hat when
an extravaganza is held up to me in one hand, and a masterpiece of
morality like _The Egoist_ in the other, I can doubt which is the
greater book; but there are moods in which I am jealous of the novels,
and wish to be left alone with my _Arabian Entertainment_. Delicious
in this harsh world of reality to fold a mist around us, and out of it
to evolve the yellow domes and black cypresses, the silver fountains
and marble pillars, of the fabulous city of Shagpat. I do not know any
later book than _The Shaving_ in which an Englishman has allowed his
fancy, untrammelled by any sort of moral or intellectual subterfuge,
to go a-roaming by the light of the moon. We do this sort of thing no
longer. We are wholly given up to realism, we are harshly pressed upon
on all sides by the importunities of excess of knowledge. If we
talk of gryphons, the zoologists are upon us; of Oolb or Aklis, the
geographers flourish their maps at us in defiance. But the author of
_The Shaving of Shagpat_, in the bloom of his happy youthful genius,
defied all this pedantry. In a little address which has been
suppressed in later editions he said (December 8, 1855)

"It has seemed to me that the only way to tell an Arabian Story was by
imitating the style and manner of the Oriental Story-tellers. But such
an attempt, whether successful or not, may read like a translation. I
therefore think it better to prelude this Entertainment by an avowal
that it springs from no Eastern source, and is in every respect an
original Work."

If one reader of _The Shaving of Shagpat_ were to confess the truth he
would say that to him at least the other, the genuine Oriental tales,
appear the imitation, and not a very good imitation. The true genius
of the East breathes in Meredith's pages, and the _Arabian Nights_, at
all events in the crude literality of Sir Richard Burton, pale before
them like a mirage. The variety of scenes and images, the untiring
evolution of plot, the kaleidoscopic shifting of harmonious colours,
all these seem of the very essence of Arabia, and to coil directly
from some bottle of a genie. Ah! what a bottle! As we whirl along in
the vast and glowing bacchanal, we cry, like Sganarelle:

_Qu'ils sont doux--
Bouteille jolie--
Qu'ils sont doux
Vos petits glou-glous;
Ah! Bouteille, ma mie;
Pourquoi vous videz-vous?_

Ah! why indeed? For _The Shaving of Shagpat_ is one of those very rare
modern books of which it is certain t