; _Master Humphrey's Clock_, 1840;
_Martin Chuzzlewit_, 1844; _Dombey and Son_, 1848; {270} _David
Copperfield_, 1850; and _Bleak House_, 1853, there is no falling off in
strength. The last named was, in some respects, and especially in the
skillful construction of the plot, his best novel. In some of his
latest books, as _Great Expectations_, 1861, and _Our Mutual Friend_,
1865, there are signs of a decline. This showed itself in an unnatural
exaggeration of characters and motives, and a painful straining after
humorous effects; faults, indeed, from which Dickens was never wholly
free. There was a histrionic side to him, which came out in his
fondness for private theatricals, in which he exhibited remarkable
talent, and in the dramatic action which he introduced into the
delightful public readings from his works that he gave before vast
audiences all over the United Kingdom, and in his two visits to
America. It is not surprising, either, to learn that upon the stage
his preference was for melodrama and farce. His own serious writing
was always dangerously close to the melodramatic, and his humor to the
farcical. There is much false art, bad taste, and even vulgarity in
Dickens. He was never quite a gentleman, and never succeeded well in
drawing gentlemen or ladies. In the region of low comedy he is easily
the most original, the most inexhaustible, the most wonderful of modern
humorists. Creations such as Mrs. Nickleby, Mr. Micawber, Sam Weller,
Sairy Gamp, take rank with Falstaff and Dogberry; while many others,
like Dick Swiveller, Stiggins, Chadband, Mrs. Jellyby, and Julia Mills
are almost {271} equally good. In the innumerable swarm of minor
characters with which he has enriched our comic literature, there is no
indistinctness. Indeed, the objection that has been made to him is
that his characters are too distinct--that he puts labels on them; that
they are often mere personifications of a single trick of speech or
manner, which becomes tedious and unnatural by repetition; thus,
Grandfather Smallweed is always settling down into his cushion, and
having to be shaken up; Mr. Jellyby is always sitting with his head
against the wall; Peggotty is always bursting her buttons off, etc.,
etc. As Dickens's humorous characters tend perpetually to run into
caricatures and grotesques, so his sentiment, from the same excess,
slops over too frequently into "gush," and into a too deliberate and
protracted attack upon