y Sharpe and Beatrix, upon Ethel Newcome and the good Colonel, upon
Laura and Pendennis, upon Esmond and Warrington, and upon all the deeply
studied characters of his mimic stage, that curtain fell to rise no more
upon such creatures as his hands had made. He will have no successor. He
is the One, the Only. Such pathos, such wit, such wisdom, will not dawn
upon us again--in time.

When he wrote Finis for the last time at the close of one of those
matchless volumes, it was an epoch closed in the history of literature.
When the recording angel wrote Finis at the close of that sad and weary
but bravely spent and useful life, it was a sad day for the world of
men, who will not look upon his like again. Who that felt a love for the
writer and the man could fail to rejoice that the end was quick and
painless? One of our own poets has well described the scene:--

"The angel came by night
(Such angels still come down),
And like a winter cloud
Passed over London Town,
Along its lonesome streets,
Where want had ceased to weep,
Until it reached a house
Where a great man lay asleep;
The man of all his time
Who knew the most of men,--
The soundest head and heart,
The sharpest, kindest pen.
It paused beside his bed
And whispered in his ear;
He never turned his head,
But answered, 'I am here.'
Into the night they went;
At morning, side by side,
They gained the sacred place
Where the greatest dead abide;
Where grand old Homer sits,
In godlike state benign;
Where broods in endless thought
The awful Florentine;
Where sweet Cervantes walks,
A smile on his grave face;
Where gossips quaint Montaigne,
The wisest of his race;
Where Goethe looks through all
With that calm eye of his;
Where--little seen, but light--
The only Shakspeare is!
When the new spirit came,
They asked him, drawing near,
'Art thou become like us?'
He answered, 'I am here.'"

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHARLES DICKENS.

No novelist has dealt so directly with the home life of the world as
Charles Dickens. He has painted few historic pictures; he has dealt
mostly in interiors,--beautiful bits of home life, full of domestic
feeling. Indeed, we may say that his background is always the home, and
here he paints his portraits, often like those of Hogarth for strength
and grotesque effect. Here, too, he limns the scenes of his
comedy