Sir,--There are many things that stand in the way of the critic when
he has a mind to praise the living. He may dread the charge of
writing rather to vex a rival than to exalt the subject of his
applause. He shuns the appearance of seeking the favour of the
famous, and would not willingly be regarded as one of the many
parasites who now advertise each movement and action of contemporary
genius. "Such and such men of letters are passing their summer
holidays in the Val d'Aosta," or the Mountains of the Moon, or the
Suliman Range, as it may happen. So reports our literary "Court
Circular," and all our Precieuses read the tidings with enthusiasm.
Lastly, if the critic be quite new to the world of letters, he may
superfluously fear to vex a poet or a novelist by the abundance of
his eulogy. No such doubts perplex us when, with all our hearts, we
would commend the departed; for they have passed almost beyond the
reach even of envy; and to those pale cheeks of theirs no
commendation can bring the red.

You, above all others, were and remain without a rival in your many-
sided excellence, and praise of you strikes at none of those who
have survived your day. The increase of time only mellows your
renown, and each year that passes and brings you no successor does
but sharpen the keenness of our sense of loss. In what other
novelist, since Scott was worn down by the burden of a forlorn
endeavour, and died for honour's sake, has the world found so many
of the fairest gifts combined? If we may not call you a poet (for
the first of English writers of light verse did not seek that
crown), who that was less than a poet ever saw life with a glance so
keen as yours, so steady, and so sane? Your pathos was never cheap,