Page:The life and writings of Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870) (IA lifewritingsofal00spurrich).pdf/312

 of a writer like Dumas is a portentous phenomenon, and the avidity with which his invariably immoral and generally licentious fictions are devoured is the most severe condemnation of modern, and especially of French society, that could well be pronounced."

That is pretty well, and one is rather relieved, for Dumas's sake, to find that the biographer has previously declared that the novelist did not write his own books at all. We read further of "the savage voluptuousness" of his books (the "savage voluptuousness" of the "Tulipe Noire" is good), of his "astounding quackery," and of his "sweating system" of production. Need we add that the "brief biography" refers us to "De Mirecourt"?

Happily the "Encyclopædia" has retrieved itself, and its latest edition contains a sketch of Dumas's life, from the pen of Mr W. E. Henley, which, in the old-fashioned language of our fathers, "does equal honour to that writer's head and heart." We learn from R. L. Stevenson's "Letters" that his collaborator in "Beau Austin" was contemplating a book on Dumas some years ago. There is, indeed, a passage in "Memories and Portraits" which was written al Henley—"something about Dumas still waiting his biographer." It is truly a pity that the author of "Views and Reviews" never wrote this book, and did not obviate the necessity for the present work by giving the public