which I hid them ;—if you ask me, I say, to explain how that very woman was suddenly converted from a remorseless foe into a saving guardian, I can only answer by no wit, no device, no persuasive art of mine. Providence softened her heart, and made it kind, just at the moment when no other agency on earth could have rescued us from-from-"

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Say no more- -I guess! the paper this woman showed me was a legal form authorising your poor little Sophy to be given up to the care of a father. I guess! of that father you would not speak ill to me; yet from that father you would save your grandchild. Say no more. And yon quiet home-your humble employment, really content you?"

"Oh, if such a life can but last! Sophy is so well, so cheerful, so happy. Did not you hear her singing the other day? She never used to sing! But we had not been here a week when song broke out from her, untaught as from a bird. But if any ill report of me travel hither from Gatesboro', or elsewhere, we should be sent away, and the bird would be mute in my thorn tree-Sophy would sing no more.'

"Do not fear that slander shall drive you hence. Lady Montfort, you know, is my cousin, but you know not-few do-how thoroughly generous and gentle-hearted she is. I will speak of you to her-Oh, do not look alarmed. She will take my word when I tell her, that is a good man; and if she ask more, it will be enough to say, those who have known better days are loth to speak to strangers of the past." "I thank you earnestly, sincerely," said Waife, brightening up. favour more if you saw in the formal document shown to you, or retain on your memory, the name of --of the person authorised to claim Sophy as his child, you will not mention it to Lady Montfort. I am not sure if ever she heard that name, but she may have done so-and-and-" He paused a moment, and seemed to muse; then went on, not concluding his sentence. "You are so good to

"One

me, Mr Morley, that I wish to confide in you as far as I can. Now, you see I am already an old man, and my chief object is to raise up a friend for Sophy when I am gone-a friend in her own sex, sir. Oh, you cannot guess how I long-how I yearn to view that child under the holy fostering eyes of woman. Perhaps if Lady Montfort saw my pretty Sophy, she might take a fancy to her. Oh, if she did-if she did! And Sophy," added Waife proudly, "has a right to respect. She is not like me-any hovel good enough for me: But for her!-Do you know that I conceived that hope-that the hope helped to lead me back here when, months ago, I was at Humberston, intent upon rescuing Sophy; and saw, though," observed Waife, with a sly twitch of the muscles round his mouth, "I had no right at that precise moment to be seeing anything-Lady Montfort's humane fear for a blind old impostor, who was trying to save his dog a black dog, sir, who had dyed his hair,from her carriage wheels. And the hope became stronger still, when, the first Sunday I attended yon village church, I again saw that fairwonderously fair-face at the far end -fair as moonlight and as melancholy. Strange it is, sir, that I, naturally a boisterous mirthful man, and now a shy, skulking fugitive-feel more attracted, more allured toward a countenance, in proportion as I read there the trace of sadness. I feel less abashed by my own nothingness-more emboldened to approach and say Not so far apart from me, thou too hast suffered -Why is this?"

GEORGE MORLEY.-"The fool hath said in his heart that there is no God;' but the fool hath not said in his heart that there is no sorrow”— pithy and most profound sentence; intimating the irrefragable chain that binds men to the Father. And where the chain tightens, the children are closer drawn together. But to your wish-I will remember it. And when my cousin returns, she shall see your Sophy."

tell me that bad books and "damned" plays are produced, and as these must have had authors, ergo authors of bad works must exist. But let us scrutinise this position. It is perfectly true that many books, not of supreme excellence, and many plays inferior to those of Shakespeare and Sheridan, have been, and are, constantly brought before the public. The critics, with unfaltering severity, expose what they consider the pretension, the dulness, the inaccuracy, the pertness, the plagiarism, and the platitude of their works. The audience yawn, cough, blow their noses with uneasy iteration, and finally hiss these plays. No copies are sold, and those unkindly “presented by the author" are, with equal unkindness, left unread. With such evidence before him, the hasty inquirer is apt to pronounce, Here we have a really bad work; here all the claims to ignominy unite. Yet such a judgment is hasty, and vanishes before extended investigation. You have only to get introduced to the author, and from his lips you will learn the true explanations of these unfavourable reviews, and hissing audiences; explanations which place the book in a very different light.

To begin with the reviews. It may be taken as a law, not less universal than that of gravitation, that no man is ever unfavourably criticised except by an enemy. In every case apply to the fountain-head, ask the reviewed author, and he will enter into minute particulars. He will tell you quietly, or indignantly, as the case may be, that he knows the reviewer, and knows why he is so hostile. This "why" has never, I assure you, the slightest reference to any possible demerit in the book. The author and his critic have met at the club, or in society, "where I kept aloof, sir; didn't choose to cultivate him, and he saw it." Or they have quarrelled, and the criticism is revenge. Or the author has spoken slightingly of the critic's powers. Or the critic is himself engaged on a similar work. Or the critic has a "personal feeling against my publisher." One or all of these motives may have dictated the review, but never the intrinsic badness

of the book.

Philosophers tell you that Consciousness is higher than evidence. Consciousness frequently overrides all evidence, and is employed as the strongest of weapons. Granting this, does it not seem clear that when the author is conscious of his critic's personal malevolence, no amount of counter-evidence can avail? So deeply rooted is this conviction that unfavourable reviews are always inspired by personal impulses, quite removed from those of simple intellect, that we must accept it among the ultimate facts of consciousness, against which argument is idle.

It may be noticed, parenthetically, that the author is by no means so ready to suppose that when he is praised, the praise is an expression of friendliness; and that when on inquiry the severe critic turns out to be one personally a stranger to the author, he cannot contain his surprise. ĺ have heard one say with the utmost naïveté: "I can't think why Blank should have written that notice, I never offended him." Another once expressed great indignation to me at an unfavourable review from a critic whom he had quoted and praised in his preface! This was, indeed, dastardly conduct on the part of the critic.

We thus perceive, that inasmuch as extended investigation always elicits some personal unfriendliness in the critic, no amount of condemnation in the reviews can guide us to the author of a really bad book. A similar result issues from an examination of the hissing audiences. The house was known to be "full of enemies." They went to the theatre determined to "damn" the piece. It is true the author's friends were mustered pretty strong by him, yet they were outnumbered. Besides Grogrum didn't know his part, and Miss Bilkers was totally incapable of doing justice to Juliana: thus all the "effects" of the play were missed, and its failure was inevitable.

But go to the fountain-head, ask the author, or his wife, or his sister, or his mother, they will eloquently assure you that Charles has been treated "most unjustly," the press having been disgracefully unfair, for the work "is really beautiful, as I am

sure you will say, if you read it." They will further tell you, that if the Spectator and Examiner affect to despise this fine production, other reviewers have been more honest, and they lay before you laudatory critiques from the Cumberland Courant and the Gateshead Times. As to Charles himself, he despises the critics and "bides his time." All great writers have been opposed, vilified, misrepresented, but posterity is just. With a sickly smile as if he were amiably struggling with the cholic, he sets

criticism at defiance, and, as Boileau says,

"Lui-même s'applaudissant à son maigre génie,

Se donne par ses mains l'encens qu'on lui dénie."

Now, I ask, can this be the author of a really bad book? Absurd. The book was excellent, but its success was hindered by certain extraneous obstacles. We must look elsewhere for our bad author: this is clearly not the man.

I have had many babies thrust under my nose to kiss and admire, some of them which, to my inexperienced eyes, seemed like mere lumps of mortality, with the complexion of a Cambridge sausage, and features of a general squashiness: fat babies, bloated babies, brickdust-coloured babies, yellow babies, and skinny babies-but an ugly baby I have never seen. Moreover I have had my amiable temper slightly ruffled by the howling and fretting of those interesting embryos. I have had my whiskers mercilessly tugged by their fat fingers, and my shirt-front dabbled by the same, holding a well-sucked crust of bread; but a disagreeable baby has not yet made its appearance. True it is, that had I relied solely on my own impressions, a fastidious taste would have prompted a very unequivocal judgment in these cases, and I should have recommended immediate boiling as the one thing needful to be done with such babies. But a philosopher will not rely on his single impressions: he inquires, investigates, compares. Personal beauty and personal attractiveness are too volatile for fixed formulas; they escape the rigours of demonstration, and appeal wholly to sentiment. Now sentiment is personal, relative, subjective; one man's liking is as legitimate as another's. What Charles thinks insipid, Philip thinks enchanting, and both are right. When, therefore, distrusting the limitation of my own finite nature, and my own imperfect experience of babydom, I sought for confirmation of my opinion among those whose greater experi

no

ence invested them with authority, I invariably found myself in direct opposition to some one more competent. I was told that I was judge of babies ;" and indeed I am far from being a connoisseur in that interesting branch of the Fine Arts. The mother, the nurse, the aunts, the elder sisters, the proud father, the unobtrusive mother-in-law, and the much-experienced Mrs Muggeridge, "expecting her ninth," were, one and all, in a high state of æsthetic enthusiasm about this very baby which I had declared, with all politeness, but with a sincerity how misplaced! to fall somewhat short of my ideal of humanity in long clothes. They pointed to its head, which Mr Thickskull the phrenologist had assured them was remarkably fine in its developments. They pointed to its lovely hair (a thin sprinkling of colourless fluff); to its legs-had I ever seen such legs? (I had seen pale polonies much resembling them); to its nose (a dab of putty); to its sweet mouth - and then what eyes! what intelligence ! what mind! In fact I was overwhelmed with details and arguments all proving this particular baby to be the "sweetest love ;" and as my opponents were persons apparently versed in the varieties of the species, I could only conclude that my opinion was the result of ignorance.

Philosophers have long vainly striven to fix a standard of Beauty. Whether they will ever succeed may be a question; but it is certain they will never succeed in fixing a standard for babies, because that is ne