lar times, to separate from the people who for
twenty months had been a part of himself. The increased success they had
achieved left no present room but for gladness and well-won pride; and
so, to welcome them into the immortal family of the English novel, and
open cheerily to their author "fresh woods and pastures new," we had the
dinner celebration. But there is small need now to speak of what has
left, to one of the few survivors, only the sadness of remembering that
all who made the happiness of it are passed away. There was Talfourd,
facile and fluent of kindliest speech, with whom we were in constant and
cordial intercourse, and to whom, grateful for his copyright exertions
in the House of Commons, he had dedicated _Pickwick_; there was Maclise,
dear and familiar friend to us both, whose lately-painted portrait of
Dickens hung in the room;[23] and there was the painter of the Rent-day,
who made a speech as good as his pictures, rich in color and quaint with
homely allusion, all about the reality of Dickens's genius, and how
there had been nothing like him issuing his novels part by part since
Richardson issued his novels volume by volume, and how in both cases
people talked about the characters as if they were next-door neighbors
or friends; and as many letters were written to the author of _Nickleby_
to implore him not to kill poor Smike, as had been sent by young ladies
to the author of _Clarissa_ to "save Lovelace's soul alive." These and
others are gone. Of those who survive, only three arise to my
memory,--Macready, who spoke his sense of the honor done him by the
dedication in English as good as his delivery of it, Mr. Edward Chapman,
and Mr. Thomas Beard.

FOOTNOTES:

[21] "I cannot call to mind now how I came to hear about Yorkshire
schools when I was a not very robust child, sitting in by-places near
Rochester castle, with a head full of Partridge, Strap, Tom Pipes, and
Sancho Panza; but I know that my first impressions of them were picked
up at that time."

[22] Moore, in his _Diary_ (April, 1837), describes Sydney crying down
Dickens at a dinner in the Row, "and evidently without having given him
a fair trial."

[23] This portrait was given to Dickens by his publishers, for whom it
was painted with a view to an engraving for _Nickleby_, which, however,
was poorly executed, and of a size too small to do the original any kind
of justice. To the courtesy of its present possessor, the Rev. Sir
Edward