he heroes of another writer, viz.--

LEATHER-STOCKING,

UNCAS,

HARDHEART,

TOM COFFIN,

are quite the equals of Scott's men; perhaps Leather-stocking is better
than any one in "Scott's lot." La Longue Carabine is one of the great
prize-men of fiction. He ranks with your Uncle Toby, Sir Roger de
Coverley, Falstaff--heroic figures, all--American or British, and the
artist has deserved well of his country who devised them.

At school, in my time, there was a public day, when the boys' relatives,
an examining bigwig or two from the universities, old schoolfellows,
and so forth, came to the place. The boys were all paraded; prizes were
administered; each lad being in a new suit of clothes--and magnificent
dandies, I promise you, some of us were. Oh, the chubby cheeks, clean
collars, glossy new raiment, beaming faces, glorious in youth--fit tueri
coelum--bright with truth, and mirth, and honor! To see a hundred boys
marshalled in a chapel or old hall; to hear their sweet fresh voices
when they chant, and look in their brave calm faces; I say, does not
the sight and sound of them smite you, somehow, with a pang of exquisite
kindness? . . . Well. As about boys, so about Novelists. I fancy the
boys of Parnassus School all paraded. I am a lower boy myself in that
academy. I like our fellows to look well, upright, gentlemanlike. There
is Master Fielding--he with the black eye. What a magnificent build of a
boy! There is Master Scott, one of the heads of the school. Did you ever
see the fellow more hearty and manly? Yonder lean, shambling, cadaverous
lad, who is always borrowing money, telling lies, leering after the
house-maids, is Master Laurence Sterne--a bishop's grandson, and himself
intended for the Church; for shame, you little reprobate! But what a
genius the fellow has! Let him have a sound flogging, and as soon as
the young scamp is out of the whipping-room give him a gold medal. Such
would be my practice if I were Doctor Birch, and master of the school.

Let us drop this school metaphor, this birch and all pertaining thereto.
Our subject, I beg leave to remind the reader's humble servant, is novel
heroes and heroines. How do you like your heroes, ladies? Gentlemen,
what novel heroines do you prefer? When I set this essay going, I sent
the above question to two of the most inveterate novel-readers of my
acquaintance. The gentleman refers me to Miss Austen; the lady says
Athos, Guy Livingston, and (pardon my rosy