(1889), and My Lady Nicotine in 1890. The Little Minister (1891) was his first attempt at a long novel. Margaret Ogilvy (a biography of his mother) and Sentimental Tommy appeared in 1896, the latter being followed by a sequel-Tommy and Grizel, in 1900. He was created a baronet in 1913, and awarded the Order of Merit in 1922. Sir James Barrie's literary career may be said to have closed with the 19th century, and his later work has been done almost entirely for the stage, to which he has contributed in The Admirable Crichton perhaps the best modern comedy. His reputation as a writer rests principally upon the sketches of Scottish village life, for in the longer novels it is only when he is concerned with that subject that he walks with a sure step. He continued the work begun by Sir Walter Scott and John Galt in revealing the humour and pathos of the Scottish peasantry, but with a subtlety of art and economy of words unknown to the earlier masters. Certain sketches in Auld Licht Idylls and A Window in Thrums, and certain chapters in The Little Minister and Sentimental Tommy have not been excelled in their grave beauty and fidelity. In that domain he is an austere artist; when he treats of other spheres his work is apt to be marred by theatricality and faults of taste. What is known as the "Kailyard School" in Scottish fiction followed in his steps till the over-cultivation of a small province ended in something not unlike burlesque.

ESSAYISTS AND CRITICS

The latter half of the 19th century was not rich, as the first half had been, in essayists who dealt with the minor moralities and the comedy of life, or in critics whose purpose was purely æsthetic. Men like Ruskin and Arnold had always a didactic aim, and are more properly ranked with the school of reflection, great as was their critical influence. The names in what is commonly called "belles-lettres" are few in number, and the tradition of Lamb and Hazlitt and Leigh Hunt was obscured by a thousand new impulses. There are only two acknowledged masters of the leisured essay, Walter Pater and R. L. Stevenson.

Walter Pater. Walter Pater (1839-94) was born in London and educated at King's School, Canterbury, and at Queen's College, Oxford. Elected to a fellowship at Brasenose in 1862, he spent the rest of his life in Oxford and in London, and, more than most scholars, avoided successfully and deliberately any personal contact with what is called ordinary life. The dates of his published volumes are almost the only landmarks in his career. If he lived somewhat aloof from humanity, his books stand also apart from the publications of his day. He belonged to "the æsthetes "--a cult which began with Ruskin and was represented in painting by the Pre-Raphaelites, and in poetry by Swinburne and Rossetti. Pater is its only notable prose representative. It was an attempt to express romance in a classical form, to impose "comely order " upon "curiosity and the love of beauty." Its philosophy expounded, in the language of Christianity, a form of Paganism which

life and

had none of the pagan joyousness. Its votaries sought to " maximize extract the utmost intellectual and emotional satisfaction from the fleeting moment. The cultivated mind became the test both in art and ethics, and the critic was apt to be drawn into strange side alleys and esoteric faiths.

Pater was probably, after Matthew Arnold, the greatest purely critical influence in later Victorian literature. But besides his critical work, he has left us a series of imaginary portraits and studies in spiritual development, embodying his creed of art and life. He possessed in a high degree the historical sense, and had a singular power of recreating the atmosphere and the modes of thought of a past age. style has been highly praised and much imitated, though it is a difficult model to follow. Its faults are its occasional monotony and superfineness, the sentences being built up cell by cell, like a honeycomb, with the result that at times the rhythm is lost. But at its best its cadences are as exquisite and intangible as an air of music, and no man has a greater gift for haunting and unforgettable phrases. His first notable work was Studies in the History of the Renaissance (1873), containing chapters on "Pico della Mirandola," "Botticelli," "Luca della Robbia," "Michelangelo's Poetry," "Leonardo da Vinci," "The School of Giorgione," "Du Bellay," Winckelmann," and a famous postscript, in which Pater sets forth his philosophy of life. In 1885 appeared his chief work, Marius the Epicurean, the spiritual history of the life of a young Roman in the age of the Antonines, who dies on the eve of finding salvation in the Christian Church. Imaginary Portraits (1887) continued this work of spiritual biography. The volume includes "A Prince of Court Painters (Watteau), Sebastian van Storck," "Denys l'Auxerrois," and "Duke Carl of Rosenmold." Appreciations (1889) is a volume of literary criticism, and includes, besides the famous essay on Style," papers on papers on "Wordsworth," "Coleridge," "Lamb," "Sir Thomas Browne," "Shakespeare," "Rossetti," and "O. Feuillet's La Morte." Greek Studies (1895) contained "A Study of Dionysus," "The Bacchanals of Euripides," "Hippolytus Veiled: a Study from Euripides," "The Beginnings of Greek Sculpture," "The Marbles of Ægina," and "The Age of Athletic Prizemen : a Chapter in Greek Art." Miscellaneous Studies (1895) contained chapters on "Merimée," "Raphael," "Pascal," "Vezelay," "Apollo in Picardy," "Emerald Uthwart," and " Diaphaneite," in which last Pater reveals something of his boyhood. Gaston de Latour (1896) is an unfinished "imaginary portrait," a philosophical romance of France during the religious wars. Ronsard and Montaigne are among the characters, and the massacre of St. Bartholomew is an incident. Essays from The Guardian" (1901) is a collection of short studies and reviews.

Pater worked in a narrow field, but his success within its limits was absolute, both in the substance and the manner of his writing. He began by yielding to what he calls the "chaotic variety and perplexity of interests" which characterized his own age. But as he grew older his selection grew more fastidious, and he returned to the central classical tradition. His genius was contemplative rather than creative. He had, however, one supreme constructive power-that of realizing

the mental processes of his characters, and if his people are apt to be otherwise pale, diaphanous shades, we know intimately the movements of their minds. He was a great portrayer of souls, and his famous style, with its needle-point fineness, was a perfect weapon for his rare and curious talent. His will never be a wide influence in literature, but it must be an abiding one.

Robert Louis Stevenson.-Stevenson was at his greatest as a novelist, though he is most perfect in his essays. Indeed, there can be no question that as an essayist in the vein of Lamb and Hazlitt he is the greatest which the later 19th century produced. To this type of writing he brought the main essential, charm of personality, and his style is as full of light, shadow, and music as a brook.

Stevenson's first literary efforts were notes on travel, and some of his most attractive work is to be found in this genre. An Inland Voyage and Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes (1878–9) revealed his style in its most daring and capricious form. The Silverado Squatters (1893) is a series of studies of the author's life among the Californian mountains. Edinburgh: Picturesque Notes (1889) is a brilliant impressionist picture of life in the Scottish capital. In the South Seas (1900) is a story of the author's cruise in a yacht during 1888-9 among the Marquesas, the Paumotus, and the Gilberts. Essays of Travel (1905) is a collection of scattered carnets de voyage. Stevenson looked upon life as an adventure, and, seeking romance, he found it, so that the episodes of his autobiography read like pages from his novels. In this group may be classed A Footnote to History (1892), dealing with German maladministration in Samoa-almost his only attempt at handling a political episode.

Of the essays proper, the first volume, Virginibus Puerisque (1881), is written in the manner of Travels with a Donkey, and, in spite of the often self-conscious and modish style, its most notable feature is its wise and acute reflections on conduct. Memories and Portraits (1887) contains some of the most famous essays, such as "Old Mortality," "The Foreigner at Home," and "A Gossip on Romance." Across the Plains (1892) contains "The Lantern Bearers," the chapter on " Fontainebleau," A Christmas Sermon," and "Pulvis et Umbra." Familiar Studies of Men and Books (1882) is Stevenson's main contribution to literary criticism, and deals with "Victor Hugo's Romances," "Burns," "Walt Whitman," Walt Whitman,” “Thoreau,” Thoreau," "François Villon," Charles of Orleans," "Pepys," and "John Knox." With this volume may be classed Essays on the Art of Writing, in which Stevenson analyses the rules of his own craft.

He has also written a number of poems which show that he had a delicate lyrical gift, and a remarkable purity and simplicity of style. A Child's Garden of Verses shows his power of envisaging the child's mind. Underwoods (1887) contains a section of Scottish verse which is probably the best since Burns. Ballads (1890), Songs of Travel (1896), and New Poems (1898), complete his contributions to poetry. It is perhaps true to say that, with the exception of The Child's Garden, Stevenson's poems are the work of an accomplished literary artist attempting a form which

hardly came natural to him. In addition to his published work he left a large number of letters, which rank among the best in modern literature.

The philosophy of his miscellaneous work is of the same simple and forthright kind that we have observed in his novels. It is a gospel of happiness, gaiety, and courage; but it is never trite, because, while his conclusions are simple, his observation is acute and his mind capable often of a rare subtlety. His exacting conscience is as notable in his style as in his ethical judgments. He sought purity and simplicity in language—what he has called "the piety of speech," and though this was often attained by, in his phrase, "skimming and skimming the pot," yet the labour, except in his earliest works, is never apparent. His essays are companionable books, and to read them is like listening to the talk of a fellow-traveller, wise, witty, kindly, deeply learned in the human heart, but always with something elfin in the background.

SUPPLEMENTARY READING LIST

Texts.-MEREDITH: The novels are published by Constable in various editions; Poems (Constable, 1902), and Letters (2 vols., Constable, 1912).-HARDY: A complete edition of the works is published by Macmillan. The Poetical Works and The Dynasts can also be had separately.-STEVENSON: Of Stevenson's works there are four uniform editions-the Edinburgh, the Pentland, the Swanston, and the Vailima -and they can also be had in editions at various prices published by Chatto. The Letters are issued in 4 vols. by Methuen.-GISSING: A considerable number of his novels are out of print; but the best are published in cheap editions by Nelson.-KIPLING: There are several complete editions of his works, published by Macmillan. His poetry is issued by Methuen and by Hodder and Stoughton.-PATER: Several uniform editions of his complete works are published by Macmillan.

Studies.-G. M. Trevelyan's The Poetry and Philosophy of Meredith (Constable, 1906) is by far the best book. See also Mrs. Sturge Henderson's George Meredith (Methuen, 1907), Photiadès' George Meredith, his Life, etc., trans. by A. Price (Constable, 1913), and Moffatt's George Meredith: a Primer to the Novels (Hodder, 1909).-Lionel Johnson's Art of Thomas Hardy (Lane, 1895); F. A. Hedgcock's Hardy: Essai de Critique (Paris, 1910).-STEVENSON: There is an immense amount of criticism of Stevenson's work. The best is an essay by Henry James in his Partial Portraits (Macmillan, 1905), and Sir Walter Raleigh's Stevenson (Arnold). See also Leslie Stephen's Studies of a Biographer, A. Lang's Essays in Little, and E. Gosse's Questions at Issue.-KIPLING: There is a Kipling Primer published by Chatto, and a Kipling Dictionary published by Routledge; see also W. M. Hart's Kipling the Storyteller (University of California Press, 1918). Criticism may be found in Lang's Essays in Little and Gosse's Questions at Issue.-PATER: Among critical studies of Pater may be mentioned those by E. Gosse in Critical Kit-Kats (Heinemann, 1896), A. Cecil in Six Oxford Thinkers (Murray, 1909), Professor Saintsbury in his History of Criticism, Vol. III. (Blackwood, 1904), John Buchan in Brasenose College Monographs, Vol. II. (Blackwell, Oxford, 1909). Oliver Elton's Survey of English Literature, 1830–80 (2 vols., Arnold, 1920), is a good general survey, and an excellent study of technique is Percy Lubbock's The Craft of Fiction (Cape, 1921).

CHAPTER II. THE LANGUAGE

Vocabulary-Literary Usage-Spoken Usage-Spelling

The 19th century, or second period of Modern English, is characterized mainly by the great development which the vocabulary has undergone.

The Vocabulary has been enlarged in various ways: (1) The mechanical discoveries and inventions of the last hundred years and the advance of scientific knowledge have added largely to the technical vocabulary, and this has encouraged the coinage of" proper terms " to express scientific and intellectual ideas.

Many of the new proper terms of science and rhetoric might well be styled inkhornisms— cf. enneastich, postprandial, epiphenomenalism, matutinal.

(2) The new interest in early literature and in dialect has enriched the vocabulary with native words which had fallen out of use since the 16th and 17th centuries. To these must be added archaic words revived through the literary diction of Morris, and especially through his Old English poems and translations from the Sagas.

(3) The use of class and technical slang and the adoption of colonial and American variants and colloquialisms have become widespread in the spoken and even in the literary usage.

(4) The borrowing of foreign words has increased under the influence of foreign travel, and the more widely diffused knowledge of foreign literature and thought.

The Literary Usage has become less rhetorical and has developed in closer connection with the spoken usage, becoming like it more technical. The modern stylistic development in prose and verse has been in this direction also, combining the best spoken usage with free admission both of colloquial and of technical language in literature.

The Spoken Usage. The greater facilities of travel and communication and the general accessibility of education have spread the received usage more widely both as to class and area, and have thus rendered it more susceptible to dialectal variation. As a whole the spoken language has tended to become less formal and rhetorical, and colloquialisms and slang to be more generally employed. More formal constructions like the use of the subjunctive are in process of disappearing, and "it is I" is becoming pedantic.

In pronunciation few changes have occurred. The o in words like no (nou) has become more open, half-way to the Cockney (nau). The old pronunciation of gold, Rome (goold, room) indicated by the name Gould and the rhyme Rome: doom (Shakespeare, Dryden) was given up about 1830.