faithfulness of its transcript of the life it depicts," and then
instantly balances the account on the adverse side of the ledger by
assuring the reader that "it has no interest of passion or mental
power." But even this fatal conclusion is diluted by a dependent clause.
"Possibly," says the reviewer, "the good feeling of the intertwined love
story may conciliate the good-will of some of the malcontent." One could
hardly carry further the fine art of oscillating between moderate
commendation and parenthetical damnation--an art that lends a factitious
air of judicial impartiality and mental equipoise. Beyond question, _The
Nation_ is one of the ablest weekly papers in the world; the admirable
scholarship of its articles and reviews in departments of special
knowledge might well be a subject of pride to any American. But its
inadequate reviews of current fiction add nothing to its value, and its
habitual tone of condescending depreciation in treating imaginative
literature of indigenous origin is one of the strongest discouragements
to literary production.

The main value of good criticism lies in its readiness and penetration
in discovering and applauding merit not before recognized, or
imperfectly recognized. This is a conspicuous trait of Sainte-Beuve, the
greatest of all newspaper critics. He knew how to be severe upon
occasion, but he saw talent in advance of the public and dispensed
encouragement heartily, so that he made himself almost a foster-father
to the literature of his generation in France. But there is a class of
anonymous reviewers in England and America who seem to hold a
traditional theory that the function of a critic toward new-born talent
is analogous to that of Pharaoh toward the infant Jewish population[1].

During the first year after its publication "The Hoosier School-Master"
was translated into French and published in a condensed form in the