sit through _Nickleby_ and to see a kind of merit in some of the
actors. Mr. Yates had a sufficiently humorous meaning in his wildest
extravagance, and Mr. O. Smith could put into his queer angular oddities
enough of a hard dry pathos, to conjure up shadows at least of Mantalini
and Newman Noggs; of Ralph Nickleby there was indeed nothing visible
save a wig, a spencer, and a pair of boots; but there was a quaint actor
named Wilkinson who proved equal to the drollery though not to the
fierce brutality of Squeers; and even Dickens, in the letter that amazed
me by telling me of his visit to the theatre, was able to praise "the
skillful management and dressing of the boys, the capital manner and
speech of Fanny Squeers, the dramatic representation of her card-party
in Squeers's parlor, the careful making-up of all the people, and the
exceedingly good tableaux formed from Browne's sketches. . . . Mrs.
Keeley's first appearance beside the fire (see wollum), and all the rest
of Smike, was excellent; bating sundry choice sentiments and rubbish
regarding the little robins in the fields which have been put in the
boy's mouth by Mr. Stirling the adapter." His toleration could hardly be
extended to the robins, and their author he very properly punished by
introducing and denouncing him at Mr. Crummles's farewell supper.

The story was well in hand at the next letter to be quoted, for I limit
myself to those only with allusions that are characteristic or
illustrative. "I must be alone in my glory to-day," he wrote, "and see
what I can do. I perpetrated a great amount of work yesterday, and have
every day indeed since Monday, but I must buckle-to again and endeavor
to get the steam up. If this were to go on long, I should 'bust' the
boiler. I think Mrs. Nickleby's love-scene will come out rather unique."
The steam doubtless rose dangerously high when such happy inspiration
came. It was but a few numbers earlier than this, while that eccentric
lady was imparting her confidences to Miss Knag, that Sydney Smith
confessed himself vanquished by a humor against which his own had long
striven to hold out. "_Nickleby_ is _very good_," he wrote to Sir George
Phillips after the sixth number. "I stood out against Mr. Dickens as
long as I could, but he has conquered me."[22]

The close of the story was written at Broadstairs, from which (he had
taken a house "two doors from the Albion Hotel, where we had that merry
night two years ago") he wrot