Part 52 (2/2)

_B._ (_pompously._) When Demosthenes was asked what were the three princ.i.p.al attributes of eloquence, he answered, that the first was action; on being asked which was the second, he replied, action; and the third, action; and such is the idea of the Irish _mimbers_ in the House of Commons. Now there are three important requisites in the diction of a fas.h.i.+onable novel. The first, my dear fellow, is--flippancy; the second, flippancy; and flippancy is also the third. With the dull it will pa.s.s for wit, with some it will pa.s.s for scorn, and even the witty will not be enabled to point out the difference, without running the risk of being considered invidious. It will cover every defect with a defect still greater; for who can call small beer tasteless when it is sour, or dull when it is bottled and has a froth upon it?

_A._ The advice is excellent; but I fear that this flippancy is as difficult to acquire as the tone of true eloquence.

_B._ Difficult! I defy the writers of the silver-fork school to write out of the style flippant. Read but one volume of ----, and you will be saturated with it; but if you wish to go to the fountain-head, do as have done most of the late fas.h.i.+onable novel writers, repair to their instructors--the lady's-maid, for flippancy in the vein _spirituelle_; to a London footman for the vein critical; but, if you wish a flippancy of a still higher order, at once more solemn and more empty, which I would call the vein political, read the speeches of some of our members of Parliament. Only read them; I wish no man so ill as to inflict upon him the torture of hearing them--read them, I say, and you will have taken the very highest degree in the order of inane flippancy.

_A._ I see it at once. Your observations are as true as they are severe.

When we would harangue geese, we must condescend to hiss; but still, my dear Barnstaple, though you have fully proved to me that in a fas.h.i.+onable novel all plot is unnecessary, don't you think there ought to be a catastrophe, or sort of a kind of an end to the work, or the reader may be brought up short, or as the sailors say, ”all standing,”

when he comes to the word ”Finis,” and exclaim with an air of stupefaction,--”And then----”

_B._ And then, if he did, it would be no more than the fool deserved. I don't know whether it would not be advisable to leave off in the middle of a sentence, of a word, nay of a syllable, if it be possible: I'm sure the winding-up would be better than the lackadaisical running-down of most of the fas.h.i.+onable novels. Snap the main-spring of your watch, and none but an a.s.s can expect you to tell by it what it is o'clock; snap the thread of your narrative in the same way, and he must be an unreasonable being who would expect a reasonable conclusion. Finish thus, in a case of delicate distress; say, ”The honourable Mr Augustus Bouverie was struck in a heap with horror. He rushed with a frantic grace, a deliberate haste, and a graceful awkwardness, and whispered in her ear these dread and awful words, 'IT IS TOO LATE!'” Follow up with a ---- and Finis.

_A._ I see; the fair and agitated reader will pa.s.s a sleepless night in endeavouring to decipher the mutilated sentence. She will fail, and consequently call the book delightful. But should there not have been a marriage previously to this happy awful climax?

_B._ Yes; everything is arranged for the nuptials--carriages are sent home, jewellery received but not paid for, dresses all tried on, the party invited--nay, a.s.sembled in the blue-and-white drawing-room. The right reverend, my lord bishop, is standing behind the temporary altar--he has wiped his spectacles, and thumbed his prayer-book--all eyes are turned towards the door, which opens not--the bride faints, for the bridegroom cometh not--he's not ”i' the vein”--a something, as like nothing as possible, has given him a disgust that is insurmountable--he flings his happiness to the winds, though he never loved with more outrageous intensity than at the moment he discards his mistress; so he fights three duels with the two brothers and father. He wounds one of the young men dangerously, the other slightly; fires his pistol in the air when he meets her father--for how could he take the life of him who gave life to his adored one? Your hero can always. .h.i.t a man just where he pleases--_vide_ every novel in Mr C.'s collection. The hero becomes misanthropical, the heroine maniacal. The former marries an antiquated and toothless dowager, as an escape from the imaginary disgust he took at a sight of a matchless woman; and the latter marries an old brute, who threatens her life every night, and puts her in bodily fear every morning, as an indemnity in full for the loss of the man of her affections. They are both romantically miserable; and then come on your tantalising scenes of delicate distress, and so the end of your third volume, and then finish without any end at all. _Verb. sap. sat._ Or, if you like it better, kill the old dowager of a surfeit, and make the old brute who marries the heroine commit suicide; and, after all these unheard-of trials, marry them as fresh and beautiful as ever.

_A._ A thousand thanks. Your _verba_ are not thrown to a _sap._ Can I possibly do you any favour for all this kindness?

_B._ Oh, my dear fellow! the very greatest. As I see yours will be, at all points, a most fas.h.i.+onable novel, do me the inestimable favour _not_ to ask me _to read it_.

How to write a Book of Travels

_Mr Ansard's Chambers._

_A._ (_alone._) Well, I thought it hard enough to write a novel at the dictate of the bibliopolist; but to be condemned to sit down and write my travels--travels that have never extended farther than the Lincoln's Inn Coffee House for my daily food, and a walk to Hampstead on a Sunday.

These travels to be swelled into Travels up the Rhine in the year 18--.

Why, it's impossible. O that Barnstaple were here, for he has proved my guardian angel! Lazy, clever dog!

_Enter Barnstaple._

_B._ Pray, my dear Ansard, to whom did you apply that last epithet?

_A._ My dear Barnstaple, I never was more happy to see you. Sit down, I have much to tell you, all about myself and my difficulties.

_B._ The conversation promises to be interesting to me, at all events.

_A._ Everything is interesting to true friends.h.i.+p.

_B._ Now I perceive that you do want something. Well, before you state your case, tell me, how did the novel go off?

_A._ Wonderfully well. It was ascribed to Lord G----: the bait took, and 750 went off in a first edition, and the remainder of the copies printed went off in a second.

_B._ Without being reprinted?

_A._ Exactly. I was surprised at my success, and told my publisher so; but he answered that he could sell an edition of any trash he pleased.

<script>