Part 21 (1/2)

CAPTAIN ROLAND (solemnly).--”There is a great deal in a good t.i.tle. As a novel reader, I know that by experience.”

MR. SQUILLS.--”Certainly; there is not a catchpenny in the world but what goes down, if the t.i.tle be apt and seductive. Witness 'Old Parr's Life Pills.' Sell by the thousand, Sir, when my 'Pills for Weak Stomachs,' which I believe to be just the same compound, never paid for the advertising.”

MR. CAXTON.--”Parr's Life Pills! a fine stroke of genius. It is not every one who has a weak stomach, or time to attend to it if he have.

But who would not swallow a pill to live to a hundred and fifty-two?”

PISISTRATUS (stirring the fire in great excitement).--”My t.i.tle! my t.i.tle!--what shall be my t.i.tle?”

MR. CAXTON (thrusting his hand into his waistcoat, and in his most didactic of tones).--”From a remote period, the choice of a t.i.tle has perplexed the scribbling portion of mankind. We may guess how their invention has been racked by the strange contortions it has produced.

To begin with the Hebrews. 'The Lips of the Sleeping' (l.a.b.i.a Dormientium)--what book did you suppose that t.i.tle to designate?--A Catalogue of Rabbinical Writers! Again, imagine some young lady of old captivated by the sentimental t.i.tle of 'The Pomegranate with its Flower,' and opening on a Treatise on the Jewish Ceremonials! Let us turn to the Romans. Aulus Gellius commences his pleasant gossipping 'Noctes' with a list of the t.i.tles in fas.h.i.+on in his day. For instance, 'The Muses' and 'The Veil,' 'The Cornucopia,' 'The Beehive,' and 'The Meadow.' Some t.i.tles, indeed, were more truculent, and promised food to those who love to sup upon horrors,--such as 'The Torch,' 'The Poniard,'

'The Stiletto'--”

PISISTRATUS (impatiently).--”Yes, sir, but to come to My Novel.”

MR. CAXTON (unheeding the interruption).--”You see you have a fine choice here, and of a nature pleasing, and not unfamiliar, to a cla.s.sical reader; or you may borrow a hint from the early dramatic writers.”

PISISTRATUS (more hopefully).--”Ay, there is something in the Drama akin to the Novel. Now, perhaps, I may catch an idea.”

MR. CAXTON.--”For instance, the author of the 'Curiosities of Literature' (from whom, by the way, I am plagiarizing much of the information I bestow upon you) tells us of a Spanish gentleman who wrote a Comedy, by which he intended to serve what he took for Moral Philosophy.”

PISISTRATUS (eagerly).--”Well, sir?”

MR. CAXTON.--”And called it 'The Pain of the Sleep of the World.'”

PISISTRATUS.--”Very comic, indeed, sir.”

MR. CAXTON.--”Grave things were then called Comedies, as old things are now called Novels. Then there are all the t.i.tles of early Romance itself at your disposal,--'Theagenes and Chariclea' or 'The a.s.s' of Longus, or 'The Golden a.s.s' of Apuleius, or the t.i.tles of Gothic Romance, such as 'The most elegant, delicious, mellifluous, and delightful History of Perceforest, King of Great Britain.'” And therewith my father ran over a list of names as long as the Directory, and about as amusing.

”Well, to my taste,” said my mother, ”the novels I used to read when a girl (for I have not read many since, I am ashamed to say)--”

MR. CAXTON.--”No, you need not be at all ashamed of it, Kitty.”

MY MOTHER (proceeding).--”Were much more inviting than any you mention, Austin.”

THE CAPTAIN.--”True.”

MR. SQUILLS.--”Certainly. Nothing like them nowadays!”

MY MOTHER.--”'Says she to her Neighbour, What?'”

THE CAPTAIN.--”'The Unknown, or the Northern Gallery'--”

MR. SQUILLS.--”'There is a Secret; Find it out!'”

PISISTRATUS (pushed to the verge of human endurance, and upsetting tongs, poker, and fire-shovel).--”What nonsense you are talking, all of you! For Heaven's sake consider what an important matter we are called upon to decide. It is not now the t.i.tles of those very respectable works which issued from the Minerva Press that I ask you to remember,--it is to invent a t.i.tle for mine,--My Novel!”

MR. CAXTON (clapping his hands gently).--”Excellent! capital! Nothing can be better; simple, natural, pertinent, concise--”

PISISTRATUS.--”What is it, sir, what is it? Have you really thought of a t.i.tle to My Novel?”

MR. CAXTON.--”You have hit it yourself,--'My Novel.' It is your Novel; people will know it is your Novel. Turn and twist the English language as you will, be as allegorical as Hebrew, Greek, Roman, Fabulist, or Puritan, still, after all, it is your Novel, and nothing more nor less than your Novel.”