riod
Forster was in his _Sir Oracle_ vein and inclined to lofty periods.

"My dear Forster," wrote Boz to him, "I cannot sufficiently say how
proud I am of what you have done, and how sensible I am of being so
tenderly connected with it. I desire no better for my fame, when my
personal dustiness shall be past the contrast of my love of order,
than such a biographer--and such a critic. And again I say most
solemnly that literature in England has never had, and probably never
will have, such a champion as you are in right of this book." "As a
picture of the time I really think it is impossible to give it too
much praise. It seems to me to be the very essence of all about the
time that I have ever seen in biography or fiction, presented in most
wise and humane lights. I have never liked him so well. And as to
Goldsmith himself and _his_ life, and the manful and dignified
assertion of him, without any sobs, whines, or convulsions of any
sort, it is throughout a noble achievement of which, apart from any
private and personal affection for you, I think and really believe I
should feel proud." What a genuine affectionate ring is here!

Later Forster lost this agreeable touch, and issued a series of
ponderous historical treatises, enlargements of his old "Statesmen."
These were dreary things, pedantic, solemn and heavy; they might have
been by the worthy Rollin himself. Such was the _Life of Sir John
Eliot, the Arrest of the Five Members_, and others.

No one had been so intimate with Savage Landor as he had, or admired
him more. He had known him for years and was chosen as his literary
executor. With such materials one might have looked for a lively,
vivacious account of this tempestuous personage. But Forster dealt
with him in his magisterial way, and furnished a heavy treatise, on
critical and historical principles. Everything here is treated
according to the strict canons and in judicial fashion. On every poem
there was a long and profound criticism of many pages, which I
believe was one of his own old essays used again, fitted into the
book. The hero is treated as though he were some important historical
personage. Everyone knew Landor's story; his shocking violences and
lack of restraint; his malignity where he disliked. His life was full
of painful episodes, but Forster, like Podsnap, would see none of
these things. He waved them away with his "monstrous!" "intolerable!"
and put them out of existence.

According to