is but indifferently observed. The reason, perhaps, is to be
sought, not in any general indifference to correctness or precision, but
rather in the want of some recognised authority, some specific rules or
principles, to which the use of words apparently synonymous, yet of
slightly different signification, might be distinctly and easily
referred. It is in regard to the finer shades of meaning, the subtler
touches of expression, the application of words and phrases where the
strictest exactness and perspicuity are required, that an ordinary
English style is apt to become loose and shadowy; and it is precisely
here that we are entitled to expect the severest, chastest form of
utterance. Coleridge used to complain of a general confounding of the
word 'notion' with 'idea,' and was often at great pains to point out the
distinctio