escription, and unnatural in effect. "Vivian Gray" and
"Lothair" cannot pretend to be truthful studies of English life, nor
would their author, probably, have represented them as such. But so
much of the great statesman's power was instilled into his novels that
they have a certain interest even for those who are most alive to their
faults. They are the conceptions of a very rich imagination, and
contain many pictures which, if untrue to nature, are still extremely
vivid. D'Israeli's chief literary, and perhaps also his chief political
characteristic, was a constant endeavor to make striking effects. The
reader may be sure to find nothing commonplace in his writings. Every
scene and every character is painted in the brightest of colors. If the
background be sombre, it will simply throw out more brilliantly the
figures in the foreground. It is said that most men have a favorite
word. That of d'Israeli was "wondrous." He took his reader into
wondrous baronial halls, filled with wondrous gems, with wondrous
tapestries, with wondrous paintings, and introduced him to wondrous
dukes and duchesses, looking out from wondrous dark orbs, and breathing
through almond-shaped nostrils. He loved to bring the royal family on
the scene, and to trace the awe-inspiring effect of their august
presence. When we open a novel of d'Israeli's we are certain of moving
in a brilliant society, although one belonging to a yet undiscovered
world. Women whose political influence changes the map of Europe,
irresistible Catholic priests are mingled with impudent adventurers and
professional toad-eaters. And over every thing is cast, by d'Israeli's
Eastern imagination, a glamour of unlimited wealth, of numberless
coronets, and of soaring ambitions. The political career of the Earl of
Beaconsfield is one of the most remarkable in history, and even his
opponents cannot withhold admiration from the great abilities and
undaunted resolution which brought that career to its triumphant close.
But the novels of the Earl of Beaconsfield have little value beyond
their reflection of his dreams and his ambition.

Among the most famous writers of fiction of the nineteenth century will
always be mentioned the name of Sir Bulwer Lytton. More than any other
writer, he studied and developed the novel as a form of literature.
Almost every novelist has taken some special field and has confined
himself to that. Dickens, George Eliot, Thackeray made occasional
incursions o