o amuse the man: because he does
not write with the artificial and often extremely arbitrary graces of
the composition books, that he is "not literature." If it be so, why in
the first case so much the worse for "the man," and in the second so
much the worse for literature. As a matter of fact, he has many of the
qualities of the novelist in a high degree: and if he were in the
fortunate position of an ancient classic, whose best works only survive,
these qualities could not fail of recognition. Much of his later work
simply ought not to count; for it was mere hack-labour, rendered, if not
necessary, very nearly so by the sailor's habit (which Marryat possessed
in the highest degree) of getting rid of money. Even among this,
_Masterman Ready_ and _The Children of the New Forest_, "children's
books," as they may be called, rank very high in their kind. But he
counts here, of course, for his sea-novels mainly: and in them there are
several things for us to notice. One is that Marryat had the true
quality of the craftsman, as distinguished from the amateur or the
chance-medley man who has a lucky inspiration. If it were the case that
his books derived their whole attraction from the novelty and (within
its limits) the variety of their sea-matter, then the first ought to be
the best, as in nearly all such cases is the fact. But _Frank Mildmay_
(1829), so far from being the best, is not far from being the worst of
Marryat's novels. Much--dangerously much--as he put of his own
experiences in the book, he did not know in the least how to manage
them. And if Frank is something of a bravo, more of a blackguard, and
nearly a complete ruffian, it is not merely because there was a good
deal of brutality in the old navy; not merely because Marryat's own
standard of chivalry was not quite that of Chaucer's Knight:--but
partly, also, because he was aiming blunderingly at what he supposed to
be part of the novelist's business--irregular as well as regular
gallantry, and highly seasoned adventure. But, like all good artists
(and like hardly anybody who has not the artistic quality in him), he
taught himself by his failure, even though he sometimes relapsed. Of
actual construction he was never a master. _The King's Own_, with its
overdose of history at the beginning and of melodrama at the end, is an
example. But his two masterpieces, _Peter Simple_ (1834) and _Mr.
Midshipman Easy_ (1836), are capital instances of what may be called
"part