r on a
public that swallows voraciously and groans; might, with encouragement,
be attending to the study of art in literature. Our critics appear to
be fascinated by the quaintness of our public, as the world is when
our beast-garden has a new importation of magnitude, and the creatures
appetite is reverently consulted. They stipulate for a writer's
popularity before they will do much more than take the position of
umpires to record his failure or success. Now the pig supplies the most
popular of dishes, but it is not accounted the most honoured of animals,
unless it be by the cottager. Our public might surely be led to try
other, perhaps finer, meat. It has good taste in song. It might be
taught as justly, on the whole, and the sooner when the cottager's view
of the feast shall cease to be the humble one of our literary critics,
to extend this capacity for delicate choosing in the direction of the
matter arousing laughter.

Footnotes:

{1} A lecture delivered at the London Institution, February 1st, 1877.

{2} Realism in the writing is carried to such a pitch in THE OLD
BACHELOR, that husband and wife use imbecile connubial epithets to one
another.

{3} Tallemant des Reaux, in his rough portrait of the Duke, shows the
foundation of the character of Alceste.

{4} See Tom Jones, book viii. chapter I, for Fielding's opinion of
our Comedy. But he puts it simply; not as an exercise in the
quasi-philosophical bathetic.

{5} Femmes Savantes:

BELISE: Veux-tu toute la vie offenser la grammaire?

MARTINE: Qui parle d'offenser grand'mere ni grand-pere?'

The pun is delivered in all sincerity, from the mouth of a rustic.

{6} Maskwell seems to have been carved on the model of Iago, as by
the hand of an enterprising urchin. He apostrophizes his 'invention'
repeatedly. 'Thanks, my invention.' He hits on an invention, to say:
'Was it my brain or Providence? no matter which.' It is no matter which,
but it was not his brain.

{7} Imaginary Conversations: Alfieri and the Jew Salomon.

{8} Terence did not please the rough old conservative Romans; they liked
Plautus better, and the recurring mention of the vetus poeta in
his prologues, who plagued him with the crusty critical view of his
productions, has in the end a comic effect on the reader.

{9} The exclamation of Lady Booby, when Joseph defends himself: 'YOUR
VIRTUE! I shall never survive it!' etc., is another instance.--Joseph
Andrews. Also that of Miss Mathe