xercise
great influence upon public opinion, so that their forecast of the
course and tendencies of fiction is worth bearing in mind. We
ourselves are ever a restless, bustling, far-wandering folk, great
lovers of fiction and travel, who not only carry forth the English
language into the uttermost parts of the earth, to be moulded in
strange dialects to queer uses, but also bring back fresh ideas and
incidents, and various aspects of a many-sided world-ranging life. If,
as has been often asserted, literature be the collective expression of
the ideas and aspirations, the tastes, feelings, and habits of the
generation which produces it, we may not be altogether wrong in
treating the short highly finished story, whether of adventure or
manners, as the impress and reflection of modern English society. But
no operation is more delicate than the endeavour to trace the subtle
connection between constant modifications of literary form and the
pressure of its ever-changing moral and material environment.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The list of these contributions at page 477 of his _Life_ is not
complete.

[2] (1) _The English Novel._ By Walter Raleigh. Being a short Sketch
of its History from the Earliest Times to the Appearance of
'Waverley.' London, 1894. (2) _Aventures de Guerre au temps de la
Republique et du Consulat._ Par A. Moreau de Jonnes. Preface de M.
Leon Say. Paris, Guillaumin et Cie., 1893.--_Quarterly Review_,
October 1894.

[3] Now Sir Walter Raleigh.

[4] Page 179.

[5] _Sense and Sensibility._

[6] _The Art of Illustration_, by Henry Blackburn, 1894.

ENGLISH LETTER-WRITING IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY[7]

The preservation and posthumous publication of private correspondence
has supplied modern society with one of its daintiest literary
luxuries. The art of letter-writing is, of course, no recent
invention; it reached a high level of excellence, like almost every
other branch of refined expression in prose or verse, in the older
world of Rome. Nevertheless, the exceeding rarity of the specimens
that have come down to us from those times is an important element of
their value; while in our own day the letters of eminent persons fill
many book-shelves in every decent library, and their quantity
increases out of all proportion to their quality.

It may be said, generally, of fine letter-writing that it is a
distinctive product of a high civilisation, denoting the existence of
a cultured and leisurely cla