her
day, but her stories are gradually sinking into an historic repose, from
which the coming generations will not care to disturb them. _Pride and
Prejudice_ and _Sense and Sensibility_ are perhaps the best of her
productions, and are valuable as displaying the society and the nature
around her with delicacy and tact.

_Mary Ferrier_, 1782-1855: like Miss Austen, she wrote novels of existing
society, of which _The Marriage_ and _The Inheritance_ are the best known.
They were great favorites with Sir Walter Scott, who esteemed Miss
Ferrier's genius highly: they are little read at the present time.

_Robert Pollok_, 1799-1827: a Scottish minister, who is chiefly known by
his long poem, cast in a Miltonic mould, entitled _The Course of Time_. It
is singularly significant of religious fervor, delicate health, youthful
immaturity, and poetic yearnings. It abounds in startling effects, which
please at first from their novelty, but will not bear a calm, critical
analysis. On its first appearance, _The Course of Time_ was immensely
popular; but it has steadily lost favor, and its highest flights are
"unearthly flutterings" when compared with the powerful soarings of
Milton's imagination and the gentle harmonies of Cowper's religious muse.
Pollok died early of consumption: his youth and his disease account for
the faults and defects of his poem.

_Leigh Hunt_, 1784-1859: a novelist, a poet, an editor, a critic, a
companion of literary men, Hunt occupies a distinct position among the
authors of his day. Wielding a sensible and graceful rather than a
powerful pen, he has touched almost every subject in the range of our
literature, and has been the champion and biographer of numerous literary
friends. He was the companion of Byron, Shelley, Keats, Lamb, Coleridge,
and many other authors. He edited at various times several radical
papers--_The Examiner_, _The Reflector_, _The Indicator_, and _The
Liberal_; for a satire upon the regent, published in the first, he was
imprisoned for two years. Among his poems _The Story of Rimini_ is the
best. His _Legend of Florence_ is a beautiful drama. There are few pieces
containing so small a number of lines, and yet enshrining a full story,
which have been as popular as his _Abou Ben Adhem_. Always cheerful,
refined and delicate in style, appreciative of others, Hunt's place in
English literature is enviable, if not very exalted; like the atmosphere,
his writings circulate healthfully and q