se Maylie and
Oliver, being the three last. None of these Dickens had seen until he
saw them in the book on the eve of its publication; when he so strongly
objected to one of them that it had to be canceled. "I returned suddenly
to town yesterday afternoon," he wrote to the artist at the end of
October, "to look at the latter pages of _Oliver Twist_ before it was
delivered to the booksellers, when I saw the majority of the plates in
the last volume for the first time. With reference to the last
one,--Rose Maylie and Oliver,--without entering into the question of
great haste, or any other cause, which may have led to its being what it
is, I am quite sure there can be little difference of opinion between us
with respect to the result. May I ask you whether you will object to
designing this plate afresh, and doing so _at once_, in order that as
few impressions as possible of the present one may go forth? I feel
confident you know me too well to feel hurt by this inquiry, and with
equal confidence in you I have lost no time in preferring it." This
letter, printed from a copy in Dickens's handwriting fortunately
committed to my keeping, entirely disposes of a wonderful story[18]
originally promulgated in America with a minute particularity of detail
that might have raised the reputation of Sir Benjamin Backbite himself.
Whether all Sir Benjamin's laurels, however, should fall to the person
by whom the tale is told,[19] or whether any part belongs to the
authority alleged for it, is unfortunately not quite clear. There would
hardly have been a doubt, if the fable had been confined to the other
side of the Atlantic; but it has been reproduced and widely circulated
on this side also; and the distinguished artist whom it calumniates by
attributing the invention to him has been left undefended from its
slander. Dickens's letter spares me the necessity of characterizing, by
the only word which would have been applicable to it, a tale of such
incredible and monstrous absurdity as that one of the masterpieces of
its author's genius had been merely an illustration of etchings by Mr.
Cruikshank!

The completed _Oliver Twist_ found a circle of admirers, not so wide in
its range as those of others of his books, but of a character and mark
that made their honest liking for it, and steady advocacy of it,
important to his fame; and the book has held its ground in the first
class of his writings. It deserves that place. The admitted
exagge