n
said of this in relation to the Goncourts, but M. Zola's own
exemplification of the doctrine was so far "larger" in every sense than
theirs, and reinforced with so much greater literary power, that it
cannot be left merely to the treatment which was sufficient for them.
Once more, it is a case of "corruption of the best." It is perfectly
true that all novel-writing--even in a fashion all romance-writing
too--ought to be based on experience[467] in practical life, and that
infinite documents are procurable, infinite notes may be made, from that
life. It is utterly _un_true that _any_ observation, _any_ experiment,
_any_ document is good novel or romance stuff.

A very few remarks may perhaps be made on approaches to Zolaism--not in
the sense of scabrousness--before Zola.

[Sidenote: "Document" and "detail" before Naturalism.]

A writer of one of those theses _a la mode Germanorum_, of which, at
different times and in different occupations, it is the hard lot of the
professional man of letters to read so many, would probably begin with
the Catalogue of Ships, or construct an inventory of the "beds and
basons" which Barzillai brought to David. Quite a typical "program"
might be made of the lists of birds, beasts, trees, etc., so well known
in mediaeval literature, and best known to the ordinary English reader
from Chaucer, and from Spenser's following of him. We may, however, pass
to the Deluge of the Renaissance and the special emergence therefrom of
French fiction. It would not be an absolute proof of the "monographitis"
just glanced at if any one were to instance the curious discussions on
the propriety of introducing technical terms into heroic poetry--which
is, of course, very close to heroic romance, and so to prose fiction
generally.

[Sidenote: General stages traced.]

But, for practical purposes, Furetiere and the _Roman Bourgeois_ (_vide_
Vol. I.) give the starting-point. And here the Second Part, of which we
formerly said little, acquires special importance, though the first is
not without it. _All_ the details of _bourgeois_ life and middle-class
society belong to the department which was afterwards preferred--and
degraded--by the Naturalists; and the legal ins and outs of the Second
Part are Zola in a good deal more than the making. Indeed the luckless
"Charroselles" himself had, as we pointed out, anticipated Furetiere in
not a few points, such as that most interesting reference to
_bisque_.[468] Scar