ever would be,--the expression of the innermost character and qualities
of the things or persons that bear them, speaks out in various ways, It
is reported of Boiardo, author of a poem without which we should
probably have never seen the _Orlando Furioso_ of Ariosto, that he was
out hunting, when the name Rodomonte presented itself to him as exactly
fitting a foremost person of the epic he was composing; and that
instantly returning home, he caused all the joy-bells of the village to
be rung, to celebrate the happy invention. This story may remind us of
another which is told of the greatest French novelist of modern times.
A friend of Balzac's, who has written some _Recollections_ of him,
tells us that he would sometimes wander for days through the streets of
Paris, studying the names over the shops, as being sure that there was
a name more appropriate than any other to some character which he had
conceived, and hoping to light on it there.

You must all have remarked the amusement and interest which children
find in any notable agreement between a name and the person who owns
that name, as, for instance, if Mr. Long is tall--or, which naturally
takes a still stronger hold upon them, in any manifest contradiction
between the name and the name-bearer; if Mr. Strongitharm is a weakling,
or Mr. Black an albino: the former striking from a sense of fitness,
the latter from one of incongruity. Nor is this a mere childish
entertainment. It continues with us through life; and that its roots
lie deep is attested by the earnest use which is often made, and that
at the most earnest moments of men's lives, of such agreements or
disagreements as these. Such use is not un-frequent in Scripture,
though it is seldom possible to reproduce it in English, as for
instance in the comment of Abigail on her husband Nabal's name: 'As his
name is, so is he; Nabal is his name, and folly is with him' (i Sam.
xxv. 25). And again, 'Call me not Naomi,' exclaims the desolate widow--