fred Jingle won the hearts of the
Pickwickians. And beneath the radiant cheerfulness of his manner, the
quick flash of observation and of speech, there was in him an element of
hard persistence and determination which would carry him far. If the
years of poverty and neglect had failed to chill his hopes and break his
spirit, there was no fear that he would tire in the pursuit of his
ambition when fortune began to smile upon him. He had touched life on
many sides. He had kept his warmth of sympathy, his buoyancy, his
capacity for rising superior to ill-fortune; and the years of adversity
had only deepened his feeling for all that were oppressed. He had much
to learn about the craft of letters; but he already had the first
essential of an author--he had something to say.

The year 1836 is a definite landmark in the life of Dickens. In this
year he married; in this year he gave up the practice of parliamentary
reporting, published the _Sketches by Boz_, and began the writing of
_The Pickwick Papers_. This immortal work achieved wide popularity at
once. Criticism cannot hope to do justice to the greatness of Sam
Weller, to the humours of Dingley Dell and Eatanswill, to the adventures
of the hero in back gardens or in prison, on coaches or in wheelbarrows.
Every one must read them in the original for himself. In this book
Dickens reached at once the height of his success in making his fellow
countrymen laugh with him at their own foibles. If in the art of
constructing a story, in the depiction of character, in deepening the
interest by the alternation of happiness and misfortune, he was to go
far beyond his initial triumph,--still with many Dickensians, who love
him chiefly for his liveliness of observation and broad humour, Pickwick
remains the prime favourite.

The effect of this success on the fortunes of the author was immediate
and lasting. Henceforth he could live in a comfortable house and look
forward to a family life in which his children should be free from all
risk of repeating his own experience. He could afford himself the
pleasures and the society which he needed, and he became the centre of a
circle of friends who appreciated his talents and encouraged him in his
career. His relations with his publishers, though not without incident,
were generally of the most cordial kind. If Dickens had the
self-confidence to estimate his own powers highly, and the shrewd
instinct to know when he was getting less than his f