Page:The black man - his antecedents, his genius, and his achievements (IA blackmanantecede00browrich).pdf/139

 thirty-eight years. During this time he has published more novels, plays, travels, and historical sketches than any other man that ever lived. It is well understood that he is not the author of all the works that appear under his name, but that young writers gain a living by working out the plots and situations that his fecund brain suggests. When the novel or the play is complete, Dumas gives it a revision, touches up the dialogue, dashes in here and there a spirited scene of his own, and then receives from the publisher an enormous sum. Undeniably a man of great genius, endowed with true fertility of imagination, and masterly power of expression, his influence has been great.

Such is the vivacity of his descriptions, such the entrainement of his narrative, such the boldness of his invention, such the point of his dialogue, and the rapidity of his incidents, so matchless often the felicity and skill of particular passages, that he always inflames the interest of the reader to the end. You may be angry with him, but you will confess that he is the opposite of tedious. Certainly no writer fills a more prominent place in the literature of his country; and none has exercised a more potent influence upon its recent development than this son of the negro general, Dumas. His novels are every where, and the enthusiasm with which his dramatic pieces were received has been of the most flattering character.