ind of hardness and
brazenness which are amazing. The difference between plain-speaking
and unclean speaking could hardly be better
illustrated. It should be added, in justice, that even Smollett
is rarely impure with the alluring saliency of certain modern
fiction.

In the first story, "The Adventures of Roderick Random" (the
cumbrous full titles of earlier fiction are for apparent reasons
frequently curtailed in the present treatment), published when
the author was twenty-seven, he avails himself of a residence of
some years in Jamaica to depict life in that quarter of the
world at a time when the local color had the charm of novelty.
The story is often credited with being autobiographic, as a
novelist's first book is likely to be; since, by popular belief,
there is one story in all of us, namely, our own. Its
description of the hero's hard knocks does, indeed, suggest the
fate of a man so stormily quarrelsome throughout his days: for
this red-headed Scot, this "hack of genius," as Henley
picturesquely calls him, was naturally a fighting man and,
whether as man or author, attacks or repels sharply: there is
nothing uncertain in the effect he makes. His loud vigor is as
pronounced as that of a later Scot like Carlyle; yet he stated
long afterward that the likeness between himself and Roderick
was slight and superficial. The fact that the tale is written in
the first person also helps the autobiographic theory: that
method of story-making always lends a certain credence to the
narrative. The scenes shift from western Scotland to the streets
of London, thence to the West Indies: and the interest (the
remark applies to all Smollett's work) lies in just three
things--adventure, diversity of character, and the realistic
picture of contemporary life--especially that of the navy on a
day when, if Smollett is within hailing distance of the facts,
it was terribly corrupt. Too much credit can hardly be given him
for first using, so effectively too, the professional sea-life
of his country: a motive so richly productive since through
Marryat down to Dana, Herman Melville, Clark Russell and many
other favorite writers, both British and American. In Smollett's
hands, it is a strange muddle of religion, farce and smut, but
set forth with a vivid particularity and a gusto f high spirits
which carry the reader along, willy-nilly. Such a book might be
described by the advertisement of an old inn: "Here is
entertainment for man and