nothing about, and with whom you were to eat your dinner peaceably,
like any common man. No. He was at all times Douglas the peculiar and
unique,--with his history in his face, and his genius on his tongue,--nay,
and after a little, with his heart on his sleeve. This made him piquant;
and the same character makes his writings piquant. Hence, too, he is
often _quaint_,--a word which describes what no other word does,--always
conveying a sense of originality, and of what, when we wish to be
condemnatory, we call egotism, but which, when it belongs to genius, is
delightful.

As he became better known, he wrote in higher quarters. "Men of Character"
appeared in "Blackwood,"--a curious collection of philosophical
stories;--for artist he was not; he was always a thinker. He had a way of
dressing up a bit of philosophical observation into a story very happily.
He had much feeling for symbol, and, like the old architects, would fill
all things, pretty or ugly, with meaning. When one reads these stories, one
does not feel as if it were the writer's vocation to be a story-teller, but
as if he were using the story as a philosophical toy. And it was fortunate
for him that he fell on an age of periodicals, a class of works which just
suited his genius. He and the modern development of periodical literature
grew up together, and grew prosperous together. He was never completely
known in England till after the establishment of "Punch." An independent
and original organ just suited him, above all; for there he had the full
play which he required as a humorist, and as a self-formed man with a
peculiar style and experience. "Punch" was the "Argo" which conveyed him to
the Golden Fleece.

Up to the time of the appearance of this journal, Jerrold had scattered
himself very freely over periodical literature. He had conquered a
position. He had formed his mind. He had seen the world in many phases, and