Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 133.djvu/20

14 Now Fielding is really a novelist in the more natural sense. We are interested, that is, by the main characters, though they are not always the most attractive in themselves. We are really absorbed by the play of their passions and the conflict of their motives, and not merely taking advantage of the company to see the surrounding scenery or phases of social life. In this sense Fielding's art is admirable, and surpassed that of all his English predecessors as of most of his successors. If the light is concentrated in a narrow focus, it is still healthy daylight. So long as we do not wish to leave his circle of ideas, we see little fault in the vigor with which he fulfils his intention. And therefore, whatever Fielding's other faults, he is beyond comparison the most faithful and profound mouthpiece of the passions and failings of a society which seems at once strangely remote and yet strangely near to us. When seeking to solve that curious problem which is discussed in one of Hazlitt's best essays—what characters one would most like to have met? and running over the various claims of a meeting at the Mermaid with Shakespeare and Jonson, a "neat repast of Attic taste" with Milton, a gossip at Button's with Addison and Steele, a club-dinner with Johnson and Burke, a supper with Lamb, or (certainly the least attractive) an evening at Holland House, I sometimes fancy that, after all, few things would be pleasanter than a pipe and a bowl of punch with Fielding and Hogarth. It is true that for such a purpose I provide myself in imagination with a new set of sturdy nerves and with a digestion such as that which was once equal to the horrors of an undergraduates' "wine party." But, having made that trifling assumption, I fancy that there would be few places where one would hear more good mother wit, shrewder judgments of men and things, or a sounder appreciation of those homely elements of which human life is in fact chiefly composed. Common sense in the highest degree—whether we choose to identify it or contrast it with genius, is at least one of the most enduring and valuable of qualities in literature as everywhere else; and Fielding is one of its best representatives. But perhaps one is unduly biassed by the charm of a complete escape in imagination from the thousand and one affectations which have grown up since Fielding died and we have all become so much wiser and more learned than all previous generations.

is very hard to be obliged to alter our relationships with our friends, and still more hard to alter the habits which have shaped our lives. Mr. Beresford, when he was forbidden to continue his visits to his neighbor, was like a man stranded, not knowing what to make of himself. When the evening came he went to his library as usual, and made an attempt to settle to his work, as he called it. But long before the hour at which with placid regularity he had been used to go to Mrs. Meredith's, he got uneasy. Knowing that his happy habit was to be disturbed, he was restless and uncomfortable even before the habitual moment came. He could not read, he could not write—how was he to spend the slowly moving moments, and how to account to her for the disturbance of the usual routine? Should he write and tell her that he was going out, that he had received a sudden invitation or a sudden commission? When he was debating this question in his mind, Edward came in with a very grave face to say that his mother was ill and unable to see any one.

"She said you had better be told," said Edward; "she has gone to her room. She has a—headache. She cannot see any one to-night."

"Mr. Sommerville has been with you; has he anything to do with your mother's headache?"

"I think so," said Edward, angrily—"old meddler; but she seems to think we must put up with him. I wish my father would come home and look after his own affairs."

"It was a mission from your father, then?" Mr. Beresford was silent for a moment, thinking with somewhat sombre dissatisfaction of the absent Meredith. Would it be so pleasant to see him come home? Would the unaccustomed presence of the master be an advantage to the house? He could not be so insincere as to echo Edward's wish; but he was moved sympathetically towards the youth, who certainly was quite unsuspicious of him, whatever other people might be. "Go up-stairs and see Cara," he said; "she is in the drawing-room."

The young man's face brightened. Oswald was absent; he was not as usual in