dull and conventional thing.

It has been often noted how a mere trifle will, in an extraordinary way, determine or change the whole course of a life. I can illustrate this by my own case. I was plodding on contentedly at the Bar without getting "no forrarder," with slender meagre prospects, but with a hankering after "writing," when I came to read this Life of Goldsmith that I have just been describing, which filled me with admiration. The author was at the moment gathering materials for his Life of Swift, when it occurred to me that I might be useful to him in getting up all the local Swiftian relics, traditions, etc. I set to work, obtained them, made the sketches, and sent them to him in a batch. He was supremely grateful, and never forgot the volunteered trifling service. To it I owe a host of literary friends and acquaintance with the "great guns," Dickens, Carlyle, and the rest; and when I ventured to try my prentice pen, it was Forster who took personal charge of the venture. It was long remembered at the Household Words office how he stalked in one morning, stick in hand, and, flinging down the paper, called out, "Now, mind, no nonsense about it, no humbug, no returning it with a polite circular, and all that; see that it is read and duly considered." That was the turning-point. To that blunt declaration I owe some forty years of enjoyment and employment—for there is no enjoyment like that of writing—to say nothing of money in abundance.

He once paid a visit to Dublin, when we had many an agreeable expedition to Swift's haunts, which, from the incuriousness of the place at the time, were still existing. We went to Hoey's Court in "The Liberties," a squalid alley with a few ruined houses, among which was the one in which Swift was born. Thence to St. Patrick's, to Marsh's Library, not then rebuilt, where he turned over with infinite interest Swift's well-noted folios. Then on to Trinity College, where there was much that was curious; to Swift's Hospital, where, from his office in the Lunacy Commission, he was quite at home. He at once characteristically assumed the air of command, introducing himself with grave dignity to the authorities, by-and-bye pointing out matters which might be amended, among others the bareness of the walls, which were without pictures. In the grounds he received all the confidences of the unhappy patients and their complaints (one young fellow bitterly appealing to him on the hardship of not being allowed to smoke, while he had a pipe in his mouth at the time). He would pat others on the back and encourage them in quite a professional manner. Of all these Swift localities I had made little vignette drawings in "wash," which greatly pleased him and were to have been engraved in the book. They are now duly registered and to be seen in the collection at South Kensington. Poor dear Forster! How happy he was on that "shoemaker's holiday" of his, driving on outside cars (with infinite difficulty holding on), walking the streets, seeing old friends, and delighted with everything. His old friend and class fellow, Whiteside, gave him a dinner to which I attended him, where was the late Dr. Lloyd, the Provost of the College, a learned man, whose works on "Optics" are well known. It was pleasant to note how Forster, like his prototype, the redoubtable Doctor, here "talked for ostentation." "I knew, sir," he might say, "that I was expected to talk, to talk suitably to my position as a distinguished visitor." And so he did. It was an excellent lesson in conversation to note how he took the lead—"laid down the law," while poor Whiteside flourished away in a torrent of words, and the placid Lloyd more adroitly strove occasionally to "get in." But Forster held his way with well-rounded periods, and seemed to enjoy entangling his old friend in the consequences of some exuberant exaggeration. "My dear Whiteside, how can you say so? Do you not see that by saying such a thing you give yourself away?" etc.

Forster, however, more than redeemed himself when he issued his well-known Life of Dickens, a work that was a perfect delight to the world and to his friends. For here is the proper lightness of touch. The complete familiarity with every detail of the course of the man of whose life his had been a portion, and the quiet air of authority which he could assume in consequence, gave the work an attraction that was beyond dispute. There have been, it is said, some fifteen or sixteen official Lives issued since the writer's death; but all these are written "from outside" as it were, and it is extraordinary what a different man each presents. But hardly sufficient credit has been given to him for the finished style which only a true and well trained critic could have brought, the easy touch, the appropriate treatment of trifles, the mere indication as it were, the correct passing by or sliding over of matters that should not be touched. All this imparted a dignity of treatment, and though familiar, the whole was gay and bright. True, occasionally he lapsed into his favourite pompousness and autocracy, but this made the work more characteristic of the man. Nothing could have been in better taste than his treatment of certain passages in the author's life as to which, he showed, the public were not entitled to demand more than the mere historical mention of the facts. When he was writing this Life it was amusing to find how sturdily independent he became. The "Blacking episode" could not have been acceptable, but Forster was stern and would not bate a line. So, with much more—he "rubbed it in" without scruple. The true reason, by the way, of the uproar raised against the writer, was that it was too much of a close borough, no one but Boz and his Bear leader being allowed upon the stage. Numbers had their little letters from the great man with many compliments and favours which would look well in print. Many, like Wilkie Collins or Edmund Yates, had a whole collection. I myself had some sixty or seventy. Some of these personages were highly indignant, for were they not characters in the drama? When the family came to publish the collection of letters, Yates, I believe, declined to allow his to be printed; so did Collins, whose Boz letters were later sold and published in America.

No doubt the subject inspired. The ever gay and lively Boz, always in spirits, called up many a happy scene, and gave the pen a certain airiness and nimbleness. There is little that is official or magisterial about the volumes. Everything is pleasant and interesting, put together—though there is a crowd of details—with extraordinary art and finish. It furnishes a most truthful and accurate picture of the "inimitable," recognizable in every page. It was only in the third volume, when scared by the persistent clamours of the disappointed and the envious, protesting that there was "too much Forster," that it was virtually a "Life of John Forster, with some recollections of Charles Dickens," that he became of a sudden, official and allowed others to come too much on the scene, with much loss of effect. That third volume, which ought to have been most interesting, is the dull one. We have Boz described as he would be in an encyclopædia, instead of through Forster, acting as his interpreter, and much was lost by this treatment. Considering the homeliness and every-day character of the incidents, it is astonishing how Forster contrived to dignify them. He knew from early training what was valuable and significant and what should be rejected.

Granting the objections—and faults—of the book, it may be asked, who else in the 'seventies was, not so fitted, but fitted at all to produce a Life of Dickens. Every eye looked, every finger pointed