ve
done what Cervantes did, what Tourgenieff did, what Mrs. Stowe did. He
would have dramatized his facts in living personalities, in effective
scenes, in vivid pictures of life. Mrs. Stowe exhibited the system of
slavery by a succession of dramatized pictures, not always artistically
welded together, but always effective as an exhibition of the system.
Cervantes also showed a fading feudal romantic condition by a series
of amusing and pathetic adventures, grouped rather loosely about a
singularly fascinating figure.

Tourgenieff, a more consummate artist, in his hunting scenes exhibited
the effect of serfdom upon society, in a series of scenes with no
necessary central figure, without comment, and with absolute concealment
of any motive. I believe the three writers followed their instincts,
without an analytic argument as to the method, as the great painter
follows his when he puts an idea upon canvas. He may invent a theory
about it afterwards; if he does not, some one else will invent it for
him. There are degrees of art. One painter will put in unnecessary
accessories, another will exhibit his sympathy too openly, the technique
or the composition of another can be criticised. But the question is, is
the picture great and effective?

Mrs. Stowe had not Tourgenieff's artistic calmness. Her mind was fused
into a white heat with her message. Yet, how did she begin her story?
Like an artist, by a highly dramatized scene, in which the actors, by
a few strokes of the pen, appear as distinct and unmistakable
personalities, marked by individual peculiarities of manner, speech,
motive, character, living persons in natural attitudes. The reader
becomes interested in a shrewd study of human nature, of a section
of life, with its various refinement, coarseness, fastidiousness and
vulgarity, its humor and pathos. As he goes on he discovers that every
character has been perfectly visualized, accurately limned from the
first; that a type has been created which remains consistent, which is
never deflected from its integrity by any exigencies of plot. This clear
conception of character (not of earmarks and peculiarities adopted as
labels), and faithful adhesion to it in all vicissitudes, is one of the
rarest and highest attributes of genius. All the chief characters in the
book follow this line of absolutely consistent development, from Uncle
Tom and Legree down to the most aggravating and contemptible of all,
Marie St. Clare. The