_Nickleby_ in which parts are played by Lord Frederick Verisopht, Sir
Mulberry Hawke, and their friends; the scene of the hero's luncheon at a
restaurant and the dreadful description of the mirrors and other
splendours would not have been written. It is a very little thing to
forgive to him whom we have to thank for--well, not perhaps for the
"housefull of friends" for the gift of whom a stranger, often quoted,
once blessed him in the street; we may not wish for Mr. Feeder, or Major
Bagstock, or Mrs. Chick, or Mrs. Pipchin, or Mr. Augustus Moddle, or Mr.
F.'s aunt, or Mr. Wopsle, or Mr. Pumblechook, as an inmate of our homes.
Lack of knowledge of the polite world is, I say, a very little thing to
forgive to him whom we thank most chiefly for showing us these
interesting people just named as inmates of the comedy homes that are not
ours. We thank him because they are comedy homes, and could not be ours
or any man's; that is, we thank him for his admirable art.




SWINBURNE'S LYRICAL POETRY


The makers of epigrams, of phrases, of pages--of all more or less brief
judgements--assuredly waste their time when they sum up any one of all
mankind; and how do they squander it when their matter is a poet! They
may hardly describe him; nor shall any student's care, or psychologist's
formula, or man-of-letters' summary, or wit's sentence define him.
Definitions, because they must not be inexact or incomprehensive, sweep
too wide, and the poet is not held within them; and out of the mere
describer's range and capture he may escape by as many doors as there are
outlets from a forest. But much ready-made platitude brings about the